Well even though they are different games in a lot of ways, there are a lot of similarities to Bonk and Super Mario Bros. The power-ups, smashing enemies, bright, colorful graphics and the easy difficulty. I don't they were trying to rip off Mario per se, but let's face it, Bonk is their (very good) attempt at a fun, entertaining, character-based action platformer which needed to be kid friendly and easy to pick up and enjoy. If you are looking for extreme challenge it's not the place to find it.