Mario: Everything About Nintendo's Plumber

Mario Bros. (1983)The game that makes him a plumber

Two years after the building site, the action goes down into the New York sewers. The setting is made of green pipes out of which turtles and crabs emerge, and the job follows: Mario becomes a plumber. The game also brings Luigi, simultaneous two-player play, and the principle of hitting the floor beneath an enemy to flip it over. Three contributions that would outlive everything else.

PaulineThe very first partner

Before Peach, there is Pauline. She is the woman to be rescued at the top of Donkey Kong, and then fades from the main games — without ever quite disappearing, since she holds the through-line of the Mario vs. Donkey Kong series. Her return is one of the finest rehabilitations in the saga: in Super Mario Odyssey, she is the mayor of New Donk City and belts out the game's song. The character has changed status without changing name.

The history of NintendoThe house before the plumber

Nintendo was not born with Mario, nor even with video games. The company had been making playing cards since the end of the nineteenth century, and felt its way between taxis, hotels and toys before finding its path. Understanding that trajectory sheds light on a great many later choices, starting with a stubborn preference for the toy over technical performance.

The green pipeThe most recognisable object

The green pipe comes from the building sites of Kyoto, where Miyamoto saw ducts laid straight onto the ground; Mario Bros. made it the entrance for its enemies in 1983, and Super Mario Bros. a teleporter in 1985. It has become a door, a lift, a hiding place and a shortcut, then a symbol so strong that it serves today as the sign of a theme park. Few pieces of scenery have had a career like that, starting from a simple technical need.

The Warp ZoneThe secret that got playgrounds talking

Three hidden rooms in the game, three pipes at the end of the first one, and whole worlds skipped in one go. The Warp Zone in Super Mario Bros. invented a way of playing parallel to the game itself: that of shortcuts passed on by word of mouth. It remains at the heart of speedrun routes, where the choice of whether or not to take a shortcut separates the Any% and Warpless categories. It is also how you reach World -1, the most famous glitch on the NES.

The graphic evolutionFrom the 16-pixel sprite to high definition

Every generation of machine has added definition to a shape laid down in 1981. It did undergo one redesign, entrusted in 1985 to Yoichi Kotabe, but one that fixed the face rather than changed it. That is rare: most 1980s mascots were redesigned at least once to survive the move into 3D. Mario went through the NES, the Super Nintendo, the 3D of the Nintendo 64 and high definition keeping the same proportions and the same three colours.

The capsThe headgear turned toolbox

The cap began as an animation saving, then Nintendo made a system out of it. Wing Cap, Vanish Cap, Metal Cap, then a living cap: from Super Mario 64 in 1996 onwards, putting a hat on Mario became a convenient way of giving him a power without touching his silhouette. It is that reasoning which leads to Cappy, where the hat becomes a character outright.

The transformationsThe complete chronology of the metamorphoses

Dozens of forms listed in order, from the Super Mushroom of 1985 to the most recent powers. The chronology reveals a rhythm: each new machine comes with an emblematic transformation, charged with summing up on its own what the hardware now allows. The detail item by item is dealt with on the power-ups page.

Metal MarioThe power-up turned driver

He appeared as a Super Mario 64 transformation, in which metal made Mario heavy, immune to damage and able to walk along the bottom of the water; Metal Mario ended up making a career of his own. He is today a driver in his own right in the racing games, with his own character profile. Few temporary powers have managed that promotion.

Baby MarioHis infant version, which appeared in 1995

Baby Mario is born with Yoshi's Island, in a game where the hero is not him but Yoshi, whose job is to carry him. The idea is clever: when Yoshi takes a hit, the baby flies off in a bubble in tears and a countdown starts — you have to catch him before it ends. The character stayed, and now drives karts alongside his adult version, which remains one of the saga's acknowledged oddities.

His mountsYoshi, Plessie and the others

Mario walks, jumps, swims — and rides. Yoshi first of all, but also Dorrie the plesiosaur of the depths, Plessie who hurtles down the rapids, Lakitu's cloud and Poochy the dog. Each mount exists to give access to a verb the character does not have on his own: swallowing, gliding, riding up a current. It is a way of widening the game without modifying the hero.

SwimmingWhen gravity changes the rules

The water levels are the counterpoint to the jump: same button, opposite behaviour. You no longer fall back down, you rise again in small impulses, and buoyancy replaces gravity. That inversion serves to break the rhythm of a game that rests entirely on precision of timing. It was for a long time the part players liked least, and one of the most worked on by the designers.

