Dev Commentary Time! Did You Know Retrush Was Originally Planned To Have Just Twelve Levels? Dijon Dunes

dev commentary time! did you know Retrush was originally planned to have just twelve levels? Dijon Dunes was not in the original plan, making it one of the last few main levels i worked on – and i think it shows how much i learned over time, cause it has great speedrun flow!

after i came up with the idea for remixes of the original 12 levels, i saw a vision in my head of a desert level whose remix is an underwater trench… and it was just TOO cool of an idea to pass up!

so i came up with a few more levels to pad out one more world, which of course means remixes for each one… and that's the story of how i overscoped this entire mappack from 12 levels to 32. oops!!!

and because it was made relatively late(ish), like 2017… that unfortunately means there's not really any cut content or beta layouts to show here.

instead, let's talk about why there's no slopes. isn't it a little weird that all the sandy dunes are squared off?

without getting too deep into the weeds, Mari0's collision system was not built to handle slopes, and every attempt at adding them over the years has been EXTREMELY hacky and unstable. retrush has no slopes because there were never any good slopes in the engine to begin with.

the versions of Mari0 i used technically had those hacky slopes, but they weren't worth using!… until a month or two ago, when Mari0: AE finally solved the problem and made great, robust slopes. a little too late for me to change the entire layout to add them, you know? ^^;

but! i remade Dijon Dunes in Super Mario Maker 2 when the game first came out as a test of its editor, and when i did, i added slopes. it's a neat alternate universe take on what could have been!

Dijon Dunes (1-3) | Retrush

This one's a technical, tricky trek across the desert and its ruins. The enemies here have a bone to pick with you – but if you get the drop on them first, the bounce will carry you over the sandy steps!

dev commentary time! Oregano Oak has a storied history that resulted in it being one of the very last levels ever built for Retrush. in fact, the stage as we know it didn't exist before this year!

back when Retrush was just 12 levels – worlds 1 through 3 – i had a little sketch in the 4-1 slot, effectively a bit of level concept art built out of tiles. it was a mineshaft inspired by Wario's Gold Mine, making good use of SMB1's varied set of brown and orange palettes!

i loved the concept but i wanted to keep Retrush properly scoped to 12 levels, so i had no place to add it into the mappack.

...but as we all know, "keeping it properly scoped" sure lasted long! so when i expanded Retrush to add a fourth world, this concept was on the shortlist.

at the same time that i expanded it, i also decided that Retrush should have four vertical levels – one per world. i had two already, Saltine Sewer and Pineapple Pipeline, so i needed two more. i decided to pick the mineshaft for this, and named it Quinoa Quarry!

...eagle eyed readers may have noticed by this point that Oregano Oak is not a mineshaft, not a vertical level, and not called Quinoa Quarry. what gives?

for starters, i kind of shot myself in the foot before getting out of the starting gate. the mineshaft concept i had was very horizontal, and trying to adapt it to a vertical passage was next to impossible. the structures i tried to add to it were pretty repetitive and boring.

the concept was tweaked to use the SMB1 ground tiles with alternating palettes for a faux 3D effect, which looks REALLY cool and i wish i could've made it work. the remix's palette was already decided – a green, mossy variation – and it would've been called… Oregano Overgrowth.

Oregano Overgrowth was more inspired by the mossy walkways of Hollow Knight's Greenpath, but i never got far enough with the base level to do any actual concepting with the remix, so this mostly exists in my memory. (the screenshot above is a recreation!)

instead, i got sick of slamming my head against the wall, and decided to pivot to another old concept i had sitting around from an unrelated project (shown here). this is where Oregano Oak and Nougat Nimbus were born... though i was still trying to make it a vertical level!

Oregano Oak was going to be more like ascending a big tree, with large branches to climb into and around, as well as the bushy platforms we're familiar with today. Nougat Nimbus was intended to go the *other* way, starting at the top of a thunderhead and working your way down.

this concept, too, was short-lived, as i couldn't come up with structures that were satisfying to climb in both directions. once again, i had painted myself into a corner.

and that's about when i paused working on Retrush in 2019. with nothing concrete, just failed attempts.

i came back to the mappack in 2021, mostly porting Retrush to a later version of Mari0 (which was an involved process), and then spent 2022 preparing to release the second demo (when i got sick for a while). finally we arrive at 2023, and Oregano Oak is still just a concept.

it felt like i no longer had the time or energy to throw together level geometry like i once did... i stared at the level's blank canvas trying to make *anything* work, and coming up woefully short.

this was the level that really made me question whether i should cut Retrush back down to three worlds. this one, and some of the underbaked levels mentioned previously... it seemed like it would be too much work to bring them all up to par.

