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Thread: Was "Doki Doki Panic" Really Supposed to Have Been a Mario Game?

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    Default Was "Doki Doki Panic" Really Supposed to Have Been a Mario Game?

    I am getting conflicting stories as to whether or not Yume Koujou: Doki Doki Panic ("Dream Factory: Heart-Pounding Panic") - which was used as the basis for our market's Super Mario Bros. 2 - was ever supposed to have been a Mario game before Nintendo ultimately decided to go this route? Well, who's right and who's wrong?

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    Doki Doki Panic was a quick fix for Nintendo when they realized that the Japanese Super Mario Bros. 2 was not what they wanted to release in the states. As can be seen on the SNES Super Mario All Stars game, Japanese SMB2 was highly similar to original SMB. Whether the original intent was for Doki Doki Panic to be SMB2 in USA is debatable, and a topic I have never seen discussed before.

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    Doki Doki Panic was not supposed to be a Mario Game. It was supposed to be just an ordinary game.

    Then the heads at Nintendo thought that the Japanese version of Mario 2 was too difficult for other markets. So they created the alternate version of Mario 2, using Doki Doki Panic as the platform.

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    Doki Doki Panic was meant to be its own game. I'm very glad Nintendo latter made it into a Mario game because very few people would have played it otherwise, and it is a superior game to the Japanese Super Mario Bros. 2 in my opinion.

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    Howard Phillips certainly deserves a lot of credit for that judgment (not to release SMB2 Japan in the West). I think it would have been a mistake because it would have been too similar to what was done in the previous years, where game sequels were far too similar to each other.
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    Quote Originally Posted by buzz_n64 View Post
    Doki Doki Panic was meant to be its own game. I'm very glad Nintendo latter made it into a Mario game because very few people would have played it otherwise, and it is a superior game to the Japanese Super Mario Bros. 2 in my opinion.
    I'll second that opinion.

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    I prefer Doki Doki Panic's crazy storyline and main character design over SMB 2/USA any day!

    Doki Doki Panic was meant to be its own game and was created by Shigeru Miyamoto. In fact the main character (Name= Imajin) was sort of a mascot for Nintendo briefly and appears in a lot of Japanese ads side by side with Mario, shaking hands.

    Last edited by Parodius Duh!; 06-25-2013 at 08:39 PM.

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    A lot of the same team that worked on the Mario series also worked on Doki Doki Panic, so it's not hard to see the "Mario-ish" qualities in the original game.

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    Quote Originally Posted by joshnickerson View Post
    A lot of the same team that worked on the Mario series also worked on Doki Doki Panic, so it's not hard to see the "Mario-ish" qualities in the original game.
    Shigeru Miyamoto created them both.

    Heres a Doki Doki Panic commercial

    http://youtu.be/BRD5vq0PAPk

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    Quote Originally Posted by Greg2600 View Post
    Howard Phillips certainly deserves a lot of credit for that judgment (not to release SMB2 Japan in the West). I think it would have been a mistake because it would have been too similar to what was done in the previous years, where game sequels were far too similar to each other.
    In a weird way, it's both too similar and too different. The Lost Levels is so difficult and meta that it sometimes borders on being a puzzle game. Its level design is like a subversion and deconstruction of the original Super Mario Bros. where it behaves in ways that undermine and contradict the rules established in the first game. It's like an elaborate Mario themed practical joke. Like the designers are sitting behind you laughing as they make you expect A but give you B. So not only do you have to deal with what's essentially a Kaizo hack, you also have to navigate all the tricks and essentially unlearn all the things you were trained to take for granted in the original. As much as I like the game, I think it was absolutely inappropriate to call it "Super Mario Bros. 2." It's like, "Hey, kids, you like Super Mario Bros.? Well get ready because we're about to seriously piss you off."
    Last edited by TonyTheTiger; 06-26-2013 at 12:14 AM.

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    However, some may regard "The Lost Levels" as being the "true" 2nd quest version of the original SMB, just as The Legend of Zelda I's 2nd quest is slightly different from the 1st quest. The actual SMB1's 2nd quest is only the 1st quest with increased difficulty.

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    Quote Originally Posted by TonyTheTiger View Post
    In a weird way, it's both too similar and too different. The Lost Levels is so difficult and meta that it sometimes borders on being a puzzle game. Its level design is like a subversion and deconstruction of the original Super Mario Bros. where it behaves in ways that undermine and contradict the rules established in the first game. It's like one big practical joke. Like the designers are sitting behind you laughing as they make you expect A but give you B. So not only do you have to deal with what's essentially a Kaizo hack, you have to navigate all the tricks and essentially unlearn all the things you were trained to take for granted in the original. As much as I like the game, I think it was absolutely inappropriate to call it "Super Mario Bros. 2." It's like, "Hey, kids, you like Super Mario Bros.? Well get ready because we're about to seriously piss you off."

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    I remember reading something about Doki Doki Panic evolving from a physics / concept test for a Mario game using the "falling/climbing" scrolling tech later used in DDP/SMB2US. I can't remember exactly where I saw that, though.

