Hayashida talks DLC for Mario, Wii U, using leftover Galaxy 2 ideas for Galaxy 3 unlikely, more
GamesRadar has published a massive interview with Super Mario 3D Land director Koichi Hayashida.
Hayashida did share a few nuggets about the 3D platformer, such as how Statue Mario barely made it into the game and how the team considered implementing a time limit on Fire Mario as was the case for the Galaxy games.
Speaking of Super Mario Galaxy, Hayashida basically said that it’s unlikely we’ll see a third game in the “series”. He doesn’t see a realistic scenario in which the staff would use leftover ideas from Galaxy 2 for a possible Galaxy 3 title.
Hayashida also confirmed that downloadable content is a possibility for Mario, discussed his thoughts about Wii U, and more.
Head past the break for all of Hayashida’s remarks!
Hayshida on whether or not Super Mario 3D Land was the first game he directed for a portable…
“That’s right, it was my first portable game as a director. I directed (the Japan-only game) Joy Mech Fight, Mario Galaxy 2, then 3D Land. In fact this was the first portable game for the whole Nintendo EAD team.”
Hayshida on the lessons he brought over from directing Galaxy 2…
“When we made Galaxy 2, we had people that really enjoyed Mario Galaxy 1 in mind, and we wanted to make sure we presented lots of interesting new ideas for them. Some of those ideas came from Mr Miyamoto himself, and others were ideas for really hard, challenging stages for people that mastered the first Galaxy. Other times we used ideas that we didn’t get to use in the first game. At a very early stage we were asking ourselves, ‘Is this going to be like Mario Galaxy 1.5?’ But we ended up having so much content that we felt comfortable putting a new number on it.
“During that development we had people on the team saying, ‘I know someone who wasn’t able to play Galaxy 1 because they found it too difficult.’ So we started thinking about how we could adjust the challenge for people that were beginners to the series. With Galaxy 2 we included an instructional video with the Japanese release titled ‘My First Mario,’ giving people an introduction to the basics of the game to hopefully make them more comfortable playing.
“I feel that was successful to a degree, but we weren’t quite able to reach everyone, and we needed to find a way to give these people an entry point into the series. We decided that’s what we wanted 3D Land to be. At the same time we still took care to make sure we gave a lot of challenges to advanced players.”
Hayshida on how designing a 3D stage for a portable Mario is different than on consoles…
“Our first thought when designing the game was, and this might be a Japan-only consideration, is that you see a lot of people commuting in Japan to school or work. Usually they’re only playing for as long as it takes to go through a couple train stations, so I decided that’s how long I wanted it to take to clear a single stage. You certainly don’t have restrictions like that on a console game.
“Another thing we had in mind was that many people are walking around with the system, so we put in StreetPass functionality. Obviously people don’t walk around with consoles, so that was something else we did new. As a design challenge we thought, ‘What could we provide for advanced player through StreetPass?’ That’s led to the exchanging of clear times, so you could look at someone else’s time, someone you might not even know, and be motivated to play the stage again and try to beat that time.”
Hayshida on whether or not he ever considered putting in the Raccoon Mario for Super Mario 3D Land…
“When development had just begun on the game, we had created the ears and tail version as well as the full body suit, as well as one more that was in-between the two. We were testing all of these, asking the team members what they liked, but it seemed like they were choosing based only on visual appearance. We had to revert to a more functional mentality, deciding that the easiest one for the player to understand visually as a power-up was the full Tanooki suit.”
Hayshida on whether or not there were any elements from Super Mario Bros. 3 he wanted to add but couldn’t…
“I think we were able to get everything that we really wanted in 3D Land, though I have to say that the Statue Mario power barely made it in. (During development) whenever people saw the full body suit, without fail people would ask, ‘Oh, he’s going to turn into a statue, right?’ So with a little bit of time left in our schedule, we were able to include it as a sort of reward for people that made it through first set of worlds. I was really happy with how that turned out.”
