One of the biggest cultural phenomenons in recent memory was ‘Barbenheimer,’ in which the people celebrated the humourous July 22nd dual-release of Barbie and Oppenheimer. After all, the two couldn’t be more different: one was bright, colourful and overall feel-good, while the other was bleak, intense and depressing.
Now, the world of video games is having its own “Barbenheimer” of sorts with the October 20th launch of both Marvel’s Spider-Man 2 and Super Mario Bros. Wonder. While not without its own warmth and lightheartedness, PlayStation’s Spider-Man game is a darker Empire Strikes Back-type sequel that features daunting new foes like Venom for both Peter Parker and Miles Morales’ respective superheroes. Super Mario Bros. Wonder, on the other hand, is a cutesy 2D platformer in which the titular plumber can transform into an elephant.
Of course, it’s not quite as jarring of a double-feature as Barbenheimer, since Mario and Spider-Man are both inherently family-friendly, unlike Oppenheimer. Nonetheless, the simultaneous Mario and Spider-Man release — which we’ll unofficially call “Super Spider Bros.” — is an amusing coincidence.
Really, there hasn’t quite been anything like it in 2023, even with the year being so stacked for games. (The September 6th launch of Starfield on Xbox and PC and Baldur’s Gate 3 on PS5 port is perhaps the closest analogue, although even then, both are massive RPGs.)
Thankfully, both Marvel’s Spider-Man 2 and Super Mario Bros. Wonder have been extremely well-received, garnering a 91 and 93 on Metacritic, respectively. MobileSyrup also loved both games — check out our respective Spider-Man and Mario reviews.
On top of that, MobileSyrup has some more coverage for each game. For Mario fans, here’s our interview with Wonder director Shiro Mouri and legendary Mario designer Takashi Tezuka. In case you missed it, we also now know who’s replaced Charles Martinet as the voice of Mario.
Meanwhile, we have two interviews for Marvel’s Spider-Man 2 — a narrative-focused conversation with Ben Arfmann (narrative director) and Lauren Mee (advanced senior writer), and a PS5 tech-centred discussion with Johannes Hammers (advanced senior audio designer) and Doug Sheahan (senior programming director).
Are you planning to play Marvel’s Spider-Man 2, Super Mario Bros. Wonder, or both? If so, which one are you picking up first? Let us know in the comments.
Update: 20/10/2023 at 12:27pm ET — Shoutout to Brent on X (Twitter) for rather astutely pointing out that we did get a more diametrically opposed video game pairing in 2020: Doom Eternal and Animal Crossing: New Horizons. We totally forgot — that’s on us. In our defence, those first few weeks of the COVID-19 pandemic were wild!
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