Trivia Browser
subdirectory_arrow_right Yume Koujou: Doki-doki Panic (Game)
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Super Mario Bros. 2 was technically not a unique Mario game, but rather an enhanced port of a Japanese game called "Yume Kōjō: Doki Doki Panic", translated to English as "Dream Factory: Heart-Pounding Panic". The "Dream Factory" part of the name refers to an expensive 1987 Japanese expo organized by Fuji Television called the Communication Carnival Yume Kōjō '87 that showcased various upcoming programs. As part of an ongoing license cooperation between Nintendo and Fuji, the festival's four main mascots became the playable characters in the game, while all other characters were created by Nintendo. It was ported and released in North America with Mario, Luigi, Princess Toadstool and Toad replacing the mascots. This was released in place of the Japanese Super Mario Bros. 2 (known in the US as Super Mario Bros.: The Lost Levels) because Nintendo of America considered it to be too difficult and too similar to the first Super Mario Bros. to compete with rapidly advancing games from rival companies.
Article on game's history:
http://arstechnica.com/gaming/2011/04/the-secret-history-of-super-mario-bros-2/
Video documenting Dream Factory festival:
https://youtu.be/tYPQEla4DUA?t=213
http://arstechnica.com/gaming/2011/04/the-secret-history-of-super-mario-bros-2/
Video documenting Dream Factory festival:
https://youtu.be/tYPQEla4DUA?t=213
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The first 100,000 copies of the game to be printed for the Playstation contained a hidden video file that couldn't be accessed in-game. The video was the South Park pilot "Jesus vs. Santa".
subdirectory_arrow_right Shady Lewd Kart (Game)
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Wild Woody DLC Trailer and Relevant Comment:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x5rt4euYklQ&lc=UgyOefebHRpsBZIVxgp4AaABAg.A1glMtsdAWZA1gm16bux7r
DLC Page:
https://store.steampowered.com/app/2900500/Shady_Lewd_Kart__Wild_Woody_Character_Pack/
Developer tweet denying April Fools association:
https://twitter.com/datshadycorner/status/1774788107986162017
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x5rt4euYklQ&lc=UgyOefebHRpsBZIVxgp4AaABAg.A1glMtsdAWZA1gm16bux7r
DLC Page:
https://store.steampowered.com/app/2900500/Shady_Lewd_Kart__Wild_Woody_Character_Pack/
Developer tweet denying April Fools association:
https://twitter.com/datshadycorner/status/1774788107986162017
subdirectory_arrow_right Eternity's Child (Game)
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Eternity's Child features the first video game credit for DidYouKnowGaming creator and VGFacts co-founder Shane Gill, who contributed art and animation to the game.
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In December 2023, a 13-year-old boy named Willis Gibson from Oklahoma became the first known person to "beat" the NES version of Tetris. At level 157 (which in itself was a world record), he reached the game's "kill screen", a feat only accomplished previously by artificial intelligence. A video of his victory was uploaded to his YouTube channel "Blue Scuti" on January 1, 2024.
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Originally, YouTuber Jirard Khalil (most famous for his webseries "The Completionist") made a cameo in Sea of Stars as an NPC named "Jirard the Constructionist", who you could donate building plans to to help construct new buildings in the town of Mirth as part of the "Home Neat Home" achievement. This cameo came after Khalil had previously featured unique builds of Sea of Stars, including one featuring Jirard the Constructionist, during his annual indie game spotlight charity event "IndieLand", which was run by his official charity organization, the Open Hand Foundation. In November 2023, a few months after the game's release, Khalil was accused of committing charity fraud through the organization, spawning a controversy that prompted the game's developers to release a patch for the game that removed his cameo, and replacing him with a generic NPC named Bob. Considering Bob is a builder, this new character may be a reference to the children's animated series "Bob the Builder".
