Mario's Time Machine is set in the year 1993. Bowser, who has built a time machine called the "Timulator", travels back in time and steals essential artifacts from various points in human history to place on display in a museum inside his castle. Because these actions will eventually change history permanently, the player character Mario takes control of the Timulator to return the artifacts to their proper areas in time. In the NES version, Bowser also kidnaps Yoshi, who is freed upon completing the game. The gameplay focuses on teaching the player the historical significance of each artifact (and of the associated historical person); to progress through the game, the player must correctly answer questions relating to the learned information. Mario's Time Machine uses a side-scrolling perspective, with a game engine that varies across all three versions. The player controls Mario using a point-and-click interface in the MS-DOS version, while the console versions use a platforming-based control scheme adapted from Super Mario World, in which Mario can move left or right and jump. Like Mario Is Missing!, the console versions use a password system to order to resume play from a particular game state.