While I enjoyed New Super U (and to a greater extent New Super 2 on the 3DS a few months earlier), it really felt like a stopgap. Another rote-albeit beautiful-2D platformer didn’t say anything special or unique about the then-new console. When New Super Mario Bros U launched alongside the Wii U in 2012, it was exactly what the console didn’t need. “Now Nintendo can stop wasting everyone’s time cranking out those bland, samey New Super Mario Bros sequels year after year and just let the fans make them.” So when Nintendo announced Super Mario Maker at E3 2014, I was simultaneously excited and relieved. I’m a Nintendo fan at heart-have been for years, hopefully will be until the day I die.