very cool stuff.  I was looking at the package today in Best Buy (getting it for Xmas from my lady, hopefully) and was pretty impressed with the box and the fold open cover.  the two full DVD cases are very welcome, what with Nintendo putting Wii Sports/Resort in just cardboard cases in the new bundles.  some of the things included might be a bit thin for some but its a nice little package.

I really enjoyed watching your cat's head bounce in rhythm to Mario getting coins. Is it strange that the inclusion of the Princess Peach letter really increases my interest in buying the collection?

The letter isn't part of the package, unfortunately. It is PR material that came with the copy. I do wish it was part of the package, though, as it is very cool and very nostalgic.

The damn seal on the box ripped some of the artwork of the top, they should have just used plastic wrap like normal. The artbook is OK (I guess I won't spoil what is in it either), but I don't see myself looking through it again. I also wish the soundtrack had a track listing so I would know what I should write when importing it to my Xbox 360 (and importing it on PlayStation 3 didn't help as the track names were all wrong). I will not mention issues with the actual game here though (other than the disc will be in 4:3 with black bars on the side).

What I did for that was take a really thin pair of scissors and carefully cut it while not damaging the artwork.

:confused;

:@

::)

C'mon, in this day and age we should be able to play these games stretched out if we want, as I believe Virtual Console games let you do.  I just ran into a similar issue of laziness with the Wii port of the Resident Evil Remake and its forced 4:3, so I'm not looking forward to having to put up with forced 4:3 on these games as well.

Agreed, this was the first time I ever had to play games in 4:3 on my Wii (or any system really) since I have my Wii set to stretch games out if they don't already play in 16:9. You get used to it, but I still find it odd that Nintendo didn't bother with this since I doubt it would have taken much effort.

I personally like the fact that the game is forced into 4:3 because I like playing games and watching movies in their original aspect ratio. I don't think it was a lack of effort on Nintendo's part that there is no stretch option (not that a rom is much effort). I think Nintendo wanted to make it hassle free to play the games in 4:3 as most people remember them (for VC games I have to change my TV settings to 4:3 to get them to display with their original aspect ratio).

Look on the back of the case (not the box) that the disc came in. :D

Agreed.  I hate the way VC games are stretched unless you go in and adjust the settings... every time...

Naturally, instead the solution is to penalize all the people who own widescreen TVs by not even giving them the option of stretching the image to fit their TV.  Honestly, this is Amateur Hour stuff here: Nintendo could have easily given people the option to play the game in whatever aspect ratio they want, but that would require work and that means less easy profits.

The original ROM does not stretch to widescreen.  This is a re-release of the original ROM.  Nothing is stopping you from using your TV to force the display into widescreen.

If Resident Evil Archives is any indication, my TV will not switch to a mode that stretches the image on disc games.  I can on WiiWare games like Blaster Masters Overdrive, but not Wii Disc games.

I thought every television has a mode that will stretch out any 4:3 signal, but I guess not. I know my parents' television has a "full" option that will stretch out any signal to fit the whole screen, including all video games and VHS tapes.

It's too bad that letter isn't a part of the package, it is pretty neat.

Yeah, my TV will stretch pretty much any image I give it...except for some odd reason Wii disc games if the resolution is hard coded to 4:3 (and presumably GameCube games as well, though I haven't tried it).  It's odd and annoying, though I guess after a few hours of play you just reluctantly get used to it.

I personally don't mind it when a classic game or movie is in 4:3 ratio. Since that's how the game was designed/movie was shot then I can't expect them to make a miracle and make it fit into a widescreen setup.

I didn't used to mind it, either, when I was still playing my Wii games on my 23 in. LCD TV (which is now being used for my PS3 games), but ever since my Wii got hooked up to the old 40 in. TV I got last Christmas, it bugs me when there's just that much TV real estate covered by black bars when ordinarily there is content (especially since the Wii menu itself fills the screen).

You mean something that fills the black bars? That's what some developers do for the classic games on the xbox 360

Yeah.  I mean, I'd be fine with the forced 4:3 on the Mario collection if they put some artwork or something in the space the black bars cover.  It just looks very odd to go from the fully-filled Wii Menu to suddenly having what feels like half your screen covered by black bars.  It feels very claustrophic in a way.

And it's not like Nintendo hasn't done stuff like that before. The Super Game Boy, Game Boy Player, and the Pokemon Stadium games (which let you play the Pokemon GB games using a Transfer Pak) would all have borders around the games rather than stretch them out. I am not saying the games should be forced to stretch, just make it a option.

Don't forget Warioland Shake It!  this generation as well, which also displayed in forced 4:3 with colored borders and whatnot to fill in the extra space on widescreen TVs.

I actually prefer having black bars.  I find borders visually distracting.  Black bars blend in and are easy to ignore.

But why not have the options for native aspect ratio with black bars, native aspect ratio with border, and stretching to fit the entire screen?  Why is "options" such a dirty word to Nintendo?  Are they secretly fascists? ;)

It goes both ways too, I'm getting annoyed at the increasing number of games that have forced widescreen.

Well, in all fairness Widescreen TVs are rapidly becoming the standard now (can you even buy 4:3 TVs anymore in standard retail?), so games are moving to support that as the primary display method.  I can't think of a time where I saw a High-Def 4:3 TV.  Give it a couple of years, and there won't be a point to having 4:3 supported anymore outside of arthouse stylistic reasons because only an extreme minority will be using those old things.

I don't know. I can't imagine there are more widescreen televisions than HD televisions, and everything still supports standard definition because it's still the majority of what's out there. So it doesn't make sense to not still give the option for 4:3, especially considering how easy it is to do so.

It's a shame too, because CRT televisions have better picture quality. I guess I'll have to track down one of those widescreen HD CRTs that they made during the transition period.

Speaking as someone who owns both a 32 inch CRT HDTV and a 32 inch LCD HDTV, let me assure you that this is not at all true.

EXCEPTION!

CRT televisions, I've found, display older games better. I'm talking NES/SNES/N64/Dreamcast/PSOne games because they were designed with that sort of TV in mind. Playing a lot of N64 games on my big flatscreen looks bad. So I took my friend's old CRT and hooked my old systems up to it and I'm very happy with the results.

There are a lot of variables to consider, such as brand, quality, personal preference, etc. At the least, I've seen enough LCD and plasma televisions to know that they are too bright for my liking.

I think it's more because most newer televisions don't display standard definition content very well, because they have to covert it to the television's native resolution. This is especially noticeable with old gaming systems, because their resolution is even lower than what's considered standard definition. HD CRTs don't have a native resolution, so they can display any signal in its natural state.

I finally decided to pick this up. I was looking at the box and noticed that they didn't even bother to get the aspect ratio correct on the sprite art pasted inside the front cover. Yes, it's a nit-picky detail, but especially for something that they're supposed to be celebrating, like the rest of the package, it just reeks of cheap cash-in.

I want to know why most of the "Super Mario Bros. "and  "Super Mario 3's music and layout was changed. Also, the main screen of the original "Super Mario Bros." game had no music, whereas now the main screen has music(I like it when the main screen had no music).

Yeah! Who does Nintendo think they are? George Lucas?