The Masochistic Gaming Ecstasy of Super Mario ‘Kaizo’ Hacks
A nightmare from your childhood, this Mario exists to break you. But you’ll find meaning in the pain.
Every night for the past several weeks, a cheerful, plump plumber arrives at my apartment and brutalizes me. Sometimes, his overalls are blue, other times red, but his cruel smile is constant. His mustache never changes. Something has gone bad with this version of Nintendo’s enduring, pipe-diving mascot Mario. He’s been modified, his game hacked into a nightmarishly difficult torture chamber that I have foolishly dedicated myself to successfully navigating.
I have decided to learn how to play “kaizo” Mario.
These are fan-made versions of Nintendo titles you might recognize, like Super Mario Bros. 3 or Super Mario World, and they’ve become increasingly popular, thanks to livestreams and video game marathons like “Games Done Quick.” Devilish enthusiasts have changed the games’ original source codes to create relentlessly-difficult new levels on top of the bones of childhood challenges, making exquisite corpses of adolescent memories.
“Kaizo” is loosely translated from the Japanese 改造 as “reconstruction,” a reference to the way in which these games break and reassemble original Mario games into new…
