Golden Mushroom in Trick Track Hall Toad Brigade

Mario's latest is the cat's pajamas!

Super Mario 3D World is a 3D Mario platformer that was released on November 22, 2013 for the Wii U.

Mario, Luigi, Peach, and Toad are enjoying a nighttime meteor shower on Peach's Castle grounds when they come across a transparent warp pipe sticking out of the ground. After Mario and Luigi fix it, a green pixie (known as one of the seven Sprixie Princesses) comes out of the pipe. She explains that Bowser has kidnapped her friends—and then Bowser drags her back into the pipe, ignoring Peach this time around in favor of his new prizes. The four follow him and his captive down the pipe, where they find the Sprixie Kingdom, a world they must work together to traverse in order to defeat Bowser once again.

Like Super Mario 3D Land on the Nintendo 3DS, it is a 3D Mario that plays like a 2D Mario. Additionally, just like New Super Mario Bros. Wii, up to 4 players can play simultaneously, though the different characters will play differently like in Super Mario Bros. 2. Alongside a new "Cat Suit" power-up enabling characters to scratch enemies and climb up walls, 3D World marks the first time since Super Mario Bros. 2 that Peach and Toad can be selected for play, as well as reintroducing the concept of having significant ability differences between the characters.

Despite its name, this has nothing to do with the Super NES game (aside from some returning enemies). It does, however, mirror the relationship between Super Mario Land and World by aiming to be a bigger console game than its original handheld adventure.

Captain Toad received his own spin-off based on his puzzle-oriented stages in this game, titled Captain Toad: Treasure Tracker. And in 2019, Super Mario Maker 2 incorporated a game style based on this game.

On September 3, 2020, as part of the 35th anniversary of Super Mario Bros., it was announced that the game would get an Updated Re-release titled Super Mario 3D World + Bowser's Fury for the Nintendo Switch on February 12, 2021. The rerelease includes various gameplay tweaks and additions such as 20% faster character movement, movesets now incorporating abilities from Super Mario Odyssey, online multiplayer with friends, a new "Photo Mode" to replace the original game's Miiverse functionality, and an improved camera.

The Switch version also includes a new side campaign entitled Bowser's Fury, which is set in the scenic Lake Lapcat. Bowser's visiting and has become so furious that he entered a massive new form, which Mario and Bowser Jr. must stop by collecting Cat Shines and awakening the Giga Cat Bell. Only then will Mario have a chance at combating "Fury Bowser" one on one. This mode takes a more open-world approach akin to Super Mario Odyssey, even as it uses several gimmicks and setpieces from the main game. In addition, a second player can control Bowser Jr. and help out Mario in various ways.

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This game provides examples of:

