The last impressive development for the 2D Mario games to me was Mario Maker. It was genuinely exciting and offered so much for people to just go insane with.

The last impressive development for the 2D Mario games to me was Mario Maker. It was genuinely exciting and offered so much for people to just go insane with. I particularly loved those levels where you would just run in one direction and crazy things would happen. But, personally, I don't mind the game being "more of the same". I think there's something that maybe journalists and game critics and maybe gamers in general don't quite understand but I know it's something Nintendo probably thinks about quite a lot: new generations. My cousins who is 10 years younger than me, his first Mario 2D game wasn't one of the original ones, it was a Nintendo DS one. He didn't care for "novel mechanics" for him everything was novel. Of course, there is always a push and pull between experienced and new gamers. But I think Nintendo has done very well over the years keeping the franchise fresh enough to entice older gamers and classic enough for new players to understand what Mario is about. I would like to see, however, a truly challenging Mario game at some point. Though I think this could be a separate game. When it comes to 3D Mario, the one on the Switch was really fun... but it was so easy! Until you got to the "dark/darker side of the Moon" that offered such a challenge utilizing every power and so on. It was really difficult and insanely fun, at least for me and my friends. I spent weeks, if not a few months with my best friend just trying to beat that final level; we'd get drunk and play Mario for hours.