Game review: Super Mario Bros. Wonder – An Instant Classic that still lacks Accessibility for Visually Impaired Players
Welcome to The Flower Kingdom!
Hello, dear readers! My name is Victor and I am a blind gaming, technology, and entertainment journalist. I am also an ambassador for universal design and an accessibility consultant. Last Friday, the nice people at Nintendo released Super Mario Bros. Wonder exclusively for the Nintendo Switch and let me assure you that Mario fans are in for one of the best platformers in the last three decades.
We received a download code for the game on its release date – October 20, and during the weekend, Alina and I spent some quality time in the Flower Kingdom. This is without any doubt a magical and absolutely fantastic platformer that will rocket your nostalgia level to the max with its familiar characters, iconic sounds, and epic soundtrack, but will also contribute to creating new unforgettable memories.
However, I have some bad news for vision-impaired and blind players, as Nintendo is still stuck in the 90s when it comes to accessibility for visually impaired gamers. I will explain more about that below.
A Colorful and Fun New Adventure Awaits
The story is simple and follows a classic plot. Mario and his friends have been invited to the Flower Kingdom, just a short hop away from the Mushroom Kingdom, by the benevolent Prince Florian. Of course, something nefarious is going to happen, as Bowser is up to no good and decides to ruin everyone’s fun.
As we embark on our adventure to save the Flower Kingdom, we’ll perform acrobatic feats through colorful platforming courses filled with boundless imagination and magical surprises.
Easy to pick up, but Hard to master
In typical side-scrolling platformer style we run to the right, jump over or overcome tricky obstacles, and use some inventive power-ups to transform our character of choice in multiple ways and fashions. In Super Mario Bros. Wonder we are introduced to the all-new Elephant Fruit, Bubble Flower, and Drill Mushroom power-ups to play around with, but undoubtedly the star of the show is the new Wonder Flower.
When we touch a Wonder Flower, a special moment is triggered for the specific level that we are playing and unexpected things can come alive, perspectives will change, or a stampede may even carry us off into the sky.
There are seven different areas to explore in the Flower Kingdom and we can do that with multiple playable characters, including Mario, Luigi, Princess Peach, Princess Daisy, Toad, Toadette, Nabbit, and multiple variations of Yoshi.
In an uncharacteristic compromise towards accessibility, Nintendo allows beginners to play with one of the Yoshis or as Nabbit. These characters don’t take damage from enemies, but the downside is that they also won’t transform with power-ups. Yoshis also have helpful abilities like flutter jumping, and they can also give Mario and pals a lift on their backs or even to other Yoshis and characters in Elephant form! This means that if we have a friend or a family member to play with, we can jump on their back in order for them to escort us through areas where we could die because of our vision impairment and Nintendo’s flawed universal design. This is definitely a plus for accessibility and also allows us to spend time with friends and family members in a pleasant and entertaining way.
The best thing about this freedom of choice is that we can always change which character we play as, so some of the most difficult levels can become more accessible and less frustrating.
Throughout our adventure, we can also unlock and equip different badges that will change the gameplay. Some of these badges are suited to help out (equip the Parachute Badge to safely float over obstacles with oversized caps), while some can create interesting challenges, such as the Invisibility Badge that makes us invisible to enemies… and ourselves.
When it comes to connectivity and networking, Super Mario Bros. Wonder can be played with three other friends via local co-op or online.
A Gorgeous Presentation
Super Mario Bros. Wonder runs quite well on the venerable Nintendo Switch and delights with its colorful presentation, endearing characters, imaginative levels, and absolutely stellar sound design. I played a few levels alongside Alina, I also tried some of them on my own with limited success, but even when only Alina played, I realized that I was humming along to the music and cheering her on with a huge smile on my face.
Nintendo’s Universal Design leaves a lot to be desired
Although I would have loved to be able to play this by myself, sadly, even in 2023, Nintendo continues to ignore blind gamers when it comes to accessibility in their games and on their platforms.
I know that they pride themselves on universal design, but with all due respect, their notion of universal design is dated and flawed as it excludes hundreds of millions of potential players living with one or more disabilities or severe impairments. It’s 2023, PlayStation and Xbox both have accessible consoles, have released games that are more and more accessible, and have spoken openly about their commitment to making the world a better place for the blind and other impaired players.
Nintendo, on the other hand, doesn’t even communicate on this subject and this most recent game from them is another clear sign that they have lost touch with reality and they don’t realize that the future of the gaming industry needs to be as accessible as possible.
No, the fact that some of the characters don’t take damage or can carry me on their back does not give me the freedom I need to experience this on my own. Look, blind individuals are extremely dedicated gamers who would go to great lengths in order to enjoy something they are interested in. We can learn maps, menus, enemy patterns, sound cues and other such things in order to make our way through a game. Super Mario Wonder has excellent universal design for most impaired players, but blind people still need specific sounds in order to know where to jump over areas or when they reach a barrier in the level. We realize that text-to-speech is no longer coming to the Switch after so many years and we are OK using OCR to read the dialogues or text boxes even if you don’t give us characters that actually speak English, but at least meet us halfway and do something to fix the issues we mentioned so many times. I was able to play five or six levels on my own jumping like crazy and hoping not to fall in a hole. Using Yoshi I got to experience at least a little of the wonder other players take for granted every time they play Super Mario. Sadly, the fact that the developers at Nintendo did not take blind gamers into consideration for this game is clear as day. No matter how much I want to play Super Mario Bros. Wonder, I’m just lying to myself every time I pick up the Switch.
When it comes to Blind accessibility we have one award-winning consultant with 100% success record and that’s Brandon Cole. PlayStation and Xbox worked with Brandon and have released three games that are totally accessible for us and I really hope that someone at Nintendo will reach out to him in order to make their games accessible as well. It is rumored that in 2024 Nintendo will release a next-generation console and I am extremely curious to find out if they will add text-to-speech and other accessibility features for low-vision and blind players.
An Instant Classic that will be played for years to come
As I said in the beginning, Super Mario Wonder is the best 2D Mario game since the early 90s and it flawlessly combines nostalgia with innovation. So, if you love the series and have a Nintendo Switch, you shouldn’t miss the opportunity to experience this magical, unforgettable and extremely fun adventure.
Alina will return again and again to the Flower Kingdom for more colorful adventures filled with joy and good vibes. Sadly, I will be forced to just join her vicariously, quietly wishing that the next generation of Nintendo consoles won’t leave blind players to stumble in the dark once again.
Review copy provided by Nintendo
Victor Dima
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