This may or may not be the first case of a main character in a game shrinking, but it’s certainly the most memorable for its day. Mario 3, already wowing millions of gamers with new powers, a massive new world and level design that will be emulated for the rest of time, kicked our eight-year-old asses with an entire set of levels based on a tiny Mario bursting baddies regardless of size.

No special environmental changes, just a total sense of bewilderment at the idea of larger-than-life enemies:

Goombas, Piranha Plants and Koopas grow up!

Teensy blocks and obstacles double in size!

Koopa Kid boss has normal head with hideously shrunken body!

A magical door directly compares the awesomely oversized...

...with the underwhelmingly regular!

Most embarrassing tiny thing that kills you:

Regular or super-sized, Goombas should never be able to stop Mario. But every single one of us has made that one dumbass jump that stops short and ends up killing you. Then you silently hope no one was watching when it happened.

We could have mentioned any number of other little heroes in big worlds, like Cool Spot, Micro Machines or Harley’s Humongous Adventure, but we figured Super Mario Land 2: Six Golden Coins deserved a nod for Macro Zone.

Oct 20, 2008

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