Rant:
I've played quite a few Mario Maker levels in the last few months. The majority are 'meh' at best. Yes there are some great levels, but they aren't ones you just come across in day to day playing.
If you go based on rankings (stars) the 10-20 levels worldwide are play by themselves levels or basically..sit there and watch your character move on its own levels, you know, absolutely no skill. Or they are just hold right, with no chance of actually having to avoid anything.
Next you have the event levels. These are levels created for/by companies on occasion. You play these to get special things that normally you would need amiibos to get. They are generally HORRIBLE.
Next you have the 100 courses. The way I understand these work is Nintendo hand picks certain levels to part of this. Some are pretty good, and some are..wtf would you put this here. One level was a 5 second straight run to the flag with NOTHING in between.
As an aged gamer I prefer a little more thought and skill behind levels. My levels require a bit of thought. There are no 'hidden mechanic/cheat' gimmicks, no blind jumps (except optional occasional hidden areas), but there are some puzzles to them. I spent many hours meticulously designing them. They aren't things I cranked out in 10 minutes. I started crafting levels and uploading them and watching when
1. few people played them
2. no one played them more than 2 times which led to..
3. No one beat them which led to...
4. No stars
5. Deleted
What I didn't know is that after a period of time. Nintendo deletes 'unpopular' levels from their servers. They have not said what constitutes an unpopular level, and have been deleting seemingly at random even 'popular' levels. These aren't levels that have cheats or are impossibly hard. It is really at this point arbitrary and no one knows the criteria.
This in and of itself wouldn't necessarily be a bad thing. One could take it as constructive criticism to make a few changes to their levels and reupload them. However, THAT ISN'T POSSIBLE. Once your level has been deleted, it is banned for good. The ONLY way to get around it is to completely rebuild it from scratch. You can't even share them with your friends! There is NO way to let anyone else try them because you can't upload them to the server.
So simply by not winning a popularity contest your hard work is banished by some arbitrary process of which no one knows the processes or rules.
The conclusion I've come to is that there are so many levels out there that unless you have your own youtube channel promoting your levels, or unless someone accidentally finds your level and likes it and promotes it (which is how I find most the good levels) or you have a bunch of friends starring your levels then you are doomed to deletion w/o having hardly anyone even trying it. Those that do, aren't interested in any kind of challenge apparently. If it isn't beatable in just a few minutes w/o much effort they just move on. The scary part is..I've never starred a level. I didn't know it was necessary. I don't care about stars. It's the equivalent of a FB like. No care.
This is what is inherently wrong with the game. There is no reason for 1up's or coins because they are one off levels, hit and forget.
I'm not going to get into 'your level must suck' discussions because that is all subjective. If I wanted to make 'run right' levels like a 10 year old then I would do that. Anyway, I'm over it. I will be getting rid of the Wii U, I will not be getting X, or Zelda, I am done with Nintendo. I gave them a chance, and their behind the times thinking slapped that chance in the face. There are many ways to handle what they are trying to do, and this isn't it. There have been countless complaints around this since they started the process last month and no one seems to know what the decision is based on.
/rant
TLDR: Didn't win arbitrary popularity contest, levels banned. Screw Nintendo and their behind the times thinking.
I've played quite a few Mario Maker levels in the last few months. The majority are 'meh' at best. Yes there are some great levels, but they aren't ones you just come across in day to day playing.
If you go based on rankings (stars) the 10-20 levels worldwide are play by themselves levels or basically..sit there and watch your character move on its own levels, you know, absolutely no skill. Or they are just hold right, with no chance of actually having to avoid anything.
Next you have the event levels. These are levels created for/by companies on occasion. You play these to get special things that normally you would need amiibos to get. They are generally HORRIBLE.
Next you have the 100 courses. The way I understand these work is Nintendo hand picks certain levels to part of this. Some are pretty good, and some are..wtf would you put this here. One level was a 5 second straight run to the flag with NOTHING in between.
As an aged gamer I prefer a little more thought and skill behind levels. My levels require a bit of thought. There are no 'hidden mechanic/cheat' gimmicks, no blind jumps (except optional occasional hidden areas), but there are some puzzles to them. I spent many hours meticulously designing them. They aren't things I cranked out in 10 minutes. I started crafting levels and uploading them and watching when
1. few people played them
2. no one played them more than 2 times which led to..
3. No one beat them which led to...
4. No stars
5. Deleted
What I didn't know is that after a period of time. Nintendo deletes 'unpopular' levels from their servers. They have not said what constitutes an unpopular level, and have been deleting seemingly at random even 'popular' levels. These aren't levels that have cheats or are impossibly hard. It is really at this point arbitrary and no one knows the criteria.
This in and of itself wouldn't necessarily be a bad thing. One could take it as constructive criticism to make a few changes to their levels and reupload them. However, THAT ISN'T POSSIBLE. Once your level has been deleted, it is banned for good. The ONLY way to get around it is to completely rebuild it from scratch. You can't even share them with your friends! There is NO way to let anyone else try them because you can't upload them to the server.
So simply by not winning a popularity contest your hard work is banished by some arbitrary process of which no one knows the processes or rules.
The conclusion I've come to is that there are so many levels out there that unless you have your own youtube channel promoting your levels, or unless someone accidentally finds your level and likes it and promotes it (which is how I find most the good levels) or you have a bunch of friends starring your levels then you are doomed to deletion w/o having hardly anyone even trying it. Those that do, aren't interested in any kind of challenge apparently. If it isn't beatable in just a few minutes w/o much effort they just move on. The scary part is..I've never starred a level. I didn't know it was necessary. I don't care about stars. It's the equivalent of a FB like. No care.
This is what is inherently wrong with the game. There is no reason for 1up's or coins because they are one off levels, hit and forget.
I'm not going to get into 'your level must suck' discussions because that is all subjective. If I wanted to make 'run right' levels like a 10 year old then I would do that. Anyway, I'm over it. I will be getting rid of the Wii U, I will not be getting X, or Zelda, I am done with Nintendo. I gave them a chance, and their behind the times thinking slapped that chance in the face. There are many ways to handle what they are trying to do, and this isn't it. There have been countless complaints around this since they started the process last month and no one seems to know what the decision is based on.
/rant
TLDR: Didn't win arbitrary popularity contest, levels banned. Screw Nintendo and their behind the times thinking.
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