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    A-D

• Action Girl: Peach and Rosalina, since they're both playable characters.
• Added Alliterative Appeal: Many level names resort to this, such as "Conkdor Canyon", "Pretty Plaza Panic", "Hands-on Hall", "Boiling Blue Bully Belt", etc.
• Adorable Evil Minions: Cat Goombas ◊ are the already Ugly Cute Goomba but in cat costumes.
• Advancing Wall of Doom:
  • At one point, the player has to speed down a vertical obstacle course to avoid a cloud of purple gas.
  • At another, a similar thing happens in reverse, with the player speeding up a vertical obstacle course to avoid a sea of Fuzzies.
• Airplane Arms: Princess Peach when running at full speed. The Mario Bros. only do this when equipped with a star, otherwise they tuck their arms in instead.
• Ambiguous Clone Ending: During Double Cherry levels, only one of a character's clones needs to touch the flagpole to register the end of the stage. When that happens, all the other clones disappear and whichever one touched the flagpole is treated as the original one.
• Ambiguous Gender: Plessie's gender is never specified.
• And Now for Someone Completely Different: The Captain Toad levels let you play as Captain Toad, whose controls are vastly different from the other characters; most importantly, he cannot jump.
• Antepiece:
  • Bowser's Highway Showdown starts with kickable soccer ball bombs laying around and then being fired out of cannons that can be used to defeat enemies and destroy big brick walls, hinting at the more complex dodging and kicking required to fight Bowser himself.
  • Before you fight Hisstocrat, you will have seen many statues that you can climb with the Cat Suit that resemble his smaller minions, hinting at how you can climb up the minions to attack Hisstocrat.
• Ant Assault: This game serves as the debut to the new type of enemies, the Ant Troopers. They are bipedal ant enemies that are commonly seen marching on ground or platforms, and are capable of walking on the walls and ceilings. They are impervious to the Goomba Stomp, but can be defeated by any other means, such as Ground Pound. They also have two other variations, such as Horned Ant Troopers, which wear spiked helmet that prevents them from getting stomped on (as long as their spikes are above them, at least), and Big Ant Troopers, which are completely indestructible.
• Anti-Frustration Features:
  • When a player has multiple copies of themself from grabbing a Double Cherry, the clones will sometimes move a bit faster than normal so they all stay in a tight group.
  • If you lose too many lives in a level, on the start of your next try you will be given a white/gold leaf power-up, which makes you invulnerable to enemy damage for the whole course. Except on Champion's Road, this prevents you from getting 100% Completion, though, until you complete the level normally.
  • You can now no longer accidentally kill your friends in multiplayer by "off-screening" them. If one player runs on too far ahead, the others trailing behind will automatically hover within a bubble and rejoin the leader.
  • Unlike most Warp Boxes in the game, the Warp Box in Champion's Road unlocks with no cutscene after collecting all the Key Coins. This is so that the player doesn't lose control on the Dash Panels and fall to their death, having to redo the entire level.
  • The Nintendo Switch rerelease made some changes for an easier and quicker experience:
    • Green Stars and Stamps do not have to be recollected if you die.
    • Character movement and speed is made much faster. For reference, Peach is the slowest character in both versions of the game, but in the Nintendo Switch version, her running speed is faster than Mario / Luigi's walk speed and equal to their running speed in the Wii U version. Some levels, such as Conkdor Canyon, are changed to accomodate this.
    • You can roll in mid-air, which gives players more air mobility.
    • To make up for the Switch's docked mode lacking a touchscreen, any player can press the R button to bring up a cursor and use the gyroscope to use touchscreen functions.
• Art Evolution:
  • This game uses more of the Galaxy games' graphical aesthetics than 3D Land did. In comparison to the rest of the series, Peach's standard design is made fairly different in this game - to be shorter and stouter (by way of a poofier dress) than usual, with a bigger head relative to her body - in order to work/look better in regular gameplay, especially relative to the other characters (as Peach is normally very tall and skinny even when compared to Luigi). Likewise, Toad is slightly taller and thicker (though not much). Rosalina is shorter than she usually is, being the same height as Peach in this game instead of being One Head Taller as she is normally, and like Peach, she's a little stouter as well. Their proportions change even more when the player uses the Cat Suit with them.
  • Fizzlits return from Galaxy 2, but are now square, anchored to the ground, and melt into much smaller square puddles with their faces on top of the surface.
• Artifact Title:
  • The "3D" in the title refers to it being a sequel to Super Mario 3D Land, despite this game not being in actual stereoscopic 3D. Only its predecessor had such visuals.
  • In the Switch version, World 2-2, Puffprod Peaks, has had half of its name rendered as this. The course's main features are platforms that move by blowing into the microphone or touching them with the touch screen. While the touch screen element is retained, the Switch's lack of a built-in microphone forced the replacement of the microphone platforms with normal moving platforms, meaning there is no longer any "puffing" involved. Averted in the Japanese versions, which had the course's name change from "Touch! Blow! Drawer Mountain Range" to simply "Touch! Drawer Mountain Range".
• Asteroids Monster: The Motley Bossblob is a gelatine surrounding a Koopa jester, which splits into many blobs when hurt.
• Attack Its Weak Point: The World 3 boss, Hisstocrat, has a very large X-shaped bandage on top of its head, letting you know where you need to hit it.
• Attack of the 50-Foot Whatever: The Mega Mushroom from the New Super Mario Bros. games returns.
• Bait-and-Switch: Just when you think you've saved the Princesses, Bowser shoves aside the end-of-level wipe, kidnaps them again, and uses them to power up his amusement park, World Bowser.
• Balance, Power, Skill, Gimmick: Mario is the balance, Luigi jumps the highest, Toad is the fastest (but the lowest jumper), and Peach can float. Rosalina is different than all four in that she's the slowest, but has the quickest sprint, matches Luigi's jumps and can use the Spin Attack.
• Battle in the Rain: The first half of the final battle.
• Battle Theme Music: The game brings back the battle themes of Super Mario 3D Land for Boom Boom and Pom Pom and, due to adding more bosses to the mix, also has a larger selection of boss music. The Hisstocrats have a jazz-styled theme for themselves, Prince Bully borrows the enemy blockade music (as he's fought in a blockade-type level) and the remaining regular bosses share a general orchestrated theme. Bowser now relies on Autobots, Rock Out! for his two themes, instead of reusing his 3D Land tracks.
• Beat Them at Their Own Game: A villainous example. For the first time ever in the main Super Mario series, Bowser uses powerups against Mario in the final battle, namely the Super Bell and a few Double Cherry.
• Big Band: A jazz-sounding soundtrack done in this style.
• Big Boo's Haunt: Shifty Boo Mansion, even taking place in front of a graveyard. Along with Captain Toad Plays Peek-a-Boo, Spooky Seasick Wreck and A Beam in the Dark.
• Big "NO!": One of Rosalina's death screams is this.
• Blackout Basement: Switchblack Ruins and A Beam in the Dark.
• Bonus Level: The golden Bowser train level, which has no enemies and a crap load of coins. Instead of a boss fight, you get to play the slot reels instead!
• Boring, but Practical: Clear Warp Pipes don't seem like much, but they let you travel to far off locations and sometimes have collectibles like coins, green stars, and stamps.
• Borrowed Catchphrase: Everyone starts a regular level with "Let's(-a) go!".
• Boss Arena Idiocy: Bowser, why would you have a giant POW Block on the top of your tower? Furthermore, why would you stand on it?
• Boss-Only Level: A Banquet With Hisstocrat and Motley Bossblob's Big Battle.
• Boss Rush: The Boss Blitz level. Six boss fights in 500 seconds.
• Breakout Character: Captain Toad, who got his own spin-off game.
• Brutal Bonus Level: World Crown (unlocked from collecting every green star, stamp, and golden flag in the game) has some of the most brutal stages in a Mario game. The Mystery House Marathon has 30 Green Stars with no checkpoints. And then there's Champion's Road. It has to be one of the most difficult stages in a Mario game. Only players at the top of their game will be able to complete this true final challenge.
• Bubblegloop Swamp: Piranha Creeper Creek, Deep Jungle Drift and Gargantuan Grotto.
• Call-Back: The game is basically one big reference to Super Mario Bros. 2: It takes place in a parallel world to the Mushroom Kingdom (Subcon/the Sprixie Kingdom), populated by fairy-like beings (Subcons/Sprixies) that are captured by the main villain and sealed inside a jar by a cork, and the main playable cast is made up by Mario, Luigi, Princess Peach, and Toad, all reusing their attributes from SMB2 as well.
• Camera Screw: When playing with multiple players, the camera can get a bit uncooperative at times when players are scattered about. Mostly averted in single-player, with many agreeing that the series finally managed to get its camera nailed here — by the time of Galaxy 2 the series had become somewhat notorious for excelling in every department except the camera controls — with the worst complaint generally being the camera is zoomed out a little too far in some of the Captain Toad levels.
• Cartoon Bomb: Along with the standard bombs, some are textured to look like soccer balls. That alone provides a hint on how to handle them.
• Casino Park: The level "Rainbow Run" is set within a giant casino.
• Cat Girl: Princess Peach and Rosalina with the Cat powerup.
• Catharsis Factor: Invoked in the final Captain Toad level, which ends with you killing the Fire Piranha Plant that has been harassing you for the duration of the level.
• Cave Behind the Falls: The way to a Green Star in Plessie's Plunging Falls.
• Cheated Angle: Whenever a character jumps, the hand that goes into the air during their jumping pose will usually be whichever's furthest from the camera. This is a reference to the Ambidextrous Sprite of the pose from the original game, since it's the more recognizable angle of the pose. This also occurred in the previous game.
• Checkpoint Starvation: The final two levels of the game both revolve around this mechanic; they are both very long and have no checkpoints at all. The final boss rush has no checkpoints either.
• Chekhov's Gun: POW Blocks make minor appearances and aren't required to beat any one level. However, they're pivotal in the final battle.
• Chuck Cunningham Syndrome: The Blue capped bespectacled Toad of the Toad Brigade doesn't appear so as to avoid confusion with the playable Toad character who wears blue for Color-Coded Multiplayer. ^note (He does in fact appear in the Switch port, as player 2's character in the Captain Toad levels.)
• Circus Episode: The game uses circus imagery rather prominently. For example, major bosses are fought in circus tents, most of the soundtrack is comprised of big brass band music, and instead of the usual Lethal Lava Land, Bowser makes his home in an Amusement Park of Doom.
• Circus of Fear: The map of World 8 (also an example of Amusement Park of Doom) and the levels Switch Scramble Circus, Tricky Trapeze Theater, the Great Tower of Bowser Land, and the Boss Only Levels where Hisstocrat, his wife and Motley Bossblob are fought.
• Color-Coded Multiplayer:
  • In the Luigi Bros. minigame, player 1 is Luigi in his modern palette (green hat/shirt and blue overalls), and player 2 is Luigi in the same palette originally used in Mario Bros. (white hat/shirt and green overalls).
  • Crosses over with Color-Coded Characters: Mario - Red, Luigi - Green, Peach - Pink, Toad - Blue, Rosalina - Cyan.
  • Mario tends to get 'default' colored power-ups (the colors from the 3D Land powerups are kept for his colors) as often as he gets red ones, such as retaining a Blue Boomerang Suit, though his boomerang became red, giving the original blue one to Toad. This results in Chromatic Arrangement regarding the Cat Suit - Mario, Luigi, Peach, Toad and Rosalina are Yellow, Green, Pink (Red), Blue and Black, respectively.
• Colour-Coded for Your Convenience: The Seven Sprixie Princesses are actually colored by what the environment in their world looks like.
  • Green - Green grassy world.
  • Yellow - Yellow sandy desert.
  • Blue - Bluish snowy land.
  • Orange - Orangish mountain/canyon.
  • Purple - Purplish beach-like land.
  • Cyan - Light blue clouds.
  • Red - Reddish lava world.
  • And the world where all of them are (re-)captured, as they're held in an amusement park with neon lights of all colors. In other words, a rainbow world.
• Competitive Balance:
  • Mario: The average of the bunch.
  • Luigi: Can jump the highest in addition to being good all around, but has poor traction.
  • Peach: The ability to float lets her recover easily, but she's slightly slower than Mario and Luigi.
  • Toad: The fastest of them all, but he falls the fastest and has the shortest jump.
  • Rosalina: Slower than Peach without her ability to float, but jumps almost as high as Luigi and also has a spin attack to use against enemies and as a small double jump. However, collecting any power-up disables the spin attack.
  • Captain Toad: Has average speed and cannot jump.
• Consolation Prize: If you fail to get any matching symbols in the slot machine minigame, you'll earn 10 coins for your trouble.
• Continuity Nod:
  • In the opening scene, Peach's Castle and the grassland area around it look directly ripped from Super Mario Galaxy 2, New Super Mario Bros. Wii, and New Super Mario Bros. U. Even the colorful spotty hills look the same!
  • When you defeat Bowser in his new car in the World 1 and 7 boss battles, the bridge collapses below him.
  • The Comet Observatory can be seen hidden far back in the background of the full version of the box art (as seen on the page image). This was a hint to Rosalina being playable in the game. Not only that, but the final world in the game, World Crown, has the Comet Observatory theme from the first Super Mario Galaxy game.
• Controllable Helplessness: Even through it's established Captain Toad cannot jump due to his heavy backpack, you can still have him try, as pressing jump makes him attempt to hop despite staying grounded.
• Convection Schmonvection: A Mario staple, this game has some stand-out examples, such as going through a clear pipe that goes under lava, and rising lava that doesn't kill you until it's ankle-deep.
• Cool Car: Bowser has an enormous spike-covered purple wagon ◊ that looks like a mix between a classic convertible and a Hummer Dinger, using it to try and run over Mario and friends. He later uses a second version covered in Tron Lines. He's so proud of it that he even introduces it with gestures that seem to say "Check out the new wheels, chumps!"
• Cool Crown: Whoever gets the highest score in a level will start the next level wearing a crown. Finishing a level while wearing this crown will reward the player additional points, but other players can steal this crown.
• Cool Train: Bowser has a fleet of them with large Bullet Bills making up the locomotive cars.
• Co-Op Multiplayer: Notably the first time it's fully implemented in a 3D Mario title, especially after it was attempted at both the vaporware direct sequel to Super Mario 64 and the Nintendo DS remake. The Switch rerelease adds online multiplayer, though for one player's game at a time.
• Cutscene Power to the Max: If Meowser was even half as aggressive during gameplay as he is during the cutscene introducing him, he would be impossible to beat.
• Cumulonemesis: The Ty-Foos, which are giant mean-looking clouds that blow strong gusts of wind at Mario and his allies to throw them off narrow paths.
• Damn You, Muscle Memory!:
  • Like Super Mario 3D Land, the Flip-Swap Platforms flip whenever someone jumps. This gets really confusing with Rosalina, since in Super Mario Galaxy 2, they flipped whenever Mario used the Star Spin, but they don't in this game.
  • If you're the type of Mario gamer who holds the dash button as much as possible, you might want to hold off pressing it when you're in the Cat Suit at some times, as holding Y in the air while in the suit will make you pounce diagonally, which may throw you off somewhat.
  • The normal roll maneuver is NOT an attack unless you're in either the Cat Suit (which lets you slide with claws out) or Tanooki Suit (which lets you spin attack with your tail). Keep in mind what power-up you have before attempting to ram enemies with dash attacks.
  • Anyone familiar with the modern Mario games will most likely wall-kick on instinct whenever falling down a pit, grazing the wall. It pays to unlearn this when in the Cat Suit as in most circumstances, it'll benefit you more to climb up the wall rather than kick off of it.
  • A retroactive one if you have played Captain Toad: Treasure Tracker before, in "Captain Toad Plays Peek-a-Boo", don't expect to kill Boos with Captain Toad's headlamp. This only applies to the original Wii U version.
  • The Nintendo Switch rerelease changed how holding and throwing items work: previously, when you run into an item, you held it as long as you held the run button and throw it when you let go. Now, the item is held automatically and you have to press the run button again to throw.
  • The Switch version also adds the dive maneuver from Super Mario Odyssey, which you can perform anytime... unless you're wearing either a Tanooki Suit or a Lucky Cat Suit, in which the dive is impossible to perform as attempting such will instead cause you to either do a tail attack or turn into a statue, respectively, both of which will cause you to plummet straight down. Coupled with the fact that the normal Cat Suit, which you can perform the dive in, is almost indistinguishable from the Lucky Cat Suit apart from the collar, there can be potential for disaster.
• Damsel in Distress: The Sprixie Princesses display this trope, as this time Bowser went to kidnap them in the Sprixie Kingdom instead of Princess Peach in the Mushroom Kingdom.
• Dark Action Girl: There are two female bosses, Pom Pom and the Hisstocrat queen, making this the only non-RPG Mario game (till Super Mario Odyssey) to have more than one female boss.
• Death Is a Slap on the Wrist: There is no penalty whatsoever for dying in 3D World. Even a Game Over is a total non-issue, in fact, it's actually an advantage, as the Lucky Houses and Toad Houses all re-open upon continuing.
• Death Mountain: The map of World 4 and the levels Puffprod Peaks and Ant Trooper Hill.
• Degraded Boss: Boss Brolder the second time you meet him. Instead of an end-of-world boss, now he's part of a blockade, with regular blockade music, and the blockade isn't even named after him; it's named after Brolders in general. This is also the case with Pom Pom and Motley Bossblob (who serve as Mini Bosses) in the way leading to Bowser's final fight.
• Deliberately Monochrome: Shiftier Boo Mansion (World Flower-6) is desaturated to the point of resembling this. Some of the original colors are still recognizable, but only barely.
• Demoted to Extra: While Captain Toad becomes a playable character in this game, the rest of Captain Toad's brigade (including Yellow Toad) now pass out items in the Toad Houses. Blue Toad however is nowhere to be seen, most likely as a result of the main Toad borrowing his appearance to prevent confusion.
• Department of Redundancy Department:
  • The seventh world is named World Castle. It too has a castle at the end of it, named World Castle-Castle ^note Though the "level" castle is a bit smaller, so it could be expressed as World Castle-Keep.
  • There's also World Crown-Crown.
  • "Spiky Spike Bridge".
• Developers' Foresight:
  • Only the Sprixie Princesses that you've rescued in total will show up in Bowser's Lava Lake Keep to help rescue the 7th Sprixie Princess. Normally, this would be 6, but it's possible to skip 2 castles (and thus, not rescue the Sprixie Princesses there) by taking warp pipes hidden in certain levels. And since you can still defeat Bowser for the final time with only those five Sprixie Princesses rescued, this essentially means that at least two of them can be left to rot in the game's ending.
  • In World Castle-5, collecting the top most key coin will trigger the poison cloud trap regardless of whether you've collected it last or not. Bad news for those who tried to be clever and skip a few coins so as to not collect the top most coin last. Also, if you wait outside of the tower before going into the unlocked warp box, the poison cloud will pause for a bit before it flows into the lava, causing said lava to rise and kill you if you don't get inside the warp box in time.
  • The World Map takes into account where the player is at the moment and loads the correct area and music as needed, even if the player uses glitches and exploits to get there via abnormal means, even correcting the player's position back onto ground level should they happen to "clip" through the floor through this method (but only if you hadn't opened a menu to save and quit, for example). The World Map is also programmed to warp the player using a bubble should they happen to fall while the camera's fixed onto the area.
  • Some levels required you to blow into the mic on the Wii U Gamepad to use certain interactive objects (e.g the Propeller Lifts in Puffprod Peaks.) Since the Nintendo Switch doesn't have a mic, all examples of the aforementioned objects are replaced with ones that move across a set path in the Switch port.
• Difficult, but Awesome:
  • The Spin Jump can get you out of a bind real fast in some situations, as it's the highest jump in your arsenal that only requires minimal footing, plus the spinning gives you extra hang time to gauge a landing. But since it requires you to rotate in place before taking off, it's hard to position yourself for the jump in addition to jumping in the direction you actually want to go.
  • An officially-recognized one is Toad, being dubbed by the devs as an advanced speedrun character.
• Disc-One Final Dungeon: World Castle looks a lot like it could be The Very Definitely Final Dungeon, and the castle at the end even looks almost identical to the final castles seen in Super Mario 3D Land and the New Super Mario Bros. games. Then Bowser re-kidnaps the Sprixie Princesses and uses them to form one more Clear Pipe that leads to World Bowser, which surprisingly manages to look even more final dungeony.
• Distaff Counterpart:
  • Boom-Boom and Pom-Pom return from 3D Land.
  • In addition, Hisstocrat has one; his queen. Unlike the king, she spits fireballs.
• Divergent Character Evolution: Unlike the New Super Mario Bros. installments with multiplayer throughout the adventure, everyone in this game has their own unique abilities. Peach is slow and can float, Mario and Luigi are the same speed but Luigi jumps higher and falls slower, while Toad's the fastest but also falls the fastest. Rosalina is slower than even Peach but makes up for it with the spin attack from Super Mario Galaxy, which serves as both an attack and a small double jump. Collecting a power-up disables the spin attack.
• Double Jump: Rosalina's spin attack becomes this when she uses it in the air.
• The Dragon: Motley Bossblob is this to Bowser in this game, being who you fight right before entering World Castle, one of the two bosses guarding The Great Tower of Bowser Land, and the last boss fought in Boss Blitz.
• Dressing as the Enemy: There's an item that disguises the character as a Goomba, preventing enemies from attacking you. Said disguise leaves the character's legs exposed.
• Drop-In-Drop-Out Multiplayer: Any player can drop in immediately at any point of the game as well as drop out on any point.
• Dual Boss: King and Queen Hisstocrat in the middle Warp Box of the Boss Blitz level.
• Dub Induced Plothole: In order to avert this trope, the "Round Goombas" or "Kuribons" from Super Mario World had their names Retconned to "Galoombas" just so that one can distinguish between them and their much more common mushroom-shaped counterparts who also appear in this game.
• Dungeon Bypass: In many levels, it's possible to run on top of Clear Warp Pipes, which also allows you to avoid being hit by any obstacles that are lurking in there.