Lives and Game OverThe mechanic Nintendo removed

For thirty-six years, from Donkey Kong to Odyssey, losing too many times sent you back to the menu. Super Mario Odyssey simply removed lives and the Game Over screen, replaced by a small loss of coins. The decision caused debate, then established itself: it takes away a punishment inherited from the arcade, where the objective was to make you put another coin in the cabinet, not to tell an adventure.

The “?” blocksThe most famous question mark

Hitting a block from below is a gesture nobody has ever needed to have explained. The “?” block serves as a reward, a platform, a clue and sometimes a trap, and its breakable-brick variant gives the scenery a destructible share. It is one of the game's rare elements to be scenery, object and mechanic all at once.

The POW BlockThe button that empties the screen

Inherited from Mario Bros. in 1983, the POW Block shakes the ground and flips over everything on it. It introduces an idea the saga would often reuse: a single action, of limited use, that changes the state of the whole screen rather than acting on one target. It has remained an object for multiplayer, where the choice of moment counts for more than aim.

The P SwitchBricks become coins

The P Switch temporarily turns bricks into coins and coins into bricks. The level does not change shape, it changes meaning: a wall becomes loot, a path becomes an obstacle. It is an elegant way of doubling the value of scenery already built, and one of the favourite devices of secret levels.

The Red CoinEight coins, one imposed route

Red Coins are not picked up in passing: they impose an itinerary. Placing eight of them in a level amounts to drawing a second route over the top of the first, often more demanding, aimed at players who want everything. The principle is taken up from episode to episode because it adds difficulty without adding a single obstacle.

The hardest levelsWhere the saga stops being kind

Behind the reputation for accessibility, the series hides some formidable passages: special worlds, one-way levels, timed challenges reserved for those who have already finished the game. Almost all of them are optional, and that is the important point: the difficulty is stored away after the ending, so as never to block the ordinary player. The article ranks the worst of them by type of demand: precision of the jump, memorisation, or sheer endurance.

The speedrunThe most fiercely contested race in the world

Finishing Super Mario Bros. as fast as possible has become a discipline in its own right, in which the record is fought over by a few hundredths: 4 min 54.365 s since June 2026, for a theoretical optimum estimated a tenth of a second away from that. The game is short enough to be replayed thousands of times and deep enough to still be hiding optimisations forty years on. It is also one of the pillars of the community's longevity.

The rarest itemsWhat you only see once

Dark Moons from Odyssey, Green Stars from Galaxy 2, the Jumpman badge from The Thousand-Year Door, the Golden Mushroom: the ranking keeps what demands the most persistence, not what is rarest on screen. The distinction matters, because the series hides a great deal and locks away almost nothing. The complete catalogue is on the items page.

Doctor — Dr. MarioWhite coat and coloured pills

In 1990, Mario swaps the dungarees for the coat and throws capsules at viruses in a falling-block puzzle. The game has nothing to do with platforming, and that is precisely the point: it proves that the face alone is enough to sell an entirely different genre. The series had regular sequels for three decades, right up to mobile.

Painter — Mario PaintA drawing program sold with a mouse

Supplied with a mouse and a mat for the Super Nintendo, Mario Paint is less a game than a studio: drawing, frame-by-frame animation, and a music editor that became a cult object. Generations of amateur composers wrote their first bars in it, and the fly-swatting mini-game remains better known than the rest of the software.

Teacher — Mario's Time MachineThe educational Mario nobody played

Developed outside Nintendo, this title sends Mario off to return to history the objects stolen by Bowser, by questioning Michelangelo or Cleopatra. The educational intention is sincere, the execution laboured. It belongs to a period when the licence was lent out fairly freely, with results the house no longer puts forward. It is part of an educational trilogy entrusted to the same publisher, of which no title left a good memory with the players of the time.

Caretaker — Hotel MarioThe CD-i episode nobody talks about

Closing doors in Bowser's hotels, on a Philips console Nintendo never made. The game was born of a commercial agreement that turned out short, and its animated cut scenes had a second life on the internet, a very long way from their original intention. It remains the most quoted example of what the licence produces when it escapes its authors.

Driver — Mario KartThe spin-off series turned pillar

The starting idea was a piece of tinkering: reuse a racing engine, put well-known characters in it and add items that upset the standings. Thirty years later, it is the brand's best-selling branch and, in many households, the only racing game in the house. The formula has never needed refounding, only widening.

Mario Kart 64Four players on one screen

The move into three dimensions and above all the four-way split screen made this episode the living-room game of an entire generation. The tracks gain relief, the items a tactical use, and the series its reputation as an argument-starter. That is where the format froze in the collective memory. It is also the first episode whose music, signed by Kenta Nagata, became pieces of music in their own right.

