Mario Power Tennis
Mario Power Tennis
October 28, 2004
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subdirectory_arrow_right Mario Tennis (Game)
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Attachment Waluigi was created by Camelot artist Fumihide Aoki during the development of Mario Tennis as a rival to Luigi. There were also talks of a Princess Peach counterpart to further expand the roster. This proposed "Warupichi" character was ultimately dismissed by Shigeru Miyamoto and Nintendo because they were hesitant about making an evil version of Princess Peach, given how she was still portrayed as innocent in earlier games. Despite this, Aoki would keep the character idea around for Mario Power Tennis, featuring another rejected design that would eventually be revealed to the public in 2023, both through unused sketches and a 3D model. In one sketch, the character wields an axe, which according to Aoki, was added to make her "cute and scary". Aoki also revealed more information through Instagram comments, like how "Warupichi" was going to be the authority figure that gave orders to Wario and Waluigi, and how he wanted to make a companion to "Warupichi" that would have been an arch-rival to Yoshi that was going to be a dragon with horns and wings. The day after revealing Warupichi and the rest of this information, Aoki deleted the original posts and locked his Instagram account.
person DidYouKnowGaming calendar_month March 15, 2013
Original DidYouKnowGaming blog post:
https://didyouknowgaming.com/post/30812672774/mario-tennis-source

2000 Camelot interview revealing the existence of Warupichi:
https://www.camelot.co.jp/gimon/gimon13.html

Warupichi character design first Instagram post (now deleted):
https://www.instagram.com/p/C0TpKyDSfOy/?img_index=1

Archived Warupichi concept art and 3D model images:
https://archive.org/details/wapeach

Archived Fumihide Aoki Instagram comment collages (all other comments in the attachment not featured in these two images were captured on desktop directly from Fumihide Aoki's Instagram posts prior to the account being locked down):
https://twitter.com/GenesisJam_/status/1730803149915472217

Warupichi design articles (second link submitted by NintendOtaku):
https://www.polygon.com/23984146/nintendo-wapeach-design-waluigi-creator-mario-tennis
https://www.thegamer.com/waluigi-creator-reveals-wapeach-designs/

Warupichi designs taken down article:
https://www.eurogamer.net/waluigi-creator-shares-then-removes-designs-of-wario-style-peach
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In the intro is a tournament board with every character in the game. In the bottom left corner of the board you can see the team of Toad and Toadette, hinting that they were possibly planned to appear as playable characters at one point during development.
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Attachment One of Wario's Power Shots, the Ultra Hand Return, is based on a Nintendo toy invented by Gunpei Yokoi in 1966 called the Ultra Hand. The toy worked to grab objects from a distance, and Wario will use it to hit a ball that is out of reach.
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Attachment When the Shy Guy wins a trophy, a cutscene is shown where he accidentally stumbles and his mask comes off while retrieving it. Luigi sees the Shy Guy's true appearance, but that player never does.
sell
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Attachment There is an unused Hammer Bro. left in the game's data. The file's name is "xcmdl_linesman_hbros_line_sbn" suggesting that the Hammer Bro. would've been the linesman at one point during development.

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