MARIO MAKER'S IMPACT

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So can anyone explain to me why automatic Mario levels are so popular in Mario Maker?
From my observations it seems that people just value an experience way more than a challenge. Which I find frustrating, it's a game, you should be playing it not watching it. So what's your thoughts?

Side Note: I wonder if anyone made a automatic RPG where you have to watch the character grind lol.

On a some what related note I saw another really popular level in Mario maker that wasn't automatic but what annoyed me was it had a deceptive puzzle. What I mean is there was a part where a brick wall was in the way and a babomb was needed. Now instead of letting the player figure out on there own that they needed to bring the bomb to the wall this section was mostly automatic in that the bomb came to the exact spot it needed to be and all the player had to do was step on it. Thus stroking the player's ego making them think they accomplished more than they actually did. Do you feel that it's right for a game designer to do that?
I felt it was cheap, and insulting to the player's intelligence but at the same time it seems that players these days can't handle much of any challenge.
So is this where games are headed? I know game designers must guide and give hints to players but that level of hand holding is maddening to me. Players should know that a bomb will break a wall. Keep in mind this is just one example of a number of instances where I see people just wanting video games with no challenge what so ever. No one wants an overly hard unfair game but I just felt like pointing this out because it was frustrating me and I needed to vent.

P.S. I do think it's okay for a little bit of automation in a level so long as it's not the whole level.
Side Note: I wonder if anyone made a automatic RPG where you have to watch the character grind lol.


There are lots. Unfortunately.

I've never understood it either. People are either easily impressed, or really don't give a shit about what they're doing.
Automatic/Idle games aren't popular because they're so well-designed, but rather because the effort to play them is so minimal that you can play them pretty much any time, including during playing a legitimately challenging game.

It's also much more likely for a skilled player to enjoy an easy game than it is for an unskilled player to enjoy a difficult one.

Also, I cannot symphatize with people who hate it when players prefer not to be overly challenged. It's this mentality why communities around difficult games are so unbearable.
The thing about Mario Maker is, making the levels is itself a game (or to be more linguistically accurate, a fun activity that is a huge part of the reason for the software title). Automatic levels are a form of play in which the creator exercises their knowledge of the system's workings to craft something that performs some function, whatever it is. This does mean that they're probably doing it more for their own enjoyment than for anybody who will potentially "play" the level. So maybe it's not so much that people enjoy playing the automatic levels as they enjoy making them. Of course, there probably are enough people who enjoy watching such levels, even if just for a change of pace between actual play levels.
It's one of those things I'll never get into. I know some people love playing games like that, but they're certainly not for me. Shoot, I love dinking around with the battle system in my game so much that I could never imagine my game without combat. To me, it's one of the things I like most about the product I've been working on.

But yeah, the higher the difficulty of your product, the less of a group you appeal to. The easier your game is to play, the larger group of people you appeal to. Some people will quit playing a game once they get a Gameover, it's unavoidable. Others will keep pressing on and see the Gameover screen as a means for them to improve and learn from their mistakes.

Notice how all the AAA games coming out tend to range on the easier side. The CoD games lean on this heavily: easy combat, make something fast and quick to play. You get hit, you regenerate health. You die, you're almost right back where you left off. It wants to reach a larger audience, so it's an easier game.

On the other end of the spectrum is Dark Souls: it's tough, but those who master its mechanics will succeed. Not everyone wants to take time to do that, however. So there's two options the creator could do with a game like this: make the game easy enough to where combat takes little effort, or keep the combat difficult enough to provide a challenge to those who seek it. In the latter, you have Dark Souls. In the former, it's no longer a Dark Souls game.

author=LightningLord2
Automatic/Idle games aren't popular because they're so well-designed, but rather because the effort to play them is so minimal that you can play them pretty much any time, including during playing a legitimately challenging game.

It's also much more likely for a skilled player to enjoy an easy game than it is for an unskilled player to enjoy a difficult one.