Sea of Stars - Jirard the Constructionist:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=02mb5Q6RiWo
Sea of Stars - Home Neat Home achievement guide:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aC1KJJS93A0
Jirard accusations:
https://www.ign.com/articles/youtuber-the-completionist-responds-to-allegations-of-charity-fraud-against-him-and-open-hand
Cameo removal:
https://www.dexerto.com/youtube/sea-of-stars-devs-remove-the-completionist-cameo-amid-charity-controversy-2434740/
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=02mb5Q6RiWo
Sea of Stars - Home Neat Home achievement guide:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aC1KJJS93A0
Jirard accusations:
https://www.ign.com/articles/youtuber-the-completionist-responds-to-allegations-of-charity-fraud-against-him-and-open-hand
Cameo removal:
https://www.dexerto.com/youtube/sea-of-stars-devs-remove-the-completionist-cameo-amid-charity-controversy-2434740/
Company: Rare
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Contrary to popular belief, Rare's name was never "Rareware", even before the Microsoft buyout in 2002. On an old Rare Scribes post dated June 19, 2000, it was confirmed that the name "Rareware" refers to the company's products, not the company itself. It's essentially a portmanteau of "Rare" and "Software". The company itself was always internally named Rare Limited.
Rare Scribes - June 19, 2020:
https://rarewhere.neocities.org/1998_2000/june1900
Example of official Nintendo website referring to them as Rare Ltd. (Banjo-Tooie game page):
https://web.archive.org/web/20020204040759/http://www.nintendo.com/games/gamepage/gamepage_main.jsp?gameId=53
https://rarewhere.neocities.org/1998_2000/june1900
Example of official Nintendo website referring to them as Rare Ltd. (Banjo-Tooie game page):
https://web.archive.org/web/20020204040759/http://www.nintendo.com/games/gamepage/gamepage_main.jsp?gameId=53
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The title of "first 3D platformer" is often erroneously given to either 1996's Super Mario 64 or 1995's Jumping Flash! - despite this, neither game can factually claim that title, with 1990's Alpha Waves being the true owner of the title according to Guinness World Records.
Additionally, 1984's I, Robot - while primarily a shooting game - did feature 3D platforming segments.
Additionally, 1984's I, Robot - while primarily a shooting game - did feature 3D platforming segments.
Guinness World Record for First 3D Platform Video Game:
https://www.guinnessworldrecords.com/world-records/89373-first-3d-platform-videogame
Hardcore Gaming 101 I, Robot article:
http://www.hardcoregaming101.net/i-robot/
https://www.guinnessworldrecords.com/world-records/89373-first-3d-platform-videogame
Hardcore Gaming 101 I, Robot article:
http://www.hardcoregaming101.net/i-robot/
Collection: Brain Age
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Dr. Ryuta Kawashima turned down over ¥3,292,377,000 JPY ($22 million USD) in Brain Age royalties, and instead donated them to Tohoku University’s Institute of Development, Aging and Cancer, where he works, to help build a laboratory.
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In Issue 206 of Nintendo Power, a joke claimed that the "true" identity of the Chainsaw Man from Resident Evil 4 was Toad from the Mario franchise.
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Before his career took off as an indie developer, Toby Fox used to play Super Smash Bros. Melee competitively under the old username 'Radiation'.
He is currently the only known competitive Super Smash Bros. player to have a character he has created represented in the series. Alongside the release of Banjo & Kazooie as a fighter, a Mii costume based on Sans from his game Undertale as well as an original remix of the song "Megalovania" were both added to Super Smash Bros. Ultimate on September 4th.
He is currently the only known competitive Super Smash Bros. player to have a character he has created represented in the series. Alongside the release of Banjo & Kazooie as a fighter, a Mii costume based on Sans from his game Undertale as well as an original remix of the song "Megalovania" were both added to Super Smash Bros. Ultimate on September 4th.
There's not much info about Toby Fox playing competitive Melee as he doesn't talk about it publicly too often, the VoD provided is the only publicly-known footage of him playing a set to my knowledge:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nzh3NUO4szE
According to people, he was known as a bit of a local celebrity due to his work on the webcomic Homestuck, though that is more hear-say than anything definitive.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nzh3NUO4szE
According to people, he was known as a bit of a local celebrity due to his work on the webcomic Homestuck, though that is more hear-say than anything definitive.
