Mario Pinball may not have been the most original handheld title in Nintendo’s E3 booth, but it was a fun distraction nonetheless.

Mario Pinball almost instantly reminded me of an all-time favorite of mine, Pinball Quest for the NES. As in most virtual pinball games, the D-pad controlled the left flipper, and the A button controlled the right flipper. The pinball “tables" were divided into isometric rooms: the top of a room appears further away than its bottom. This simulated perspective, making use of pre-rendered environments, was very attractive and allowed for more vertical table space on-screen. In fact, it worked so well that there was no scrolling within any of the demo’s rooms.

The demo began with a western-looking room with roaming goombas. I cleared the bunch by knocking Mario (squished into a ball) around with the flippers, which activated a cannon in the center of the room. After coercing Mario into the cannon, I was presented with a selection of areas—I chose the ice-themed area first, and later explored a grassier locale. The worlds featured respectable variety in their rooms: some required me to simply clear the enemies and knock down a door to progress, while others offered branched paths. I one room, I created a hole in the iced floor by repeatedly knocking a giant ice block toward the top of the screen. This exposed a secret underwater room with treasure chests to open and familiar sea-faring baddies to thwart. A room in the temporate climate contained a “!" switch, though I didn’t have time to investigate further, unfortunately.

The coins squandered from chests and the more common question block could be used in Toad’s tent shop. Items purchased were used with the B button in-game and lasted for a predefined time limit. The super mushroom made Mario larger, and the pipe served as a center bumper. Overall, the available power-ups were less exciting than I had hoped for: swinging a raccoon tail or throwing hammers would be much cooler than briefly growing larger. In some rooms I also acquired stars by clearing enemies, which seemed to unlock doors (a la Super Mario 64), and blue coins, which I found no purpose for.

Mario Pinball’s enemies weren’t all alike: while I destroyed wandering goombas and circling penguins without much effort, I had to hit koopa troopas once to knock them on their backs and a second time (quickly) for victory. Mario Pinball also features bosses (or so I’ve heard), but I wasn’t skilled enough to encounter one in my scattered thirty minutes.

Mario Pinball looked good on the floor, and it showed off some great design concepts with its branched and hidden rooms, but I had trouble exploring the game. I had to hit Mario from just the right angle to travel through a door—the game was not generous in the slightest. I spent far too long in cleared rooms simply because I couldn’t advance my Mario ball. While such strictness might be fine and dandy for a pinball simulation, it is detrimental to a light-hearted pinball game featuring a deformed plumber.

Mario Pinball could use some tweaking, but its current level design leaves me intrigued as to what other Mario-inspired paraphernalia the final game will include. I don’t predict it will be a must-buy, but older codgers will likely get a kick out of a pinball game harkening back to simpler times.