Also, I cannot symphatize with people who hate it when players prefer not to be overly challenged. It's this mentality why communities around difficult games are so unbearable.

Kinda' reminds me how, when a new MMORPG comes out that advertises being difficult, you have the "go back to WoW" comments that fill their message boards whenever someone complains.

author=kentona
ultimate idle game
http://www.nyan.cat/

Well there goes twenty minutes.
Ratty524
The 524 is for 524 Stone Crabs
12986
I wish I knew why, too, because as a developer it feels like my audience is completely divided and will never give a clear answer as to what they want in games.

My biggest concern about designing any type of idle level/game or "compelling experience with minimal-to-nonexistent gameplay" type of games is that they almost strictly rely on their novelty value alone; Like Pogs or Tiger Electronic games, they're a fad that have little staying power over time. Once the next big hoopla comes, the early fad is immediately discarded out of an audience's mind and replaced with something new.

Meanwhile, there are people who still go back to Super Mario World or Crono Trigger based on the merits those games offered.

Heck, in that Nyancat example, is there honestly anyone who gives a damn about it nowadays compared to when it was first in its prime, or even know that it exists?
I don't think anyone can really predict lasting power, or what ultimately makes a game timeless. In fact, it seems to happen on accident most of the time. You either need incredible foresight or be very lucky.

Of course, there's a big difference between a fad and a milestone. Who the heck is still playing Angry Birds or Farmville, for instance?
Oh wow there really is an auto RPG lol
Anyway thanks for the comments everyone it was nice to get your perspectives.
As a note: Auto-playing levels are not unique to Mario maker, they showed up in Little Big Planet as well.

Idle or clicker games, especially the good ones and once you get past the first section or run, tend to be about optimization and advancing overall stats run to run. They are definitely in the 'put it in the background while doing something else' category, but the gameplay itself isn't moment to moment, but long term. Most of them incorporate a 'restart' system, where after getting some tokens during a run, you can restart, and the tokens increase your dps/let you buy more things to improve your runs, like starting later in it, starting with more gold, etc. So they are not truly idle, the best ones anyway. They actually tend to be -more- involved later, in example in Clicker Heroes the latter stages of the game tend to be about quick 30-50 minute runs to optimize farming of the points you need to upgrade, as opposed to long, not paying attention 'deep runs'.

Just my two cents.
Actually the automatic music levels are impressive because it's crazy hard to make those things but I feel like those shouldn't be levels. Mario Maker should have just included the old music maker from Mario Paint and then let users put those songs into their levels. That way you could actually do the whole custom music and still have the space to do a legit level.
Jeroen_Sol
Nothing reveals Humanity so well as the games it plays. A game of betrayal, where the most suspicious person is brutally murdered? How savage.
3885
Well, the origin of those automatic levels is actually pretty interesting, and I also feel it is relevant. It all started with a little rom hack of Super Mario World. I believe it was simply called "Auto Mario". It became a huge fad, and more people started to create automatic music playing levels, until it became a thing of the Mario hacking community.

So obviously, when Mario Maker came out and all those Mario hackers had an easy editor and platform to create/distribute their automatic levels, it became a more commonly known thing in the world. Skip ahead to now when everyone's heard of it.

So basically, automatic levels are (and in my opinion should be) levels because they (together with Kaizo Mario) are the way Mario level editing became a thing in the first place.

Edit: Also, can you really complain the levels aren't difficult enough while 100-man expert exists?
author=Jeroen_Sol
Edit: Also, can you really complain the levels aren't difficult enough while 100-man expert exists?


100 man expert mode is filled with unfair levels unfortunately. I like a challenge but unfortunately most of what's there is ridiculous crap thats not well designed.

Just because I don't care for the automatic stuff it shouldn't be assumed that I like the crazy unfair stuff.
There are people who make great levels in Mario Maker though its just hard to find.
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