The gameplay will remind you of Super Mario games, and that would be a very good thing – if MSD would give you the mushrooms, the flowers, the question boxes, and other bonus items that made playing Mario more fun than frustrating. Enemies seem to appear out of nowhere, and there is no save feature to make the going less painful. This means everyone but the most expert action gamers will probably give up long before they reach the halfway point.

To its credit, MSD offers much more production value and gameplay than most of its contemporaries: seven levels, with two "sub-chapters" and one boss each. The settings are very diverse: you will traverse an industrial city, a winter wonderland, long catacombs, and even a wacky topsy-turvy universe. The parallax scrolling is very smooth, and there are many secrets to uncover as well as a split-screen two-player mode. But when all is said and done, MSD is far too unforgiving to appeal to anyone but the most hardened joystick experts. Recommended, but be warned if you found Super Mario a hard game – this excellent tribute is far more challenging.