The Game of Life Super Mario Board Game: Rules for How to Play

Objective

The objective of The Game of Life Super Mario is to be the first player to defeat Bowser.

Set Up

Assemble the spinner by attaching the cardboard piece to the bottom of the plastic spinner. Place the spinner on its base and attach the pointer to the base.
Place the gameboard in the middle of the table. Slide the tabs of the spinner into the holes in the gameboard.
Sort the money by its value and place each value into a slot in the storage tray.
Separate the star pegs by their colors, and place them in the storage tray.
Split the cards based on their types. Shuffle each set of cards separately and place them in facedown piles next to the gameboard.
Each player chooses a playing piece, and places it on the start space.
Each player takes five 1 coins and one 5 coin.
Everyone takes a turn spinning the spinner. The player that spins the highest number starts the game. Play moves left/clockwise throughout the game.

How to Play The Game of Life Super Mario

You will begin each turn spinning the spinner. The number you spin determines the number of spaces that you will move your playing piece. To begin the game you can choose which direction you want to move. Once you have started to move down a path, you must continue moving in the same direction on future turns. The easiest way to know which way you are moving around the track is to have your character face the direction that they are moving in.

Moving three spaces after spinning the spinner — The Yoshi player spun three on the spinner. They decided to take the left path off the start space. They move their piece three spaces.

Should you ever reach a space where the track splits in two directions, you can choose which of the two directions you want to move. You also have a choice in what direction to move after you choose to use a pipe to move.

Choosing which path to go down — The Peach player has reached a space that has two different paths to go down. They can either choose to go left or up.

While moving you will use all of the spaces that you spun with two exceptions. If you ever reach a Star space, you have to stop and take the corresponding action. Should you reach an orange space, you can either choose to stop and take the corresponding action or you can keep moving until you have moved up all of your spaces.

Choosing whether to stop on an orange space — The Luigi player reached an item space. They still have spaces remaining. They can either stop on the item space, or they can continue moving around the board.

Once you finished moving, you will take an action based on the space you landed on. See the corresponding space section below to see what each space does in The Game of Life Super Mario.

Should you ever owe coins but do not have enough to pay all that you owe, you will pay whatever coins you have. Any extra coins that you owe are ignored.

After you have taken the action for the space you landed on, your turn ends. Play passes to the player on your left.

Board Spaces of The Game of Life Super Mario

Coin

Should you land on a green coin space, look at what is pictured on the space. Should it have a + sign and a number, you will gain the corresponding number of coins from the bank. If the space shows a – sign and a number, you lose the corresponding number of coins. Should you land on the space pictured above, you would receive two coins.

Action

When you land on a action space, you will draw the top action card. Read it out loud and follow its directions.

After you complete the action on the card, you will return the card to the bottom of the action deck.

Minigame

The minigame space lets the players compete in a minigame. Draw the top minigame card and read out what is printed on the card. The minigames involve competing in thumb wars, playing rock paper scissors, or involve spinning the spinner. If the minigame does not involve all of the players, the player who lands on the space gets to pick who they will compete against. All of the players involved in the minigame will compete to see who wins it. The winner of the minigame receives a reward.

After the minigame is completed, you will return the card to the bottom of the corresponding deck.

Item

Whenever you reach an item space, you can choose to stop your movement even if you have spaces remaining. This is optional so you can continue moving and ignore the item space if you still have spaces remaining.

Should you land on the item space or choose to stop moving, you will draw the top item card. You will keep the item card to yourself, and you don’t have to tell the other players what you drew. The item cards give you different benefits during the game. You can choose when you want to use the card based on what the card says. Some cards can only be played at the start of your turn while other must be played at the start of other player’s turns. You may never use an item card when battling Bowser.

Once you use an item card, you will return the card to the bottom of the deck.

You may only have one item card in your hand at a time. If you still have an item card in your hand when you land on the item space, you can choose to draw a new card to replace the card in your hand. You will place your current card on the bottom of the corresponding pile, and then draw a new card.

Companion

Like the item spaces, you can choose to stop on a companion space even when you still have spaces left to move. Stopping is optional though, so you can continue moving if you don’t want to stop on the companion space.

When you stop on a companion space, you will draw two cards from the top of the companion deck. You will choose one to keep, and you will return the other card to the bottom of the deck. Place your chosen companion card face up on the table.

Choose a companion card — After landing on a companion space, the player drew these two cards. They will choose one of the two companions to keep. The other is returned to the bottom of the deck.

