Nintendo's goal was to challenge preconceived notions of downloadable content (DLC) and make New Super Luigi U a game large enough to stand on its own.

New Super Luigi U was announced in a February 2013 Nintendo Direct; digital and retail versions were released between June and August.

Nintendo took multiple routes to promote the expansion and Year of Luigi, including a partnership with the Chicago Transit Authority and a parkour-themed mockumentary.

[1] Although retaining the same control scheme as Mario, Luigi himself has less friction and slides easier,[5] and also jumps higher and moves slower midair.

"[11] To help make the DLC distinct from that of NSMBU, various developers were brought in from the New Super Mario Bros. 2 team to design new gimmicks that didn't overlap with the base game.

Ideas for gimmicks found within the new levels were conceptualized fairly quickly; the similarity between the new DLC and New Super Mario Bros. 2 "began to bother" Tezuka.

[10] When the DLC for New Super Mario Bros. 2 was released, to their expectations, fans were disappointed that the content was too basic to be held behind a paid barrier.

[12] When development for New Super Mario Bros. U DLC recommenced, they experimented with the concept of levels that "had extremely short courses but increased difficulty."

Takemoto viewed the length change from a different angle; he noticed how each subsequent release in the Super Mario series had levels that were longer than the last.

He asked a specific programmer to create a prototype; he was originally skeptical about the idea but was shocked to find it worked well, calling Takemoto about his discoveries before he even viewed it in person.

[12] They also considered and incorporated the ability for him to dodge enemies altogether as he does in New Super Mario Bros. U, which ended up being included in the final version; they found the idea to be a good feature for beginners or less experienced players.

[10] This fell in line with one of Shigeru Miyamoto's philosophies for game design: "An idea is a single solution that solves multiple issues at once.

They also announced that the DLC would release not only for the Wii U Nintendo eShop but as a standalone physical copy as well, with a green box instead of blue.

[17] On July 27, Takemoto made an post on Miiverse that Nintendo would be holding a challenge for its players; the goal was to complete the main story mode while collecting the fewest coins possible.

[19] Kiosk booths were placed on the second floor of the Clark/Lake station so passersby could demo the game,[19] and a Luigi costumed character was a frequent rider.

The video depicts Luigi as a "legend of parkour" who has mysteriously vanished from the industry, and the film crew attempts to meet with an on-the-run Nabbit to learn of his current whereabouts.

Writing for Eurogamer, Chris Schilling increasingly found frustration in the time spent between dying and opening a level, and negatively compared the experience to Super Meat Boy, which resets the player immediately after failure.

[3] Kollar enjoyed the limited time but was ultimately frustrated that it left little room to play at their own pace or to view the game's graphics;[1] VentureBeat's Jeff Grubb shared similar opinions.

[28] Schilling considered the level design challenging but uninteresting, due to the fact that most had only one direct path to completion and did not give the player much freedom to explore.

[2] Henry Gilbert of GamesRadar called the shorter levels "impressively compact", and considered the shortened concept to be a positive with Super Mario series veterans in mind.

[26] Whitehead applauded the gimmicks found within levels and named memorable events that they considered were Nintendo holding back their creativity.

[4] USGamer's Jeremy Parish considered the game to be frustrating, not because of the intentional difficulty, but other various changes to Luigi's control did not add up well to the precise and quick-paced level design.

[9] Gilbert criticized the multiplayer; they felt the game focused primarily on single-player and most levels were unmanageable with four players participating simultaneously.