Players are desperately trying to finish the last unbeaten Super Mario Maker 1 level before the game goes offline

When Super Mario Maker was initially released for the Nintendo 3DS and Wii U in 2015, it’s hard to say if Nintendo knew exactly what it was setting itself up for. Opening up the opportunity for fans to create their own Mario levels and upload them for the community to play is a fun concept, and everyone was able to find something they loved about it.

However, as we draw closer to Nintendo’s server shutdown, players are racing to complete as many levels as possible before they’re taken away. In fact, one group is taking this so far that they’re just one level away from having completed every level in Super Mario Maker. This level, “Trimming the Herbs,” may just be the toughest in the game’s history.

Why do players want to complete every Super Mario Maker level? There are a ridiculous number of levels in Super Mario Maker, made by both die-hard players and professional game devs alike. While the sequel may have drawn most players away, there’s been a dedicated group continuing to make and play levels in the original release.

Late last year, Nintendo announced it would be ending server support for the 3DS and Wii U on April 9, 2024, at 9 AM JST. This means that all games with online elements will become unplayable, including Super Mario Maker. With just under a month to go, a small community is working together to complete every level. You can actually check out the progress they’ve made on their official website.

At the time of writing, 99.99% of all levels have been completed. The only one that remains is called “Trimming the Herbs,” and it’s an absolute nightmare.

I was never good at Mario platformers, but even I can understand that this level is pretty much impossible. In order to upload a level for others to play in Super Mario Maker, you had to complete it yourself. That’s what makes this so infuriating for those trying to get through it. The level is clearly possible, but it requires such frame-perfect play that you almost need the blueprint of where to go and when to get through it.

There’s some discussion out there about the level having clears registered on it. However, those have been detected as cheats because there’s something in the results that gives them away. Those results show that a user simply changed the code to tell the game the player has completed them.

That being said, the community seems confident “Trimming the Herbs” will be completed before Nintendo shuts down the 3DS and Wii U servers forever. It feels like this group is one discovery away from making a major breakthrough, and it really is, depending on how you look at it. Humans have always had an intrinsic need to explore, uncover mysteries, and map out their surroundings. That’s exactly what’s happening here, just with the user-created levels of an incredibly popular Mario title.