At the time of this writing, Vermont senator Bernie Sanders is in a heated race with former Vice President Joe Biden as the two compete to be the Democratic nominee for president. Supporters for both candidates have come up with unique ways to get out the message about their preferred choice, but the Super Bernie World video game may be one of the most creative yet.
Super Bernie World is a retro, NES-style platformer inspired by Nintendo's Super Mario Bros. franchise. Developed by Emma Maassen and her team, Super Bernie World is hoping to encourage people to vote for Bernie, and its main menu even includes a link to donate to the Bernie Sanders campaign. The gameplay is typical Super Mario Bros. fare, but with a Bernie Sanders twist. For example, instead of collecting mushrooms like Mario does, Bernie instead eats Vermont cheese to get more power. Those that want to check it out for themselves can play Super Bernie World in their browser by clicking here.
The enemies in the game mostly consist of right-wing political figures. The Super Bernie World Goombas appear to be wearing Donald Trump MAGA hats, and the Koopa enemies are meant to look like Kentucky senator Mitch McConnell. Instead of taking on Bowser, Bernie instead fights Republican politicians, including current president of the United States Donald Trump.
This isn't the first time that Bernie Sanders has been featured in a video game. Back in 2016, a Bernie Sanders RPG was successfully funded on Kickstarter, and the Vermont senator has appeared in a variety of other political parody games as well.
Besides occasionally appearing in video games, Sanders has also had a presence in the real world video game industry. Sanders has pushed the video game industry to unionize, and was the first major politician to create his own Twitch channel. Bernie has also spoken out against video games being blamed for real world violence, and has said that he stands in solidarity with both gamers and game developers.
Most recently, Sonic Fox told people to vote for Bernie after winning the Mortal Kombat 11 Final Kombat tournament. Whether or not this support from gamers translates into actual votes in the ongoing Democratic primary remains to be seen.
Super Bernie World is out now for PC.