Super Mario Odyssey - and some general chat about Mario games

[Hecate]

Good lad, you a bit hot with those pants on?

[madhair60]

There is an irony to decrying gamers while sounding the most like yer stereotypical gamer that it's possible to sound. Everything must be done this way, etc.

I agree with you that there's too much hand-holding in most games. I wouldn't say that the brief parts on the loading screens where Cappy says "btw you can do a ground pound" are an egregious example of them. I'd also say that comparing the original two-button 1985 Super Mario Bros to the 14-button Mario Odyssey is a bit silly, with regard to how you expect it to dripfeed anything to the player without any dialogue. I found it perfectly freewheeling; that's its biggest strength. I figured out the hat-bounce, then the hat-throw-to-dive-to-hat-throw-to-dive, and not a word was said about it.

[popcorn]

I'd also say that comparing the original two-button 1985 Super Mario Bros to the 14-button Mario Odyssey is a bit silly, with regard to how you expect it to dripfeed anything to the player without any dialogue.

But it can be done:

I figured out the hat-bounce, then the hat-throw-to-dive-to-hat-throw-to-dive, and not a word was said about it.

[madhair60]

I assume you don't like Mario 64 either, as it has about a thousand times more talking.

[popcorn]

Dunno, haven't played Mario 64 in a hundred years. What is ur point.

[madhair60]

I'm just trying to establish if you just generally don't favour the 3D Marios, since they all do this to some extent.

[popcorn]

I don't mean to pick on the Mario series specifically about the tutorial problem - it just happens to be the game I'm playing right now. Odyssey is far from the worst offender.

I like the 3D Marios best when they're straightforward linear obstacle courses rather than open-field things. I liked 3D World more than Galaxy.

My happiest 3D Mario experience, from memory, are the bonus stages in Sunshine. No gimmicks, no clutter, no fat, just fiendish tests of skill. Let me get stuck in and get out of my way. (Of course they were made maddeningly frustrating by the fact that you got kicked back into the overworld once you ran out of lives, but that's a different matter.)

[madhair60]

I'd have loved a whole game of those abstract levels and 3D World definitely came close. I still haven't done Champion's Road or that last Mystery Box level. I wouldn't mind going through the whole thing again to be honest. I did it all in couch co-op and it was marvellous.

I can see your point to be perfectly honest, I suppose it just doesn't bother me as much? In Mario it seems so breezy compared to almost every other platformer on the market.

[madhair60]

There have been rumours that Nintendo are re-releasing New Super Mario Bros U on the Switch, which I'm all about as I love that series and want that game on a handheld yesterday. New Super Mario Bros tends to get a lot of stick and I've never really understood why; the levels are always great and that's the meat of any Mario game. I can see the criticism of the aesthetics to some degree, but it's 2D Mario!

[popcorn]

I can see your point to be perfectly honest, I suppose it just doesn't bother me as much? In Mario it seems so breezy compared to almost every other platformer on the market.

Which is fine! And like I say Odyssey is far from the worst offender.

What confuses me is when I make a criticism and the response is "it doesn't matter because the game is good". It's like, fine, cool, maybe the rest of the game is 99% masterpiece, but I'm trying to make a general point about design here. This happens in threads about games but not about films, for some reason.

[madhair60]

Dual reaction of general surprise at the complaint given how gentle it is in this one, plus that other chap saying it's evidence (along with BOTW) that Nintendo have forgotten how to make games. Incredulity, really.

[popcorn]

Dual reaction of general surprise at the complaint given how gentle it is in this one

It's not much but I do find it very irritating. My tolerance for unnecessary bullshit in games has dropped hugely in recent years. Basically any point in an action game where I have to stop and read text is an energy drop, a fun-crusher. If you tolerate it, fine, but defend it and I am coming to ur house.

I can so easily imagine a Mario that drops you into the Mushroom Kingdom with nothing but a "wahoo!" and you figure out the rest from there. That'd be lovely. It would say so much about the game, make such a statement. Lots of games do this, even modern ones - look at Inside, for example. It's not an impossible design task.

[Hecate]

There is an irony to decrying gamers while sounding the most like yer stereotypical gamer that it's possible to sound. Everything must be done this way, etc.

Now you're just being ridiculous.

[madhair60]

That's both true and untrue.

Edit: When you say Super Mario Bros 2, do you mean USA or Super Players?

[Twed]

Now you're just being ridiculous.

I said the same thing, is this synchronized ridiculousness?

But it can be done:

It can, but think of Nintendo's audience. They actually know what they're doing, but they can't just make games for us.

[Hecate]

Edit: When you say Super Mario Bros 2, do you mean USA or Super Players?

The shit one you don't like.

[madhair60]

I like them both. Let's be friends instead.

[Hecate]

The daft one with the snakes in the pots and the scary face that chases you and you have to pick up the key and throw it about and you smash the potions on the floor and go to the dark world.