    E-G

• Early Installment Weirdness: In regard to the Captain Toad gameplay. In this game, he can't defeat ghosts with his headlamp like he could as an NPC in Galaxy or like the other characters can in this game with a Light Box, but he can in Treasure Tracker. In fact, it's one of his few tactical advantages. This is rectified in the Switch port, where the headlamp functions exactly as it did in Treasure Tracker.
• Easter Egg:
  • Like New Super Luigi U before it, this game has hidden 8-bit Luigis scattered all over the game. Unlike Luigi U, they range from waiting for a specific amount time, hiding in some out of the way spaces, or even Freeze Frame Bonuses There's even one hiding in the instruction manual.
  • The rocket ship that takes you to the bonus worlds after you beat the game will show up in the background at the beginning of World 1-1 after you've unlocked it.
• Easy Level Trick: Champion's Road can be made significantly easier by bringing in a Tanooki Suit from another level.
• Eating the Enemy: The game introduces the Potted Piranha Plant which characters can pick up and use to eat other enemies, including ones that can't be beaten normally like Fuzzies. They can even eat other Piranha Plants.
• Egopolis: World Bowser is this.
• Embedded Precursor: The title screen lets you access a slightly tweaked NES version of Mario Bros. called Luigi Bros., done in celebration of The Year of Luigi, unlocked via completing the game or already having a New Super Luigi U save file ^note (Wii U version only; the Switch port does not take New Super Mario Bros. U Deluxe into account.). Now Luigi is both Player 1 and 2, with the second player being the original palette.
• Everything's Better With Bunnies: A few levels have rabbits that the characters can catch for certain goodies. Mount Must Dash's Miiverse stamp is also a rabbit.
• Everything's Better with Spinning: Returning from Super Mario Sunshine is the spin jump - twirling the analog stick quickly causes your character to spin like a top, and pressing a jump button during this sequence has them do a spinning jump that allows them to reach heights that a normal jump normally can't. The same effect can also be achieved if a character standing underneath another jumps and hits whoever's above them.
• Evil Tower of Ominousness: World Bowser-Castle, home of the final boss, is aptly named "The Great Tower Of Bowser Land".
• Fairy in a Bottle: How Bowser captures the Sprixie Princesses. He's clearly been playing too much Zelda. At the end of the game, he ends up in a bottle.
• Fake Longevity: Want to get all five stars and get 100% Completion? Be prepared to take a very long time. Eventually, you will have to complete EVERY stage in EVERY world with all FIVE characters (including Rosalina, who isn't unlocked until after you've completed the second level of World Star, which makes the game's longevity even more fake). At least this can be alleviated if you play with friends, or cheat using multiple controllers: you only have to COMPLETE all stages, not go through them entirely.
• Family-Unfriendly Death: All of the bosses disappear in a flash of light upon defeat, but Motley Bossblob lies sprawled on his back, looking truly dead when he dissolves into light. His star-shaped pupils and tongue sticking out don't help.
• Far East: Invoked. According to an Iwata Asks article, Hands-On Hall was intended as what the devs felt foreigners see their homeland as; a mishmash of Japan and China. For that level, they stereotyped their own country.
• Floating Continent: Almost every level is comprised of floating landmasses, sand, and stones, among other materials.
• Floating Water: Shows up in a couple levels, and even moves. Not even justified.
• Forcibly Formed Physique: The Prince Bully fight has this happen to Prince Bully himself whenever you push him into a pipe. He's shot out another pipe compressed into a helpless small cylinder.
• Friendly Fireproof: Zig-Zagged:
  • With players: Fireballs won't hurt other players, but projectiles from the Cannon Box can. When carried, the Piranha Plant will attack other players, knocking them over but otherwise leaving them unharmed.
  • On the other side, Hammer, Boomerang, and Fire Brothers can accidentally knock each other out.
• Fuuma Shuriken: Pom Pom throws these. The color of the shuriken determines who is the real Pom-Pom from her shadow clones.
• Funny Background Event: Throughout the game, you'll often and briefly see 8-bit Luigis hiding in the scenery.
• Futile Hand Reach: Mario, Luigi, Peach, and Toad all do this when Bowser kidnaps the Sprixie Princesses.
• Game-Over Man: Your character (Or multiple in multiplayer) fall into the Game Over screen with a disappointed or anguished expression. Choosing 'continue' makes them enthusiastically jump up and run off the screen to continue their quest.
• Gameplay and Story Integration: The rocket ship that takes you to the bonus worlds after you beat the game will show up in the background at the beginning of World 1-1 after you've unlocked it.
• Gameplay and Story Segregation:
  • Mario, Luigi, Toad, and Peach will all be shown in the opening cutscene, no matter how many players are actually present.
  • In the credits, the same four characters are shown wearing cat suits, even if you completed the final level without one.
• Gangplank Galleon: Spooky Seasick Wreck is an old pirate ship, so naturally the place is crawling with Boos making it a Big Boo's Haunt as well.
• "Get Back Here!" Boss: Invoked by Bowser in the battles where he drives his car. He actually dares the player characters to follow him so that he can attack them with soccer bombs and his flame breath.
• Ghostly Glide: Averted with Rosalina, who normally floats off the ground normally. In this game, she runs like everyone else
• Gimmick Level: Several, such as Beep Block Skyway and Footlight Lane, which show hazards and elements unique to them.
• Gold Makes Everything Shiny: The golden Bowser train level is made up of nothing but gold and gold coins.
• Gravity Is a Harsh Mistress: After beating Bowser in the first and penultimate battles with him, the bridge gives way along with his car. It takes a couple seconds of Bowser hanging in midair and flailing comically before gravity takes him as well.
• Green Hill Zone: The map of World 1, in the vein of the 2D Mario games since Super Mario Bros. 2. Individual levels set in this theme include Super Bell Hill, Really Rolling Hills, Spawling Savanna the bonus level Super Block Land.
• Guide Dang It!: If you haven't figured out the GamePad's secret-revealing capabilities, you'll never figure out how to complete Shiftier Boo Mansion. Toward the end of the level, there's an outdoor section with a Warp Box at the end. Going through it will just send you back to the beginning of that section. Using the touchscreen or microphone will reveal a path of clouds leading under the bridge to where the real Warp Box is.

