Data for Mario Kart World contains names for nine removed drivers. Most of them are straightforward romanized Japanese names of objects or enemy species and can thus be assumed with relative confidence to be them.

However, two of them are more vague. “Driver_Bird” does not seem to refer to any specific type of bird; while it makes sense to assume it would be the decorative birds found throughout most modern Mario games (which are often called “bird” internally), those are small while Driver_Bird was supposed to have been medium weight.

The other one is “Driver_KuriboTwins”, being Japanese for “Goomba Twins”. This was most likely a two-Goomba stack, though it is possible it would have been two Goombas sitting side by side in a kart, or possibly even new original characters.

Source: mondomega

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In Super Mario Galaxy, Spring Mario has “phantom arms” that can only be seen through walls.

Top: Spring Mario normally has no arms. This is both visible during gameplay and can be seen by extracting his model, which shows that his arms end at the shoulders and there are no arms underneath the spring enveloping his body. Despite this, when he bounces off a wall in such a way that the wall is between him and the camera, his silhouette can briefly be seen extending an arm to push himself off the wall with.

Middle and bottom: a closer look at the arm, as well as a halfway view of Spring Mario’s visible model and the silhouette model.

The reason for this is that all forms that have a silhouette to begin with (so e.g. not Boo Mario, who simply cannot be seen through walls) share the same silhouette model, which is a low-polygon version of default Mario. This results in some forms missing things in the silhouette (Bee Mario has no wings) and some forms having “phantom limbs” like this.

Source: supertoastymutt

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Officially licensed 2024 set of Peach-themed charms and jewelry from Japan.

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Sketch of a Yoshi and Toad alongside a Yoshi Egg and a Super Star, drawn in 2000 by Takashi Tezuka, director, designer and producer for 60 different Mario-related games.

Source: VGDensetsu, Heritage Auctions

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Top: in Paper Mario: The Origami King, there is a story sequence during the Green Streamer segment whereby Mario, Olivia, Kamek and Bowser Jr. are running away from a Chain Chomp up a giant tree. During this, there is a Piranha Plant that shoots fireballs at Mario from an unreachable ledge, after which it is torn apart by the Chain Chomp.

Middle: due to being in an area Mario cannot reach and being needed for a cutscene, the Piranha Plant does not actually have a valid battle ID associated with it. By modifying the game to drop Mario on that ledge and touching it, it is revealed that entering a battle with an enemy without a valid ID brings Mario to a unused “default” battle against 4 Toads.

Bottom: the battle is clearly intended for internal testing during development and as such is very glitchy and unfinished. There are 5 rings instead of 4, though the fifth one is purely cosmetic and nothing can actually be pushed to it. The Toads are just reskinned Goombas (also simply called “Goomba” when targeted), and will attack with headbonk attacks, during which they also shrink down. Finally, the Toads can not be attacked with anything except the Tail item, with all other items missing automatically.

Source: ZXMany

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Three unused/early loading screen illustrations extracted from the files of Donkey Kong Bananza.

Source: Polley001, seandwalsh

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Original Wrecking Crew illustrations from a series of official 1985 Japanese guides for various Famicom games.

Source: ozidual, drammynation

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In Luigi’s Mansion 3, mice* are small non-ghost enemies that can be quickly sucked up with the Poltergust. However, a rare glitch may occur whereby a mouse will not actually be sucked in, and instead become attached to Luigi’s flashlight.

The mouse will harmlessly hang on to the flashlight, as seen in the footage, until the next time the Poltergust is turned on.

*while the rodent may look like a rat, it is called a “mouse” in official material.

Source: RatPie_87

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Official Nintendo of Europe Super Mario 64 standee to promote the European release of the Nintendo 64. Of particular interest is the disclaimer “Mario shown at actual size” on the bottom; as the standee is 5 feet 3 inches tall and Mario’s foot is 2 inches above the bottom, this means he was intended to be 5 feet 1 inch (155 cm) tall.

Please note that this standee predates the early 2000s standardization efforts to have all official Mario content conform to internal guidelines issued by Nintendo Japan, so it is likely that this size is no longer considered to be official (though interestingly, using the Luigi’s Balloon World distance measuring on Mario’s own model gives his height also at exactly 5 feet 1 inch). However, at least in 1997, and at least by Nintendo of Europe, Mario was officially considered to be 5 feet 1 inch tall.

Source: TheUltiMarioFan

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While the majority of international NES cartridges were the same plain grey color (with some notable exceptions such as the gold The Legend of Zelda cartridge), Japanese Famicom versions of the cartridges were available in all possible colors.

Above are all the Mario-related games released for the Famicom in cartridge form (so excluding e.g. Super Mario Bros.: The Lost Levels, which was only available on a disk), to showcase the different colors used even within a single series. Please note that for some of the games, two versions of the label existed (a “plain” one with a pulse design and one with actual artwork), though the color of the actual case was not changed between the two. In these cases, the artwork label version is provided.

1st row: Donkey Kong, Donkey Kong Jr., Mario Bros.
2nd row: Donkey Kong Jr.+Donkey Kong Jr. Math, standalone Donkey Kong Jr. Math, Pinball
3rd row: Golf, Donkey Kong 3, Family BASIC
4th row: Wrecking Crew, Super Mario Bros., Super Mario Bros. 2 (known as Super Mario USA in Japan)
5th row: Super Mario Bros. 3, Dr. Mario, NES Open Tournament Golf
6th row: Yoshi, Yoshi’s Cookie, Wario’s Woods

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