Makin’ Marios Together

Super Mario Maker is a dream come true for some of us, particularly the children of the 80s who would imagine their own designs for Super Mario Bros. during boring periods in school. This title’s soon-to-be existence feels like someone at Nintendo realized this audience has come of age, and would enjoy a viable venue with which to assemble their own levels and share them as they see fit.

Thanks to the tools it will include, it’s also an equal opportunity product. Those of us who grew up with Mario Bros., Super Mario Bros. 3, and Super Mario World will be able to craft our own levels in their worlds, and let other players experience them. That especially qualifies for those who were smart enough to preserve the old designs they drew on paper (unlike me, sadly). For the current generation of children, and those younger than us who grew up with Nintendo’s games in the 00s, the New Super Mario Bros. tools will be available for them to experiment with (though I’m sure the older audience will experiment with them, too). That is, assuming those children aren’t in their “I’m too old for Nintendo games!” stage.

Nintendo has been promoting the title since early this year by showcasing levels made by their staff members, other developers, and special guests, displaying what’s possible with its level designer. We saw fantastic examples of these when Shigeru Miyamoto played through Game Center CX’s Arino’s designs early this year, and they were a huge part of what made the Nintendo World Championships this past June memorable. These moments concurrently awoke the creative juices with the audiences mentioned above. I wouldn’t be surprised if those who didn’t already have old levels drawn on paper have already started mapping the levels they plan to make.

Of course, those promotions also worked to dispel rumors saying players wouldn’t be able to create levels as large as those from the old games, which provided a positive ulterior motive.

With the game being around one month away (with a release on September 11th in America, of all days), Nintendo has started its wider advertising campaign. This kicked off with an overview trailer that’s over seven minutes in length, showcasing all the game’s plethora of features. That includes the ingenious level designs people will be capable of creating, but there’s a little catch.

Nintendo’s taking some heat over placing arbitrary restrictions on the options players will have on launch day. Only a few features for level designs will be available at first, while the rest will roll out via an unlocking method requiring five minutes of play every day over nine days. Some would rather have every tool available initially, but upon thinking about it, it’s nothing to throw a hissy fit over. I understand Nintendo’s line of thinking here, and it all involves the learning curve with the creative process.

This will allow players to slowly adjust to all the tools available, and master their placements and usage. As more unlock, they’ll have the opportunity of adjusting to those. Having to work within the confines of what they’ll have will lead to more creativity, and the end result will be better for more of the playing base.

This can teach people not to take an arbitrary “everything but the kitchen sink” approach when creating levels, to make them realize it’s cohesion that matters. Sure, making and experiencing devious level designs for the sake of it will be fun at first, but that will get boring after a while. This restriction won’t prevent people from doing that anyway, but it will lower the chance of that happening, and that’s good for everyone. Hey, the limited tools may be enough for people to create those more simplistic level designs drawn in their youth. Because no one was that devious when they were younger, right? (Don’t answer that.)

Even if you were hoping to play through levels created with every customization tool on day one, this isn’t a big deal. You can bide part of your time by playing premade levels the game will arrive with. Super Mario Maker will have 100 dozens of levels already on disc, using all four styles. Nintendo has yet to detail what those levels will entail, and how many levels will be available for each style, but they should before the game releases. Additionally, the levels used in the Nintendo World Championships will be included among those numbers, along with one designed by Rayman and Beyond Good & Evil director Michel Ancel. Hopefully they also feature some from Nintendo’s current and former Mario level designers, including Shigeru Miyamoto and Takashi Tezuka.

If you own a Wii U, have a good time with it when it arrives. It’s not like you’ll ever forget the date if you live in America.