Forty years ago, the Nintendo Entertainment System hit North American shores, singlehandedly resurrecting the video-game market after its infamous post-Atari crash in 1983. To do so, it needed a heavy hitter, a killer must-have title that could put butts in seats and lock audiences into the tube TV until their eyes bleed. That game was Super Mario Bros. — a product so potent, its exact alchemy has never been re-created.
Although Mario himself first appeared in 1981’s Donkey Kong for arcades, it was the very super 1985 NES game that catapulted the mustachioed mascot into the pop-culture stratosphere. After appearing in hundreds of games, Mario himself has basically become gaming’s Mickey Mouse; his face and faux-Italian cadence instantly recognizable to anyone who has been on Ear