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In 1993, Alfred Chicken publisher Mindscape attempted a publicity stunt by having Alfred Chicken run for a seat in the UK Parliament in the 1993 Christchurch, Dorset by-election, having an actor in an Alfred Chicken costume appear at the British House of Commons constituency of Christchurch as votes were read out. The Alfred Chicken Party ranked at second last with 18 votes, exceeding the Rainbow Alliance (a party intent on abolishing Parliament) by 2 votes. The Alfred Chicken Party, and the "Buy The Daily Sport Party", were cited years later by the Liberal Democrats as a reason for increasing the number of signatures required for a party to get on a ballot.
subdirectory_arrow_right Glover 2 (Game)
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In 2018, an indie studio named Golden Mushroom claimed they were working on a sequel to Glover for the Nintendo Switch. However, it was soon discovered that they had only applied for the trademark to the name "Glover", and not the copyright, meaning they didn't actually own the rights to the IP. In reality, the copyright had been acquired by Piko Interactive, who had purchased it from Atari SA (the company that had purchased Hasbro Interactive in 2001).
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In late 2018, a trailer for the film's sequel "Ralph Breaks the Internet" premiered on TV as part of Disney Channel's "Movie Surfers" series. The first half of the trailer used almost 40 seconds of cutscenes from the 2012 Wii game based on the first movie, and used unreleased higher quality renders of these cutscenes rather than the compressed footage released in the game. This trailer also features a noticeably bad, ad-libbed narration from an unknown actor portraying Ralph; this actor does not sound like the original film's actor John C. Reilly, nor the soundalike actor used in the Wii game and commercials Brian T. Delaney. Considering the overall confusing cheapness of the trailer, it's not known why the show's producers chose to use unreleased HD renders of these cutscenes instead of footage from the first film, which they had to have had access to and would have matched the visual quality of the film's sequel better.
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Baldur's Gate 3 was originally revealed with a CGI trailer at a conference for the Google Stadia cloud gaming service in June 2019 as part of an Early Access exclusivity deal that would ultimately be cancelled when Stadia was shut down in 2023. The game's director Swen Vincke touted the service at the time for its purported accessibility, and the potential for in-game community feedback to directly affect the game's development and playthroughs via Stadia's Crowd Choice feature. However, Vincke later expressed regret over having the game be revealed this way, calling it "a really stupid deal" due to the challenges of releasing an Early Access build to a second platform, but that "it allowed me to pay for the CGI."
Baldur's Gate 3 Stadia Announcement:
https://www.ign.com/articles/2019/06/06/baldurs-gate-3-officially-announced-for-pc-and-google-stadia
Stadia-Exclusive Features:
https://www.ign.com/articles/baldurs-gate-3-stadia-exclusive-features-early-access-contents-release
Stadia Reveal Regret:
https://www.ign.com/articles/larian-founder-on-working-with-google-stadia-for-baldurs-gate-3-it-was-a-really-stupid-deal
https://www.ign.com/articles/2019/06/06/baldurs-gate-3-officially-announced-for-pc-and-google-stadia
Stadia-Exclusive Features:
https://www.ign.com/articles/baldurs-gate-3-stadia-exclusive-features-early-access-contents-release
Stadia Reveal Regret:
https://www.ign.com/articles/larian-founder-on-working-with-google-stadia-for-baldurs-gate-3-it-was-a-really-stupid-deal
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The translation group RPGe's 1998 English translation of Final Fantasy V is considered to be one of the most widely-played and influential fan translations in video game history. It gained this reputation because it released before Squaresoft's first official translation in Final Fantasy Anthology in late 1999, and despite RPGe primarily consisting of inexperienced teenagers, it was regarded as a better translation than the official one, leading many Western players to first experience the game through it.
