Super Mario Seasons

As most of you probably know, I love Mario games and I love SMBX. I'm not the seasoned veteran that Brickroad is, but I know my old-school Mario fairly well. (Except the enemy names: I don't really pay attention to many of those.) I also realize that SMBX allows designers to get a little creative with the traditional Mario formulas. This dose of freedom has led to some very interesting levels centered on a "gimmick": some sort of contraption or puzzle that puts a spin on Mario fundamentals.

The problem with gimmicks? They can look very amateurish (or "romhacky" as we say in the community) and can be full of design flaws that will frustrate and alienate the player. Ultimately, most gimmick-centric games are not fun to play due to cheap challenge, and Super Mario Seasons is an example of this. We all fall into that pitfall from time to time: there are probably annoying gimmicks in virtually every SMBX game, mine included. The problem in Seasons is two-fold: (1) this game has a higher concentration of the gimmicks and cheap shots than is to be expected, and (2) the execution of the gimmicks is lacking due to oversights and "cheap shots".

Super Mario Seasons is a short demo consisting of about a half dozen stages, mostly in the Winter vein. I guess each world will be based on a season, which could be a cool theme if executed well. The game also makes heavy use of secret stars, Yoshis, special power-ups, and other SMBX staples. We'll start with...

The Good
There are certainly some positives in this game. First and foremost, I like the music selections. I heard the Ice Cap theme from Sonic somewhere in there: that always makes me grin. Most of the selections were spot-on; only a few were jarring. Another thing I enjoyed was the variety of powerups. It's nice to obtain a hammer suit right off the bat, especially since this game features massive amounts of weak enemies.

I also enjoyed the first level, which was quite visually appealing had plenty of shell powerups for Yoshi. For those of you who don't know, Yoshi can gain special powerups by eating shells of a certain color: for instance, blue shells enable Yoshi to fly. This mechanic is used really well in the first level, though I would've liked to have seen a showcase of the "pound" and "fire" moves. The castle before the first level had some interesting rooms with funny NPCs (though the dialogue could use some proofreading).

I also liked the pacing of the star acquisitions. There's a secret star in every level, and the locked doors don't really require a ton of stars. I don't have to wait two worlds to unlock a secret. However, what's behind those locked doors can be quite disappointing, which leads me to...

The Not So Good
Since this is a demo, I'm going to focus on providing constructive feedback. There's clear effort being placed in this game, and I certainly don't want to discourage anyone from working on this game further, but there are a ton of opportunities for improvement.

The layout of the opening castle is awkward and a little frustrating. Opening the first door of the castle—the first room of the game—gets me killed unless I jump immediately. This is a recurring issue in other levels: the first enemies are placed far too close to the starting point. Players can get killed by a weak enemy before they can even get their bearings.

These cheap shots start mounting quickly, especially when compiled with the level gimmicks. Some of the jumps are just too tricky for early levels. In the second level, an off-screen Koopa kept kicking its shell at me—I had no warning and very little room to navigate. This comes after a section with a jump that requires a massive running start (due to the slippery surface), and a pipe/platform that's nearly impossible to reach without jumping on enemies. (This would be fine if the platform had a special reward, but it's just a powerup.) Shortly after this, I ran into a whole bunch of Shy Guys walking on top of each other, again with little room to navigate. It was a funny sight, but very frustrating to get past after the fifth time. I burned a lot of lives here—not out of challenge but out of cheapness. Each of these individually would contribute to a challenging and fun level (and I love challenging Mario levels!), but the sum of all of them is just too much for me. I didn't feel like my mental or platforming skills were being tested: I felt like they were being exploited and tricked. Shortly after these issues, I ran into a Kaizo ("romhack") trap:



That gold coin box was invisible, and there are several others in that stretch of platforms. So the player is being forced to burn lives through trial and error by figuring out where and how high to jump? Frustrating. The issue is compounded by the other cheap shots in the level that I mentioned above. I'm fine with a few cheap shots in a Mario level—just not 5 or 6 at once, because then I stop having fun and can just go and work on my own games or play the classic Mario games. Please give us some sort of hint or warning, or at least a margin or error: at least then I would stay interested due to the foresight of the developer.

Another level had me creating a path by forcing me to jump at just the right moments. (The details are kinda complex.) The issue is that a Bullet Bill Launcher messes up my timing by shooting bullets at me while I'm timing my jumps and movements. This forces me to either burn powerups or screw up the entire gimmick to survive. I would say that three-quarters of the gimmicks in this game, while ambitious and interesting on paper, fail in execution. I think they can be improved immensely with time and polish.

The first boss was an interesting surprise, but underwhelming: I just have to take out a couple of Piranha plants with vegetables. Thankfully, the second boss makes up for it:



My only issue was with the placing of this boss and the overall layout around it. Flanking it with Thwomps was a decent way to spice it up, though.

Graphically, the layout of the levels is a mixed bag. The levels are competently decorated, but the arrangement of the tiles is often confusing and awkward (just look at the screenshots above). I don't mind cluttered levels at all—heck, I love making detailed levels—but there comes a point where the design just seems random and overly compact. Some of these levels have reached that point, and I don't think many SMBX reviewers and players are comfortable with pointing this out. A lot of the issues I have with SMBX levels can be fixed by acquiring fundamental layout sense from the classic Mario games. You can still make your levels detailed and "cluttered", but as long as they minimize the cheap shots and give players room to breathe, you should be fine.

Conclusion
This level feels more like a critique for the developers than a review, and for that I apologize. However, the game is in its infancy and I wanted to give the creators some things to think about. I like the concept and see flashes of greatness here, but I think the "romhacky" gimmicks/cheap shots need to be either minimized, polished, or telegraphed, and the level layouts need a good dose of Mario fundamentalism. I hope the finished game will pan out to be an enjoyable Mario romp!

Overall: N/A (based on what I played, it would be a 1.5)