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Mario
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.
(Redirected from Super Mario)
For nearly two decades, Mario has been the official video game mascot for Nintendo.
Mario (full name Mario Mario, Japanese: マリオ), also known as Super Mario, is a video game character created by Shigeru Miyamoto for Nintendo, named after the Italian landlord, Mario Segali, at Nintendo of America. He is one of Nintendo's best-known characters and considered by many to be the biggest video game character in history, appearing in literally hundreds of games, many of them bestsellers.
Overview
Mario is the official video game mascot for Nintendo, and is almost synonymous with the Nintendo brand. Because of this, Mario only appears in Nintendo games on Nintendo systems. There are a few small exceptions in which he has appeared on PC educational titles in the United States, and some very early games in which he appeared were adapted for non-Nintendo systems such as the Atari 2600, but these are rare deviations.
Mario first appeared in the video game Donkey Kong as a nameless protagonist, but later was called Jumpman. The game was surprisingly successful, and when the Nintendo Entertainment System was released, Mario was given the starring role in the revolutionary Super Mario Bros. game. Shortly thereafter Mario took on role of mascot of Nintendo and has since been extensively merchandized. Mario's major rival was Sega mascot Sonic the Hedgehog who debuted in the early 1990s, and the two mascots competed head-to-head for nearly a decade afterward. In 1996, with the release of the Nintendo 64, Super Mario 64 marked Mario's 3D debut and made him the very first 2D established video game character to appear in a full 3-D game.
Mario has appeared on television in several cartoons, in comic books, and in a feature film where he was played by Bob Hoskins.
Mario's supporting characters include his younger, but taller brother, Luigi, Princess Peach Toadstool, Toad, Yoshi, and King Bowser Koopa, the main villain of the series, among others.
Little is known about Mario's history. Mario games specifically lack overly-complicated plots or too much character development as to not limit Mario's future roles. According to some American manuals and gameplay, Mario and his brother are Italian Americans born and raised in Brooklyn, New York City. He is said to be a plumber (though he has held several other blue-collar jobs in his lifetime) and wears a red shirt, cap, and blue overalls. Other games and manuals suggest that he grew up in the fictional Mushroom Kingdom.
Mario's distinctive look is due to technology restrictions in the mid-'80s: with a limited number of pixels and colours, the programmers could not animate Mario's movement without making his arms "disappear" if his shirt was a solid colour; they did not have the space to give him a mouth; and they could not animate hair, so Mario got overalls, a moustache, and a cap to bypass these problems. Mario's creator Shigeru Miyamoto has also stated when interviewed that Mario wears a cap because he finds it difficult to draw hair.
His surname, also "Mario," first became known in the 1993 feature film Super Mario Bros. This was to explain how both Mario and his brother Luigi could both be known as the "Mario brothers" (though Nintendo has never confirmed this). This is also backed up by the title of the game Dr. Mario.
The original Super Mario Bros. series pioneered many concepts in modern video games, such as warp zones, power-ups, end-of-level bosses, and multiple endings. Even to this day, many adventure games operate in the same so-called "hop and bop" style gameplay that was first developed for SMB.
Miyamoto created these from ideas he had seen in other media. One of his most recognizable contributions to his Mario universe is the Super Mushroom, which would enlarge Mario until he came into contact with an enemy. This idea was derived from the "Eat me" and "Drink me" potions in the Lewis Carroll story, Alice in Wonderland. The concept behind warp pipes, colored tubes which sometimes transport Mario to another area, was adopted from Star Trek.
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Mario is the best-known icon of video gaming.