The first translation attempts stemmed from widespread confusion over Squaresoft not releasing three FF games in the West: Final Fantasy II, Final Fantasy III, and FFV. Their decision to release Final Fantasy VII internationally under its original numbering after Final Fantasy VI was released in the West a few years earlier as the "third" game in the series also contributed to this.
The co-creator of RPGe, named Shadow, was inspired by an incomplete FFII translation by users Demi and Som2freak (the latter having later lent Shadow tools to work on FFV), and started translating FFV by making flashcards for which hex code corresponded to each Japanese and English character in the game's data. He promoted his efforts online using photoshopped FFV images and recruited other users to create RPGe, including translator David Timko, and a computer engineering major named Hooie who also asked Japanese instructors at his university to help translate some enemy names. RPGe's plan was to directly edit their English script into the text files of a ROM of the Japanese version, but their work was slow and tedious due to them having little experience with fan translations and being out of touch with fledgling emulation communities. This lead to technical issues with their text and sprite editing software, and English characters being poorly displayed under conditions that were originally designed for larger Japanese characters. The group also suffered from internal factionalism, and since Shadow promoted himself as the public face of the project, he found that he could not handle the attention and controversy that came from how seriously he took the project and RPGe itself, seeing the translation effort as a vital service to the Squaresoft fan community. After Demi published a lengthy post parodying Shadow, he "snapped" and left RPGe. The co-founders of RPGe would also eventually step down, but other users would take over and start their own work.
A user named Myria, who had argued against RPGe's hex editing approach to no avail, split off from their efforts beforehand to work on a separate translation. Sharing similar setbacks to them, she gradually parsed through the code used to handle the text files, and edited it so it could recognize English characters of different sizes and fit more in a dialogue box. Som2freak helped translate the script for a time, but then left the project after bringing on a new editor, named harmony7, who started heavily revising Som2freak's translations to his chagrin despite seeing several issues with it.
One of the most controversial aspects of the translation was the main character's name. Squaresoft's later English translation named him "Bartz", but RPGe's translation named him "Butz", which many joked sounds like "butts". Myria claimed that Butz was the most accurate translation based on documents and official merchandise using it "the way we'd written it" (for reference, the Romanized version of the Japanese name "バッツ" comes out as "Battsu"). However, Butz is used in real life as an actual German surname with a different pronunciation, the vowel being an "oe" sound like in the English words "put" and "good". Therefore, Bartz would make more sense to match up with the vowels in the Japanese name than Butz, and also fits better as a German first name since Bartz is a pet name for Bartholomäus (Bartholomew).
The bulk of Myria's technical work ended in October 1997, with harmony7 still working to revise the entire script until something unexpected happened. An early version of the fan translation mysteriously appeared on a Geocities website with others taking credit for it. This prompted RPGe to release their work up to that point as "v0.96" on October 17, 1997, with the final patch eventually being released in June 1998. The translation patch received acclaim for its technical aspects and near-professional writing quality, and influenced other players to become translators, including Clyde Mandelin who would later create the English fan translation for Mother 3. Squaresoft never contacted RPGe about the translation, and while their 1999 localization of the game was seen as inferior to RPGe's, Myria would later opine that Square Enix's 2006 localization in Final Fantasy V: Advance was better than theirs. Myria continued hacking and reverse-engineering games and eventually earned a job at an undisclosed major video game company.
The first translation attempts stemmed from widespread confusion over Squaresoft not releasing three FF games in the West: Final Fantasy II, Final Fantasy III, and FFV. Their decision to release Final Fantasy VII internationally under its original numbering after Final Fantasy VI was released in the West a few years earlier as the "third" game in the series also contributed to this.