    H-M

• Hailfire Peaks:
  • Spooky Seasick Wreck mixes Big Boo's Haunt with Gangplank Galleon.
  • Peepa's Fog Bog combines Big Boo's Haunt with Slippy-Slidey Ice World and a small dose of Bubblegloop Swamp.
• Happy Circus Music: The level Switch Scramble Circus has a very fun, bouncy orchestral theme.
• Hard Mode Filler: Worlds Mushroom and Flower are composed of previous levels with gimmicks thrown in.
• Heartbeat Soundtrack: Get near Champion's Road on World Crown's map. You'll know you have quite a challenge waiting when you hear the heartbeats.
• Helpful Mook:
  • There are sleeping Piranha Plants in pots that will eat any enemies the player comes across when carried, but they become hostile once the player drops them.
  • Some enemies are living trampolines that turn into actual trampolines when attacked, which you can use to jump to higher areas.
  • The rats will do damage if you collide with them, but they also demonstrate how some obstacles work.
• Hero of Another Story: Captain Toad has his own levels, with unique mechanics, and drives the Golden Space Train. He's also got his own game which ends up tying into this one!
• Hollywood Darkness: Played straight in some caves and night levels, averted for some others.
• Hub Level: In a vast departure from 3D Land's map system, this game's world map is closer to those from games like Super Mario Bros. 3 and Super Mario World, complete with branching paths leading from level to level and world to world. However, Mario and his friends have complete freedom of movement and can even jump around the area, essentially making it a smaller-scale reinterpretation of the freer Hub Levels of the pre-3D Land 3D games.
• Infinite 1-Ups: One trick can be done as early as the second level of the game , just like in its predecessor.
• Interface Spoiler:
  • The Sprixie Kingdom map shows that there are at least five worlds that you will travel to.
  • If you zoom out and move the camera around you, you can see the next worlds that you will travel to.
  • The red level list reveals the amount of levels that are in the worlds you haven't completed yet.
  • You can also see the silhouettes of the stamps that you haven't unlocked yet and some of them are easy to tell what they are.
  • Probably the worst one comes from the Miiverse features. It's probably best to have those off if you want a spoiler-free run.
    • Many posts reveal that there are stamps of Rosalina, and if that doesn't convince you, there's a stamp of her in a cat suit.
    • Playing against the Ghost Miis can accidentally spoil the game when you see one of them doing the spin attack from Super Mario Galaxy, which reveals that it could either be a new power-up later on in the game or that Rosalina is possibly a playable character.
    • Meowser, the final boss, is a stamp. They really should've auto-spoilered that one.
• Invincible Minor Minion: The Big Ant Troopers can't be killed by jumps, ground pounds, or projectile attacks. Fortunately, they are only found in places where their invincibility is vital for when you need to pounce on them and get to various platforms.
• I Shall Taunt You: Some enemies, like Spinies, Boos, and Para-Dry Bones laugh and cheer if they contact damage you.
• Jiggle Physics: Peach's and Rosalina's skirt.
• Jumped at the Call: Peach is the first one to enter the pipe and go after Bowser and save the Sprixie Princesses.
• Kaizo Trap:
  • Certain Big Boo's Haunt levels will put fake flagpoles made of Boos at certain points, which can be dangerous if you have a bunch of Boos nipping at your heels and expect them to be defeated by the automatic enemy-killer activated by goals.
  • Running out of time by messing up the Clear Pipes at the end of Champion's Road.
• Kishotenketsu: Designer Koichi Hayashida used this formula to guide his design philosophy in this game. Many levels have the same structure: a new mechanic is introduced in a safe environment (ki), then the stakes are raised for the player (sho), an unexpected complication occurs (ten), and finally, all of the previous ideas are brought together for the home run to the finish pole (ketsu).
• Kung Fu-Proof Mook: The Octooombas, which could be stomped upon in their first two appearances, will only bounce you off if you jump on them here, and no power-up or other attack will hurt them. To defeat them, you have to ground pound them.
• Laser-Guided Karma: During the end credits, Bowser has been trapped in a bottle.
• Late-Arrival Spoiler: Rosalina is supposedly a secret character. Despite this, various media for Super Smash Bros. for 3DS/Wii U, including Rosalina's character page and the Super Smash Sale's first sale mention 3D World exclusively as a Rosalina-centric game, rather than sorting it with the other Mario characters. In addition, she appears in her cat form alongside the other player characters on the official soundtrack's cover art. In fact, the fact that she's unlockable was first revealed in a trailer Nintendo put out before the game was even released anywhere in the world. The game wasn't even out and Nintendo didn't even consider it a spoiler.
• Later Installment Weirdness: Being the thirteenth console platform game in the Super Mario Bros. series, this is the first core game since Super Mario Bros. 2, itself an Oddball in the Series, where Princess Peach is not a Damsel in Distress but rather a playable character. The Sprixie Princesses take her usual place as the ones to be rescued. The same game also promotes Rosalina and Captain Toad to playable characters, who were non-playable in previous games and still in need of Mario's help despite not being kidnapped. In terms of gameplay, the game borrows the style of Super Mario 3D Land for which the first objective in most levels is not about collecting Stars but simply meeting the goal line (stars are still required to access the boss levels, as well as some of the regular levels; this is a trait that 3D Land didn't have because its levels had Star Medals instead). In terms of narrative, there are no spoken dialogues, so the communication between characters is limited to gestures and expressions.
• Leitmotif:
  • The Sprixie Princesses, Bowser, and Captain Toad all have unique themes associated with them, and they're remixed several times throughout the game.
  • Plessie is associated with the Slider theme from Super Mario 64.
  • The Mystery Challenge theme is from Super Mario Galaxy 2, and the Mega Mushroom reuses its theme from New Super Mario Bros..
  • The death theme is rearranged from Super Mario Bros. 3.
  • Although the standard victory theme is new, the boss victory theme from Super Mario 3D Land returns, fully orchestrated.
• Lethal Lava Land: The World 7 map and several of its levels (such as Boiling Blue Bully Belt and Simmering Lava Lake), as well as Boss Brolder's Castle, Backstreet Bustle and Grumblump Inferno which are in other worlds. Notably, some levels have blue lava instead of red.
• Level Ate: Pretty Plaza Panic, Cakewalk Flip and Cookie Cogworks. Averted with Double Cherry Pass, which looks like it was made of edible cake but it's actually a grassland level with the colors of a cake.
• Level in the Clouds: The map of World 6 and the levels Clear Pipe Cruise, Pretty Plaza Panic, and The Great Goal Pole are all sky-themed. In addition to cloud platforms, there are Donut Blocks and Clear Pipes required to travel across the sections of the sky. The latter two levels have strict time limits, so Mario and his friends have to move quickly through the clouds and floating platforms.
• Light 'em Up: The Light Box can be used to defeat ghosts.
• Locomotive Level: The Bullet Bill Express and The Bowser Express. The Golden Express is a Bonus Stage version.
• Long Song, Short Scene: The song that plays when the game loads is double the amount of time the game usually loads. The only way to hear it in full is to either eject the disk while it loads ^note disk version only or you have the technical know how to rip the music off the game files.
• Magical Clown: The boss Motley Bossblob is a jester-like Koopa who can transform into a giant Blob Monster clown.
• Marathon Level: The aptly-named Mystery Box Marathon. Take 30 Mystery Box challenges and make them into one level with no checkpoints, and you have this level.
• Market-Based Title: In Japan, the updated Nintendo Switch version is known as Super Mario 3D World + Fury World.
• Me's a Crowd:
  • The Double Cherries give the player a clone that follows his/her every movement.
  • Also happens with Luigi Bros., where both players are Luigi.
  • Pom Pom has gained this ability and will utilize it during your battle with her. Boom Boom even tries his hand at this cloning business in his second battle.
• Mirror Boss: Bowser uses the Super Bell and Double Cherry in the final boss fight.
• Mix-and-Match Critters:
  • Conkdors are condors that look like cartoon ostriches sporting a spiked purple Koopa shell. Also, their beaks look like toucans'.
  • Plessie resembles a plesiosaurus/Loch Ness Monster (aquatic, names resembles "plesiosaurus" and "Nessie"), a seal (has seal-like bark and flippers), and a Yoshi (has a large, bulbous nose and small eyes, gives Mario and friends a ride).
• Monster Clown: The Motley Bossblob can take the form of a giant clown that tries to kill you.
• Moving the Goalposts: World Star-4 features a literal moving goalpost. What appears to be a simple 8 second level turns into a frantic chase as the winged goalpost moves ever further away from you.
• Musical Nod: Loads of them:
  • For starters, there's music that's reused entirely: the underground theme, the Toad House theme, the Rainbow Run/Coin Heaven theme, the Mystery Challenge theme, and Boom-Boom and Pom-Pom's themes are all taken from Super Mario 3D Land. The Comet Observatory music is also reused for World Crown's map.
  • The Slot Machine's theme is the character selection screen from Super Mario Bros. 2.
  • Mount Must Dash, being an homage to Super Mario Kart, naturally remixes the game's Mario Circuit theme.
  • Plessie's theme is a remix of the Slider theme from Super Mario 64.
  • Gusty Garden Galaxy receives a remix for the levels Honeycomb Starway, Honeycomb Skyway, and Champion's Road. Captain Toad's theme is an extended version of his leitmotif from this game, as well.
  • Bowser's Lava Lake Keep, Snowball Park, and Super Block Land all have remixed music from 3D Land. This also holds true for the levels that are thematically derived from those three.
• My Instincts Are Showing: In the Nintendo Direct trailer, Cat Mario is shown sneaking up and pouncing on birds in one of the levels.
• My Rules Are Not Your Rules: Apparently, Meowser's clones can act independently. Something you can't utilize with your own clones when using the Double Cherries.
• Mythology Gag:
  • Fire Peach's color scheme is taken directly from Peach's very first appearance.
  • The game's title is an allusion to Super Mario World in the same way Super Mario 3D Land is to Super Mario Land.
  • Mario and Co. rescue various Sprixie Princesses of different colors.
  • Toad's victory pose seems to be taken from Wario's Woods, his only starring role.
  • This is not the first time the Mario Bros. were able to commandeer a Koopa Shell.
  • In the introduction cutscene, Mario and Luigi go back to their roots as plumbers and fix a busted Clear Pipe in record time with tools pulled out of nowhere. These are one of the few moments Mario and Luigi do some actual plumbing.
  • And to the point, this isn't the first time that Bowser, of all people, has used items against the good guys.
  • The noise Hisstocrat and his queen make to summon its servants is the same as the snake whistle from Wario Land 3.
  • There are a few levels with switches that can only be accessed with a certain character. Luigi has a switch in a ghost house.
  • In 3-3/Shifty Boo Mansion, getting one of the Green Stars requires jumping into a painting ala Super Mario 64. Complete with the same ripple effect.
  • The Toad playable here is blue, the same color of the Toad playable in the NES version of Super Mario Bros. 2.
  • Mount Must Dash is a reference to the Mario Circuit stages from Super Mario Kart, complete with similar graphics, boost panels, a finish line, and a remix of the music.
  • The golden Bowser train is a reference to the treasure ships from Super Mario Bros. 3 that had nothing but tons and tons of coins.

