So it turns out I'm basically the best Mario 35 player of all time, and I never would have known this if they didn't release Mario 35. I shouldn't give away all of my secrets, but I like you guys, so here we go.
First, this is kind of obvious, but the goal is to be the last one standing. You can die to enemies or pits, but once you're not dying to those, your main concern is time.
You max out at 400 seconds on the clock, and you should be reaching that fairly easily and staying there for most of the game. The best way to increase your time is to defeat enemies. You get the most time from consecutive jumps and shell kills. You get more time from starman kills than from single hops, and you get more time from hops than from fireball kills. Even so, you usually have enough enemies onscreen that you can afford to fireball as many as you care to do.
For 20 coins, you can spin the item roulette, which will give you a mushroom, fire flower, starman, or POW block. Save your coins for when you're small, unless you're really short on time and need enemies dead now.
You can take levels at a fairly slow pace for most of the game. Rushing will not usually benefit you. When it gets down to a couple of players left, the timer will run way faster. (It will also go turbo if you stop moving for too long, so don't actually stop moving.) As long as you're staying near 400 seconds, don't feel pressured to advance.
Learn the location of the power-ups in the first two levels at the very least. There are two power-ups and a starman in 1-2 before the first pit. There are even more hidden goodies in world 2, although in my experience, you spend almost all your time in world 1.
You get a big coin bonus if an opponent dies to an enemy you sent. It can be worthwhile to go out of your way to kill hammer bros or Bowser.
The warp zone gives you a random selection of levels. This is always better than advancing to 1-3, a level with unpredictable enemies and few power-ups. Relatedly, water levels are awful and should be avoided whenever possible.
First, this is kind of obvious, but the goal is to be the last one standing. You can die to enemies or pits, but once you're not dying to those, your main concern is time.
You max out at 400 seconds on the clock, and you should be reaching that fairly easily and staying there for most of the game. The best way to increase your time is to defeat enemies. You get the most time from consecutive jumps and shell kills. You get more time from starman kills than from single hops, and you get more time from hops than from fireball kills. Even so, you usually have enough enemies onscreen that you can afford to fireball as many as you care to do.
For 20 coins, you can spin the item roulette, which will give you a mushroom, fire flower, starman, or POW block. Save your coins for when you're small, unless you're really short on time and need enemies dead now.
You can take levels at a fairly slow pace for most of the game. Rushing will not usually benefit you. When it gets down to a couple of players left, the timer will run way faster. (It will also go turbo if you stop moving for too long, so don't actually stop moving.) As long as you're staying near 400 seconds, don't feel pressured to advance.
Learn the location of the power-ups in the first two levels at the very least. There are two power-ups and a starman in 1-2 before the first pit. There are even more hidden goodies in world 2, although in my experience, you spend almost all your time in world 1.
You get a big coin bonus if an opponent dies to an enemy you sent. It can be worthwhile to go out of your way to kill hammer bros or Bowser.
The warp zone gives you a random selection of levels. This is always better than advancing to 1-3, a level with unpredictable enemies and few power-ups. Relatedly, water levels are awful and should be avoided whenever possible.