"i wish i just had something to start with," i said to myself. "just a little bit of level geometry to build on. i wish younger me had left *something* to work with."

as a matter of fact... i did. and when i realized, i went rushing to open an especially old version of Mari0.

did you know the creators of Mari0 attended Gamescom for several years? they had playable versions of Mari0, Not Tetris, and more on the convention floor. Mari0 was set up as a "time trials" demo with ghosts of other players and a unique speedrunning level!

one year the developers asked the community to make a speedrunning level for them to take to Gamescom. being knee-deep in Retrush, i jumped at the chance! iirc, i was the only person to finish... because i already had material to work with.

the level i submitted was called Reprise, and it was a "best-hits" mash-up from several levels of Retrush with some connective tissue. the developers had some great feedback for it, some of which made it back into Retrush itself!

returning to Oregano Oak, i was very interested in how deep this "connective tissue" ran, and if i could use any of it in a new level. i hit the jackpot: a completely unique middle section based around classic athletic-style mushroom platforming. exactly what i was looking for!

i copied over as much of that old work as i could, which ended up covering about a third of the level – but the momentum and excitement carried me to complete the rest of the level extremely quickly. Oregano Oak went from 0 to 100 in just two days!

it wasn't the vertical level i dreamed of, but making it a horizontal level and reusing my old work helped me Actually Make The Level instead of feeling stuck forever and removing it from the pack. symmetry and planning is nice, but sometimes you just gotta get the work done!

the end result is one of my favorite levels in the whole thing, with a unique speedrun flow that really shows how much i've improved over the years!

Oregano Oak is the epitome of Retrush's development cycle – it may have taken nine years, but it's way better for having taken its time.

Oregano Oak (3-3) | Retrush

A classic athletic style level with a fresh coat of paint! The flying enemies provide lots of opportunities for bouncing to shortcuts on higher platforms... and with good timing, some of the falling enemies do too!

every day i get closer to finding my voice...!

i used to have so much trouble talking – not just from being shy and timid, but a mental blockade of isolation and repression.

now that's slowly coming undone, and i'm so proud of myself!

i can carry conversations… hold my own in groups… encourage my fellow shy friends to speak up… follow discussions that i know nothing about… "circle back" on things i thought of earlier…

it's not perfect and human nature dictates it never will be, but i've come so far 💙

dev commentary time! Nectarine Nocturne was also not in the original 12-level plan for Retrush. in fact, both it and Dijon Dunes were made to expand World 1 for a better learning curve and difficulty pacing! now that i've seen people play it, i think that was a smart move.

god, though, i REALLY struggled to make this level work. this was one of the slowest levels to put together – it was only about halfway done when i tabled Retrush in 2019 to start working full time, and coming back to it in 2022 was no easier.

i didn't scrap even a single platform because it was already hard enough to come up with ideas… i stuck by every decision and made it work somehow, even if the original execution started out awkward. editing existing levels is much easier than making new terrain from scratch…!

the final result plays beautifully, though, and i get excited anytime someone goes for the speed tech on their first try. it's a really fun and accessible level in that regard, especially as a follow up to the rest of the first world – i'm proud of myself for seeing it through!

this section is kind of a Mari0 signature of mine – the way the platforms get lower and lower as the blue gel keeps you bouncing high in the air. i've put it in like three mappacks at this point, and frankly, it hasn't gotten old ✨

one last thing! i struggled a bit with the art design on this level. in my attempts to make this level look sufficiently lively, i bounced around a couple of ideas that never saw the light of… er, night. like this ferris wheel background!

Nectarine Nocturne (1-4) | Retrush

Neon lights and gel-powered flights combine for a level that's almost as fun to watch as it is to play! The gels take time to master, but the shortcuts they create are super satisfying to pull off~

Nectarine Nocturne (1-4) | Retrush

Neon lights and gel-powered flights combine for a level that's almost as fun to watch as it is to play! The gels take time to master, but the shortcuts they create are super satisfying to pull off~

Gelato Grasslands (1-1) | Retrush

Welcome back to familiar plains of bricks and pipes! This is a great place to get reacquainted with SMB1's physics and sense of momentum. With well-timed jumps, you can clear even the tallest pipes at full speed!