They did NOT need to hit the 'lazy' people with sticks. As I said in my last post, the producers needed to make the call that the budget and timeline needed to be extended to get these features. There just wasn't enough time in the day. I would bet substantial amounts of money that virtually all of the developers involved would want to improve these features. Features are added and removed based on what's doable in those constraints. These games get set forth with a budget and timeline in mind. This is almost definitely not an issue of laziness. I can't help but speak up in instances of people calling developers lazy. What was that, Nintendo? You almost left out features? You didn't put a feature to good use? You have to speak up, I can't hear you over your screaming laziness. So, after some trepidation, the cooperative mode was included in the final product after all. Amano and Ishikawa rationalized it in a few ways, including how a less-skilled player can improve by watching a better one, and how two players can work together to collect the multitude of coins present on the screen at one time.

The solution? Have the camera focus on one player, while allowing the two to compete for who that player is. This would prove troublesome in terms of how to focus the camera on both players. 2's level structure allowed for a lot of exploration, not just simple left-to-right progression. More than that, they also pointed out that, unlike other entries in the series, New Super Mario Bros. Though a prototype of the mode was up and running, the pair didn't believe that they would have enough time to go back and retrofit the levels that had already been completed to accommodate a possible second player. While this inclusion seems like a no-brainer, it was met with hesitation from Yusuke Amano and Masaaki Ishikawa, the Director and Art Director of New Super Mario Bros.

Rather than the competitive mode that was featured in the original New Super Mario Bros., Tezuka instead envisioned a mode more akin to that in New Super Mario Bros.

2, Takashi Tezuka, who was overseeing the development of the game, suggested that a robust cooperative mode be added. 2's cooperative mode, which allows two players to progress through the entire main game together, was nearly unable to be included in the final product, the latest Iwata Asks revealed.ĭuring the development of New Super Mario Bros.

Mario bros two player