However, Nintendo of America found this sequel too similar to its predecessor, and its difficulty too frustrating, for the nascent American market.

This prompted a second Super Mario Bros. sequel based on Yume Kōjō: Doki Doki Panic,[a] Nintendo's 1987 Family Computer Disk System game which had been based on a prototype platforming game and released as an advergame for Fuji Television's Yume Kōjō '87 media technology expo.

The objective is to navigate the player's character through the dream world Subcon and defeat the main antagonist Wart.

Magic potions found in each level are used to temporarily access "Sub-space", a reflected, unscrollable area where the player can collect coins and Mushrooms that increase the character's maximum health.

Mario suddenly awakes and decides to tell Luigi, Toad, and Princess Toadstool, who all report experiencing the same dream.

Nintendo of America did not want the increasingly popular Mario series to be too difficult to a recovering, transfiguring, and expanding market — nor to be stylistically outdated by the time the Japanese Super Mario Bros. 2 could be eventually converted to the NES's cartridge format, localized, and mass-produced for America.

[6] The first prototype's gameplay emphasizes vertically scrolling levels with two-player cooperative action: lifting, carrying, and throwing each other; lifting, carrying, throwing, stacking, and climbing objects; and incrementally scrolling the screen upward when reaching the top.

Dissatisfied so far, Miyamoto then added the traditional horizontal scrolling, saying to "make something a little bit more Mario-like",[10] and saying "Maybe we need to change this up ... As long as it's fun, anything goes".

However, the prototype software was too complex for Famicom hardware at the time, and the gameplay was still considered lacking, especially in single-player mode.

[6] Unwilling to compromise on gameplay, Tanabe suspended development of the prototype until eventually receiving instruction to use the Yume Kōjō festival mascots in a game.

The title and character concept were inspired by a license cooperation between Nintendo and Fuji Television to promote the broadcaster's Yume Kōjō '87 event, which showcased several of its latest TV shows and consumer products.

[6] The Yume Kōjō festival's mascots became the game's protagonists: a family consisting of the boy Imajin, his girlfriend Lina, and his parents Mama and Papa.

The rest of the game's characters, including the main villain named Mamu, were created by Nintendo for the project.

[12] Summarizing Tanabe's recollections within a 2011 interview, Wired said "Although the initial concept for the game had been scrapped, the development of that original two-player cooperative prototype inspired all the innovative gameplay of Super Mario Bros.

[6] For the international conversion into Super Mario Bros. 2, many graphical changes were made to the scenery and characters' look, animation, and identity.

[13][14] The R&D4 staff modified the character likenesses of Mario, Luigi, Princess Toadstool, and Toad, building them over their respective counterpart models of Imajin, Mama, Lina, and Papa.

[15] Yume Kōjō: Doki Doki Panic needed only a few alterations for its conversion into the Mario series because its gameplay elements were already so heavily rooted in it: Starman for invincibility, the sound effects of coins and jumps, POW blocks, warp zones, and a soundtrack by Super Mario Bros. composer Koji Kondo.

Nintendo has continued to re-release both games, each with the official sequel title of Super Mario Bros. 2 in their respective regions.

It is possible to change the character after losing a single life, while the original version allows changing it only after completing a level or when the player loses all their lives and chooses "Continue", making the game more forgiving when choosing a character not adept at some specific level.

In March–April 1996, Nintendo's partnership with the St.GIGA satellite radio station released an ura or gaiden version of the game for the Satellaview system, titled BS Super Mario USA Power Challenge[d].

[23] It features 16-bit audiovisual enhancements to the 8-bit original in the fashion of Super Mario All-Stars, plus "SoundLink" narration (radio drama-style streaming voice data intended to guide players through the game and give helpful hints and advice) and broadcast CD-quality music.

Another feature unique to the game is the inclusion of gold Mario statues (ten in total for each chapter) that are hidden in various locations (including Sub-Space).

After clearing a level, the player could press "Select" to see some statistics such as the number of statues, coins, cherries, and mushrooms collected, as well as displaying which bosses had been defeated.

Graphical and audio enhancements appear in the form of enlarged sprites, multiple hit combos, digital voice acting, and such minor stylistic and aesthetic changes as an altered default health-meter level, boss-order, backgrounds, the size of hearts, Princess Toadstool being renamed to the now-standard "Princess Peach", and the inclusion of a chime to announce Stars.

[30] Upon release, Super Mario Bros. 2 was the top-selling video game in the United States for fourteen consecutive months, from October 1988[45] through late 1988,[46][47][48] into 1989[49][50][51] through spring[52][53][54] and summer,[55][56][57] to November 1989.

[68] The re-release as Super Mario Advance in 2001 received generally positive reviews, garnering an aggregate score of 84/100 on Metacritic.

[69] One reviewer concluded "all nostalgia and historical influence aside, Super Mario Bros. 2 is still a game worth playing on the merits of its gameplay alone", and that "the only reason you may not want to pick it up is if ... you already own it in another form.