Hayashida on whether or not it’s important for a director to have experience in level design…
“This is a really basic way to put it, but for a director I think that knowing how a game is produced from start to finish is very helpful. You should have a base knowledge of every single process along the way, but they don’t necessarily have to be an incredible expert in any one of those per se. Though now that I think about it, Mr Koizumi, the director of Mario Galaxy 1, had done some level design as well. Now that’s not something that he spent all of his time on, but the first level in Galaxy 1 was something he created. But as I said, a high level of stage design knowledge isn’t critical.”
Hayashida on whether or not working on 2D Mario interests him…
“I hadn’t really thought about myself necessarily doing that. It’s something I have a passing interest in, but that comes from wanting to explore all the possibilities for Mario games. Having done a lot of level design, there’s part of me that’s curious about that sort of thing. But it’s just something I’ve explored when thinking about the possibilities for Mario overall.”
Hayashida on whether or not he sees DLC working for future Mario titles…
“Of course there’s some possibilities there. As with any new Mario game we have to look at what sort of potential new technology can present, and think about how that matches with Mario gameplay to make something interesting and compelling. For example, for 3D Land we looked at the stereoscopic display and StreetPass and tried to think of what type of possibilities exist in a Mario world for those types of things. We’re always looking for things that match up like that, and if we find a particularly compelling combination it is, of course, something we’d pursue. Finding that match is part of my job, so it’s something I’m always thinking about.”
Hayashida on what interests him about the potential of Wii U…
“I certainly think it’s interesting hardware with many possibilities. If I had to share just one idea from my own personal experience, it would involve when my family is watching TV together. If I want to play games on the Wii I can’t, but if I had a Wii U I could use that smaller display to play a game while they watch TV. That’d be really good for someone with a family like me.”
Hayashida on whether or not he believes there are secrets in 3D Land that players haven’t found yet…
“It’s really hard to say. Maybe I should ask you if you found one that ’m interested in. Have you had the experience of hitting a Question Block with your head and having it stick to you and pop out coins?”
Hayashida on the stage in 3D Land that allows you to clear it in seven seconds…
“(Laughs) We have that one set up so you can clear it in seven seconds. There’s also an interesting spot in level 2-3 with the pixel art everywhere. Toward the end if you go to one spot in a white area in the background, you reach a place where there’s 1Up picture and you get a 1Up Mushroom from it. That’s one few have seen, so I’d challenge yourself to try and find that.”
Hayashida on whether or not he drew inspiration from the Mario Land titles on Game Boy…
“As it so happens, the Land part of the title didn’t make it into the working title until very late in the development process. It wasn’t really a key concept driving us from the beginning. But if I had to pick out one concept that was a nod to the Land games, as Fire Mario the fireballs bounce off of walls. That always makes me think of how fun it is to throw superballs around your room as a kid, and Mario Land had a similar transformation.”
Hayashida on why it’s important to keep the Mario series fresh every time…
“One element is that every time we come out with new hardware, the unique capabilities of that technology drives us to find new combinations for gameplay that’s familiar in the Mario universe, but made new by something special about that hardware. That combination of familiar and new, I think, gives people a sense of freshness.”
Hayashida on the reasoning behind the inclusion of the 2D Mario art in 3D Land…
“The postcards came in pretty late in development. We were asking ourselves as we worked on the cinematic sequences how we could do to make it more than just another in-game movie. We realized because the 3DS had an SD card slot, we had an opportunity to add some art onto player’s SD cards for making it a certain distance through the game. Once those images were on the SD card, they could be used elsewhere and you could play around with them if you want to.
“Also, when you look at the postcard, you can see the different layers in the stereoscopic view. Did you try shaking the system when looking at an image? …When you shake it the different layers of the postcard jumble around a little bit. They even have some animation you might not be expecting. The postcard you get for clearing the stage in World 4, you see an image of Peach praying next to the castle. If you shake it you’ll see images change in the background, including behind the castle walls you’ll see a Goomba pop out and occasionally even see Luigi.”
