New Super Mario Bros. Wii To Include Official "Cheat"

phlack writes "Yahoo Games has an article describing a new mode in Nintendo's upcoming New Super Mario Bros. Wii that will allow the player to activate a 'demo' mode to get out of a hard situation. Nintendo plans on incorporating this into future games. Is this a good idea (to help relieve frustrations) or just sanctioned cheating?" They actually patented this system as well.

Fantastic

[Jarlsberg]

Having kids (5 and 9), I would have to say this is fantastic. Games like Super Mario Galaxy are too hard for my youngest, and I constantly have to step in and help with the levels. Now, Super Mario Galaxy is quite fun, but any game gets quite dull after having to go through the same stuff over and over. Let's have cheat/demo modes and let the kids have fun. :)

By the way, my youngest have no problems with Super Mario Sunshine - it is a much easier game for kids. Maybe it's the controller?

Might be good

[Ksempac]

If this means game companies can stop worrying about frustrated casual gamers and start making their game harder and longer then I say "go for it".

I'm sick and tired of both the debilitating trend and shortening trend in the video game industry. I've got a friend which enjoys video game but isn't good at it and even him was disappointed that he finished Star Wars Force Unleashed in only 7 hours. I thought it couldn't be worse, but I've been proved wrong with a test I saw on the latest Terminator video game : apparently, you can finish it in 4 hours (and I'm not even talking about the price/hours ratio). Sure theses two games use well-known licenses, but this trend is occuring for almost every video game serie.

On the other hand, I'm currently playing Ninja Gaiden Black, which is reputed for its difficulty. I'm at the 2/3 point, it took me 30h to get there, and I've enjoyed every minute of it.

Back in my day...

[midifarm]

I don't want to come across as an old codger, but cheat codes and the like have ruined gaming. Easter eggs and hidden levels are fun and add some dimension to the games. Cheat codes, continues and even the prospect of getting unlimited extra lives have taken game skill levels to a new low. If you have to cheat you obviously aren't good enough to win. Most of us who played years ago, beat the super hard levels, by A) having great skill at the game or B) got really lucky. Either one is fine with me, but entering in a cheat proves that you don't have either. I say remove the cheats, keep the Easter eggs and hidden stuff, increase the gameplay and quit making games disposable. It's cheaper to rent the game for 2 weeks from the video store, solve it and give it back than buying it. You're going to find the sales figures plummet for marginal games. There needs to be a change in the industry.

Re:"cheating"

[bigstrat2003]

In a single-player game, that I paid for, the interaction is between me and something owned by me. Its purpose is my entertainment. Challenge is part of that, but if I want to use an easy way, what could anyone possibly have against it?

I agree, but there are some jackass gamers out there who feel that the very presence of such a cheat option is something offensive and terrible. It's not enough to challenge themselves, they must force everyone else to take on the same challenge.

Then again, that's why those idiots have no friends.

Re:Only for casual gamers

[Devout_IPUite]

I would count on this damaging gameplay experience. Gran Turisimo 3 includes an auto-pilot mode. When you first start playing the game it's not infeasible that the auto-pilot is a better race car driver than you... So you might end up using it a bit and before you know it, you can only use the auto-pilot because you're not good enough to compete on your own at the current difficulty.

Personally, when this happened to me I went back and restarted without using B-Spec mode on a race I hadn't already won at least once (using B-spec to farm for credits to buy competitive cars for other races was a different story). I enjoyed the gameplay experience MUCH more the second time.

Re:Instant Satisfaction

[grumbel]

Imagine for a moment that your DVD player didn't have a fast forward button, after all you should watch the movie, not skip through it to the end for instant satisfaction.

Doesn't sound to great, does it? With video games its the same thing. Sure a challenging game is fun, but being forced to play through those challenging parts is not. It should be the users choice of how he wants to enjoy the game and if books and movies are any indication, it works quite fine when the user has instant access to the end of it.

The only real trouble I see with this is that games have progression, you learn skills in earlier levels to use them in later ones. So if you skip those learning parts, because you find them to hard, you mind end up being even more screwed later on, as you haven't learned how to play the game, thus a hard game becomes an impossible one.

But in the end: You payed for the game, so you should have the right to see all of it, if cheats and autoplay allow that, so be it.

The Game Genie

[Dusthead Jr.]

When we first got the NES SMB was the only game we played for it for a while. So with all the frustration of playing the damned game we did eventually beat it. And that was that. The we got a Game Genie and played it again but we kicked the games ass. In a game where getting touched once or twice by any enemy kills you It felt good to get a permanent invincibility and plow through the game. That's how I uses cheating now days, beat the game at least once, then cheat. I extends the life of the game IMHO.

I don't know...Eg: Street Fighter 4 (read)

[emanem]

Hi all...

I don't know if it's ok or not...but I think if it's needed then a game is not well balanced (against CPU I mean, not the game itself).
For example, if you play in the easiest mode at SF4 the final boss is able to destroy you anyway, while in all the other enounters the opponents are really...easy.
Now, I think that SF4 is a great game, well balanced etc etc. Really I stopped WoW to play SF4 PvP.
But as a single player game the fact the last boss is very hard even in easiest mode is a bit depressing, considering the quality of the game itself.
But to be 100% honest there could be a reason for that...in order to unlock all the characters you have to defeat the final boss some times straight without losing a game...so CAPCOM knew that everyone would play the game at easiest mode just to unlock all 25 characters...so basically this could be seen as a possible motivation to implement this hard boss as the fact everyone will face him at easiest mode...but still I don't like this.

I'm against demo mode but in favour of balanced games.
Cheers,

Re:Only for casual gamers

[The End Of Days]

Smart choice staying anonymous, because in truth nothing says loser quite like being snotty about being good at video games.

