Franchise: Mario

Koopa troopas' Japanese name, “Noko-noko” (ノコノコ), is the Japanese term for doing something without much care.

In the 2023 film "The Super Mario Bros. Movie", the Japanese name for the character Spike (the foreman from Wrecking Crew) was changed in the corresponding dub. Although no specific reason was given as to why the change was made, it can be assumed it was done to avoid controversy as the character's original Japanese name is "Blackie", which is also a derogatory racial slur in English-speaking countries used to refer to dark-skinned people of African descent.

Years prior to the animation studio Illumination having a film based off the Mario franchise with the 2023 film "The Super Mario Bros. Movie", the series had been referenced in a handful of films by the same studio, including Donkey Kong references in "Dr. Seuss' The Lorax" and "Despicable Me 3", and an homage to kicking a Koopa Troopa shell featured in "The Secret Life of Pets".

In 1983, an album was released on vinyl by Kid Stuff Records titled Donkey Kong (alternatively called Donkey Kong Goes Home), retelling the story of the video game of the same name. It is notable for not only potentially being the first time Mario was voiced (having an unknown release date in 1983, which was also the debut year of Saturday Supercade), but also giving Mario a stereotypical Italian accent with an "-a-" verbal tic as opposed to the gruff Italian-American accent that would be used in multimedia projects for the rest of the 80s (including Saturday Supercade), predating Charles Martinet's debut as Mario in Mario Teaches Typing by 8 years. According to Kid Stuff Mario voice actor Pat McBride, the reasoning for this voice direction was


Nintendo never gave the team behind Donkey Kong Goes Home any form of guidance for the project, and did not give any word - positive or negative - about the finished album beyond approving it.

As of 2023, Mario has prominently appeared in at least one theatrical film per decade since he was created in 1981:
•1986’s Super Mario Bros: The Great Mission to Rescue Princess Peach, which is one of the first film adaptations of a video game.
•1993’s Super Mario Bros, the first live-action film adaptation of a video game.
•2007’s The King of Kong: A Fistful of Quarters, a documentary that revolves around Steve Wiebe attempting to usurp Billy Mitchell’s high score on Donkey Kong.
•2015’s Pixels, which incorporates Donkey Kong as the final boss of the film’s climax (alongside Mario making a brief cameo).
•2023’s The Super Mario Bros. Movie, which is the first video game film to make $1 billion dollars at the box office.

Interestingly, the two films that weren’t direct adaptations of the games, The King of Kong and Pixels, were directed and produced respectively by Seth Gordon, who considered making a 3D film adaptation of Super Paper Mario back in 2008.

Yoshi's Story was the first Mario series game to be rated E for Everyone instead of K-A for Kids to Adults due to the changeover by the ESRB from the previously used K-A rating in 1998.

Concept art for Paper Mario: Color Splash shows that the captain of the Violet Passage was at one point going to have a dark skin tone. This would've marked the first instance of a Toad with a distinct skin color (not counting usually-pale Toads under a transformation) in a Mario game, but not the first instance of a non-pale Toad in the Mario franchise as a whole. The Super Mario Bros. Super Show featured a one-off Native American Toad named Pronto, a parody of Tonto from The Lone Ranger, in the episode "The Provolone Ranger".

Starting with Super Mario 64, the Koopa Troopa's voice is an incredibly short snippet of "HUMAN, YELL - YELL: FEMALE", a sound effect of a woman gleefully screaming from the Best Service Voice Spectral Volume 1 sound pack, modified into different pitches and speeds. In some games, a different snippet from the sound effect is used to represent Koopa Troopas screaming or being frustrated.

Goomba's name in the Japanese version is "Kuribo" (クリボー), which means "Chesnut boy" or "Chesnut people". They were named like this because the character sprite was mislabelled by one of the programmers of the original Super Mario game, saying that it looked like a chestnut.

Paratroopa's Japanese name, 'Pata-pata' (パタパタ), comes from the Japanese onomatopoeia for flapping wings.

In the Super Mario World official guidebook interview, the game's composer Koji Kondo was asked how he came up with Mario's main theme, and revealed that it was originally very different, and went through multiple iterations. He commented:

Lakitu's Japanese name, 'Jugemu' (ジュゲム); or 'Jugem' as it was romanized in later games of the series, comes from a rakugo folk tale. In the tale, a couple could not think of a suitable name for their newborn baby boy and so the father went to a temple and asked the chief priest to think of a name. The priest suggested several names, but they couldn't decide on one, so they decided to mix all of those names into one, the final result being:

Jugemu-jugemu Gokonosurikire Kaijarisuigyo-no Suigyomatsu Unraimatsu Furaimatsu Kunerutokoroni-sumutokoro Yaburakojino-burakoji Paipopaipo-paiponoshuringan Shuringanno-gurindai Gurindaino-ponpokopino-ponpokonano Chokyumeino-chosuke

Before Super Mario World, Koopa Troopas walked on all four legs.

According to the Mario Kart: Double Dash!! and Mario Kart Wii official guides, the character Daisy is Princess Peach's cousin. However, there are no official sources or in-game evidence that confirms this.

According to a Nintendo documentary, Wario is Mario's childhood friend who grew up with the same plumbing skills.

According to a Nintendo Documentary, Mario's favorite music is not only Opera, but Euro-Pop as well.

According to Eiji Anouma, Miyamoto got the idea of naming Mario from Marionette. Marionette is a puppet controlled from above with strings or wires. Miyamoto also made puppets during his days at school where he would display his puppets in front of the class.

In the Mario Kart games, Rosalina is a heavy/large class character. However, in the Super Smash Bros. series she is a light class character. The reason she is a heavy class character in Mario Kart is most likely due to her height.

After the launch of Mario Strikers Charged, Next Level Games had pitched to Nintendo a Mario volleyball game titled Super Mario Spikers. Referred to during development as simply Mario Volleyball, it was to be a mix of volleyball and wrestling mechanics, and was presented with hints of a TV game show. It was intended for the Wii and work began on it around the end of 2006. Development was canceled in 2007 after the pitch had failed with Nintendo. The game was financed as a reward from the studio's previous work on the Strikers games, and the volleyball mechanic was thought to have been reused for Mario Sports Mix.

Mario has starred in over 200 different games.