Mario’s Space Adventures Explained: Every Time Nintendo Sent Him Outside the Atmosphere

The Super Mario Galaxy Movie has released, with Mario's latest cosmic adventure adapting two of his greatest games to the big screen. But while the film brings this interstellar world back to the forefront, the Galaxy series is far from the first time Mario has ventured into outer space.

In fact, space has been a recurring thread throughout the franchise for decades, appearing across a wide range of games and media in often surprising ways. Main titles, spin-offs, educational games, and even cartoons have all embraced celestial settings — and given how inventive the Mario series is, it's no surprise that it often reaches beyond the Mushroom Kingdom. In order of release, here are 10 examples of Mario space sagas outside of Super Mario Galaxy.

10 The Super Mario Bros. Super Show!

In a Mario Galaxy Far, Far Away

Mario's first trip to space is definitely a strange one. The penultimate episode of 1989's The Super Mario Bros. Super Show! is a Star Wars parody titled "Star Koopa", which has Bowser (under the guise of Darth Koopa) commanding an army of Stormtroopas.

Mario and Koopa duel with "lightplungers" instead of lightsabers, the Koop Star replaces the Death Star, and the Mushroom Colony is led by Obi-Wan Toadi. Amazingly, that's not even the first Kenobi reference in this cartoon, with Mario seeking advice from Obi-Wan Cannoli in a live-action segment of another episode.

9 Mario Kart (Series)

Race the Rainbow

Any Mario Kart fan will instantly recognise the name Rainbow Road, which features in every single game as the final track in the Special Cup. As the name suggests, players race across a gigantic, floating, rainbow-coloured path with a pristine glass surface. It has a different iteration in each title, but all versions — except the ones in Double Dash!! and World — take place in space.

It's often also the most difficult track to complete in each game, littered with hazards and featuring tons of sharp twists and curves. Rainbow Road also tends to have few or no railings, so racers are constantly at risk of falling off the track. Its iconic status has led to multiple appearances across other Mario media, such as a giant path in Super Mario Galaxy 2, a stage in Super Smash Bros. for Nintendo 3DS, and a thrilling scene in The Super Mario Bros. Movie.

8 Super Mario Land 2: 6 Golden Coins

You've Just Crossed Over Into the Space Zone

As far as Mario's platforming adventures go, his first series of space-themed levels dates back to his second mainline Game Boy outing, Super Mario Land 2: 6 Golden Coins. The game is split into six different worlds, and one of its most memorable is the Space Zone. The levels here have low gravity, so Mario can jump much higher than usual on the Moon Course and float indefinitely on the Star Course.

The Zone ends with a boss fight with Tatanga, an alien invader and the main antagonist of the first Super Mario Land. Tatanga's role has been demoted in the sequel, now serving as Wario's henchman, but with his spacecraft capable of firing flurries of projectiles, he's still no pushover. He is also notable for being the first extraterrestrial main villain to appear in the Super Mario franchise.

7 Mario's Time Machine

One Small Step for Man, One Step Back for Gameplay Quality

By far the most obscure game on this list, Mario's Time Machine was an educational MS-DOS game intended to teach young players basic history. In it, Bowser uses a time machine to steal significant artifacts from various points of history to display in his own personal museum. In the NES re-release, one of those items is the American flag from the Apollo 11 mission.

Mario uses the time machine to travel to 1969, emerging on the Moon to return the flag to the Apollo Lunar Module. It's over before you know it, and it's not nearly as fun as Super Mario Land 2's Space Zone — Time Machine as a whole received negative reviews due to its barebones gameplay — so this one's definitely more of a curiosity than a recommendation.

6 Super Mario World 2: Yoshi's Island

Raphael is Cool But Rude

Though Raphael the Raven's Castle is grounded on Yoshi's Island, the Moon can be seen in the starry background, foreshadowing World 5's amazing climax. When Yoshi and Baby Mario reach the top, Kamek declares, "I banish you to forever twinkle in the heavens, BEGONE!!" Raphael, having enlarged due to Kamek's magic, boots the heroic duo all the way to a small moon.

