Happy 30th Birthday Super Mario Bros!

Super Mario Bros, the iconic platform game that defined a generation of gamers, turns 30 this September. Queue a wave of nostalgia across the world… What was your first video game? Odds are it involved everyone’s favourite Italian plumber! Nintendo sent the call for celebrations to mark 30 years of Super Mario Bros, and staff at Life Science Centre in Newcastle were happy to oblige with costumes (and cake!) to mark the anniversary of this beloved part of gaming culture. The Science Centre is currently hosting Game On 2.0, the biggest collection of playable computer games in the world, so it only seemed fitting to celebrate Mario’s contribution to gaming history. As part of video game royalty, Mario is a firm favourite across the Game On 2.0 exhibition. He makes an appearance across several games and platforms; including his very first appearance as the hero character in arcade classic ‘Donkey Kong’, released back in 1981 – do you feel old yet?! Although not the first appearance of Mario, the release of Super Mario Bros in 1985 had a huge impact on gamers, and is widely considered to be the game that reinvigorated the then lacklustre platform-gaming market. In fact, Super Mario Bros was the best-selling game of all time for a single platform until 2013, when it lost out to Wii Sports, another famous Nintendo creation. Whether your childhood was shaped by Mario Bros or Mario Kart, gaming fans will find that they can indulge in plenty of playable nostalgia before the Game On 2.0 exhibition ends on 3 January 2016 – controllers at the ready!