Through the Living Hope

Okay, I might actually hate that Nintendo did this. So, y'all are familiar with Super Mario Bros 2 for NES (released in 1988), right? Well, sorry to burst your bubble, but YOU WERE LIED TO.

That game WASN'T meant to be the sequel to Super Mario Bros (released on NES in 1985).

The game intended to be the sequel was SMB: The Lost Levels. The Lost Levels was released in Japan in 1986, and it was so hard that it wasn't released in America (at least until Super Mario All Stars for SNES Classic, which wasn't released until 2020 (imagine 2020 is capsed there for yelling). (Future Spark here, I did a bit more research and another source says 1993, which is better, but still the point stands.)

"But Spark, there is a SMB2!"

Is there?

SMB2 was never meant to be SMB2. Nintendo just changed the sprites from characters of a COMPLETELY DIFFERENT GAME to Mario sprites.

The original game was called Doki Doki Panic, and it was released in Japan in 1987. The characters from that game were all replaced with Mario sprites and released in America as SMB2. It was released in Japan as Super Mario USA in 1992. Apparently, Nintendo thought they "wouldn't notice" that it was the exact same as a game they'd released six years before. This is also why the game is so DRASTICALLY different from every other early Mario game.

I can imagine the board room meeting. 
NinCEO: Okay, we need to do something for a sequel to SMB.
NinWorker: We have this ready. *holds up Lost Levels*
NinCEO: No. The Americans are too stupid, we can't release this to them.
NinWorkerWhoWonClassClownInHighSchool: Ya know what would be funny.

I mean come on Nintendo. We're supposed to be the lazy ones. It's your job to program games. So why don't you get your head in it.

AND ANOTHER THING.

Many of the enemies that originated in SMB2 ARE STILL PART OF MARIO LORE! Shy Guy, Birdo, Mouser in the Super Mario Bros Super Show, the spiky cactus things - THOSE ARE ALL FROM DOKI DOKI PANIC. EVERYTHING IS RUINED NOW THANKS TO LATE 80S NINTENDO