Everything you need to know about Super Mario Run's brand new game mode

Image: Nintendo

There’s a whole bunch of Super Mario Run news to be enjoyed on Wednesday morning, but not all of it was good news. It’s great that Nintendo’s hot new title became the fastest mobile game ever to surpass 25 million downloads, hitting the major milestone in just four days (in fact, the game was actually downloaded 40 million times in its first four days!). How impressive is that feat? The previous record was held by Pokemon Go, which took 11 days to reach 25 million downloads. On the flip side of the coin, Nintendo also gave us some bad news: Super Mario Run won’t be updated with any fresh new levels, free or paid, as many users had been hoping.

While it’s obviously sad news that there are no additional levels or worlds coming to Super Mario Run, that doesn’t completely rule out the addition of other types of new content. In fact, Nintendo has already added a brand new game mode to its wildly popular iPhone app, and we’ll tell you everything you need to know about it.

Super Mario Run has been available on the iPhone for just six days now, but players have already been treated to a solid update and now, a brand new game mode. Dubbed “Friendly Mode,” the new addition allows users to compete against their friends in a fun and less competitive way. Here’s how it works:

First and foremost, you’ll need to have added some friends in order to try the new Friendly Mode feature, which is basically a “friendly run” that you can participate in without having to pay any Rally Tickets. Simply choose the friend you’d like to challenge from your friends list, and you’ll be off to the races. You won’t pay any Rally Tickets to race, and you won’t earn any coins, gain any Toad followers or level-up any enemies. You can basically think of it as practice mode.

If you haven’t coughed up $10 for the full game, you’ll be able to play Friendly Mode just one time per day. If you’ve paid for the full version and cleared world 1, you can play up to three times per day. And if you’ve cleared world 2 and beyond, you can play Friendly Mode as many as five times each day.

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Zach Epstein Executive Editor

Zach Epstein has been the Executive Editor at BGR for more than 15 years. He manages BGR’s editorial team and ensures that best practices are adhered to. He also oversees the Ecommerce team and directs the daily flow of all content. Zach first joined BGR in 2007 as a Staff Writer covering business, technology, and entertainment.

His work has been quoted by countless top news organizations, and he was recently named one of the world's top 10 “power mobile influencers” by Forbes. Prior to BGR, Zach worked as an executive in marketing and business development with two private telcos.