New Super Mario Bros. 2 on 3DS with obsessive gold coin collection. Mario in classic levels with special power-ups to amass millions of coins. Accessible arcade fun. A solid Mario on 3DS.
Your verdict
Category
Platformer4 players3+
Co-op
Description
Mario and Luigi set off to rescue Princess Peach in this entry centred on frantic gold coin collection across varied worlds. Published by Nintendo, released in Europe in August 2012. One million gold coin objective, gold transformations including the Gold Leaf, timed Coin Rush mode, downloadable DLC levels. Multilingual version.
New Super Mario Bros. 2 review
4/5
Art direction
★★★★★
"Striking"
4/5
Music
★★★★★
"Excellent"
1/5
Story
★★★★★
"Anecdotal"
Gold contaminates the whole image. The blocks, the pipes, the enemies hit, the flowers picked up, right down to the counter's digits: everything the game wants to foreground turns metallic yellow, and levels are read by spotting what shines first. The scenery, deliberately kept in muted brick and foliage tones, exists mainly to make that golden rain stand out.
The 1985 theme returns and the game plays with what everybody knows about it. Arranged for brass and drums, it keeps its exact cadence, speeds up abruptly when time runs short, exactly as on the original machine, and shrinks to its bass line in the underground passages. Thirty years on, that mechanism still produces the same jolt in anyone who knew it.
Gameplay
"Excellent"
Fun
"From the very first seconds"
Coin-hunting becomes a joyful obsession here: golden pipes, cascading blocks and a gold flower rain coins by the thousand, for the heady joy of hoarding. The pixel-perfect jump stays impeccable and two-player co-op adds spice. Bright, generous and instantly satisfying, a platformer as welcoming as it is addictive.
Addictiveness
"Obsessive"
Gobbling up coins by the hundred while chaining together enemies and blocks in a jubilant gold rush sets up a loop where every level urges you to hunt down its three hidden star coins. The co-op mode renews the urge to start over. The formula stays very conventional, but the chase for a million coins and the pinpoint controls keep an immediate hook.
Difficulty
"Balanced"
Lifespan
"Average"
Technical info
💾0,27 GB📅17/08/2012
Published by Nintendo
New Super Mario Bros. 2 (3DS) price, value & rarity
Is New Super Mario Bros. 2 still worth playing in 2026?
A 2D Nintendo platformer fully geared toward collecting gold coins, this New Super Mario Bros. 2 pushes the player to amass a million coins across its worlds, helped by power-ups like the gold flower. The solid level design and impeccable handling ensure a smooth pleasure, but the formula, safe and familiar, lacks surprise against the other entries. The local co-op mode adds real spice. For a fan of classic platforming or a player after signposted comfort, the title keeps a pleasant but unadventurous effectiveness.
