Super Mario Bros warp zones were intended to work slightly differently [video]
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Re: Super Mario Bros warp zones were intended to work slightly differently [video]
#2For those who can't watch the video or just want a text summary:
The underground 1-2 level is supposed to stop scrolling as soon as the mundane return-to-surface pipe comes onto the right edge of the screen. (Unless you're walking on the ceiling.) But because of a programming error, it keeps scrolling, revealing that the warp zone room is there.
It was originally intended to be a much more hidden secret than it turned out to be.
(This is all explained much more thoroughly yet accessibly, and illustrated much more brilliantly, in the video; I suggest you watch it when you can.)
Now for some speculation on my part.
It's unclear whether the error was missed in testing or intentionally left unfixed because they decided they liked the erroneous behavior better. But there's a bunch of evidence that warp zones were added very late in the game's development, perhaps as a last-minute change.
This includes:
* Comments in original SMB source code (revealed in the 2021 "Nintendo Gigaleak") confirm that the programmer thought they were checking if Y = 0 when deciding whether to lock scrolling for the warp zone, even though the code doesn't do that. And these subroutines are located at the ends of their files/sections.
* Each object and enemy in the game is assigned a code, and the ones used to control warp zones are assigned the last codes used in the game.
* Memory addresses assigned to warp zone control variables are at the end of their respective tables.
* The code that decides where the warp pipes take you is implemented as: "Are we in World 1-x? Then 2-3-4. Else, are we underground? Then 5. Else, 6-7-8." This indicates that the level maps were stable when the warp code was written.
Re: Super Mario Bros warp zones were intended to work slightly differently [video]
#3For those who can't watch the video or just want a text summary: The underground 1-2 level is supposed to stop scrolling as soon as the mundane return-to-surface pipe comes onto the right edge of the screen. (Unless you're walking on the ceiling.) But because of a programming error, it keeps scrolling, revealing that the warp zone room is there. It was originally intended to be a much more hidden secret than it turne…
> But there's a bunch of evidence that warp zones were added very late in the game's development, perhaps as a last-minute change.
I assumed they were for testers to quickly go to some level on a release build?
Re: Super Mario Bros warp zones were intended to work slightly differently [video]
#4For those who can't watch the video or just want a text summary: The underground 1-2 level is supposed to stop scrolling as soon as the mundane return-to-surface pipe comes onto the right edge of the screen. (Unless you're walking on the ceiling.) But because of a programming error, it keeps scrolling, revealing that the warp zone room is there. It was originally intended to be a much more hidden secret than it turne…
Thank you, I'm so tired of 15 minute videos for something that can explained in text and images that can be read in one minute.
Re: Super Mario Bros warp zones were intended to work slightly differently [video]
#5For those who can't watch the video or just want a text summary: The underground 1-2 level is supposed to stop scrolling as soon as the mundane return-to-surface pipe comes onto the right edge of the screen. (Unless you're walking on the ceiling.) But because of a programming error, it keeps scrolling, revealing that the warp zone room is there. It was originally intended to be a much more hidden secret than it turne…
Thank you, I'm so tired of 15 minute videos for something that can explained in text and images that can be read in one minute.
But how else would we make $300k a year on YouTube?
Re: Super Mario Bros warp zones were intended to work slightly differently [video]
#6I was expecting typical youtube "you won't believe THIS!" but it was actually really informative, as someone without knowledge of how they stored levels in SMB1.
Re: Super Mario Bros warp zones were intended to work slightly differently [video]
#7I wonder if this kind of obsessive analysis of popular NES-era games will end in a couple decades, as the people who grew up in the console's heyday grow too old; or if they'll continue because interest in these particular games transcended a particular generation (and they're simple enough for people to really take them apart).
Re: Super Mario Bros warp zones were intended to work slightly differently [video]
#8Re: Super Mario Bros warp zones were intended to work slightly differently [video]
#9For those who can't watch the video or just want a text summary: The underground 1-2 level is supposed to stop scrolling as soon as the mundane return-to-surface pipe comes onto the right edge of the screen. (Unless you're walking on the ceiling.) But because of a programming error, it keeps scrolling, revealing that the warp zone room is there. It was originally intended to be a much more hidden secret than it turne…
Thank you, I'm so tired of 15 minute videos for something that can explained in text and images that can be read in one minute.
It's actually a reasonably detailed explanation that goes beyond that summary, including into how SMB levels were represented and video breakdowns of the state changes.
But TL;DR is a way of life.
Re: Super Mario Bros warp zones were intended to work slightly differently [video]
#10I wonder if this kind of obsessive analysis of popular NES-era games will end in a couple decades, as the people who grew up in the console's heyday grow too old; or if they'll continue because interest in these particular games transcended a particular generation (and they're simple enough for people to really take them apart).
> they'll continue because interest in these particular games transcended a particular generation
Speedrunning seems to support this idea. That’s also one of the reasons retro games have been analyzed in such depth.