A companion cards benefit applies to you for as long as you have the card. Some of the characters have a lucky number. Their abilities only activate when a player spins their number at the beginning of their turn when they are first moving their character. Any spins outside of the first spin of a turn do not activate their ability. Should a character’s ability activate, you must use it before the current turn ends.

Spinning a companion's lucky number — One of the players spun a seven on their movement spin. The player holding the Toad companion card gets to take four coins from the bank.

You may only have three companion cards in front of you at a time. Should you already have three companion cards and you land on the companion space again, you can choose a new companion card (in the same way as detailed above) to replace one of the companion cards that you already have.

Pipe

The pipe spaces are orange so you can choose to stop on them even if you have spaces left to move. You can choose to move past the space if you still have spaces left.

When you stop on a pipe space, you can choose to travel to the other pipe space that is the same color. After you move to the other pipe space, you turn ends.

Two connected pipe spaces in The Game of Life Super Mario — The Luigi and Mario pawns are on two of the pipe spaces that are connected. When you land on either of these spaces, you can immediately move to the other pipe of the same color.

Star

Whenever you reach a star space you have to stop moving even if you still have spaces left.

You then have a choice to make. You can either collect five coins from the bank, or you can purchase a star for ten coins. Should you choose to purchase a star, you will pay ten coins to the bank and then take the corresponding color star peg and attach it to your playing pieces base. You may only purchase one star of each color.

Purchasing the green star — The Mario player landed on the green star space. They have decided to purchase the star. They pay ten coins to the bank and then add a green star to their base.

During the game you want to collect stars as they will help you when you decide to battle Bowser.

Winning the Game

As you move around the board you will collect coins and stars. You are trying to power up your character for the final battle against Bowser.

Once you have acquired two or more stars, you can choose to battle Bowser. If you want to collect more stars to make the battle easier, you can continue to collect stars. You will move towards Bowser’s Castle in order to battle him. You do not have to land on the castle by exact count. If you reach the space though, you must stop at it and battle Bowser.

To battle Bowser you will spin the spinner. You will add the number of stars you have to the number you spin. Each star adds one to the number you spun. This gives you your total number.

Should you spin twelve or higher, you have defeated Bowser. You win the game. The rest of the players count up their coins and stars to determine their position in the game. Each star is worth ten coins. The player with the highest total gets second place. The next player gets third and so on.

Defeating Bowser — The Luigi player collected all six stars and then reached the Bowser space. They ended up spinning a seven on the spinner. Since their total was 13, the Luigi player has won the game.

If your spin is under twelve, you failed to defeat Bowser. As punishment for failing the battle, you lose all of your coins. Your character is also sent back to start and your turn ends.

Failing to beat Bowser — The Mario player decided to challenge Bowser with only four stars. They spun a six on the spinner to make a total of ten. Since the Mario player didn’t spin high enough, they failed to defeat Bowser. They lose all of their coins and return to the start space.

The Game of Life Super Mario FAQ

If you have any questions about how to play the game, leave a comment below on this post. I will try to answer any questions asked as best and as quickly as possible.

Components

Gameboard
Spinner
4 Character Tokens
24 Star Pegs (4 of each color)
26 Action Cards
10 Minigame Cards
10 Companion Cards
10 Item Cards
4 Reference Cards
95 Coins
Storage Tray
Instructions

Year: 2021 | Publisher: Hasbro | Designer: Jordan Bello, Joe Bradford, Hasbro Studios

Genres: Family, Roll and Move

Ages: 8+ | Number of Players: 2-4 | Length of Game: 30-60 minutes

Difficulty: Light | Strategy: Light | Luck: Moderate-High

For more board and card game rules/how to plays, check out our complete alphabetical list of card and board game rules posts.

Written By:

Eric Mortensen

Eric Mortensen is an owner and head writer on Geeky Hobbies since 2014. He is an avid board game player and collector with over 3,000 board and card games in his collection. Since 2014 he has written more than 1,100 board game how to play guides.

Ashley von Bose

Saturday 7th of September 2024

Player 1 lands on a minigame. Another player, say player 3 wins the minigame and the reward is to move to any unoccupied space. Does that player also complete the action on the space they chose to move to for the reward? For example, they chose to move to a star space. Do they go ahead and buy the star before player 2 takes their turn?

Monday 9th of September 2024

The instructions are on the vague side when it comes to the minigames. I would think the player that won the minigame would get to take the action from the space they move to. Otherwise there wouldn't be much reward for winning the minigame. This is not an official answer as it is not directly addressed in the instructions. This is how I would personally handle the situation though.