The co-creator of RPGe, named Shadow, was inspired by an incomplete FFII translation by users Demi and Som2freak (the latter having later lent Shadow tools to work on FFV), and started translating FFV by making flashcards for which hex code corresponded to each Japanese and English character in the game's data. He promoted his efforts online using photoshopped FFV images and recruited other users to create RPGe, including translator David Timko, and a computer engineering major named Hooie who also asked Japanese instructors at his university to help translate some enemy names. RPGe's plan was to directly edit their English script into the text files of a ROM of the Japanese version, but their work was slow and tedious due to them having little experience with fan translations and being out of touch with fledgling emulation communities. This lead to technical issues with their text and sprite editing software, and English characters being poorly displayed under conditions that were originally designed for larger Japanese characters. The group also suffered from internal factionalism, and since Shadow promoted himself as the public face of the project, he found that he could not handle the attention and controversy that came from how seriously he took the project and RPGe itself, seeing the translation effort as a vital service to the Squaresoft fan community. After Demi published a lengthy post parodying Shadow, he "snapped" and left RPGe. The co-founders of RPGe would also eventually step down, but other users would take over and start their own work.
A user named Myria, who had argued against RPGe's hex editing approach to no avail, split off from their efforts beforehand to work on a separate translation. Sharing similar setbacks to them, she gradually parsed through the code used to handle the text files, and edited it so it could recognize English characters of different sizes and fit more in a dialogue box. Som2freak helped translate the script for a time, but then left the project after bringing on a new editor, named harmony7, who started heavily revising Som2freak's translations to his chagrin despite seeing several issues with it.
One of the most controversial aspects of the translation was the main character's name. Squaresoft's later English translation named him "Bartz", but RPGe's translation named him "Butz", which many joked sounds like "butts". Myria claimed that Butz was the most accurate translation based on documents and official merchandise using it "the way we'd written it" (for reference, the Romanized version of the Japanese name "バッツ" comes out as "Battsu"). However, Butz is used in real life as an actual German surname with a different pronunciation, the vowel being an "oe" sound like in the English words "put" and "good". Therefore, Bartz would make more sense to match up with the vowels in the Japanese name than Butz, and also fits better as a German first name since Bartz is a pet name for Bartholomäus (Bartholomew).
The bulk of Myria's technical work ended in October 1997, with harmony7 still working to revise the entire script until something unexpected happened. An early version of the fan translation mysteriously appeared on a Geocities website with others taking credit for it. This prompted RPGe to release their work up to that point as "v0.96" on October 17, 1997, with the final patch eventually being released in June 1998. The translation patch received acclaim for its technical aspects and near-professional writing quality, and influenced other players to become translators, including Clyde Mandelin who would later create the English fan translation for Mother 3. Squaresoft never contacted RPGe about the translation, and while their 1999 localization of the game was seen as inferior to RPGe's, Myria would later opine that Square Enix's 2006 localization in Final Fantasy V: Advance was better than theirs. Myria continued hacking and reverse-engineering games and eventually earned a job at an undisclosed major video game company.
2017 Kotaku article:
https://web.archive.org/web/20170428183534/https://kotaku.com/how-three-kids-beat-the-odds-and-translated-final-fanta-1794628286
2021 IGN article:
https://web.archive.org/web/20210508152802/https://www.ign.com/articles/the-untold-drama-and-history-behind-final-fantasy-5s-fan-translation
Butz surname pronunciation:
https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Butz#Pronunciation_2
Bartz pet name source from Ancestry.com:
https://www.ancestry.com/name-origin?surname=bartz
Final Fantasy Chrome Figure Collection wiki articles:
https://finalfantasy.fandom.com/wiki/Final_Fantasy_Chrome_Figure_Collection
https://ffmerchandise.fandom.com/wiki/Final_Fantasy_Chrome_Figures_Collection
Ebay listing for Final Fantasy Chrome Figure set including Butz:
