EXCLUSIVE HANDS-ON PREVIEW: Super Mario 3D World

While they’ve shown off a fair amount of it already, Nintendo had a couple new things to reveal about the upcoming platformer Super Mario 3D World when they gave press people some hands-on time with it during a recent media tour.

For those unfamiliar with the game, Super Mario 3D World — which is coming to the WiiU on November 22 — combines the classic 3D platforming and exploration of 2010’s Super Mario Galaxy 2 and similar games with the multiplayer co-operative and competitive aspects of 2012’s New Super Mario Bros. U.

Or, as some people prefer to think of it, it’s the Mario game where you get to wear a cat suit.

Though you can play it alone, it’s really meant to be played with up to three friends, who use the Wiimote and Numchuck to help you and each other make it through these inventive obstacle courses, while also trying to grab more coins and score more points than you. As Mr. Burns once said, “You see, teamwork will only take you so far. Then the truly evolved person makes that extra grab for personal glory.”

While the game has been shown off before, the good people at Nintendo did have a couple new things to show us.

The biggest of these is a new power-up called Double Cherries, which instantly make a second version of your character. This doppelganger will not only do whatever the first is doing — be it jumping or tossing a fireball — but they’ll also move in the same direction, even if the two have been separated by some obstacle. Which, yes, means you can accidentally force your character’s double to walk off a ledge.

What adds to the mayhem isn’t just that you might have, for instance, two Marios, a Peach, a Luigi, and a Toad all running around at the same time, but that, if there are enough Double Cherries in a level, you could have five Marios, three Peaches, four Luigis, and five Toads all running around at the same time. Though we didn’t see any levels with thirteen Double Cherries, so I wouldn’t worry too much.

Another new aspect of the game is how it will incorporate light and shadow into some levels. In the one we got to see, there were points where a pathway was hidden by shadows, forcing you to take a leap of faith like the one Indy took in Indiana Jones And The Last Crusade (except that, if you failed this one, you just bump into a wall). In other parts, there were moments where you’d only see the shadow of Mario or his pals on the back wall, and would have to act accordingly. It was kind of like that scene in Kill Bill 2, if Uma Thurman looked more like Ron Jeremy.

Finally, the last new bit of Super Mario 3D World that Nintendo let us play was the first boss fight. In it, Bowser drives up in a giant muscle car, and rather than just run you over, he tosses bombs at you. But because the bombs look like soccer balls, Mario and his pals just kicked them back at the car until it broke down and Bowser had to call AAA.

Oh, and for those yelling, “DUDE, SPOILER ALERT!!” at their computers, tablet, or cell phone…really? After playing an earlier part of the level where you kick the soccer ball bombs around, you really think you wouldn’t have known right away to kick them at Bowser’s car at the end of the same level? Have you not played any other video game in your entire life?

And that, ladies and gentlemen, was all we got to see, and play, of Super Mario 3D World on this day. Look for the game to comes out November 22nd on the WiiU, when someone will probably spoil the fact that you can play as different Nintendo characters, won’t get to shoot anyone with a rocket launcher, and will have to jump over things.