Go Your Own Way: How Mario Galaxy's Development led to Nintendo's Sandbox Vision

Nintendo has an extensive history for refusing to follow trends, refusing to go along with what is successful and what is working within the gaming industry. They’d rather establish the trends, or at the very least survive on having the best and most innovative first-party games in the market. Love or hate the strategy, it has allowed Nintendo to become one of the last remaining companies from the 1990s, as the world of gaming is notoriously cutthroat and notoriously brutal to developers, publishers, and even hardware designers. Now, they have the top-selling console in the market for the last two years despite the hardware limitations when compared to its peers.

This strategy doesn’t just apply to hardware, it applies to their software and first-party output. You can tell when a game is a Nintendo game based off of polish, personality, and just how damn different it is to the typical games you see. In one quick example we have Metroid Prime and Halo 2, which released on the same day; one of them was the established game in an emerging genre, while the other presented a unique first-party adventure/shooter experience you don’t see anywhere else.

Nowadays, Nintendo has continued standing out in the crowded gaming industry by secretly altering the way they view the gaming experience overall, and is enjoying immense riches for it. I believe this shift started with Super Mario Galaxy. I also believe this shift is causing a little stir within the company, and also within the fanbase. The old guards and the new guards have definitely worked together to create spectacular games, but I believe the new way games are being made in the Japanese company are a result of a compromise that has given us amazing experiences----even if some franchises might be suffering for this new vision.  

Let’s go back first.

During the Wii days, Nintendo wanted to make a grand-scale Super Mario game to take advantage of the “better” hardware (PS3 and XBox 360 continue laughing) and bring him to the newest generation. However, there were strong differences of opinion between just how much story should be featured in a Mario game. Shigeru Miyamoto, the creator of Mario that notoriously is anti-storyline for his creations, did not want any depth to the existence of Rosalina and the Luma stars, while the director Yoshiaki Koizumi wanted to not only give us an excellent Mario experience with the presentation of an epic AAA title, but also wanted to deepen the typical damsel in distress storyline of the franchise with new characters and backstories.

The inner clashing led to Koizumi winning the battle, but Miyamoto ultimately winning the war—more on that later. Super Mario Galaxy would become a spectacular experience, an award-winning smash hit, and the critics were blown away by not just the gameplay, but the presentation and depth that you hardly see in the usually-carefree Super Mario titles. From soundtrack to graphics to art direction, this was the first Mario game that literally felt like there were stakes. There was exploration, variety, and even a sense of importance.

Then came Super Mario Galaxy 2.

Miyamoto not only killed the story aspects, but he even introduced an easy mode setting that was first introduced in New Super Mario Bros. If you were struggling in the game, a help system was created within the game, slightly breaking the fourth wall, completely available to help you out. This easy mode innovation would allow for gamers of all ages and skill levels to enjoy the game---however it would also slightly disrupt the flow of an ongoing story if it had one. It makes no sense for Super Mario to try to save the galaxy, but then comes Rosalina to do the job for him. The result is a totally fun game that nonetheless wasn’t as immersive or felt as epic as the original. But, it was still extremely fun.

This easy guide innovation, as clever as it is, could only be possible if you’re able to strip the game down to the barebones and focus strictly on gameplay and disregard exploration, disregard continuity, disregard the overall concept of a person playing the game trying to progress on his/her own, and working his/her way towards the finish line. Miyamoto would also circumvent this by essentially punishing the gamer if they used any help while trying to also collect everything and get the secret ending---you have to go back and beat the levels on your own to truly earn said rewards. Super Mario Galaxy 2 would also sell incredibly well, would also win awards, and would also remain a staple in Nintendo history. But it also established a trend that may not sit well with all Nintendo fans and remains controversial among the hardcore gamers overall.

Super Mario Galaxy 2 would lay the groundwork for how Nintendo can approach making a game with the latest technology. Nintendo can make games for everybody, can create a digital menu for gamers to choose how to enjoy the product, there is no set path. You can be a collector, you can ignore all the help and try to beat everything on your own, or you can just casually play it and take the help when necessary. Just a couple years after Mario Galaxy 2 we’d see the game creating madman Sakurai implement this concept with the criminally underrated Kid Icarus Uprising---you can play the entire game on one of NINETY different difficulty levels. This difficulty slider also becomes a popular feature in Smash Bros. WiiU, which also features dozens of different difficulties on top of all the customizable options.