    N-P

• Ninja: Pom-Pom can teleport short distances, create shadow clones of herself, and use throwing stars to attack.
• Ninja Pirate Zombie Robot: Prince Bully's helmet looks like a mix between a visored Medieval bascinet, a horned barbarian helmet, and a plumed Greco-Roman helmet.
• No Name Given:
  • Bowser's purple automobile apparently has no official name.
  • Nor do any of the seven Sprixie princesses, individually.
• No Ontological Inertia: Averted with the Double Cherries. Upon acquiring the power-up and gaining clones, damage to one will make it disappear. However, there's no need to keep track of the original out of fear damage to it will make the other clones disappear; the last clone standing will always end up being the real deal.
• Noob Bridge:
  • A variation. While all obstacles in the game can be navigated normally, there are many shortcuts one can take if they're savvy with moves not listed in the manual. Such as the Spin Jump (rotate the stick until you spin, then jump) and the Ground Pound Jump (jump shortly after landing a Ground Pound).
  • The level Cosmic Cannon Cluster. A portion of the level requires you to scale a wall by bouncing on cannonballs shooting in sequence to advance. Until then, this maneuver was not necessary to progress. This technique also shows up in the Brutal Bonus Level.
• Nostalgia Level: One bonus area features a giant Small Mario sprite from Super Mario Bros.. There's also Mount Must Dash, which is an homage to the original Super Mario Kart, Super Galaxy being one to Super Mario Galaxy and Super Block Land being one to Super Mario 3D Land. There's also a golden train full of coins, reminiscent of the treasure ship in Super Mario Bros. 3.
• Not Quite Flight: The Tanooki Suit returns with the same limited floating mechanics from 3D Land.
• Off-Model:
  • Done deliberately with Peach's proportions changing to fit the Cat Suit, as the model for the latter is shared among the playable characters.
  • This also happens with Rosalina. Boomerang and Tanooki Rosalina suffer this, since they share the same models and animations with Boomerang and Tanooki Peach. Rosalina noticeably looks off with Peach's girly running animations in those powered-up forms.
• Old Save Bonus: In the Wii U version, having a New Super Luigi U save file unlocks Luigi Bros. on the title screen without having to beat the game. (The Switch version does not take into account New Super Mario Bros. U Deluxe, so you must beat the game to unlock it.)
• Ominous Floating Castle: World Castle.
• One-Gender Race: The Sprixies seem to be only females, since all of the non-Princesses wear pink dresses.
• One-Winged Angel: For the final boss fight, Bowser uses a Super Bell to transform into a tiger version of himself called Meowser.
• Painting the Medium: Rainy levels rain on the camera/game screen.
• Palmtree Panic: The map of World 5, and the levels Plessie's Plunging Falls and Sunshine Seaside.
• Panthera Awesome: Bowser uses a Super Bell to turn himself into Meowser, a tiger version of himself, for the final boss fight.
• Post-End Game Content: Beating the game unlocks some extra worlds where you can unlock Rosalina, as well as the Luigi Bros. game (although it can be available from the start if New Super Luigi U save data is present).
• Power-Up:
  • 3D World introduces the Cat Suit. When you grab the Super Bell, you will now be able to climb walls, scratch, and pounce on your enemies.
  • The Double Cherries, which create one copy of the player for each one grabbed.
  • The Fire Flower, Tanooki Suit, Boomerang Suit, and Mega Mushroom return as well, the latter appearing for the first time in a 3D Mario game (as well as in 4-player co-op, something that has not yet happened in the New Super Mario Bros. series it debuted in).
• Power Up Letdown:
  • Any Power-Up becomes this if you are playing as Rosalina. In her normal and small forms, she has a spin attack that also functions as a pretty useful Double Jump. However, grabbing one of the advanced powerups (Fire Flower, Super/Lucky Bell, Tanooki Leaf, etc.) erases this ability. While it is nice having an extra power (and an extra hit point), players playing as Rosalina may face the dilemma of forgoing powerups or risk losing her useful Spin Attack.
  • The Tanooki Suit and Lucky Cat Suit can retroactively become this in the Switch version, since you cannot perform the extremely useful midair dive while wearing them due to how they work - the dive is performed by pressing the dash button immediately out of a Ground Pound, but the Tanooki Suit will do a tail swipe instead of the former, while the Lucky Cat Suit will turn you into a statue instead of the latter, both of which will cause you to plummet downwards instead of diving.
• Power Up Mount: Plessie, a large Yoshi-like dinosaur, can carry all four characters and is able to race through certain river levels.
• Princesses Rule: In the Sprixie Kingdom, seven of them.
• Projectile Pocketing: Items such as Green Stars can be collected from afar with certain projectiles such as boomerangs or cannonballs.
• Promoted to Playable:
  • Captain Toad becomes playable for the first time in levels exclusive to him where he can only navigate without jumping.
  • This game also marks Rosalina's first playable appearance in a Mario platformer as a Secret Character.
• Pun: Princess Peach's Double Cherry Catchphrase is "Sooo peachy!"
• Punny Name:
  • Every Climax Boss. First, Hisstocrat, whose name is a combination of "hiss" and "aristocrat" due to being a king and a snake. Second, Motley Bossblob, which refers to the multitude of blobs that make up his giant form, but also a motley, a name for a jester's outfit. Third, Meowser, which is pretty self-explanatory.
  • Some of the new enemies. For instance, Conkdors (a bird enemy which attacks with its head), Rammerheads (which resemble hammerhead sharks), Madpoles (aggressive tadpoles) and Brolders (boulder bros).
• Puzzle Game: Captain Toad's levels shift from platforming to this. Without the ability to jump, the gameplay becomes navigating the level and manipulating the camera to find the Green Stars in every nook and cranny.

    R-S

• Racing Ghost: Ghosts of other players' Miis can be raced against if you connect online.
• Recurring Boss Template: Except for the Final Boss, all the boss types are fought at least one other time. In particular, Boom-Boom and Pom Pom are back, acting much like they did in 3D Land. They do have some new abilities, though; Boom-Boom can turn invisible and Pom Pom learned how to clone herself and toss shurikens.
• Remilitarized Zone: Bowser's Bullet Bill and Bob-Omb Brigades, as well as Bullet Bill Base and Cosmic Cannon Cluster.
• Remixed Level:
  • All of the levels in Worlds Mushroom and Flower are remixed versions of the levels seen in the first eight worlds (and in a certain case, one from World Star. The exception is Boss Blitz in World Flower.
  • Mystery House Marathon remixes 30 Mystery Box challenges and puts them in one big Mystery House.
• Removable Shell: Koopa Troopas once again have this, for the first time in the 3D games since Super Mario 64. This time around, the player can actually put on the shells themselves to get some Super Speed.
• Retaliation Mode:
  • Boom Boom performs a shell ramming attack once stomped; on his last hit point, the shell turns invisible.
  • Boss Brolder performs an invincible spinning attack that throws out pyroclasts when damaged.
  • King Ka-Thunk drops back down onto the arena when hurt, destroying parts of it.
• Rhythm Game: The slot machine bonus game, if you want it to be ^note the key is to hit the panels halfway between beats, each at the same point of a measure, as the pictures change with the beat, and loop back after each measure, and the beat-block gimmick returning from Galaxy 2..
• Rise to the Challenge: The level Fuzzy Time Mine involves having to escape a tower-like mine that is being filled up by Fuzzies.
• Robot Clown: Downplayed. Motley Bossblob is — as the name says — more of a Blob Monster Clown, however his Chrome Champion look really gives him a robotic vibe.
• Royals Who Actually Do Something: Princess Peach. Also done mildly with the Sprixie Princesses, who pull out tools to set up Clear Pipes for the heroes to move between worlds.
• Rubberband AI: Bowser's car moves as fast as you do.
• Sand Is Water: In level 8-2 "Plessie's Dune Downhill", Plessie floats through sand just as they did through water in previous levels.
• Save the Princess: Averted for Princess Peach. In a departure from the standard Mario plotline, she is now playable alongside the Mario Bros. and Toad. Instead of the princess, seven other princesses will serve this, all of them being the Sprixie Princesses of the kingdom.
• Scenery as You Go: Footlight Lane has paths that are only visible in a small circle around your character. Impacts from a Ground Pound or enemy attacks or collection of a Green Star briefly expand the visibility.
• Scenery Porn: The game has stunning visuals and it really shows in the scenery. Some segments of the game exist purely to show off the graphics, like the long Clear Pipe ride in front of a sunken ship in Pipeline Lagoon.
• Score Milking: The Lucky Cat Suit's ability to create coins with its transformation power grants an infinite means of gaining score (along with a very slow method of gaining lives). Repeatedly hitting a Koopa shell with the Tanooki Suit's tail also allows for milking, as the score increments on each hit like a Goomba Stomp combo. These are more effective in the Mystery Houses, where grabbing a Green Star stops the timer.
• Scoring Points: After a conspicuous absence in the previous game (in which you earn coins instead of points), it's back in full force. They still mean nothing, though, unless you count the inevitable competition between players when the scoreboard is shown at the end of the course.
• Secret Character: Rosalina, who is unlocked upon completion of World Star-2, Super Galaxy.
• Self-Imposed Challenge: No-powerup runs and/or no-damage runs can add a bit of challenge to some of the levels,
• Shifting Sand Land: The World 2 map and the levels Conkdor Canyon and Plessie's Dune Downhill.
• Ship Level: Spooky Seasick Wreck is set on a series of crashed galleons filled with Boos and Peepas. Gigantic Seasick Wreck, of World Mushroom-6, trades in the specters for Ty-Foos, with Mega Mushrooms being the order of the day.
• Shout-Out:
  • In the opening scene, Bowser bottles a fairy.
  • One of the secrets in a level takes you to a bunch of black blocks stacked together to form an 8-bit Link from the original game. Light them all up to reveal the sprite, and the "Item get" jingle from Ocarina of Time plays.
  • The first Mystery House where you fight enemies is called Mystery House Melee. The second one is called Mystery House Brawl.
• Signature Move:
  • While all characters get stamps that showcase them in the Cat Suit, the three characters other than Mario (who is shown with all power-ups) get stamps based on the other power ups: Luigi is shown using the Tanooki Suit (or to be more precise: his own Kitsune variation of the suit), Peach is shown using the Fire Flower, and Toad is shown using the Boomerang Suit. They were also seen using them in the various trailers.
  • Rosalina, the secret character, has an actual Signature Move in the Spin Jump which only works when she's not using a power-up. Fittingly, she only gets the usual four stamps showing her Normal, Small, and Cat Suit forms, as well as her Player Icon.
• Skill Gate Character: Peach and Rosalina, in spite of being able to correct mistakes and/or take shortcuts with floating or spin attacking/double jumping in Rosalina's case, move at the pace you'd expect a lady with high heels to move at. Veterans of the game will find that the other characters, coupled with advanced moves, can clear levels faster and more efficiently.
• Slippy-Slidey Ice World: The World 3 map and the levels Snowball Park and Ty-Foo Flurries.
• The Smurfette Principle: Subverted. Peach is the only playable female character, until you unlock Rosalina in the postgame content.
• Snowy Sleigh Bells: The theme playing in Snowball Park is the remix of the Super Mario 3D Land cheerful ice theme and it makes just as much use of sleigh bells.
• Solid Clouds: The game has semi-solid cloud platforms that can be entered from underneath throughout various courses. They're officially called Cloud Lifts, but some of them are stationary and some are even invisible. Ground-pounding a Cloud Lift would cause it to dissipate temporarily.
• Space Zone: The maps of Worlds Star, Mushroom, Flower, and Crown, and the levels Beep Block Skyway, Rainbow Run (also an example of Casino Park), Super Galaxy, Honeycomb Starway and Cosmic Cannon Cluster.
• Spin Attack:
  • Rosalina can use the spin from Super Mario Galaxy, which serves as an attack and a small extra jump. It gives her advantage over the other characters since she's the only one that can do it, but it won't help much for speedruns. The primary downside is that it can't be used if she's above normal form.
  • The Tanooki Suit retains its trademark tail swipe attack, as well as the rapid spin move that replaces the roll.
• Spot the Thread: Although her clones all bear near-identical shurikens, only the real Pom Pom's is colored a girly shade of pink. The real one is also the only one wearing a green bow on her head.
• Stock Food Depictions: The double cherry power-up, as expected, features two pinkish-red cherries joined at the stem.
• Stock Subtitle: World.
• Super Not-Drowning Skills: Just like in its predecessor.

