5. New Super Mario Bros. Wii (2009)

This game featured cool power-ups like the ice flower and the penguin suit, but was still a challenge nonetheless.

New Super Mario Bros. Wii took the series back to its roots in 2009. Actually, its gameplay and design reminded many of classic Mario games like Super Mario Bros. 3. It also brought back the challenge of the old side-scrolling 2D Marios… Actually, each world in New Super Mario Bros. Wii required quite a bit of skill to make it through.

This was also the first Super Mario to feature four player, co-op multiplayer, something that admittedly the later Super Mario 3D World did better. Actually, it was too easy to get in your friends’ way in games or push each other into the pesky Goombas, and the fight for power-ups could turn nasty sometimes… But the expertly designed levels, challenge and creativity on display proved why nobody can quite manage to make platform games the way Nintendo does.

Came out on: Wii