Okay, I just came back after two weeks off (due to travel and Fire Emblem), delighted to find dozens of levels by quality makers waiting for me in my subscription feed, and I already sat through this argument on somebody's Twitch stream yesterday. So in lieu of combing through the last few pages to comment on some of the levels I've caught up on so far, let me offer a different perspective on this.
I dropped off SMM1 by early 2016 because I had no decent ideas and too much else to play (and not so much because of the quality problem, as I learnt pretty quickly to ignore 100-Mario and grab my codes off tight, focused communities like our old board). I got sucked back into it earlier this year, 2019, and the experience was incredible: let's just say the Wii U was my most-played platform this year until SMM2 came out. And as I combed through hundreds of levels I had missed, I paid close attention to the upload dates to get a sense of the general trends of what to expect for SMM2.
From my experience, I would go as far as to say that SMM1 didn't start until the casual audience fell off. I saw countless spectacular creations that could not have existed in the first months of the game (either because they took weeks to put together, or depended on mechanical knowledge of the engine that hadn't been cracked open yet, or relied on features that were patched in late like bumpers and checkpoints)—and most people, including die-hard high-quality creators who burnt themselves out by cranking out twenty levels in September 2015, missed out on just how good things became. It's not like SMM2 picked up right where SMM1 left off, too, as we've only had so much time to come to grips with the new elements and study how players read them.
It's healthy to let the game slow down. Given the activity in this thread in the first few weeks, I think it's easy to lose perspective on just how quickly many of you have been cranking out content. You can't expect the initial rush to last for any game on any platform. Some of you here turned out creations so outrageously successful that I hear you talking about a few hundred plays, or a likes ratio of 25%, as though they were a sad and tragic thing. I witness a churn of Twitch viewer submissions every day from people who would kill for the sort of numbers that make certain folks here feel neglected and depressed.
We are not yet at the point where truly ambitious projects that take a few weeks or months to make have even sprung into existence. This game has years of life left in it, and I think those who are intrinsically interested in Mario making enough to stick with the game will find themselves handsomely rewarded. In the meantime, there's no need to kick yourselves for having "maker's block" because you haven't made anything in a week, or check your maker points every day and panic that the numbers have barely moved.
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Also: the way the Popular tab works, I actually think many people here have a better shot at getting more plays in the presence of a smaller overall casual audience. This might sound counterintuitive, so let me explain.
When you have a level that's off too a very good start (a 50% likes ratio and about 100 plays), it climbs the top list. A lot of you have experienced this already. And there it runs headfirst into the casual base that depends entirely on the in-game tools for finding levels. The level then meets one of two fates. For stages that are a good fit for casual players, your likes and plays rocket into the stratosphere. For stages that were never really meant for that audience to begin with (but which got a great start via code-sharing with other people who are serious about Mario Maker), running into them is a bit of a curse: you get a brief boost from the leaderboard, but then the casual players pummel you back to earth.
As the audience matures and the median level of game knowledge goes up in the player base, the second fate shouldn't be quite as vicious. People who make trickier, more elaborate, or more knowledge-dependent levels will have a better shot at meeting their intended audience before being slapped down.
I'm seeing something analogous on Twitch, too. SMM2 streamers are still pulling in numbers and building loyal follower/subscriber bases, but the viewer level queues are starting to thin out because the makers are all slowing down. That isn't a bad thing at all: the queues to get your own creations played are shorter now, and streamers are willing to be just a little more patient with sitting through them. It's a subtle change, but it's there. The competition for attention is shrinking faster than the audience (and it's worth remembering that SMM, like a healthy e-sport, sustains a big audience that would rather watch than play; SMM1 YouTubers were still pulling half a million views on some videos in early 2019, and you can bet that most of this came from people who never owned a Wii U).
And as far as play numbers and the casual audience are concerned, it's also worth remembering that a monstrous percentage of Nintendo's sales come over the holiday season.
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We're two months in. The audience numbers from the launch period would be unsustainable for any game. SMM1 in 2019 was healthier than people give it credit for, particularly on YouTube and Twitch, and wasn't really decisively killed until the release of SMM2. (On forums like this especially, where everything gets shoved under the Hangouts rug after a month, people too quickly accuse anything that isn't the hot Fortnite-scale trendsetter of being "dead" while ignoring how stable the player bases really are.) It was surprisingly active as the last holdout on a platform that was dead, discontinued, and generally unobtainable unless you went out of your way for it.
SMM2 is in a healthy state and there's no need to panic like some Twitch streamers are doing because WoW Classic is the hot new thing that's vacuuming up the casual crowd, while Nintendo players are bunkered up for one of the busiest first-party seasons we've ever seen (or still buried in Fire Emblem). Of course the play numbers will go down, when even Mario Maker obsessives like myself are taking breaks to play other games. But this time around, the community infrastructure is already in place and the baseline of interest is several times higher. That was never going to change the trend that every big release goes through when the casual crowd moves on.
The worst thing you can do to your own interest in SMM2 is to burn yourself out now and never return. You'll miss so much good stuff, much of which will inspire your own good stuff. For my part, I know that I would be very happy from this point on just to crank out one level a month (and even that seems ambitious).
This is a game where it's fine to walk away for a few weeks or months when you're not feeling up for Mario. The levels will still be here when you come back (and if you have a good subscription list, or if you keep track of codes for interesting-looking creations even when you're not playing, you'll actually be overwhelmed with content when you return). You're all pushing yourselves so hard, while I'm over here wondering how long it's going to take me to catch up on the good levels and profiles here.
I will say that we desperately need the out-of-game bookmark site (and in general, a bookmark feature separate from the Like button). That's a necessary fixture for coming back to SMM from long breaks. My notepad of codes I haven't gotten to yet, and might not get to for weeks, is growing frightfully long.
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If there is a sense of panic right now that the game is dropping off a cliff, a huge part of the problem is that everybody is burning themselves out, including the fellow makers that are in your pool of players. Slow down.