It's brilliant! The floating princess and the magic carpet and holding down with toady so you do mega jumps to get to secret places!
and that bird thing that spits eggs at you out of her mouth and you have to throw them back at her!
and the slot machines in between levels!

[madhair60]

I wish they'd revisit it properly. Elements showed up in 3D World, Captain Toad etc, but no full-on Subcon game.

Playing Odyssey it occured to me that the backflip from Mario 64 onward is an adaptation of the super jump from SMB2.

[Hecate]

Nintendo need to do a roguelite, some sort of endless dungeon crawler with toady where you go mining and get loot and stuff. Something simple that they can keep adding loads of content to.

I remember when they were designing breath of the wild and showed the prototype they'd made in the engine of the original game and I was like "but I want that one!" it looked loads more fun - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bk5swSyJ5zQ

[popcorn]

I said the same thing, is this synchronized ridiculousness?
It can, but think of Nintendo's audience. They actually know what they're doing, but they can't just make games for us.

Text tutorials ain't the way to teach anyone how to play Super Mario, whether it's your battle-hardened supernerds or your grandma. It simply isn't how human beings learn things.

[Kelvin]

There have been rumours that Nintendo are re-releasing New Super Mario Bros U on the Switch, which I'm all about as I love that series and want that game on a handheld yesterday. New Super Mario Bros tends to get a lot of stick and I've never really understood why; the levels are always great and that's the meat of any Mario game. I can see the criticism of the aesthetics to some degree, but it's 2D Mario!

I don't mind the Wii one, but NSMB Wii U is probably the most I've actively disliked a major Nintendo release in years. I could barely get through it, I found it so boring.

Certainly the games look generic as possible, but I also think the level design feels perfunctory, like Mario by the numbers. No exciting new ideas or gameplay concepts. For me, that game is an actual example of what Hecate is talking about in this thread; Mario by numbers, created by formulae to be just good enough, but require no extra work or resources.

Especially after seeing the best levels in Mario Maker, and the variety of ways a proper developer could inject new life into the 2D games, I don't see the appeal in going back to that type of level design for some years.

[madhair60]

Sure, and Mario by the numbers is fucking 10/10, so what's the ploblem

[popcorn]

New Super Mario Bros don't feel right. It's bland in presentation, design and execution. It feels all floaty and fake. It's like a sort of Chinese knock-off Mario, like Sonic 4. I got the one on DS (was that the first one?) and remember nowt about it.

[madhair60]

Loved all four of 'em

[Kelvin]

Text tutorials ain't the way to teach anyone how to play Super Mario, whether it's your battle-hardened supernerds or your grandma. It simply isn't how human beings learn things.

But it's also not how Mario Odyssey teaches you. The controls appear as overlaid text while you still move and jump and experiment in the area where the ability is used. The scenes with cappy are the only exception, and they exist solely to disguise loading screens.

If Super Mario Bros on the NES had loading screens, a toad would probably tell you about holding run to get over small holes, and kicking a shell to find secrets.

I mean, look at the first level of Odessey. It teaches you how to move the camera while you can't move, I admit, but after that, everything is taught by experience. How to capture the frog, how to use its abilities, how to fight enemies, how to find hearts, how to open doors. Everything is done by art design or overlaid hints. The game is a perfect example of the type of tutorial design you're advocating, but you're focussing on the 10 second loading screens.

[magval]

I wish they'd revisit it properly. Elements showed up in 3D World, Captain Toad etc, but no full-on Subcon game.

Playing Odyssey it occured to me that the backflip from Mario 64 onward is an adaptation of the super jump from SMB2.

Is it not from even earlier, in Donkey Kong?

[Bhazor]

I think 2D Mario will need a real revolution on par with Galaxy or Odyssey for the next release. Mario rules 3D platforming but in the aftermath of Rayman Legends and the Donkey Kong Returns games New Super Mario Bros looks like trash.

[Consignia]

Is it not from even earlier, in Donkey Kong?

You may be thinking of Donkey Kong 94, which game way later than Mario 2. Great Puzzle platformer that one.

[popcorn]

But it's also not how Mario Odyssey teaches you. The controls appear as overlaid text while you still move and jump and experiment in the area where the ability is used. The scenes with cappy are the only exception, and they exist solely to disguise loading screens.

If Super Mario Bros on the NES had loading screens, a toad would probably tell you about holding run to get over small holes, and kicking a shell to find secrets.

I mean, look at the first level of Odessey. It teaches you how to move the camera while you can't move, I admit, but after that, everything is taught by experience. How to capture the frog, how to use its abilities, how to fight enemies, how to find hearts, how to open doors. Everything is done by art design or overlaid hints. The game is a perfect example of the type of tutorial design you're advocating, but you're focussing on the 10 second loading screens.

Aye, I'm a couple of hours in and now and you're right. The tutorial-y bits just create a bad impression.

I would genuinely prefer a normal, clean loading screen. It would be less boring. I mean that.

There's still too much text for my liking generally (I still think Mario ought to be designed with as little text as possible, tutorial or not, and basically any time you're spending in a menu is time wasted imo).