Top: 1994 concept documents for Donkey Kong Country 2 feature an idea for silhouette levels, whereby the foreground and all sprites would be silhouettes while the background is colored. These did not appear in the finished game or any Rare-developed Donkey Kong game after that.

Bottom: however, in 2010, silhouette levels actually appeared in Donkey Kong Country Returns, looking exactly as described in the concept document. Whether this is a result of Retro Studios consulting old Rare design documents or whether the idea was thought up independently as a coincidence is unknown.

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An obscure unintended technique in Super Mario World is the Yoshi trampoline double jump. If Mario approaches Yoshi while holding a trampoline, throws it upward and mounts Yoshi on the next frame after that, Yoshi will bounce off the trampoline while it is being thrown up, so that both of them are in mid-air at the same time.

This allows Yoshi to bounce off the trampoline one more time in mid-air, allowing additional heights to be reached. With practice, it can be performed repeatedly, as seen in the footage.

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“Mario Factory” was a group of arcades/entertainment centers with gift shops that operated in various locations in Japan between 2006 and 2010. This brochure shows a 3D floor plan of one of the locations.

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Four-panel comic from the official 1991 Japanese guide for Super Mario World, depicting Mario as being unwilling to use his cape due to it being too cozy. An English translation is provided.

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A glitch commonly used in speedruns of Paper Mario is clipping out of bounds using an NPC. Some NPCs walk close to walls, and their hitboxes have priority over walls, so jumping into an NPC near a wall with proper timing and angles will cause Mario to be pushed through the wall instead of into the NPC. Since Mario will fall through the out-of-bounds void for some time, this can be used to angle him carefully so that he ends up in an unintended position after returning back to his initial elevation.

However, there is one NPC that does not require any precise jumps or other setups to push Mario out of bounds, and does it simply by being talked to, being this Bub-ulb in the central area of Flower Fields. Note how Mario can just walk off the edge of the world after talking to the Bub-ulb.

Interestingly, the Star Spirit Klevar can be seen floating underneath the area in the void as Mario is falling. The game stores certain cutscene-only NPCs underneath the rooms, including at all times both before and after the cutscenes are played. As such, while Klevar only appears in that room for a single scene during regular gameplay, he is actually stuck in the void forever.

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In Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door, NPCs who award Mario with items have special failsafes for the scenario where Mario’s inventory is already full, whereby they will announce that they are setting the item aside for Mario to pick up later when he has room to carry it. Normally, the NPCs will set the item either on the floor or on a raised surface like a table near them.

However, Swob, a Bob-omb in Fahr Outpost who initiates the final Trouble in the Trouble Center, has a notable way of handling the storage of the item. If Mario cannot carry the Snow Bunny that Swob wants to give him, Swob will whimsically set it behind the cannon so that it is actually impossible to see from the regular point of view of the camera, and requires external tools to see (as shown at the end of the footage).

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The credits of the 2023 Super Mario Bros. movie list Getty Images for stock photography provided. The photograph in question is this New York skyline seen in the Super Mario Bros. Plumbing commercial segment.

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Artwork used for an officially licensed 1995 Yoshi’s Island jigsaw puzzle from Japan.

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Commemorative 1991 phone card (as an insert in an egg-shaped greeting card) depicting a cross-promotion between the Japanese Kirin Lemon soft drink and Super Mario World.

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Cover of the official 1991 Japanese guide for the SNES version of SimCity, featuring the Statue of Liberty-like Mario statue that can be unlocked in that game.

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