There's a room within EAD Tokyo's offices where the employees working on new 3D Mario games stick Post-It notes of ideas on the walls. Only about one in every 50 makes it into the games, claims producer Koichi Hayashida, but I strongly suspect that there were a few empty walls by the end of development on Super Mario 3D World. Every level is a non-stop bombardment of stuff, with familiar concepts and enemies used in fresh and exciting ways, and brand new ingredients liberally sprinkled on top.
Nintendo describes it as a 'grand culmination', a Best of Mario Volume One, if you will. But that doesn't really cover it. It feels more like the game equivalent of a double album, a Mario-themed collection of hit singles and B-sides with an extra disc's worth of demos, rarities and new, unheard tracks.
Though again, that's not quite right either. In some respects - and maybe it's the music that prompted this thought - it's like a freeform jazz performance: you recognise most of the individual elements but it all comes together in a constantly surprising, semi-improvisational manner. You might have felt these rhythms and melodies before, but you're never quite sure what's around the next corner, and the anticipation at what comes next is every bit as exciting as being confounded by what you do find.
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