But clearly the approach to makes games for everybody has to also innovate and adjust, as the gaming industry was getting better at appealing to casuals while telling stories and truly immersing the gamer to these storylines and environments they’re featured in. We saw franchises like Grand Theft Auto, Red Dead Redemption, God of War, Uncharted, Call of Duty, Bioshock and many others over the years emerge and become not just great games, but excellent overall experiences. More so, these games weren’t just quality, but the difficulty of these games were secretly getting easier, and now we see more automatic checkpoints, much less punishment when you do one particular section of the game incorrectly, and more story that replaces actual gameplay. Easier gaming was becoming part of the “quality of life” expectations in today’s gaming. Whenever there was an actual tough game, like Dark Souls, it became the exception to the norm, as opposed to an expectation like the infamous controller-breaking experiences in the SNES/Genesis days.

So how can Nintendo tell good stories, while avoiding having to compete graphics-wise, avoid online multiplayer and online achievement systems (which we all know they hate) as an essential feature to selling a $60 game, and remain the top option for hardcore, casuals and for families? How can Nintendo make a game that appeals to all without sacrificing what has become essential cornerstones of the industry like strong story, presentation, and depth? The WiiU failed partially because Nintendo’s games were no longer attracting the hardcore crowds, and in gaming you cannot, and will not survive on the mercy of casual players. Can Nintendo remain Nintendo as the industry demands more from the products themselves?

Welcome to Nintendo’s sandbox technique.

As the console with the perfect pairing of games that are highly varied and games that are very customizable, Nintendo has found a way to attract everyone; Nintendo has evolved into making giant games that do not have to be fully explored for full enjoyment of the overarching story, and sometimes don’t even have stories unless the user is committed to making them. All this, on a console that can literally be played in a variety of different ways.

On the customizable side, we have the 2-D Mario games which outside of ports has become dependent on Super Mario Maker---a game that allows people to create and share levels. With Mario Maker, you can play easy, creative courses, or you could end up playing nailbiters with extreme difficulty and require perfect precision to complete. Mario Maker 2 has even expanded so that creators can make their own entire Mario games, complete with worlds and levels within them. The result is 10 million levels created, this is easily the biggest platformer of all-time in terms of sheer content (and this is with Nintendo STILL fumbling some of its potential). As of today, we haven’t had an actual new 2-D Mario game since New Super Mario Bros. U back in 2012.

In 2020, Animal Crossing: New Horizons focused less on the villagers and their ever-evolving inner storylines in favor of a grandiose number of customizable options, which resulted in 24 million copies sold and quickly rising to become one of the best-selling games in history. Even though Smash Bros. has always been an already-customizable experience, Ultimate steps it up several notches with the deepest lineup in the history of fighting games, creating a replayability factor that easily dwarfs every previous Smash Bros. game ever released. End result? Best-selling fighting game of all-time, and a fighter that easily has generations worth of potential fun and mayhem. EVO 2021 is going to be so wild if we can get the pandemic under control.

Then we have their low goalpost-high ceiling concept, which has now been maximized to perfection for a sandbox-esque experience. With this, it lowers the bar for finishing the story, finishing the main game sooner, but expanding the amount of sheer overall content to exponential levels. Any type of upgrade is basically eliminated in favor of having the player decide how to tackle the obstacles. Super Mario Galaxy 2 flirted with this back in 2010 by giving us the requirement of 70 stars, but the overall total at a whopping 240, having entire sections of the game optional to play. Now fast-forward to Super Mario Odyssey: 124 required moons to face Bowser a final time, out of ONE THOUSAND MOONS you can find and collect. The importance of these moons/stars is devolved into becoming easy collectables when beating the game, while allowing Nintendo to rev up the challenge for explorers and competionists by sprinkling additional collectables in every corner of the worlds featured. You choose how to take on this game, you choose your pace, you literally choose the types of Super Mario platforming you want to engage in.

Breath of the Wild became the benchmark for this drastic change within Nintendo, as it launched with the Switch on March 2017 and immediately made its presence known. Now, the major Nintendo games have removed nearly all semblance of streamlined gameplay and story beats, but instead of eliminating story they give you the option to pursue the adventure however you like. Breath of the Wild allows you to go straight to the final boss within the first few hours, or you can spend over 120 hours exploring every single nook and cranny for all the seeds, all the memories, all the hidden shrines and main quests. As of this day, there are still secrets being discovered within the vast world of Hyrule.

