4: Super Mario 3D World
A game that originally came out for the Wii U, but has recently seen a re-release on the Nintendo Switch, Super Mario 3D World is one of the most overlooked Mario games out there.
Part of the reason it’s so overlooked is because it came out for the Wii U which is by far Nintendo’s biggest misfire in the home console market and therefore didn’t have the strong install base for enough people to experience the game.
The other reason is because Nintendo, during this low point in their history was also struggling to turn around the 3DS and made the mistake of the 3DS stealing all of the Wii U’s thunder. By this I mean that before we got New Super Mario Bros U, Mario Kart 8 and Super Mario 3D World on the Wii U, we had already got New Super Mario Bros 2, Mario Kart 7 and Super Mario 3D Land. This was too much Mario in a short period of time, combined with that players had already had their fill of these similar experiences on the 3DS which was a cheaper and portable system.
To top things off Super Mario 3D World gave everyone the initial impression that it was just a prettier continuation of the 3DS game, which although everyone loved 3D Land wasn’t the epic Mario Galaxy style entry in the series people hoped for.
But this initial impression wasn’t very fair as the game was filled with incredibly inventive ideas and was a rich adventure with tons to see and do. The Cat Mario abilities allowed Mario to scale walls years before Link would do the same in The Legend of Zelda Breath of the Wild, and the combination of Mario, Luigi, Peach and Toad as playable characters harkened back to the equally often overlooked Super Mario Bros 2 for the NES.
