Super Mario Maker Level Designed By Michel Ancel
Michel Ancel, creator of Rayman and Jade, and France’s greatest known game designer, has created a level in Super Mario Maker. Nintendo France filmed Ancel as he designed his own level and also interviewed him on how he approaches level design. The video is entirely in French with no translations or subtitles, but it’s not difficult to figure out what is being said thanks to the visual graphics being used. Ancel’s favorite Mario game is apparently Super Mario Land for Game Boy.
Some fans fluent in French have been able to discern some of the bullet points Ancel discusses in the middle of the video. He speaks of the principles of good level design; that a well-constructed level should have a natural flow, and there should be a clear understanding of the objective or goal and how to get there. Toward the end Ancel is asked what surprised him about Super Mario Maker; he replied that he was able to mix some things he didn’t think would go together to create interesting results.
You want to play the level, don’t you? Nintendo heard you before you said anything: it’ll be one of the 60 pre-loaded levels that will come with the game when it ships next month. (Previously, various news outlets reported the game would include 100 levels; this was erroneous information.)
Super Mario Maker comes out September 11. All we know about Ancel’s level is that it will take place underground and will contain lots of Boos.