Dr. Mario World is an Infectious Puzzle Game – Review (iOS)

Dr. Mario World is a new mobile take on a classic SNES game, and a great follow up to be sure. By combining the best parts of the original Dr. Mario with new gameplay, Nintendo has created an addicting yet relaxed mobile game that stands on its own.  

Visually, Dr. Mario World’s graphics are good for a mobile game. All of the characters, worlds, and gameplay maintain a steady movement, while not being overly complicated. Mario, Peach, Bowser, and many others have all become doctors, sporting lab coats and other medical wear to convince us of their legitimacy to help both the citizens of the Mushroom kingdom and the Koopas survive the onslaught of viruses coming their way. By maintaining the feel of the original Dr. Mario during each level as well as adding a map similar to the Super Mario series, this game is sure to bring on nostalgia in many different facets. Even the music maintains a similar melody to Dr. Mario (though varying enough that you don’t get more frustrated at the music than the difficult levels of the game like the original… or maybe that was just me).

The gameplay includes similar rules to the original Dr. Mario; the player moves pills around to create matches in order to eliminate all of the viruses onscreen. Instead of the level constantly adding more viruses and increasing in speed, Dr. Mario World sets out to add more variance to the puzzle solving involving locked areas, blocks, frozen or moving viruses, and much more. This allows the levels to become increasingly more challenging, while maintaining variety and suspense with each new trial. For each attempt at a level a life is used. When the lives are depleted, the player must either wait for a new life to show up or purchase a life, though this is only applicable in the stages mode.

The touchscreen on smaller phones creates some frustration as the players’ fingers cover up a lot of the levels and it is very easy to accidentally double click and ruin your chances of beating a level. One of the great new mechanics created specifically for the mobile game, however, involves grabbing pieces of the pills and dragging them through other pieces, viruses, and blocks to create a match. This mechanic seriously modifies the way one plays Dr. Mario World, and it is a welcome change.

In Dr. Mario World, the player chooses one of Nintendo’s favorite characters to play as, progressively adding more options of characters throughout the game. Each character has their own bonus; for instance, when powered up, Dr. Bowser can destroy two random rows of viruses and pills, and Dr. Peach clears one random column. Other various power-ups affect the gameplay as well, including the option to destroy pills, add time, and increase the score. In addition to a doctor character, the player can choose separate assistants that create bonuses as well. These bonuses vary slightly between the stages mode and versus, but do provide an edge against the level or your opponent.

In the stages mode, the player progresses through worlds to help defeat the viruses and save the Mushroom kingdom and Koopas, while in the versus mode, the player either competes with a global matchup or their friends to achieve extra points and bonuses. In the versus mode, reaching separate tiers also creates a discount in the game’s store. Like many mobile games, Dr. Mario World includes a shop to purchase game currency to excel the player’s progress. The majority of purchasable options are completely unnecessary as long as the player has relatively high patience. 

Dr. Mario World creates a fresh look at a well-loved game, creating suspense and variety while maintaining the nostalgic gameplay of its namesake. Overall, the largest issues with the game include difficulty to be precise with gameplay on smaller phones due to the touchscreen’s mechanics in gameplay, as well as the loading times sometimes being longer than necessary when the game is exited and reopened again. Dr. Mario World is a great mobile game that any Nintendo or puzzle game fans of all would enjoy.

Check out our Review Guide to see what we criteria we use to score games.