You aren’t pursuing a direct story, you are developing the story, and picking the chapters to follow, picking your own pathways to partake in while exploring the massive land placed in front of you. Despite the controversy, it can’t be a coincidence that Pokemon has abandoned their “hidden machines” feature which are required upgrades to collect in order to progress through the adventure. Look at how the approach to Kirby and Yoshi games have also changed, removing all challenge and allowing you to choose how much exploration and collecting to commit to.  

Most AAA titles take about 10-20 hours to complete, with a few exceptions going up to 50 hours. Nintendo on the other hand has cornered the market of games that can run you over 50 hours easily: Pokemon (especially if you nuzlocke it up), Super Mario, Legend of Zelda, Animal Crossing, even Luigi’s Mansion having games on Switch that definitely gives you maximum value for your $60 purchases. They have avoided multi-player becoming the value enhancer in favor of giving the gamers open worlds to pursue, games with giant menus of customization. With that, now we see notoriously lengthy games like Skyrim and The Witcher now making their way to the Switch---when before they probably would have avoided heading to a Nintendo console.

Of course, this isn’t without its pushback and setbacks. Super Mario Odyssey doesn’t have the focused story beats of Mario Galaxy, which probably disappoints those wanting the 3-D Mario franchise to evolve beyond surface-level gameplay, no matter how fun it is. The pain was especially deep when Mario’s 35th anniversary collection arrived with minimal polish to Super Mario Sunshine and Super Mario Galaxy. Breath of the Wild was criticized to lack the deep mythos and storylines of previous Zelda titles, as the lack of direction and unexpected freedom was nearly intimidating to some longtime fans. Can’t also be a coincidence that the first Zelda remake to arrive on Switch was the notoriously minimalistic (but still enjoyable) story of Link’s Awakening.

There are some franchises being avoided altogether because this new direction doesn’t mesh with what we’re used to from the series. F-Zero has yet to see a sequel precisely because its rabid difficulty and more complex racing gameplay goes against the grain of accessibility Nintendo seeks within its games. How CAN you easy mode F-Zero, a game meant to drive you up five walls? Metroid Prime 4 and Bayonetta 3 have experienced long delays, and probably because of secret requests to change up its gameplay to meet this new vision.

Then we have Paper Mario: The Origami King, which just looks like a behind-the-scenes deathbattle during development as dozens of different ideas bounce around and bounce off each other (and we have interviews to prove that there were indeed struggles in making the game Intelligent Systems wanted to make). There’s an extremely controversial battle system, a strange lack of true helpers which is impossible to implement successfully in a role-playing game, no actual level-up system (which once again, this is supposed to be an RPG). The sandbox concept was clearly being forced on here, as they drowned the game in collectables and secrets and activities, but didn’t want to force players into a straightforward story with a required element to have to be “stronger” in order to progress through. Somewhere within Origami King is a top-tier RPG, but instead we have a game that’s chock full of fun, as well as wasted potential. This was Super Mario Galaxy 2 disguised as Super Mario RPG.

Overall however, Nintendo’s new direction has led them to extreme riches, and a return to the top of the gaming world as the Playstation 5 and XBox Series X tries to catch up. This new direction perfectly syncs up with the portable ability of the Switch, as now you can play the game in smaller batches and bunches before moving to your next activity. The Switch has zero signs of slowing down, and this is with anniversaries coming up and the heavily-rumored Switch Pro right around the corner. Boy, just imagine the Switch Pro potentially launching this holiday with the Pokemon Diamond/Pearl remake, some Mario Odyssey DLC, and the next Breath of the Wild. You’ll see some sales records fall.  

At this point, Nintendo’s biggest obstacle is themselves, as there might be more resistance towards the sandbox from within their own developers and second-party studios in the coming years. The question as to whether Nintendo will cave in and allow some rule-breaking or remain strict in their current game-creating code is yet to be answered, but as of now its hard to deny their strategy is working. Nintendo’s new approach is definitely unique and yet another example as to how the company enjoys making games that zigzags away from what’s the norm in gaming---even if it might damage some of their classic ideas and franchises in the process.

With their ability to craft a giant gaming sandbox for gamers to craft their own paths and experiences, the Switch has bucked the obstacles of being less powerful, less online-friendly, and less story-driven as their competitors and carved its own wild path to immense ongoing success. Over a decade of tweaking ideas through different games has resulted in the massive hits we see today.