What's your favorite halloween adjacent Mario level/location.

[Evil Captain Odyssey]

Ghost houses and haunted levels are a recurring theme in the mario series. What are your favorite examples of a halloween level/location in the Mario series.

Luigi's mansion is of course the obvious pick. I also like deep-dark galaxy, which isn't really halloween themed, but it does have a ghost ship, and enough of the spooky vibes are there.

 

[MiracleDinner]

Twilight Town / Creepy Steeple and The Underwhere

 

[Waluigi Time]

Bonneton, not necessarily Halloween-themed but I think it's Tim Burton enough to count. Shoutout to The Last Resort because I really like the visuals in that game.

 

[Ray Trace]

Luigi's Mansion locations are very obvious answers but in this thread, I'll answer with Painted Swampland. It's a very unique location in the Mario series and its background visuals are very memorable. Probably like the only level I remember fondly from NSMBU.

Though tbh in general we need more haunted biomes than just forests. Would like a haunted ice land or a haunted lava area for example.

 

[Borp]

The Pumpkin Zone from Mario Land 2. Also Haunted Hall from Donkey Kong Country 2.

 

[MegaBowser64]

Spoiler: quahahaha

Big Boo's Haunt from SM64, I really love the vibes going on there, the fact that the house isn't just a vast empty space with random little walls like in NSMB is very cool. Obviously the Mad Piano is cool, I like how there are 3 stories as well as a basement, and a interconnected... side... garage... thingy, and there's even ROOF ACCESS. It's awesome how the music isn't just extremely cheesy halloween-esque stuff and instead contributes to a lot of the level's fear factor. It's really neat how the whole thing happens in a cage, I love how the front of the house makes a face, the background is very cool, the textures are amazing, it's overall a very great spooky level.

I also like the haunted house in the background of GBA Boo Lake it's creepy cool

DS Twilight House is a good one, the trees in the background and the color of the sky make it cool, plus that central house

The problem with NSMB ghost houses is that they're not really houses, and just kind of stereotypical and dry? idk the original NSMB had ok ghost houses but it kind of went downhill from there

and of course we can't forget Horror Land.

 

[Koopa con Carne]

I was never a huge fan of ghost-themed areas in the Mario franchise proper (albeit I would lie if I said Bigmouth Galaxy wasn't a pretty fun level) but damn the Donkey Kong games have some hauntingly good gems.

Numero uno is Creepy Castle from DK64. They nailed the creepy atmosphere pretty much across the board and yet in a way that works well with the game's cartoonishness. I liked Frantic Factory as well.

Closely following them is the entirety of Gloomy Gulch in DK Country 2 (but not the DK Land 2 version because that replaces the setting and mechanics of Haunted Hall with those of a generic roller coaster level)