Mario Kart 8 DeluxeThe best-selling game on the Switch

An enriched version of a Wii U episode that went unnoticed, this instalment became the best-selling title on the Switch, at 71.08 million copies as of 31 March 2026. Its longevity is abnormal: it went on selling by the million several years after its release, carried by the track expansions and by the simple fact that nobody ever trades it in.

Mario Kart WorldThe Switch 2 launch game

Released in June 2025 with the new console, this instalment abandons the succession of closed circuits for an open world linking the tracks to one another. As of 31 March 2026, it had shifted 14.7 million copies, which makes it the best-selling title on the machine and a launch in keeping with the series' tradition.

Mario Kart TourThe mobile episode, opened then closed again

Designed for the phone, with a collection economy and themed seasons, this instalment shuts its servers for good on 30 September 2026. Its history sheds light on Nintendo's caution about mobile: the house goes in, observes, and withdraws without drama when the format does not serve the brand in the long term. Its tracks built on real cities will remain its most original contribution to the series.

Golfer — Mario GolfGolf made legible in three shots

Entrusted to the Camelot studio, the series pulled off a tour de force: making golf immediately playable without betraying its mechanics. The three-stage gauge becomes a model of legibility there, and the adventure mode turns golf outright into a role-playing game. The handheld episodes even grafted on a character progression borrowed from role-playing, which remains unusual for a sports game.

Mario Golf: Super RushWhen everyone plays at the same time

This instalment adds a mode in which the players hit simultaneously then run towards their ball, turning a discipline of waiting into a speed event. The idea is typical of the way the brand handles sports: keep the basic rule, remove the dead time, and accept that purists will grumble. An adventure mode even grafts on a character progression, in continuity with the series' handheld episodes.

Tennis player — Mario TennisThe sport best suited to the character

Tennis suits Mario perfectly: two players, a rally, an instant reading of the action. Camelot added a system of special shots and characters with sharply contrasted attributes, which is enough to create depth without a manual. It is the brand's most consistent sports series. The series also served as a launch pad for Waluigi, created to complete a doubles team.

Mario Tennis AcesA tennis game with a story

This instalment makes an unexpected bet: giving a sports game an adventure mode, with an evil racket that possesses Luigi and bosses to be fought with balls. The idea stands out, and is a reminder that the brand allows itself narrative grafts everywhere, including where nobody asked for them. The game introduces an energy gauge that makes it possible to break the opponent's racket, turning the rally into a duel of attrition.

Footballer — StrikersFootball rid of the referee

Five against five, tackles allowed, an electrified fence, not a single foul blown. The Strikers series takes it upon itself to strip football of everything that slows it down and keep only the duel. The result is brutal, fast, and probably the furthest from the real sport of all the brand's sporting offshoots. Each character has an overpowered shot worth two goals, which is enough to turn round a lost match.

Super Mario StrikersThe ancestor of in-house arcade football

The licence's first footballing attempt already sets everything up: enclosed pitches, special moves, no refereeing. Released at a time when sports simulations dominated, it defends the opposite position — sport as a pretext for a multiplayer action game, not as faithful reproduction. Released on GameCube, it had a sequel on Wii that remains one of the most frantic episodes in the brand's whole sporting branch.

Mario Sports MixFour sports in a single box

Basketball, volleyball, hockey and dodgeball brought together in one title, with simplified rules and items borrowed from the racing games. The compilation formula makes it possible to try out several disciplines without committing a whole series to each, and to measure which one deserves a sequel. Developed by the studio behind several Japanese role-playing games, it also slips in a few guest characters from that universe.

Olympic athleteThe meeting of the two historic rivals

Seeing Mario and Sonic share an athletics track would have been unthinkable in the 1990s, when the two mascots embodied opposing camps. The crossover, backed by the real Olympic Games, lasted several editions and serves as a reminder: yesterday's commercial rivalry has become a shared selling point. Each edition follows the real disciplines of the Games, which incidentally makes it an archive of the Olympic programme, from 2007 to 2019.

Party host — Mario PartyThe board and its mini-events

A board, dice, stars to buy and mini-games between each turn. Mario Party uses the character as a host rather than as a hero, and takes on a share of chance that can overturn a game in the last few seconds. It is the series that has done most to establish the brand as an evening game.

Mario Party SuperstarsThe historic boards done up as new

Rather than inventing, this instalment takes boards and mini-games from the first titles and brings them up to date. The nostalgia bet pays off, and reveals a constant: in this series, players are more attached to the boards than to new rules. Above all, it corrects the flaw for which the previous episodes were most reproached: the shared car disappears, and classic turn-by-turn play returns.

