Super Mario World
GameBy Nintendo Entertainment Analysis & Development · Released Nov 21, 1990
Documents about Super Mario World
Whitepaper4 pages
At the Push of a Button: Player/Avatar Fusion and the 'Gestural Potential' of Video Game Music
This paper proposes a new gestural analytical framework for understanding how video game music engages players and draws them into the ludo-narrative worlds they inhabit.
- The paper proposes a 'gestural potential' framework that extends Robert Hatten's musical gesture theory by treating the player as both listener and performer with agency over the game's virtual landscape, rather than a passive listener.
- The author argues that existing musical gesture theories, which assume passive listeners, are inadequate for game music and that any framework must account for individual differences in how players move through games.
- The primary case study compares the music and level design of two SNES 2D side-scrolling platformers, Super Mario World and Super Metroid, to identify a phenomenon termed 'ludomusical cocooning', in which attuned, embodied players reach heightened immersion.
DiGRASep 2024
Whitepaper3 pages
ROM Hacks and Modding in the Age of User-Generated Content
This paper examines ROM hacking and player modding of video games in the context of user-generated content (UGC) and the figure of the prosumer, who both consumes and produces content.
- The paper argues that developers increasingly build user-generated content into their design strategies to extend the commercial lifecycle of games, thereby absorbing the once-contentious practice of modifying game data.
- Super Mario Maker is presented as a case study in which a major publisher takes the subversive activity of ROM hacking and code modification and channels it into a controlled, highly replayable, officially sanctioned tool.
- Developers retain authority over what players can create, how they can create it, and what content is permitted, including banning levels that feature certain content or exploit glitches.
DiGRAJan 2020
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