    Anyway, whatever it was that I read said that Doki Doki Panic had started as basically a tech demo using Mario characters, but ultimately became it's own game and concept.

    Feel free to prove me wrong, as I can't provide a source of exactly where I read that.

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    If that's true about Doki Doki being a test that's a cool factoid if it can be proven.

    It's nice to see a thread where people are not being the internet Nintendo hipster rerun of how SMB2 sucks, is a fake and so on. I tired of that childish rant years ago as people seemed to in general have a solid love of it like any Mario title back in the day up until 'the lie was exposed' and suddenly it became one of the early staying Nintendo whinefests.

    Howard I think really did make the right choice. When you look at the year SMB1 came out in Japan vs here, and then SMB2 J and how little the game advanced against the look/sound and play quality of other games it was a dated hot mess that was super challenging that would have been a turn off for a lot of kids their target market. It's not a bad game, but even today or even in the SNES era it wasn't a favorite in our region because of how evil it can be, it really was not a SMB2 as much as a (as Nintendo worded it here) Super Mario for Super Players, a set of 'Lost Levels' that were just so advanced only the best of the Mario fans would really enjoy doing it.

    Our SMB2 to their SMBUSA really was the KEY game in the franchise as much as the original in molding what IS Mario that has staying power to date. Brighter cartoon worlds, varying different abilities, ability to pick up and carry/throw enemies and items, lands from all over the world (ice, desert, field, etc), and multiple characters like the shy guys and pokey that have stuck around. SMB2 is even getting a nod at the end of the year with the new Super Mario Bros game popping up that has Princess and Toad back with their old floating and speed abilities coming back.

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    If the original JP SMB2 had been released instead of the doki-Mario mashup that we got, then I woulda been a seriously cranky kid. They made a good choice reworking Panic into a Mario game IMO.

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    Quote Originally Posted by Tanooki View Post

    It's nice to see a thread where people are not being the internet Nintendo hipster rerun of how SMB2 sucks, is a fake and so on. I tired of that childish rant years ago as people seemed to in general have a solid love of it like any Mario title back in the day up until 'the lie was exposed' and suddenly it became one of the early staying Nintendo whinefests.
    Anyone who says that SMB2 'sucks' IS just a hipster moron who belongs to the 'Im too cool for school crowd'.
    Yeah, everyone LOVED the game back when it was released. There is so much to love about SMB2.

    And besides, it was released in the USA as SUPER MARIO BROS 2, NOT DOKI DOKI FEATURING MARIO. Therefore its a fucking Mario game.

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    It really depends. I've heard that Nintendo wanted something as breakthrough as the first, so they wanted a game that scrolled up and down. I believe that Doki Doki Panic was originally going to be Super Mario Bros. 2 but Nintendo decided to stick with the original format in Japan worried that it was too much of a departure. Here's a video about it from Did You Know Gaming. I don't know what their source is, but I tend to trust them. Skip ahead to about 3:50 to get to the part about Mario 2. Personally, I love Mario 2. It was a lot of fun even though it was so different. Having the Lost Levels, I must say I prefer the version one got. And it has nothing to do with the difficulty.

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    Quote Originally Posted by Polygon View Post
    It really depends. I've heard that Nintendo wanted something as breakthrough as the first, so they wanted a game that scrolled up and down. I believe that Doki Doki Panic was originally going to be Super Mario Bros. 2 but Nintendo decided to stick with the original format in Japan worried that it was too much of a departure. Here's a video about it from Did You Know Gaming. I don't know what their source is, but I tend to trust them. Skip ahead to about 3:50 to get to the part about Mario 2. Personally, I love Mario 2. It was a lot of fun even though it was so different. Having the Lost Levels, I must say I prefer the version one got. And it has nothing to do with the difficulty.
    That's exactly where I'd heard what I posted. Thanks for finding that.

    But... I can't source that information to anywhere. Anyone? Even a Japanese article or anything?

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    FOR THE RECORD DOKI DOKI WAS NEVER INTENDED TO BE A MARIO GAME NOR WAS IT A "TEST" FOR A MARIO GAME. Nintendo wanted a unique platformer for the disk system that would hopefully be just as or more popular than the SMB franchise, also the main character 'Imajin' was intended to be the mascot for the fds after disk-kun. I highly suggest you all read the famicom history book, it clearly states this information.
    Last edited by Parodius Duh!; 06-26-2013 at 12:18 PM.

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    Kesuke Tanabe said in 2011 to Wired Magazine that DDP was originally a Mario type prototype. He was told to use Yume Kojo characters later on. After Nintendo of America cancelled Smb2, they had them modify DDP.
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    Quote Originally Posted by Parodius Duh! View Post
    FOR THE RECORD DOKI DOKI WAS NEVER INTENDED TO BE A MARIO GAME NOR WAS IT A "TEST" FOR A MARIO GAME. Nintendo wanted a unique platformer for the disk system that would hopefully be just as or more popular than the SMB franchise, also the main character 'Imajin' was intended to be the mascot for the fds after disk-kun. I highly suggest you all read the famicom history book, it clearly states this information.
    Scans would be nice so that the debate can end

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