Re:Only for casual gamers

[phaggood]

I consider myself the "poster child" for the term "casual gamer". Having enough frustrations in meatspace, I don't want to the attempt to finish a game to be anything like work. I have a handful of Playstation II games and the closest I've got to a finish is "Kim Possible". My kids had to get me past the agility test early in Kingdom Hearts, and a similar test early in "Ghost in the Shell" has ended my progress in that game (my teen girl has no interest in the game and my 7yr old is too young too see such graphic violence).

Really, it's play, I don't wanna work that hard. There are serious sports players and there are "beer-belly" leagues where overweight men hit softballs and sorta jog around the bases - to each his own. If "Ghost" had a demo mode, I might actually know what's in the rest of the damned game nearly two years after I purchased it.

My other console is a Wii, and the types of games I have purchased for it, Wii Play, Playground, Wii Sports, Wii Fit, Wii Music, Cooking Mama, Game Party, Endless Ocean; further demonstrate I purchase games to have fun, not increase my frustrations. Perhaps this is why some of the few meatspace sports I do enjoy are tennis and softball - it seems easier to find casual players for these than say basketball or football which seem to be dominated by guys trying to relive their high school glory days or at least prove they "still got it".

Re:Only for casual gamers

[elrous0]

What were the hard parts on HL2 you're talking about? I generally thought the game was pretty well designed. But there were two areas that did give me trouble too, though. There is one area where you have to shoot off a certain lock. I didn't know this and flailed around forever trying to figure out how to get past the area before I finally looked it up in a walkthrough and realized I was supposed to just shoot off the lock. Another part was the part where you have to take down the helicopter in the speed boat. It took me forever to finally do it, but MAN did it feel good when I did. That fucking helicopter had been a constant annoyance throughout that entire section of the game, and watching it fall felt GOOD!

Re:Only for casual gamers

[ThePhilips]

I may catch on with the casual gamers, though.

I wouldn't count on that.

I have to agree.

For casual players (I consider myself being one too (at least in context of consoles)) it is important that game just flows, either guiding you or making you to explore the possibilities. It is bad game where you hit a bump - "demo" mode wouldn't solve it.

Only thing "demo" mode would achieve is to solve an ancient puzzle of hard core games when you buy an expensive game but get stuck in the middle. It is hard to justify the situation provided that you forked a pretty hefty money for the whole game, but can't enjoy it fully. Add here all the "lockable" crap and you have a case of potentially angry customer.

Could this mean harder games?

[Quackers_McDuck]

I am all for this if it means that they'll make the game actually difficult now. Recently Nintendo games have become way too easy, presumably because they don't want to frustrate casual players. With this demo feature, they can make the games provide more of a challenge without risking alienating casuals.

Similar to Blizzard's new content

[farker haiku]

This is very similar to what I've been seeing out of Blizzard, but the opposite approach (and I think Blizzard has this right). Instead of pushing the "Easy Button", how about making all the content easy and making hard modes that you can do for mad props/cool cut scenes/phat loot/self gratification.

Re:Only for casual gamers

[haddieman]

I can relate to that. Even though I consider myself a hardcore gamer, I really only enjoy putting in massive amounts of work in certain games (e.g. Super Stardust HD). When I play a game I'm looking for one of two things depending on my mood; when I'm worn out after a long day at work and I just want to relax, I'll throw in Burnout Paradise and just drive fast, but on weekends when I have more time, I will spend hours playing Killzone 2 or trying to get 100% on Metroid Prime 3. Of course, the game still has to be fun. If a game isn't fun it doesn't matter how hard or easy it is, I'm not going to play it. That's why I think that having a "demo mode" is a good idea (at least for Nintendo) because if you want to experience the challenge (if that's what makes the game fun for you) then you can. On the other hand, if you just want to relax and enjoy the game world you can do that as well.

Re:Only for casual gamers

[vux984]

I would count on this damaging gameplay experience.

Did idgodmode ruin Doom? Of course not.
Did being able to get Castle-9 lives in Super Mario Brothers ruin it? Even today I still can't beat World 8 without a healthy stack of lives going in.

What about updownupdownleftrightleftrightabab in umpteen million other games for extra continues, ammo, whatever, etc?

How is this really any different? I mean idgodmode made you invincible with unlimited ammo.

Re:Only for casual gamers

[ground.zero.612]

I would call you an apathetic gamer rather than a casual gamer. Playing games is either about solving problems, competition, or both. Being unwilling to do either is not what I would call a gamer at all. Not in any sense of the word I've been accustomed to using since I first played Pong when it was *gasp* new.

What's "content"?

[johannesg]

But, hey, you paid for the game, I say you should be able to access all of its content, regardless of your playing skill.

If you think of content as just the graphics, or the levels, then I suppose this lets you access all the content. But if you think of content as the gameplay, then rather than letting you access it, this is taking it away from you (if you let it of course).

I certainly understand the sentiment though. I've seen enough games with ridiculous difficulty spikes (usually when a boss appears) where I used cheats as well - or simply gave up.

Re:Sounds like a good idea.

[socrplayr813]

Rereading my post, I see how it was a bit ambiguous. I don't usually play games that require that kind of work to unlock things. If the game is fun in its own right, then I'll play it, but I generally refuse to put hours into something if I'm not enjoying it.

I think for some people, the work they put into achieving high levels or unlocking things in games does make it more fun. However, I think that's partially because many of them don't get enough of a sense of accomplishment from the rest of their life. That's not universal, of course, but I've gone through a couple of low points in my life in which I fell into a bit of a game addiction. Life sucked; games gave me some small sense of accomplishment and let me be important/powerful somewhere to make up for what was missing elsewhere.