This is where the showdown against the oversized bird takes place, with gravity allowing you to circle the entire moon long before Super Mario Galaxy made it a regular gimmick. This is also the only time when Baby Mario won't cry if he falls off Yoshi's back, so he certainly seems to have become comfortable with outer space very early in his life.

5 Mario Party (Series)

Black Holes and Dice Rolls

Mario hasn't just ventured into space — he's hosted parties up there! With Mario Party being such a massive series, it has far too many space-themed boards to cover — but Mario Party 2's Space Land is perhaps the most notable, as it was considered cherished enough for a return in the best-of compilation Mario Party Superstars.

There is also plenty of creative space-themed mayhem to be found across the series' mini-games, with players ground-pounding panels to match spaceships in "ID UFO," trying to escape an event horizon in "Black Hole Boogie," and racing hovercrafts in the F-Zero-like "Cosmic Slalom."

4 Paper Mario (Series)

These Space Trips Aren't Paper-Thin

Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door, one of Mario’s most beloved RPGs, also takes a surprising detour into space. The planetary plumber and his pals use a cannon to blast themselves to the Moon in order to retrieve the Crystal Star. The low gravity allows for higher jumps but also causes slower movement, making it tricky to avoid the spiky Moon Cleft enemies.

Not knowing what dimensions await them behind the doors of Flipside Tower, Mario's arrival in outer space comes as a sudden surprise to him in Wii follow-up Super Paper Mario — and not a pleasant one. The lack of oxygen rarely seemed to faze Mario in his previous space adventures, but this game decides to add a small dose of reality to the proceedings, and companion Tippi is forced to warp them back to the tower before Mario perishes.

The gang returns after Mario acquires a fishbowl to use as a helmet, and forms an alliance with an alien called Squirps. From here, the game essentially becomes a 2D shoot-'em-up, with Mario flying through space and using Squirps to shoot beams at incoming threats.

3 Mario Golf: World Tour

Great Galactic Golfing

Mario's Star was the final and most difficult course in Nintendo 64 sports spin-off Mario Golf. It's a visual feast for Mario fans, with each hole based on different characters from the franchise. 3DS sequel Mario Golf: World Tour took the course to the next frontier when DLC introduced a remade version, giving it a beautiful new Super Mario Galaxy-themed makeover.

This took Mario's Star out of its 64-bit clouds and into space, with stars shooting across vibrant nebula backdrops and Galaxy elements such as Star Bits and Rainbow Stars introduced. The Star Pack DLC also debuts Rosalina as a playable character in the Mario Golf series, who brings some of her cosmic magic into the game — instead of directly holding her club, she levitates and controls it with her Star Wand.

2 Super Mario Odyssey

Peaches, I Love You... to the Moon and Back

Mario's newest 3D outing pivoted from galaxy hopping to globe-trotting, but that doesn't mean there isn't another space adventure snuck in here. The story's final destination is the Moon Kingdom, which is where Bowser intends to force Princess Peach into marrying him.

Once again, the low gravity means higher jumps, though this disappears when Mario gets to the lava-layered Underground Moon Caverns. The surface is also home to the invulnerable Moonsnakes, spiky serpentine beings made of rock and metal. The in-game brochure even speculates that these may be the evolutionary origin of all life on Earth.

1 Mario + Rabbids Sparks of Hope

Better to Light a Spark Than Cursa the Darkmess

Much like the Super Mario Galaxy games, the entirety of Mario + Rabbids Sparks of Hope is an interstellar adventure. The crew use the WM ARC ("Washing Machine Advanced Rabbid Carrier") spaceship to travel to various planets in their goal to rescue the Sparks, which are Luma-Rabbid hybrids.

The game's main antagonist is Cursa, an entity aiming to cover the galaxy in Darkmess — a cosmic blight that engulfs entire planets with its dark matter-like substance. It even absorbed and merged with the Watcher of the Stars herself, Rosalina, and conquered her Cosmic Observatory, pushing Mario’s cosmic adventures to their most dramatic extreme.