https://www.ebay.com/itm/275540207811
https://web.archive.org/web/20170428183534/https://kotaku.com/how-three-kids-beat-the-odds-and-translated-final-fanta-1794628286
2021 IGN article:
https://web.archive.org/web/20210508152802/https://www.ign.com/articles/the-untold-drama-and-history-behind-final-fantasy-5s-fan-translation
Butz surname pronunciation:
https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Butz#Pronunciation_2
Bartz pet name source from Ancestry.com:
https://www.ancestry.com/name-origin?surname=bartz
Final Fantasy Chrome Figure Collection wiki articles:
https://finalfantasy.fandom.com/wiki/Final_Fantasy_Chrome_Figure_Collection
https://ffmerchandise.fandom.com/wiki/Final_Fantasy_Chrome_Figures_Collection
Ebay listing for Final Fantasy Chrome Figure set including Butz:
https://www.ebay.com/itm/275540207811
subdirectory_arrow_right Antonblast (Game)
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In 1986, Nintendo and Fuji Television produced a 70-minute TV special based on The Mysterious Murasame Castle for the weekly one-shot drama series "Getsuyou Drama Land" (Monday Drama Land). The special, like many other episodes in the later years of Getsuyou Drama Land's run, featured members of the popular J-Pop girl group Onyanko Club as cast members, and starred Masaki Kyomoto as the game's protagonist Takamaru. The special aired once on December 8, 1986, almost eight months after the game's release, and never aired again. It was later released on DVD in 2005 as part of the box set "Onyanko Club in Getsuyou Drama Land DVD Box 2".
The special's existence and DVD release flew under the international radar until 2023, when a user named Ruka, after being prompted in a 4chan thread to verify claims that the special was lost media based on an uncited edit on the game's English Wikipedia article, discovered that copies of the box set were actually being offered on Yahoo! Auctions. Ruka subsequently placed a bid and won a copy from the auction, and YouTuber Haruko Please uploaded the special to YouTube the following week. With its rediscovery, it's thought to be one of the first live-action adaptations of a video game, and is also the earliest known product to come from Nintendo's collaborations with Fuji, which after this special's airing continued with Yume Koujou: Doki-doki Panic.
The special's existence and DVD release flew under the international radar until 2023, when a user named Ruka, after being prompted in a 4chan thread to verify claims that the special was lost media based on an uncited edit on the game's English Wikipedia article, discovered that copies of the box set were actually being offered on Yahoo! Auctions. Ruka subsequently placed a bid and won a copy from the auction, and YouTuber Haruko Please uploaded the special to YouTube the following week. With its rediscovery, it's thought to be one of the first live-action adaptations of a video game, and is also the earliest known product to come from Nintendo's collaborations with Fuji, which after this special's airing continued with Yume Koujou: Doki-doki Panic.
Onyanko Club in Getsuyou Drama Land - Onyanko Torimonochou: Nazo no Murasamejou:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gGwkT7MwPHk
Haruko Please 4chan thread:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yMC2q1mcJ-g
Time Extension article:
https://www.timeextension.com/news/2023/11/lost-tv-drama-based-on-the-mysterious-murasame-castle-preserved-online
Promo image source:
https://www.neogaf.com/threads/the-mysterious-murasame-castle-ot-takamaru-support-group.869369/
Monday Drama Land Japanese Wikipedia article:
https://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/月曜ドラマランド
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gGwkT7MwPHk
Haruko Please 4chan thread:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yMC2q1mcJ-g
Time Extension article:
https://www.timeextension.com/news/2023/11/lost-tv-drama-based-on-the-mysterious-murasame-castle-preserved-online
Promo image source:
https://www.neogaf.com/threads/the-mysterious-murasame-castle-ot-takamaru-support-group.869369/
Monday Drama Land Japanese Wikipedia article:
https://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/月曜ドラマランド
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Super Mario Bros. Wonder marks the first game to not feature performances from long-time voice actor Charles Martinet, who voiced Mario and Luigi (and Wario and Waluigi in other games in the series) since 1990.
Nintendo announced that Martinet would retire from portraying the Mario Bros. permanently and become a "Mario Ambassador", nearly two months before the game's release.
Nintendo announced that Martinet would retire from portraying the Mario Bros. permanently and become a "Mario Ambassador", nearly two months before the game's release.