When I was 10 I bought a little electronic game that featured two men in dungarees frantically running up and down ladders as they passed cakes along a conveyor belt from an oven into a white van. Engraved on the front of that flip-open game was the eponymous title Super Mario Bros. Thus Mario and Luigi had arrived. At least in my world they had. Very soon I was rescuing Princess, killing Bowser, jumping on turtles, racing in cars against Donkey Kong and Toad and generally having a lot of fun with my two new plumber friends. And there is still a lot of Mario fun to be had, even without a Nintendo. Enjoy:

• Super Mario World Deluxe - If your thumbs weren't bleeding you weren't serious
• Super Mario 3 - Incredible recreation with joystick option
• Super Mario, Blue Twilight - Interesting unofficial reincarnation
• ZSNES - Super Nintendo emulator with Super Mario Kart
• Secret Maryo Chronicles Open Source version with level editor
• Super Mario War Mario goes psycho in this deathmatch edition
• Whack-A-Monty (Pocket PC) - Hidden Mario game for mobile phones
• Super Goboy (Symbian) - Gameboy emulator with Mario and Zelda