    T-Y

• Tactical Suicide Boss:
  • Again, Bowser uses this trope when he throws soccer bombs that can be kicked back onto the car he's riding. If he'd just kept on spitting fire at Mario and his friends, he'd be invincible.
  • Boom Boom would be unstoppable if he didn't feel the need to come out of his shell to do his spinning arm attack.
  • Pom Pom uses doppelgangers to aid her in her fight. You have to hit the real deal in order to damage her. The trope comes in when she decides to stand out from her doppelgangers for no apparent reason by having a different colored Fuuma Shuriken than the clones.
  • Both Hisstocrat and Queen Hisstocrat feel a need to have their servants hold plates over their heads for no reason other than to make it easier to stomp them.
  • Boss Brolder would be invincible if it wasn't for the fact that he can only be hurt by having a Brolder (which he summons to help him) thrown at him.
  • Motley Bossblob only becomes vulnerable because he performs the extra-high jump that splits his clown form into smaller blobs. If he stuck with the smaller jumps, he would be invincible.
  • Meowser somehow felt the need to go onto POW Blocks at certain points of his fight. Said things are the only thing that can hurt him.
• Taken for Granite: The Tanooki Suit's statue ability has been passed on to a rarer version of the Cat Suit, known as the Lucky Cat Suit, which can transform you into a golden cat statue, a reference to a Japanese lucky charm known as the maneki-neko.
• Tank Goodness: Bowser's Tank Battalion returns.
• Temple of Doom: The levels Spike's Lost City and King Ka-thunk's Castle.
• Temporary Platform: Beat Blocks reappear, now called Beep Blocks. Here, they function more like their original appearance, but there are some sequences with longer blocks on an angle that function as a slide.
• Tennis Boss: Bowser's Highway sees you kicking the soccer ball bombs he throws at you back at his car.
• Title Scream: Done at the title screen by the initial four characters ("Me-ow!").
• Tomboyish Ponytail: Peach gets this in all of her power-up forms (except the hooded Cat and Tanooki suits). Rosalina too!
• Top-Down View: Similar to its 3DS predecessor ^note (done as a homage to The Legend of Zelda's 25th anniversary), Honeycomb Starway is an Auto-Scrolling Level where you travel across hexagonal platforms using nothing but the Boomerang Flower. Switchblack Ruins also uses this view.
• Took a Level in Badass:
  • On top of generally showing a bit more competence in his minions and obstacles, somewhere along the line, Bowser finally took a good look at Mario's powerup arsenal, and asked himself "why haven't I ever tried to use these?". His idea to perch precariously on top of POW blocks for Mario to hit him was a little less bright.
  • Boom Boom, believe it or not. Unlike 3D Land, where he attacks you in the exact same way, he adopts different attacks this time — either he turns invisible or spawns another shell to distract you. Pom Pom, however, isn't as lucky.
  • Also, the Octoombas. In the Galaxy games, they were a slight step up from the regular Goombas and could still be stomped on easily. However, now jumping on them doesn't work, and they spew cannonballs. To defeat them, you need to ground-pound them.
• Toy Time: Rolling Ride Run.
• Traintop Battle: The train levels see you fighting enemies and dodging obstacles on top of the trains.
• Travel Cool: Saving the kidnapped pixie princesses is the focus of the plot. Interestingly in the background, in case you missed it, the game's subplot is having Bowser shut down all inter-level public warp pipes, and replace them with his own private road and railroad infrastructure.
• Tube Travel: The Clear Pipes frequently let you do this.
• A Twinkle in the Sky: Bowser becomes one upon being defeated in the first and third battles against him.
• Two Girls to a Team: Peach and Rosalina are the two playable female characters in this game.
• Underground Level: Koopa Troopa Cave, Shadow Play Alley, Backstreet Bustle, and Switchblack Ruins.
• Under the Sea: Pipeline Lagoon and Rammerhead Reef.
• Unexpected Gameplay Change:
  • Some levels involve controlling Captain Toad (of the Toad Brigade), who cannot jump, as he maneuvers around enemies to grab Green Stars, in a set-up remarkably similar to that of Wrecking Crew.
  • There are also levels that play like a top-down shooter, and others featuring dash panels that force the characters to run at above max speed.
• Unstable Equilibrium: When playing co-op, the winner of each level is awarded a crown that is worth 5000 points in the next level. This makes it easier for one player to win several levels in a row, although other players can fight for the crown.
• Variable Mix:
  • The music changes when you go underwater, becoming muffled and distorted.
  • The music of the circus levels change depending on how far you are in them.
  • There are two pairs of worlds that share the same general music but have different instrumentation depending on which of the two you're in. All of the other worlds have their own music.
  • Water-themed levels have different tracks for surface and swimming sections, which change as you move between them.
• Vehicular Assault: Bowser tries to run over the heroes with his big car.
• The Very Definitely Final Dungeon: The eighth world, World Bowser.
• Video Game Cruelty Potential: Like New Super Mario Bros. Wii, in multiplayer, characters can pick up other characters, leading to situations like Mario throwing Peach off a cliff or Toad chucking Luigi into lava.
• Video Game Cruelty Punishment: As lives are shared this time around, you probably don't want to kill the other players often.
• Villainous Harlequin: Motley Bossblob in both forms, though his blob form tends toward Monster Clown.
• Walk, Don't Swim: Captain Toad is weighed down so much by his backpack that he just walks underwater.
• Weak, but Skilled: Captain Toad has absolutely no jumping ability. That doesn't stop him from solving the puzzles that happen to be his stages.
• Wham Shot: Bowser putting on a Super Bell.
• Wintry Auroral Sky: Snowball Park is an snowy stage which conveniently takes place at night, so the green auroras can be well seen in the dark skies.
• Would Hit a Girl: Just like in Super Princess Peach, Bowser has no qualms in fighting Princess Peach. Or Rosalina, for that matter.
• Written Sound Effect: Sort of an example. Ka-Thunks and their king, King Ka-Thunk, are most likely named after the sound they make when moving/attacking.
• Wutai: Hands-On Hall, which deliberately shows a stereotypical rendition of medieval Japan.
• You Don't Look Like You: The Bullies were completely redesigned from Super Mario 64. They're recolored, no longer spherical, and their horns are pointed in a different direction.
• Your Princess Is in Another Castle!:
  • There's a few levels where some Boos fake you out by disguising themselves as the end of level flagpole.
  • And another one much later on where a goalpost is right there at the beginning. The post then grows wings and tries to run away from you, setting the stage for the real course. You can still end it any time if you're fast enough and touch the pole, but if you're going for 100% then you more-or-less have to run through the entire level.

