My eldest is at that lovely age where he is overly influenced by commercials. He wants everything he sees on TV, or he thinks I need everything he sees on TV. When it comes to video games, he begged for Splatoon nearly every day for two months. Now that he has said game and loves it, he’s on to the next biggest thing, which happens to be Super Mario Maker. The kid really has no idea what this game entails.
I’ve tried to explain to him repeatedly that it’s not a typical Mario game, that it’s about building your own levels and playing levels others have made. It’s more about creating stuff that ridiculously difficult or super silly than playing a traditional Mario game. But he doesn’t care. He sees the commercials, he sees kids talking about how much fun it is to make levels, and he’s all over it.
So I’ve decided to make a deal with him. If he can learn about Mario games and show me that he understands them and what Super Mario Maker is about, I’ll look into getting the game for him. This means he has to play some of the original games. He has no idea what a real platformer is, and it’s about time he learns and he learns the hard way. I showed him where both Super Mario Bros. and Super Mario Bros. 3 are on the Wii U (I bought them at least a year ago), and set him on his way. Within minutes, the complaining was in full force.
This is hard! You have to jump perfectly! Oh my gosh, you die after getting hit just once?
And he wants Super Mario Maker. Silly, silly little boy.
After watching a reshowing of the Nintendo World Championships 2015 on Sunday, where the final stage was Treehouse-created levels for Super Mario Maker, that sealed the deal. He said it looked fun, but it was way too hard for him. So he went back to the last game he asked me for ad infinitum: Mario Kart 8.
Well, that’s fine. But he needs to respect where that game came from as well. I went through the Wii U eShop, found the original Mario Kart from the SNES, and purchased it. He has absolutely loved it. He and the husband were racing against one another last night, and he admitted that he needs to practice this one a lot before he moves onto MK8.
I feel like my work here is done.
Now maybe I should school him in Super Smash Bros. Melee before we consider picking up Super Smash Bros. Wii U…
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