Super Mario Epic 2: Dream Machine
| Super Mario Epic 2: Dream Machine | |
|---|---|
| No image | |
| Developer(s) | Jeff Silvers |
| Announce Date | May 2003 |
| Release Date | September 11, 2004 |
| Genre | Platform |
| Players | 1 |
| Input | Standard keyboard |
| Medium | The Games Factory, Multimedia Fusion Express |
| Platform | Windows |
| Status | Unknown |
Super Mario Epic 2: Dream Machine is a fangame created by Jeff Silvers. It is the follow-up to his first fangame, Super Mario Epic. A sequel, Super Mario Epic 3, is currently in the works.
Contents
History
In April 2003, Jeff Silvers released his first fangame, Super Mario Epic. It was met with mixed reviews and quickly spread across the Internet (mostly on foreign language European websites). Silvers began planning a sequel that would address many of the issues players had with the original's engine, including the inability to stomp enemies and the lack of essential Mario elements such as ? blocks.
Production begins
In late May 2003, Silvers began working on the core engine for SME2 in The Games Factory. This engine featured many elements painfully absent from SME, though it still used the built-in platform movement. Eventually, features such as static object enemies, ? blocks, and stompable enemies were implement, which would allow Silvers much more freedom in level design than he had with SME's engine. Early in production, he introduced Rage's veggie carrying engine, which allowed the player to pluck vegetables from the ground, a la Super Mario Bros. 2. This was a feature that, at the time, wasn't included in many fangames, and would prove to be majorly influencial in SME2's level design.
The first demo
In the summer/fall of 2003, Silvers released the first demo of Super Mario Epic 2, which by now was subtitled Dream Machine. The demo received little attention, though it was given two mostly positive reviews on MFGG. The demo featured an early version of SME2's first level, Grass Fields. The demo version of the level was somewhat different than the level seen in the final release, and the engine was still pretty far from what it would eventually become.
Production hiatus
Sometime in late 2003 or early 2004, Super Mario Epic 2's production went into its first hiatus. Silvers began pursuing other projects to prevent himself from becoming burnt out on Dream Machine. The first was Mega Man Vendetta, an ill-fated Mega Man fangame which was marred by a poor engine and uninspired level design. The next project Silvers pursued was Wasted Smiley Pinball (originally Jeff Silvers Software Pinball), a poor pinball simulator which used the ball movement object in The Games Factory and featured no realistic pinball physics whatsoever. The game was released in May 2004 to universally bad reviews, and Silvers once again set his sights on his Mario fangame.
Production resumes and corruption ensues
Around this time, Silvers began to run into numerous problems. The Games Factory began to corrupt his source files seemingly at random, which would undo weeks of work at a time. This led to several instances in which Silvers considered abandoning the project out of frustration. When file corruptions began to occur on a nearly weekly basis, Silvers switched production of the game over to Multimedia Fusion Express, a program that was essentially the same as The Games Factory but less prone to file corruption. The file corruption incidences became much rarer after the switch.
Anticipation builds
In mid-2004, Silvers began releasing SME2 screenshots on the MFGG Forums. MFGGers immediately took notice of the game, and anticipation began to build. Subsequently, Silvers became nervous that what he was producing would not meet the high expectations people had formed. He pondered abandoning the project under the assumption that people would forget about the game if he quit talking about it. He was eventually pursuaded to release a second demo. The new demo, the first public beta release since late 2003, featured Shyguy Hills, a level that consisted mostly of Shyguys, Snifits, and Lakitu. Though some complained of the difficulty, most agreed that the demo was entertaining, and Silvers decided against dropping the project.
The release
Super Mario Epic 2: Dream Machine was released on September 11, 2004, on MFGG and The Daily Click. It received mostly positive reviews, and placed third in that week's "Game of the Week" poll at The Daily Click. Like it's predecessor, it began to spread to various download sites across the Internet with virtually no assistance from Jeff Silvers. Caiman.us added the game to their site shortly after its release, where it has enjoyed a constant place on the upper half of that site's Top 60 Downloads and Top 60 Average lists (to date, it has been downloaded more than 38,500 times from that website alone). It was featured on about.com, and went on to receive five 2005 MFGG Awards (Best Game of 2005, Best Level Design, Best Story, Best Secrets, and Best Setting), as well as two other nominations (Best Engine and Best Usage of Resources).
