From Player to Level Designer: Exploring Design Thinking Through Mario Maker 2

Abstract

This paper reports on a game design study that took place in April 2025 over nine days with 53 school-aged students, in a small, rural town on the west coast of Canada. Led by the researchers who took over the one-hour class, while the teacher supported, the study was centred on both game play and playful game design, and we centred play as a central, core, engaging part of both playing and designing digital games. To that end, participants first played a simple, fast paced game (WarioWare: Get It Together!) in pairs on Nintendo Switch Lites, and were asked immediately begin thinking about game design: who are the characters, what are the rules (what can and can’t they do), what is a “game screen” and then to make characters, rules, and game screens of their own, designing them in their own game designer “sketchbook” before moving to their own game design using the software Mario Maker 2 also in pairs. As they designed their level, we emphasized playability and user testing, and the 10 days culminated with a play session in which the participants demonstrated their by and large very playable games (only 2 students didn’t complete a level). The study shows how basic, highly engaging and enjoyable digital game design can support classroom learners to explore design thinking, and that playing and designing games can create room for a different social order, one in which marginalized students might be able to take up a more central role, for example, as having game playing expertise, or being especially talented at drawing their own levels in their game design sketchbooks. Further, we saw just how engaged most participants were with their own design process, circulating to show others in the class their games, and/or asking them to play what they had made, taking pride and interest in their varied designs. Overall, and as a short-term intervention, the project demonstrates the very big hold digital games continue to have for young people as an entertainment medium, with participants readily taking up the challenge to move from playing to designing their own games.