I suspect many of my fellow parents can relate to this, but when you have your first child, a whole bevvy of problems that never existed before are suddenly thrust upon you.
“Do we have enough nappies?”
“Oh God, she missed the potty again.”
“No, you can’t sit there Daddy, my Peppa Pig toy is sitting there.”
Granted, a lot of these aren’t necessarily ‘problems’ as such, rather minor inconveniences that, along with frequent moments of unbridled joy, make up the weird and wonderful world of parenthood. I do, however, have a bit of a bone to pick with Nintendo; specifically with its approach to game difficulty in the last mainline Mario, Super Mario Bros. Wonder.
Before having a child, the idea of lowering a game’s difficulty had honestly never really entered my mind. If anything, I would crank the difficulty up wherever I could in the hope that it would both extend my overall playtime and provide a unique sense of accomplishment. Halo on Legendary? No problem. Bayonetta on Climax? Is that all you’ve got?
This all changed, however, when my daughter expressed interest in playing Mario Wonder. She watched the Super Mario Bros. Movie and became somewhat obsessed with the characters – especially Princess Peach. She’s only three, so I knew immediately that if I’m going to let her play, I’d need to make sure it was as approachable as possible, despite my own proclivities.
As you might know, however, Super Mario Bros. Wonder essentially locks its lower difficulty setting to specific characters: Nabbit and four Yoshis. So when the character select screen came up, I gently tried to explain this to my daughter, knowing full well how the conversation would go.
“Now listen, if you go for one of these characters, the game will be a bit easier for you and you’ll have a lot more fun.”
“I want to be Princess Peach thoooough!”
“That might be a bit trickier. If you go for the purple rabbit, it’ll be better.”
“No, Princess Peach!”
Sigh. Anyone who’s had the pleasure of raising a three-year-old knows that it’s borderline impossible to change their mind once their heart is set on something. In this case, Princess Peach is my daughter’s favourite character from the movie, so of course she’s going to want to play as her. This meant we’d have to do without the perks – including invincibility – that come with Yoshi or Nabbit.
Wonder’s Badge system would have potentially eased certain tricky scenarios, but they’re not a comprehensive replacement for proper difficulty options
So how did it go? Well, rather predictably, not well. The opening stage – Welcome to the Flower Kingdom – was doable, but it went rapidly downhill from there. I knew that changing to Yoshi or Nabbit wasn’t suddenly going to make the game a cakewalk; after all, while both characters boast unique abilities that would theoretically make most scenarios easier, there’s still the task of actually navigating the levels. Given my daughter’s age and inexperience, even that would no doubt prove quite the challenge.
Still, it seems baffling to me that Nintendo would create a game aimed at children and families and not offer any optional difficulty settings for the majority of its 12 playable characters. No offence to Nabbit, but no child wants to play him when the likes of Mario, Luigi, and Princess Peach are sitting right there; especially when the Illumination movie had such an immediate, profound influence on my daughter’s perception and preferences.
And yes, I know Wonder’s Badge system would have potentially eased certain tricky scenarios, but they’re not a comprehensive replacement for proper difficulty options, in my eyes.
I wish I could say that I managed to convince her so she could enjoy the game, but she was exceptionally stubborn in her desire to play as Peach. And honestly? I’m quite proud of that. It makes me think that perhaps, way off in the future, she’ll be playing her games on higher difficulties just like me… Or she just loves Peach and wants to play as her – yeah, that’s probably it. In the end, though, she gave up and went back to playing with her Peach plushie.
Games like Celeste have proven that even the most challenging of experiences can be accessible to almost anybody when it has the right options in place. Quite frankly, I think with invincibility turned on and unlimited stamina applied, my daughter could probably have more fun with Celeste than she did with Mario Wonder – and I consider the latter to be much easier on its default settings.
So come on, sort it out Nintendo. You’ve made some strides with difficulty and accessibility options over the years, but you’ve clearly got a long way to go. Applying blanket difficulty settings to a tentpole Mario title seems like the most basic of tasks when your goal is to reach as many potential players as possible, but as ever, the company stubbornly things its own way.
Forcing those who want a breezier time to play as a specific character, though..? Nah, that ain’t it.