Bowser's Fury

• Adult Fear: Throughout the mode, you'll find a mother cat who's crying over her missing kittens that you have to find for her.
• And Your Reward Is Clothes: Beat the game once and Plessie is still in their cat form. Obtaining 100% completion gives Cat Mario the Giga Cat Mario skin, turns Bowser Jr. into Meowser Jr., and gives Fury Bowser a shining white mane of hair and stronger attacks.
• Animal Motifs: Cats; taken Up to Eleven from 3D World, Lake Lapcat's scenery is heavily cat-themed, down to the clouds, there are cats roaming freely around, and all of the enemies are cat-ified.
• Anti-Frustration Features: A few islands gain Propeller Boxes about halfway through clearing their list of challenges, saving the player some time in future objectives and exploration.
• Ascended Extra: Plessie is much more important in Bowser's Fury than they were in Super Mario 3D World, serving as Mario's mode of transportation around the lake, being crucial for several of the Cat Shines, and even assisting Mario and Junior in the Final Boss.
• Assist Character: Bowser Jr. can help by attacking enemies near Mario and painting on walls marked with a "?" to reveal hidden power-ups or structures. The player can also set how often Bowser Jr. helps, and a second player can take control of him in a similar vein to Cappy.
• Attack of the 50-Foot Whatever: Fury Bowser, whose presence either rains hell upon the lake for a few minutes or fights Giga Cat Mario. Taken Up to Eleven in the ending when Mario and Plessie end up taking all three Giga Bells and grow to a very ridiculous size that punts Bowser away.
• Autobots, Rock Out!: Fury Bowser's appearance is heralded by "Disaster", a death metal-esque piece complete with the "lyrics" to match.
• Battle in the Rain: Giga Cat Mario fights Fury Bowser in the middle of a rainstorm. In fact, rainstorms are used to alert players that Bowser's about to awaken.
• Behemoth Battle: The Giga Cat Mario vs. Fury Bowser fights.
• Belly Flop Crushing: How Giga Cat Mario and Plessie defeat Bowser.
• Bonus Boss: Of sorts. Your only non-cosmetic reward for 100% completion is a significantly harder version of the final boss fight, with Bowser having more health in the first phase and leading you on a longer chase with stronger attacks in the second.
• Boss Warning Siren: When Mario has nearly collected enough Cat Shines to engage the final battle with Fury Bowser, he suddenly awakens again with the sky now turning a deep crimson in his wake, and the metal track that accompanies him now cues in with an electric guitar riff reminiscent of a klaxon alarm buildup, because the game has just changed and now he's not going to stop for anything.
• Call-Back: The intro cutscene seen on the expansion's official Japanese site shows Mario fall into Lake Lapcat through a portal with Shadow Mario's symbol from Super Mario Sunshine. Doubles as foreshadowing as the corrupting ink from Fury Bowser is paint.
• Chekhov's Gun: Several islands gain optional Propeller Boxes in the area right by the spawn point that can be useful for quicker traversal after the course has been cleared normally once. (Crisp Climb Castle has them at the start as the course is designed around them.) The Propeller Boxes come in handy big-time in the postgame and gain a new purpose there, as they're extremely useful for reaching the floating Lucky Isle during Fury Bowser attacks. Their being at the spawn points is convenient for this second role as well, as it allows for quick equipping when you warp to whichever island Lucky Isle has spawned next to.
• Cherry Tapping: Averted. Fury Bowser is not only calmed down by collecting a Cat Shine during his rampage, it whittles down his health bar. However, once his health is low enough, it won't harm him anymore and the player must hit him as Giga Cat Mario to defeat him.
• Chuck Cunningham Syndrome: Luigi, Peach, Toad, and Rosalina are absent despite featuring in Super Mario 3D World. Luigi only makes a cameo in the form of the Fury Shadows, and the various cats around Lake Lapcat share the colors of the playable character's cat forms (green, pink, blue, and black respectively).
• Clipped-Wing Angel: Inverted. In the second phase of the final battle, Bowser's expelled the paint coating him, now reduced to Giant Bowser as opposed to Fury Bowser. Visually played straight, he's considerably not as big nor as visually menacing, but what he does have is some semblance of awareness back. Not total, but sufficiently enough to strategize, recognizing the Giga Bells as a threat and taking them out of the equation, as well as cranking the payload of his attacks Up to Eleven into a nigh-on Bullet Hell barrage that only gets incrementally harder to maneuver around.
• Closed Circle: Lake Lapcat was meant to be the site of a vacation for Bowser and Junior, but after Bowser's transformation into Fury Bowser, the ship they were using got wrecked and Bowser Jr. became trapped in the area, later dragging Mario into the circle for help.
• Collection Sidequest:
  • All twelve of the main areas reward a Cat Shine for finding five of the Cat Shine Shards.
  • The mother calico cat will ask you to find one, three, and all five of her kittens.
  • Plessie Medals are scattered throughout the lake and will teleport when collected five times away from the player until turning into a Cat Shine at the end.
  • After beating the game once, Toadette needs help in finding Captain Toad and the rest of the Toad Brigade. However, there isn't any extra reward for finding all of them beyond the Cat Shines you get from each one.
• Continuity Nod: There are a few to Super Mario Sunshine.
  • In general, the setting of Lake Lapcat is sunny and tropical, harkening to the aesthetics of Sunshine.
  • Bowser Jr. joins Mario, and he is armed with the Magic Paintbrush, the weapon he debuted with in Sunshine. It turns out Jr.'s paint was the cause of Fury Bowser's transformation and the goop covering Lake Lapcat, much like the goop he made in Sunshine spawning enemies and coating Isle Delfino.
  • The portal to Lake Lapcat emerges from Shadow Mario's painted mark on the ground.
  • The collectibles are Cat Shines, evidently a feline variant of Shine Sprites.
  • The Fury Shadows behave much like Shadow Mario, being goopy enemies (this time resembling Luigi, not Mario) who run on a loop through a course and are defeated merely by staying on their tail and hitting them enough times.
• Cute Kitten: Small, cute-looking cats with color schemes based off each of the party's cat forms are the natives of Lake Lapcat. They'll nuzzle up against Mario and can even ride Cat Plessie with him when tossed onto their back. They're not so cute when Fury Bowser awakens though.
• Cuteness Proximity: Amusingly inverted. The cats of Lake Lapcat find Cat Mario's form irresistible and begin caressing him.
• Deadly Prank: While nobody dies, the ending reveals that the cause of Bowser's new form was Junior painting him while he was sleeping with his magic paintbrush. The fact that even after being cleared of the ink, he's still big and angry shows it really pissed him off, with the implication that Bowser's anger turned the magic black paint into the corroding plague infecting Lake Lapcat.
• Death Is a Slap on the Wrist: Even moreso than 3D World and Odyssey, as dying only takes away 50 coins, and the only use for collecting Coins is getting a random power-up at 100.
• Demonic Possession: Inverted, for once. Bowser only became black due to Junior having painted over him in an otherwise-innocuous prank with his magic paintbrush, but it's Bowser's rage that did the rest, spreading the black paint over him and turning it into a corrosive Hate Plague that engulfed Lake Lapcat and turned him into a violently-furious colossus.
• Developers' Foresight: After the first encounter with Fury Bowser, the game will automatically restore Mario's health if he took a hit. However, it's possible to take damage again before meeting Bowser Jr. if you touch the black goop, so Small Mario's model has animations for the cutscene where you meet him if you happen to do so in that state.
• Enemy Mine: Mario and Bowser Jr. are forced to team up to deal with Bowser's transformation into Fury Bowser.
• The Fellowship Has Ended: When you beat Bowser for the last time, Bowser Jr. screams at Mario momentarily, then walks away, just to let him know that they're enemies again.
• Fisher King: Whenever Fury Bowser awakens, the weather turns rainy, the sky turns dark (and later gets a red tone), stone platforms and fireballs rain on Lake Lapcat, and the cats turn on Mario even if he is wearing the Cat Suit.
• Fission Mailed: One of the fights with Fury Bowser ends with him getting back up and retreating back into his shell, instead of the usual Defeat Equals Explosion, with no islands unlocked in the process. While at first it might seem like that particular battle was a joke, it wasn't. Accessing this ending is required to reach the ending, and weakening Fury Bowser by activating the Bowser amiibo combined with collecting the Cat Shines simply does not skip this fight.
• Foreshadowing: Despite only being revealed in the ending, there's some hints scattered that Bowser's new form is associated with the magic paint from Bowser Jr.
  • When Mario first enters Lake Lapcat, it's through a black version of the M symbol made by Bowser Jr. back in Sunshine, the first hint that the inky substance from Fury Bowser is magic paint.
  • While explaining what happened, Bowser Jr first paints a picture of Bowser before painting it black by covering it black ink just like Fury Bowser, which is exactly what caused Bowser to go crazy in the first place. Also, Mario's doubt over Jr's explanation that Bowser only became Fury Bowser "just because" turns out to be justified when it's revealed that Jr. himself was responsible for the new form (albeit unintentionally.)
  • One of the enemies is a clone of Luigi made up of the same ink corrupting the lighthouses and Giga Bells called Fury Shadow, not unlike Bowser Junior's Shadow Mario form.
• Gameplay and Story Segregation: It's established early on that Cat Shines have the power to ward off Fury Bowser by supplying energy to a lighthouse, whose beam drives him away. All the same, he'll be repelled when you collect a Cat Shine that's not tied to an island and doesn't power a lighthouse, with the cutscene showing him turning away without a lighthouse activating. As such, this goes unexplained, but is fairer to the player than the alternative of having to collect only island Shines to drive Fury Bowser off.
• "Get Back Here!" Boss:
  • The Fury Shadows run away from you and you have to catch them, not unlike Shadow Mario.
  • The final fight with Giant Bowser plays like this as he constantly jumps out of your way.

