One of the many things that Nintendo treated the world to at E3 this year was a glimpse of Mario Maker, a game where players could design their own Mario levels. Styles shown varied from the classic NES Super Mario Bros. to the more modern iterations of the series.
A consistent question that many asked about this forthcoming title was whether it would have online capabilities or not? Would you be able to send your created levels to friends or share them online on forums etc?
Well in an interview with US Gamer, producer Takashi Tezuka hinted at the answer. The interviewer compared Mario Maker to Mario Paint and lamented the fact that you couldn’t share your creations with friends, however with the internet this shouldn’t be a problem. Tezuka responded, echoing the same sentiments. ‘Now, with the Internet, you’re able to interact with friends from far away, so if you wanted to share courses with friends far away, we’re able to do that, in a technological sense. I would like to consider doing something like that with Mario Maker.’
Tezuka also hints at the return of Mario Paint’s ‘Melody Maker’, which has been used to re-create many popular hits in the years since its release. He said ‘Yes, I would like to incorporate music into it, too. I think that Mario Maker makes it even easier to make your own creations. So you had the music creator, Melody Maker, in Mario Paint. I want to make the music part even more intuitive and easier this time around as well. I mean, we’re working on it, and I don’t know exactly what we can do, but that’s our goal.’
Mario Maker seems to be channeling that spirit of Mario Paint, an interesting but limited game. Hopefully with modern technology at the disposal of the developers then Mario Maker can be a fun tool for players to use and will encourage a bustling online community were created levels can be shared.
