![]() Whatever the quality, players seem to respond strongly to seeing familiar games reinterpreted with Mario Maker's palette. Others were downright confusing, like a "SONIC 1 MEMORY" level that bore only a passing resemblance to the original game's Green Hill Zone. ![]() Some of these levels were downright clever, from Metroid and Zelda-themed dungeons to levels that accurately recreate Super Mario 64 stages in two dimensions. Homage levelsĪ full 20 percent of the Top 50 levels were explicitly inspired by some other game. Somebody obviously has too much money to spend on Amiibos. One popular level-titled "Amiibo Maniac!!"-has attracted over 19,000 stars just by offering a long row of question blocks to let Mario try on every single Amiibo costume, in order, without the threat of any enemies. A full 16 of the top 50 levels transformed Mario's appearance using the "mystery mushroom" item, which creators can unlock by tapping the appropriate Amiibo to the Wii U gamepad (or beating an in-game challenge). People seem to love changing Mario into other popular characters. Surprisingly, "Super Meat Bros." has managed to attract over 25,000 stars, even though fewer than 20,000 people have actually beaten it (in over 4.6 million attempts!). ![]() That means the average player will die over 230 times before getting to that goal (or just giving up, we suppose). The sadistic "Super Meat Bros." level (an homage to ultra-hard indie darling Super Meat Boy) takes the cake in this category, with a completion rate of just 0.44 percent. Either way, it seems clear the most popular levels you actually have to play are ones that make players work a little bit to get to the end. Eight of these levels had completion rates under 10 percent if you want to be stricter with where you cut off the "ultra-hard" moniker. On the opposite end of the spectrum, 17 super-popular stages were completed under 15 percent of the time (measured by number of total lives, not individual players). Still, it's a bit sad that so many Super Mario Maker players apparently like watching the game play itself at least as much as taking an active part in the level. They're obviously very easy to finish, too, which gives most players a prominent opportunity to grant a star using the button shown at the end of the level. Auto-complete levels are fun to watch, often bouncing Mario around frenetically and putting him in constant death-defying close calls. The overwhelming popularity of these levels makes some sense. All six of these levels played theme songs from famous Nintendo franchises, of course. Six of these levels were part of a significant subset of auto-complete levels that use pink music-note blocks to play a song as Mario moves. ![]() That includes 11 of the top 13 levels, which clog up the very top of the game's Most Starred chart with levels that don't require any active input from the player. In total, 19 of the top 50 levels can be completed without hitting a single button (or by simply running to the right). Auto-completion is the new blackīy far the easiest path to achieving Super Mario Maker popularity is to make a level that plays itself. That's thanks in part to some significant issues with the way Super Mario Maker surfaces levels and measures their popularity. Our analysis shows that, to the contrary, the levels that seem to be getting the lion's share of public adoration are ones that use some cheap (if occasionally clever) design tricks to attract attention. We've been keeping an eye on the Top 50 "Most Starred" levels listed in the game's "Course World" section to see if the cream of the level design crop was rising to the top. or at least the portion of the public that gives "stars" to its favorite levels. After 30 years of "Super Mario" games, Super Mario Maker gives us a rare opportunity to survey what kinds of Mario levels are generally most loved by the public. ![]() Now that over one million players have uploaded over 2.2 million distinct levels in the game over a matter of weeks, we can finally begin to answer that question. Who knows what kind of level design trends and counter-trends will rise to the top once the game's own internal social network effects come into play." Further Reading Super Mario Maker pulls the curtain back on game design’s promise and perilIn our initial review of Super Mario Maker (which we played on pre-release servers accessible only to developers and critics), we noted that the game was sure to change quite a bit "once the public starts making and uploading its own levels in significant numbers. ![]()
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