Over three years ago the first game of the Super Mario Maker series was released on Wii U, this game has won a lot of fans through the ability to create your own levels with the well-known plumber Mario.
So it’s hard to hide that after the great success of Nintendo Switch, everyone was waiting for the sequel. We’ve got Super Mario Maker on 3DS, but this version had no online sharing experience – creating, sharing, and playing levels created by other creators. Which has always been the most important feature of this series.
Luckily, on the horizon appeared a glimmer of hope, Super Mario Maker 2 was officially announced, with new functionalities, new themes, story mode and full of new features. Is this a title for you? Or maybe you know it already and you can not wait for it?
Let’s dig into my review and find out more about what awaits you.
What are the differences between Super Mario Make 2 and its predecessor?
Story Mode
This is one thing that wasn’t included in the original game. Maybe Nintendo decides to throw something fresh or build for gamers between creators and players. But one thing is certain – you don’t need to focus on the infinite saving of the Princess Peach.
This time you have to work with Toad and Toadette on one task – rebuilding Peach’s castle.
Looks like a simple and boring task, but it isn’t. Story Mode is fulfilled by over 100 original levels designed by Nintendo.
If you want to repair the castle, you need to complete those levels. Quickly go to Taskmaster Toad, whos happy to offer you a job.
Every task/level guarantees you a payout – coins. Remember to catch as many coins as you can in any of these levels [you can replay them and get missing coins].
Every course has a different difficulty level. You can expect more coins for completing the more difficult ones.
When you earn enough coins to start repairs or to build another piece of the castle, hand them over to Chief Toadette, who allows you to choose which section of the castle you can rebuild as next.
Every new section of Peach’s castle unlocks new levels and makes them available from Taskmaster Toad.
Levels created by Nintendo look incredibly good. I enjoyed them from visual and mechanical perspectives. You can find simple levels where you have to go from point A to B and collects just coins or you have to use new swing claws to jump, find a key or keys, access different places, bring items that help you access another location and then you can finish your job task. Swinging, puzzle elements and more classic Mario levels mixed with some clever use. This is what you get in Story Mode. Do not worry, you will not get bored. If you enjoyed playing Super Mario Bros games, I would say that some of these levels can surprise you – positively!
First-time player? No worries, Super Mario Maker 2 and Yamamura’s Dojo got you covered
“Yamamura’s Dojo” is a place where you can find a friendly pigeon named “Yamamura”. He is always happy to help you and show some basics or teach you how to control Mario. This is a nice touch and definitely will help newcomers. But if you have already played Super Mario Maker, I don’t think you’ll find something for yourself in this place.
Course Maker
If you’re a creator then Course Maker is created for you. Unleash your creativity in this new toolkit for Super Mario Level Designer.
This is a powerful toolkit with all assets available at your fingertips. In Super Mario Maker 2, you have access to every item from the very beginning, unlike the original game. Finally, you can start creating your levels without any restrictions.
Super Mario Maker 2 offers more than all from the very beginning. There are new elements too, like slopes, day/night, clear conditions, new themes, angry sun and more. All of this opens new opportunities to control your game experience.
There’s a lot of new stuff, even UI has been refreshed. Where everything has been divided into categories with quick access to individual elements. Besides, when it comes to the mechanics of creating levels in itself, not much has changed. However, one drawback can be found.
Handheld mode is your best friend! Create interface and control with a gamepad feels clumsy. It takes some time to get used to it, but still, it’s not the same as the handheld mode or Wii U experience. Remember that you can buy cheap stylus, and improve your game experience like in the original game.
Some most significant changes in Super Mario Maker 2 apply to the custom scroll option, which provides you more control over your level. The next one is slopes – I am not able to determine how long I have been waiting for it. Slopes work wonderfully… what can I say more about them? There are slopes.
Swinging claw – mhmm, another interesting item. With the help of this one, you can create some evil levels. There is thousand, I’m telling you thousands of opportunities and how you can use them to achieve an interesting effect.
Let’s say your player is not expecting this: exit from the pipe and land … Exactly where? Maybe on some floating cloud or directly in the claws, just avoid opponents and swing until the goal line – clever and evil. Maybe you have a different idea of how to use it?
The next big change in a game is 3D World style! This new style is full of unique features like Cat Mario, long jump flips and flops, clear pipes, blink blocks, Koopa Troopa Car, and enemies who attack from the background.
Wow, so much new stuff, all of this available for creators! This is a big change in the Mario Maker game and all of these features will bring a nice twist to your newly created levels.
Remember just one – 3D World is a separate game style, you can not convert your 2D world into a 3D World. Any attempt to swap your 2D level to 3D level wipes entirely all of your work. But no worries, because before that the game will inform you about this with a big message box and question if you want to erase everything and start again with the chosen style.
There is one thing, well a few things that are missing in 3D World – there are no vines, and you can not stack enemies one on top of each other like in a 2D world. The lack of these elements does not cause the creation of the level to suffer, however, you stay under the impression that something is missing.
As the last, I left the Clear Condition feature. This is something totally new and deserves an extra line. You can choose if you want to set some extra option that is required to complete the level. For example, you can set: “Reach the goal without taking damage”
No one will be able to finish the level if they took any damage at this level. A flag will not be available and a specific message will be shown to the user when these reach a final destination.
However, we can find one limit here. You can set only one condition rule per level. Plus all of them are the same for each game style.
Course World
The game also has to offer Course World, a dedicated place to share created levels with the rest of the world. We have here features like Leaderboards, Endless Challenge, Network Play and a place for your avatar, something like Miiverse available in the old Wii U game. You can change outfits for your character [you will be given new pieces for unlocking new achievements, some for uploading the first level or playing the first level created by another user]. However, the game does not have support for Amiibo. Unfortunately, you can not unlock new costumes using your figure collection.
The maker profile in Mario Maker 2 feels richer than in the original game. We have stats like Maker Points, Medals, Versus Rating, info about Uploaded Courses, Liked Courses, Played Courses and world record times. This should keep players coming back more often to online features, both groups – creators and players.
Endless Challenge is similar to one we know from Wii U. Basically this features offers a limited number of lives [you can earn more in these levels] and challenge you to play without losing your last life. Whos levels do you have to play? Of course, created by other users.
I spent a lot of time with Super Mario Maker 2, this is an incredible sequel, with tons of new features, and great and funny Story Mode. For someone like me, who likes to create and play, this is the best sequel we could receive. Certainly, many players will come back, because Super Mario Maker has a strong community full of creators and players. I can not imagine what the Super Mario Maker community can do with all of these new features. Hope to see some epic levels this weekend. Maybe one from you?
Additionally, to that I recommend you to watch my video review available on the OtakuGuru YouTube channel. Hope you’ll enjoy it and get a better glimpse into Super Mario Maker 2.
Review copy provided by Nintendo UK
