Have you ever watched a streamer or a friend play custom Super Mario Maker levels and think "this would✅ make a great tournament"? If you did, then you're in luck. Nintendo just announced that it will be hosting a Invitational during this year's E3 show.
In case you're not an avid Nintendo follower, it bears mentioning that the developer/producer/maker of childhoods posted a Direct video today. The video detailed the many new features available in the upcoming Super Mario Maker 2. The game is due out on June 28th, so there was a lot of ground to cover. There's literally new types of ground to use when making st🐽ages, as well as more robust online multiplayer options. There's also a story mode, Mii integration, and so much more.
It was all a bit much to take in, making it easy for smaller annou🎃ncements to slip by.
One of these fly-by announcements definitely deserves a closer look. The Super Mario Maker 2 invitational is happening on June 8th as part of Nintendo's E3 presence. That puts it right alongside the Super Smash. Bros Ultimate and Splatoon 2 tournaments.🧜 That's a pretty big dealꦰ for what is typically considered a more social game.
It also shows that Nintendo does listen to the fans... sort of. The first Super Mario Maker still maintains a devoted community on streaming platforms. Fans love to watch their favorite streamers take on ridiculously-convoluted levels, to the point where you have to wonder if its sadism at work. Sometimes the viewers are even invited to submit their own stages to personally torture the streamer. So yes, definite🍨ly sadism.
With the community still going strong years after the game's release, you'd think Nintendo would center a tournament around stage creation, Mario Maker's main gimmick. Unfortunately, the page states that "invited players test their plaওtforming abilities o♏n Super Mario Maker 2 courses, custom-made by Nintendo’s Treehouse!"
So it's basically a speedrunning contest, with custom stages made by Nintendo to advertise the game's features. That'll probably still make for an entertaining watch, just not what fans would expect from a Super Mario Maker event. Let's just hope the Treehouse designers are♍ as sinister as the pe🐲ople on Youtube and Twitch.