In the SNES game, player 1 controls Mario and player 2 controls Luigi. In the Game Boy Advance game, the player can choose to play as either Mario or Luigi by pressing the R button on the world map. Additionally, in the SNES version Luigi is an exact copy of Mario with a different color palette. In the Game Boy Advance version, Luigi was changed in several ways including:
• Luigi is taller and skinnier than Mario and more closely resembles his modern apperance. Luigi also wears blue overalls instead of his purple overalls from the SNES version.
• Luigi jumps higher, moves slower, and scuttles in mid-air much like he does in Super Mario Bros. 2 (U.S. version). He also runs slower and has worse traction than Mario.
• Luigi flies higher with his cape than Mario, but also flies slower.
• Fireballs from Fire Luigi bounce higher.
• When Luigi rides Yoshi, Yoshi doesn't instantly eat enemies; Yoshi can spit enemies out, and use some of them as weapons, but swallows them after 7-8 seconds.
• All coins will fall out of a block if Luigi hits it, whereas the coins come out one-by-one when Mario hits the same block.