Hayashida on any power-ups from Galaxy that he wanted to bring back to 3D Land but didn’t…
“There was certainly some talk when adding Fire Mario to 3D Land if it would be temporary like in Galaxy, or a permanent ability. Obviously we sided with permanent. Ultimately these games have such different designs that we didn’t find much that was transposable from one to the next. When talking about the transformations to add to 3D Land, if something had fit I think we would have used it.”
Hayashida on the use of three levels of Mario health as opposed to the six sectioned circle in most 3D Mario games…
“One of the game reasons we did it that way is because the stereoscopic view presents a problem if you have a lot of UI elements on the screen. As you’re moving around, if something pops out of the screen in front of a UI element, it can cause a stereo window violation, which is uncomfortable for the player. So we didn’t want to put any UI on the top screen if we could avoid it.
“As for how we wanted to express Mario’s health meter, going with turning into small Mario when you take damage wasn’t something we thought about from the very beginning. It came a little later as a way to express taking damage.”
Hayashida on whether or not changes like the health system and removing punch/kick abilities were tough for the team to deal with initially…
“As I was saying earlier, we always have to look for expressions that match the world that we’re creating. In the case of previous 3D Mario games, we would have two objects on a flat plane, and the kind of action Mario would do might be based on the proximity of those two objects. Your distance from the enemy when you initiate an action could result in a spin or punch or kick, depending on far you are from this other object on a flat plane.
“But in the case of 3D Land, we had the stereoscopic display, which allowed people to judge depth perception in an entirely different way. We wanted to use this as an opportunity to get people back into the habit of thinking of stomping on enemies as the main action that Mario undertakes. In a 3D world that had always been a challenge for some people. And we think we succeeded in fixing that. For those that still found the idea of stomping an enemy even with the 3D display somewhat challenging, they have the Tanooki Suit’s tail, which is a really good match. It reminds people of the spin attack from Galaxy, but uses something unique about the suit.”
Hayashida on whether or not the Galaxy 2 team was left with any ideas that could appear in a possible third game…
“When we worked on Galaxy 1 we came up with a mountain of ideas. Of course, the ideas that made it in to the final product were the ones at the very top. Those ideas that were most compelling or could be implemented most easily and effectively. The other ideas were a little bit rougher. Ideas we weren’t positive that’d be as effective, or might have been much more difficult to include.
“When you think about trying to make a game like Galaxy 2 from that large group of ideas that we had already decided were on the rough side, that becomes a very difficult project. The only way that we got through the development of Mario Galaxy 2 was by coming up with entirely new ideas. I think of that as a very challenging project when I look back on it.
“From that perspective, to say we’d make another game using the ideas left over from Galaxy 2, it’s very difficult for me to imagine. I feel like we really did research the field very well for possible ideas and we used everything that was reasonably easy to implement.”
Hayashida on whether he thinks that him as well as other high level Nintendo developers are prepared for Miyamoto’s eventual retirement…
“Of course Mr Miyamoto is not going to retire any time soon, and I have to say I’m going to be working hard as I can on games now and in the future. But Nintendo is made up of a lot of really great ideas, many of which were contributed by Mr Miyamoto himself. We all care very much about these ideas, we try hard to grasp them and use them in our work. We also do our best to pass along these ideas to the next generation of developers, and that’s an ongoing process.”
Hayashida on which game he prefers: Super Mario Bros. 3 or Super Mario World…
“Well, this is just my personal preference, but I would have to say that I am really into Super Mario World. The reason for that is it was the first Mario game that I was able to beat. I had Mario 3, but I think I only got as far as World 4 or so. (Beating Mario World) was a really good memory for me, and I wanted to carry that forward into the development of 3D Land, which is why I tried to design the game so that a lot of people would be able to clear the game at least through the normal ending. They could then have that good feeling of seeing the ending of a game.”
