It’s Mario Day! I Rank the 10 Best Super Mario Games of All Time

I’m not a big tennis or Mario sports game fan, but I’ll defer to my colleague Jordan Minor on this. He doesn’t just say Mario Tennis Fever is a great Mario sports game; it’s his new favorite sports game, period. It’s tennis with Mario, which has the storied, dubious legacy of introducing Waluigi to the world in Mario Tennis on the N64. This latest Mario Tennis game includes Waluigi, of course, and adds a new mechanic called Fever Rackets that lets you pick and choose special abilities for whatever character you want to play. It’s rewarding, varied, and accessible to both casual gamers and tennis enthusiasts. It even has an RPG-like adventure mode. Seems pretty great.

Super Mario 3D World might not tinker with 3D Mario conventions like Galaxy and Odyssey do, but it’s just a great game in its own right. It combines 3D movement with classic 2D-style linear levels and doesn’t have gimmicks beyond the wall-climbing cat-suit power-up. It doesn’t need them because the gameplay and level design hold up so well. The Bowser’s Fury add-on puts Super Mario 3D World’s mechanics in an open world filled with collectible Cat Shines that are hidden by challenges and puzzles, and a kaiju-sized Bowser in the background. This isn’t the best Mario game, but it’s still really, really good.

Mario Kart World is a pretty big leap in concept from Mario Kart 8 Deluxe, as it’s the first Mario Kart game with an open world. It looks great and plays just as well, though it doesn’t have nearly as many proper courses as Mario Kart 8 Deluxe. Plus, the routes connecting the tracks aren’t nearly as interesting. Still, it’s a very big, very fun Mario Kart title that shows a lot of promise for the series’ future as Nintendo continues to develop the idea beyond the usual four-track-cup formula.

Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door is the second game in the Paper Mario series and easily the best, filled with fun characters, interesting settings, and plenty of Metroid-like exploration. Like Super Mario RPG’s Switch remake, Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door’s Switch remake doesn’t add much besides sharper and more detailed graphics—the jump from GameCube 3D to the Switch isn’t nearly as big as the jump from prerendered SNES sprites to the Switch. That said, this is an all-timer RPG starring the plumber.

An RPG based on Mario might not seem new after 12 games across two different sub-series, but it seemed wild in 1996 when Square, the makers of Final Fantasy, released Super Mario RPG: Legend of the Seven Stars. It isn’t just good; it easily ranks among the top three SNES role-playing games. Its Switch remake gives the classic title a sharp, colorful 1080p makeover without altering the charming characters, fun puzzles, or isometric platforming. It doesn’t have many extras, though post-game boss fights add challenge to the admittedly short and relatively easy game.

What’s better than Mario’s greatest 8-bit and 16-bit hits? Well, not much, but Super Mario Maker 2 at least lets you try to live up to those standards. It takes the already brilliant idea of the first Super Mario Maker and adds new themes and tricks. It’s a toolkit for designing your own Mario levels and sharing them with friends. You can play with Super Mario Bros., Mario 3, Super Mario World, New Super Mario Bros., and even side-scrolling Super Mario 3D World game styles, each with its own classic graphics and unique mechanics. Super Mario Maker 2 isn’t as active as it was when it first came out in 2019, but it still has thousands of user-made levels and entire campaigns that range from the incredible to the infuriating.

Mario has gone in all sorts of directions in 3D, but in 2D, he languished for more than a decade as the New Super Mario Bros. sub-series defined his side-scrolling gameplay. They’re good, but didn’t reach the peaks of the 16-bit era, and after four games, they started to feel stale. Then Super Mario Bros. Wonder broke Mario out of his 2D rut by injecting much-needed variety into the side-scrolling Mario formula with its reality-warping Wonder Flowers, diverse stage designs, and more expressive character models and animations.

The first Super Mario Galaxy is incredible, but Galaxy 2 improves on it with better, more varied levels, though it lacks the original’s narrative charm. This collection includes both Galaxy games, which is a great deal for 3D Mario fans. Although it’s a pretty barebones package lacking many extra goodies, Super Mario Galaxy 1+2 looks and plays great, especially on the Switch 2 with its free performance update.

This one is divisive, but I’ll be both controversial and brave. Super Mario Odyssey is my favorite Mario game in the series for how huge, dense, and outright clever it is. Mario uses the powers of his new hat-person friend, Cappy, to control enemies and objects as he travels the world to rescue Princess Peach. It adds welcome variety to the 3D Mario formula while staying true to the series’ look and feel. It’s fantastic, and it’s no surprise that the team that made it went on to make the equally stellar Donkey Kong Bananza.