• Giant Footprint Reveal: Upon landing in Lake Lapcat, the player is immediately treated to the sight of Fury Bowser's huge footprints in Fur Step Island.
• Golden Super Mode: Mario gains a new powerup in the form of Giga Cat Mario (the form Mario takes upon using a Giga Bell) becomes entirely golden and gains spiky hair, reminiscent of Super Sonic or a Rajang, in order to actually fight Fury Bowser.
• Hate Plague: Fury Bowser will affect the normally-peaceful cats with his ink whenever he's active, during which they turn a shadowy purple and start attacking Mario on sight (this also prevents any lost kittens from being carried during Fury Bowser's activation). It's implied in the ending that rather then the paint corrupting him, Bowser's anger corrupted the paint into the ink that covers Lake Lapcat.
• Invisible Wall:
  • Even if the player can swim across the mass of black paint (or simply walk far away enough as Giga Cat Mario), they are stopped by a blue invisible wall like the footlight platforms that make up Trickity Tower.
  • You are stopped from going back to Fur Step Island before beating the game by a traditional (i.e. actually invisible) wall.
• Item Caddy: Bowser Jr. serves as this, carrying up to five of each power-up for Mario to switch to on the fly.
• Kaiju:
  • The game revolves around Bowser turning into a massive, monstrous version of himself called Fury Bower, forcing Mario and Bowser Jr. to locate a power-up called the Giga Bell that can turn Mario into Giga Cat Mario to combat him. If you get damaged while using Giga Bell, then Mario will lose the cat power-up, but will still remain big.
  • Taken Up to Eleven when Cat Mario and Cat Plessie touch the three Giga Bells Bowser had imprisoned in the ending, both become so gargantuan they completely dwarf Giant Bowser—cue an impending Belly Flop Crushing. Even when Mario reverts to normal size, celebrating with the cats of Lake Lapcat, the camera pans out to reveal they're dancing on the still-gigantic Cat Plessie.
• Jump Scare: For being a colossus, Fury Bowser has extremely adept jumping that he can virtually warp across the entire lake and, sometimes, even jump right in front of you in a second.
• Let Me at Him!: Bowser Jr. has to hold his father from ripping Mario to shreds after changing him back to normal in the ending.
• Loyal Animal Companion: Plessie has a much more expanded role here than in 3D World and once they appear, the friendly aquatic dinosaur will come to and offer Mario lifts wherever he is on the map. Plessie is essential for confronting Giant Bowser for the final boss fight.
• Magical Land: Lake Lapcat is presented as one, being a place where everything down to the scenery is feline in form and Cat Shines unlock the Giga Bell power-ups, which are framed as having an ancient tie to fighting off evil. The different design and behavior of Lake Lapcat Cat Goombas compared to their 3D World appearance suggests that there is a difference between an enemy using the Super Bell power-up and an enemy being from Lake Lapcat, with the lake having some supernatural influence on the biology of creatures living there.
• Mega Neko: In order to fight Fury Bowser, Mario transforms into a Kaiju sized version of his cat form.
• Muscles Are Meaningless: Jr's just a kid with a pudgy build, with little in the way of obvious muscle. He still holds back his father, when he attempts to kill Mario after being brought back to normal, who's about the size of a car, and is strong enough to crash through stone with only his arms.
• Musical Nod: Scamper Shores' theme sneaks in the intro sequence of Super Mario Bros. 2's overworld theme.
• Mythology Gag: The first mission in Fort Flaptrap involves defeating Cat Bullies and is named "Bully the Cat Bullies", following the naming pattern of "Bully the Bullies" from Super Mario 64.
• Nice Job Fixing It, Villain: Fury Bowser awakening isn't all bad- it actually makes several Cat Shines available, either by his beam being the only thing able to destroy Fury Blocks hiding them or by spawning the migrating Lucky Isle, a small floating platform with five Shines on it, in the postgame. His rampages also bring many helpful platforms to bridge gaps or bounce up to high places, possibly reducing a platform or item-collection challenge. Because of this, Fury Bowser is often able to be the key to a Shine that will immediately drive him away.
• Not Zilla: Fury Bowser is a massive Homage to Godzilla, even to the point of his fire breath resembling Godzilla's Atomic Breath.
• Oh, Crap!: Fury Bowser is one for Mario and Jr. both, but this goes even further when in the final act neither collecting Cat Shines nor activating lighthouses can stop Bowser, with the Giga Bell contacting you to tell you that Bowser's gotten so unbelievably pissed that nothing's going to work on him anymore, Fury Bowser now pursuing you nonstop until you get the Cat Shines you need to activate the Giga Bell and fight him one last time. That being said, it's completely possible to avoid this headache altogether should the player prioritize collecting Cat Shines than fighting Fury Bowser the second-to-last time.
• One-Winged Angel: On top of the titular Fury Bowser, Giant Bowser, which is Bowser clean of the paint but possessing blindingly-white eyes.
• OOC Is Serious Business: Mario at first is showing no interest in getting Junior out of the mess he's in, not buying that Bowser suddenly turned and Junior has "no idea" how it happened. And he is absolutely right in that. However, it's when Junior lays out that he would never ask Mario for help in any circumstance, followed by earnestly pleading for him to save his father that Mario relents and throws his hat into the ring to put things right.
• Paint It Black: Bowser's new form Fury Bowser is inky-black, except for glowing red and yellow highlights aground his stomach, spikes, mouth, eyes, and flaming hair. As the ending reveals, it's quite literal thanks to Bowser Jr.'s prank.
• Palette Swap: The returning enemies and bosses look different due to their cat details, but these are purely aesthetic as they do not behave any differently from how they did in 3D World. Cat Goombas are an unusual case since they are functionally copies of regular 3D World Goombas and thus not palette swaps of 3D World's own Cat Goombas.
• Photo Mode: The Switch remake of this game includes the Snapshot Mode with Nintendo promoting some challenges with it. It's almost the same one as in Super Mario Odyssey, but the stamps are added to the environment instead of the picture.
• Post-End Game Content: Some things can only be done or collected after you roll the credits by defeating Bowser at 50 Cat Shines, such as completing the starting island and Lucky Isle, a glowing floating island that has five Cat Shines, only appears when Bowser is active, and moves locations every time he awakens.
• The Power of Hate: Due to his anger over being painted black by his son, Fury Bowser spreads his dark ink around Lake Lapcat, darkening the lighthouses and corrupting the cats with a Hate Plague. Near the end, his fury has gotten so bad that not even the lighthouses can hold him back anymore. Despite being cleared of said ink, Bowser still being big and rampaging shows that he really didn't like being pranked by his son. And REALLY HATED the fact that Mario, his nemesis, had to save him as well.
• Punny Name: The first island in the game is called "Fur Step Island." "Fur Step" sounds like "first step" and the island is embedded with Fury Bowser's footprints.
• Rated M for Manly: People didn't ignore the fact Fury Bowser sports pecs, coupled with his giant ominous form and darker color tones.
• Remixed Level: Each of the main islands changes with two new challenges when left and returned to after the first main challenge, achieving an effect between separate level missions in an older 3D Mario and a traditional remixed Mario level.
• RPG Elements: Fury Bowser has a health bar floating above his head, something that is typically seen in action RPGs and not in 3D Mario games.
• Solid Clouds: Cloud Lifts return in this game. In the Blue Coin Bustle mission in Slipskate Slope, Mario can skate on Cloud Lifts.
• Stalked by the Bell: The main focus of the game acts similar to Odyssey, as you must collect Cat Shines to unlock the Giga Cat Bells to use against Bowser's new form; however, Fury Bowser will periodically awaken and start rampaging across the island, and will only go back to hibernating either after a set amount of time, or if you find a Cat Shine during his rampage. As some Cat Shines can only be accessed while Fury Bowser is active, you must learn to use his rampages against him. Eventually, collecting a shine will be the only way to send him back, and by the endgame, nothing but the Giga Bell will stop his rampage.
• This Is Gonna Suck: Bowser Jr. whines at the ending, as he's grateful to Mario, but has to remain loyal to his father, so he imitates Bowser's earlier tirade of roars before happily rejoining his dad, who is restored to his normal grumpy self.
• Time-Limit Boss: Fury Bowser will not wait for Mario to obtain all the Cat Shines needed to confront him, and when he begins rampaging, watch out. Everytime he reincarnates he also resists the power of the Cat Shines and lighthouses more and more until they can no longer hold him back.
• Tranquil Fury: After being defeated for a third time, Fury Bowser transforms into Giant Bowser. Giant Bowser is identical to regular Bowser besides his gargantuan size and pupil-less eyes. However, unlike Fury Bowser who just rampaged across the lake, Giant Bowser is calm enough to steal the Giga Bells from Mario and retreat when the heroes are getting close enough to take them back.
• Tropical Island Adventure: The game takes place on a large lake with tropical islands, though said lake is also home to a freezing castle, a volcano, a wasteland, a colosseum, and a mechanical tower.
• Tsundere: Of the harsh kind. Bowser Jr. makes it clear to Mario that he only needs his help to calm his dad down, and in the ending, instead of thanking Mario for his help, Junior just roars in his face and runs away. However, the credits show that he's painted art of their adventure, and the first post-game mission, "Junior's Graffiti Gratitude" is him painting a mural of him and Mario collecting Cat Shines, and implies he is only able to express his true feelings through graffiti. Also, if Mario gets hurt, Junior will laugh, but if Mario dies, Junior reacts in shock and horror.
• Ungrateful Bastard: Even after you finally beat Bowser down to size, his titular fury still lingers on, with him still attempting to murder Mario. The only reason there wasn't a Post-Final Boss is because Jr. successfully held him back, but even Jr. seems to feel compelled to turn on Mario at the end...at least around his father.
• Unstoppable Rage: The only thing Fury Bowser seems to have any regard for is his hatred of Mario, and will confront and pursue the plumber wherever he goes. Until Mario can either find a shine fast or fight back with the power of the Giga Cat Bell, all he and Bowser Jr. can do is dodge and run. By the endgame, the unstoppable part becomes quite literal. The shines eventually stop working on him and only the Giga Bell can put an end to his rage.
• Unwitting Instigator of Doom: Poor Bowser Junior. Prank your dad by drawing on his face? Innocent mischief. Spread black paint on him with your magic paintbrush, causing his rage to turn the paint into a cascading corrosion that sends him spiraling into an apocalyptic wrath? You just screwed up major.
• Vacation Episode: Bowser Jr. and his father are in the lake due to a vacation gone wrong. Thanks to Bowser's transformation and the wrecking of their ship, their trip has turned into a nightmare.
• Waist-Deep Ocean: The colossal Fury Bowser is shown emerging from and retreating into water that is only ankle-deep when he's rampaging.
• Wave-Motion Gun: Fury Bowser's fire breath concentrated in a massive beam, in the vein of Godzilla's Atomic Breath.
• Weakened by the Light: Fury Bowser can be forced back into hibernating after finding a Cat Shine, which cleans up the lighthouse and gives Fury Bowser Scratch Damage. However, Bowser resists it more and more until, after 3 shines shy of 50, the light no longer weakens him, making his rampage endless and forcing you to unlock the Giga Bell to stop him once and for all.
• With Great Power Comes Great Insanity: Fury Bowser resembles Godzilla ◊ and is one of the strongest and most terrifying forms Bowser's ever obtained (only rivaled by Giga Bowser). But unlike his other Giant forms, the Koopa King's so consumed with fury that his sanity nosedives. Fury Bowser's a mindless rampaging monster that cannot distinguish friend from foe, obliterating everything with fury blasts and rains of fire and spikes. Even his doggedly-loyal son is concerned for him in this form, and allies with Mario to save his father.

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Golden Mushroom in Trick Track Hall Toad Brigade

Source: https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/VideoGame/SuperMario3DWorld

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