Hotel Mario is a single-screen puzzle video game. Controlling Mario, or his brother Luigi in two-player mode, the player must search the "Klub Koopa Resort" for Princess Toadstool, who has been kidnapped by Bowser. The game comprises seven hotels, which each feature 10 stages. The player must shut every door in the stage by moving up and down elevators and avoiding enemies. Mario can step on most enemies as in previous games, but some must be avoided by changing floors or entering an open door. At the end of each hotel, the player engages in a boss fight with a Koopaling; in the final hotel, the player battles Bowser. The game features various power-ups: the Super Mushroom allows Mario to take multiple hits, the Star Man makes him temporarily invincible, and the Fire Flower allows him to throw fireballs.
Development
In 1989, Nintendo and Sony agreed to develop a CD-ROM-based add-on for the Super Nintendo Entertainment System, known as the SNES-CD or Nintendo Play-Station, that would allow for full motion video and larger games. However, Nintendo instead signed with Philips to make the add-on, and Sony redesigned their console as the PlayStation. By 1993, Nintendo had abandoned plans for the add-on. As part of dissolving the agreement, Nintendo licensed Philips to use some Nintendo characters for their CD-i console, resulting in three Legend of Zelda games as well as Hotel Mario. Another Mario game, Super Mario's Wacky Worlds, was canceled at the prototype stage. Nintendo had no part in the games' development; they were instead created by inexperienced developers. Hotel Mario was developed by Fantasy Factory. The developers and testers tended to be older in age; background artist Trici Venola noted one tester was "well past retirement". Since the target audience of children would have faster reflexes, the game was designed to play well for the testers, then sped up. Hotel Mario uses FMV cutscenes to tell its story. Feeling an early version was "mechanical" and "visually no fun", Venola and art director Jeff Zoern used elements from Disney and J. R. R. Tolkien to enhance the visual style. Illustrations of the stages were composed of several blocks, each with one detail. The first item Venola created for all hotels was the door. Each building took a week to complete and was designed with a specific theme; for instance, Bowser's hotel uses a gothic design.
Reception
Hotel Mario initially received mixed reviews. Electronic Gaming Monthly praised its gameplay as simple yet addictive. GamePro said the game was fun but quickly grew boring, awarding it a "fun factor" of 2.5 out of 5. GamePro rated Hotel Marios graphics 3.5 and sound 4 out of 5, writing, "the only intriguing aspects of this game are the well-fashioned animated sequences". Video Games: The Ultimate Gaming Magazine gave the game 7 out of 10, but acknowledged its difficulty. Spanish magazine Super Juegos gave it 87. Hotel Mario has since been described as one of the worst Mario games. IGN's Levi Buchanan said that while it was superior to Philips' The Legend of Zelda games, closing doors was not "a strong enough hook for an entire game", and J.C. Fletcher of Joystiq ridiculed the plot: "Apparently Bowser has nefariously plotted to have his underlings open doors in... his own hotels, thus wasting air conditioning and increasing his own electric bill. Mario and Luigi must heroically latch all the doors and save their archenemy from having his hallways get too cold." GamesRadar described it as "craptastic", and Eurogamer as "little more than a really rubbish version of Elevator Action". The controls have been criticized as unresponsive. The cutscenes have been widely criticized. 1UP.com described them as "outright terrifying", and IGN called them "abysmal", resembling "a bad flip-book of images printed out of Microsoft Paint". Joystiq described them as "amateurish, garishly colorful, shaky, randomly zooming animation". The voice acting was also criticized; both 1UP.com and IGN found it ill-fitting for the characters and lacking the playfulness of Mario's current voice artistCharles Martinet. Danny Cowan of 1UP wrote: "Mario sounds more like someone's ex-smoker grandpa trying to imitate a Mafia hit man... The dialogue is meant to sound playful, but the character voices imply acts of menace and hate." In 2008, IGN named Hotel Mario one of the ten worst Mario games.
