Nintendo Game & Watch: Super Mario Bros.

This little bit of hardware is such a disappointment. While it isn't terribly executed, its flaws far outweigh the $50 price tag, and that's assuming you're able to get it at that low of a price. Getting the good out of the way, it does feel put together decently, and the screen quality is pretty good. I read a review praising it to no end, and while I don't think it deserves that much praise, it's good. They seem to have hacked the games a little bit to operate without a select button, so you're able to select two player mode or Luigi in The Lost Levels. However, that's where the compliments end. First, the screen! Yeah, I just got done praising it, but it's far too small for proper 4:3 TV games. There's a reason why the late 90s Super Mario Bros. Deluxe for Game Boy Color had a more limited field of view compared to the NES original. I never played the Game Boy Advance NES classics port, but in the Game and Watch's own right, it fails. Everything's too small, and if you're playing the game in a position that isn't with your arms scrunched up to your face, then the screen's too far away which just makes everything on the screen look even smaller. The size of the screen may have been adequate for the LCD games of the classic Game and Watch games, but it's just simply inadequate here. The A and B buttons are a problem. They are smaller than NES controller buttons. That's not too much of a dealbreaker. It may help mitigate the next complaint, but they are smaller. I get it, they were going for a Game and Watch look and feel. However, this is NES Super Mario Bros. Anyway, the buttons are also rubbery and convex instead of NES controller smooth and concave. Imagine if the material for the NES controller start and select buttons was used for the A and B buttons and arced out towards you. This is a problem if you're holding down the B button to run and wish to slide your thumb a little bit on the B button to position it to roll onto the A button to jump while still holding the B button down. The smooth NES buttons made this easy. The Game and Watch buttons make this feel like you're fighting it if you're out of position and need to slide into position. The small size of the buttons somewhat mitigates this, but it's still a poor feel. This didn't make me lose any lives (yet), but it's still a problem that takes me out of the experience. Also, the B button is awfully close to the protrusion for the screen. Sometimes my thumb hits part of the protrusion while I'm trying to press the B button down. That's also a problem. The d-pad is at least adequate. There's not a lot to say about it. The software selection is no surprise. Super Mario Bros. 1, The Lost Levels, and a Marioified version of one of the most famous Game and Watch games, Ball. The first two are better played on a 3DS or a Switch when you're on the go. Seriously. It's much easier to see what you're doing on one of those systems. If you get a Split Pad Pro for the Switch, it brings you even closer to the NES experience. I'd also argue that the Game Boy Color port, Super Mario Bros. Deluxe, is a better option for on the go play than trying to play the Super Mario games in full frame on the tiny screen provided by this Game and Watch unit. And then there's Ball. If you're paying $50 to play Ball, then you're paying too much. Moving on to the clock function, it's nice, but it's not $50 nice. It's not $50 nice on multiple levels, as a matter of fact. Yes, there are Easter eggs. You can change visual themes. It's got Mario doing Mario things. It's so thoroughly meh. There's some kind of seconds hand that seems a bit out of sync. It begins to sound more intense when it's on one side of the screen, presumably when it's about to change the minute, but it doesn't seem to actually sync to the changing of the minute. It doesn't seem to make much sense. You can turn the volume down to get rid of the strange sound which makes things a little bit less awful. Also, there's no kickstand like in older Game and Watch games, so that's a problem if you were planning on standing it up for your alarm clock. Oh wait, that's not actually a problem because this unit doesn't have an alarm clock function. I bought this thing on the idea that it would have an alarm clock. Many classic Game and Watch games included an alarm clock function after a certain year. Why can't this thing be as good as something that came out in the 80s? There's also the matter of the placement of the USB charging port. Did it have to be directly in the center of the right edge of the system? Couldn't they have moved it up a bit? While it doesn't block your hand from being in a position that allows you to reach the A and B buttons when you have the plug inserted for charging while trying to play the system, it does push your hand further down than you may usually have it. This is the one thing that makes me the most irritated when it comes to this new Game and Watch. They didn't have to make it this way, but they did. They could have certainly moved the connector on the circuit board up a little bit and moved the power button to the top of the system, but they didn't. With my big man hands, a need to charge the unit means that I can't comfortably hold the system to play it, and that's something that's very un-Nintendo in the world of Nintendo handheld consoles. They've been at it for three decades. Certainly they could have foreseen the position of the charging port being a problem. Finally, regarding the hack to Super Mario Bros. 1 that lets you play two players on one system, that means that the game is now a pass the controller two player alternating game. Nintendo released a pass the controller game in the year 2020 where touching a surface may pass along literal death in the form of Covid-19. Tremendous work, Nintendo. You could have just removed two player entirely, but instead you released an object which encourages you to use it in a way that can be hazardous to your health. This may be the gaming blunder of the year, and we've had so many strong contenders this year. The one and only good thing about buying this disappointing little $50 trinket is that it comes with the most perfect tiny USB cord for Android Auto in my truck. No, this disappointing little $50 trinket doesn't come with a USB power adapter. You have to provide that yourself. They couldn't make me too happy. However, the USB cord fits my truck and my phone in the one cup holder that I keep it in when using Android Auto so perfectly that I went outside with no shoes and jacket on in the middle of fall in the middle of cold November to test it out, and it worked. I was so happy. Honestly, I think the way they could have improved this system would have been to make this a collection of old Game and Watch games like Nintendo did with the Game and Watch Gallery collections for Game Boy, The original Super Mario Bros. Game and Watch game could have been the marquee game, and they could have included other Nintendo oddities like Mario's Cement Factory and Flagman along with Ball and other single screen Game and Watch games. While old Game and Watch games aren't tremendously engaging gaming experiences, a collection like this would be an interesting way to highlight Mario's and Nintendo's history and a more economically sound one at $50. And an alarm function with a kickstand would should have been there. I don't know why it's not. I was at least expecting to use this Game and Watch as an alarm. An expensive novelty alarm, but one that I thought was going to make me happy. Seriously, I can't rate this as zero stars, but at least the one star exists for the supremely convenient USB cable that this unit comes with. I can't overstate how happy I am with the USB cable. It declutters my truck that much more.