Fighter — Smash Bros.The plumber in a fighting game

In Nintendo's fighting series, Mario serves as the reference character: balanced, without excess, the one you learn with. A good part of the Mushroom Kingdom goes with him, from Peach to Bowser by way of the Koopalings. His set of moves there sums up his career — fireball, cape, water pump. The number of characters from the Mushroom Kingdom exceeds that of any other brand represented in the game.

Strategist — RabbidsA crossover nobody expected

A turn-based tactics game, developed by a French studio, mixing the Mushroom Kingdom with Ubisoft's Rabbids. On paper the idea looked absurd; both episodes were praised, Miyamoto included. It is the clearest demonstration that a character with no biography can be lent out without damage. The second episode goes further by adding space exploration and an orchestral soundtrack by a well-known video game composer.

Architect — Mario Maker 2The designers' tools, opened to everyone

The game hands the public the very bricks of the series: graphic styles from five eras, enemies, items, rules. Anyone can build a level and publish it. It is a complete reversal of the relationship with the brand, which goes from a closed catalogue to a workshop, and a discreet way of documenting its own grammar. It adds to the first episode a story mode of more than a hundred levels, built by Nintendo to show what the tool allows.

The community's levelsWhat players have made of it

Musical levels, automatic runs, logic puzzles, challenges of a difficulty Nintendo would never dare publish: the community has pushed the tool well beyond its intended use. The most famous creations demand months of preparation and a few seconds of perfect execution. A whole category is devoted to so-called automatic runs, in which the player touches nothing while the scenery performs the choreography. Others require thousands of attempts before being validated by their own author.

Mobile runner — Super Mario RunA Mario playable with one hand

The first real Mario on a phone: the running is automatic, only the jump stays under control. The bet is to keep the sensation of the jump by removing everything else. The business model, a single price rather than micro-payments, cut against the mobile market of the time. The game also offers a kingdom-building mode and asynchronous races against other players' runs, two additions specific to this version.

Jailer — Mario vs. Donkey KongThe 1981 duel returns, as a puzzle

The gorilla steals toys made in his own image, and Mario has to recover them in puzzle levels. The series comes full circle with the very first game, by turning it into a puzzle: same characters, same conflict, different verb. It has had several episodes and a recent remake. The series descends directly from a 1994 Game Boy episode long considered one of the console's best games.

On the board — Monopoly and UNOMonopoly, UNO and company

Off the screen, the character also serves as a wrapper for classics of the board game. Those editions almost never change the original rules: they replace the squares, the cards and the counters. It is the degree zero of licensing, and one of the most effective ways of installing it on a living-room table. A few editions go further and genuinely modify the rules, adding effect squares or items borrowed from the video games.

The cancelled gamesThe projects that stayed in the drawer

Abandoned prototypes, sequels recycled into something else, ports halted along the way: the series has as many dead projects as most brands of its age. Some have left documented traces, others are known only through late testimony from developers, with all the caution that requires. The article carefully distinguishes what is documented by Nintendo from what belongs to persistent rumour, a distinction rarely made elsewhere.

The Japanese exclusivesWhat never crossed the borders

Episodes reserved for a local peripheral, difficult versions re-released elsewhere under another name, titles tied to a defunct Japanese service: part of the catalogue was never distributed in Europe. It is one of the reasons the series' official numbering sometimes looks incoherent seen from here. Several of those titles ended up resurfacing decades later through the subscription services, which put an end to their status as rarities.

Mario in virtual realityShort, cautious forays

Nintendo has never committed the brand to virtual reality other than through side modes and brief experiences, grafted onto existing games. The caution is understandable: the free camera and motion sickness go badly with a series built on precision of the jump and rapid movement. The two most accomplished attempts graft an observation mode onto existing episodes, without ever touching the way you play.

Super Mario Bros. 2The sequel that was not one

The game sold in the West under that name was not the Japanese sequel, judged too difficult, but another title entirely redressed in Mario's colours. Hence its unusual rules: you pull up vegetables instead of squashing, you choose between four characters with distinct abilities. That anomaly enriched the series for good, which kept several of its creatures.

Super Mario Bros. 3Costumes, world map, the 8-bit summit

Often cited as the most accomplished of the NES episodes, it introduces the world map, the costumes that change abilities and Bowser's airships. Its richness comes from a simple principle: each world tests a new idea for a few levels, then moves on to the next. The Tanooki Suit came out of it.

Super Mario LandThe plumber fits in a pocket

Developed by a different team, on a tiny monochrome screen, this first handheld episode takes liberties: new settings, new enemies, vehicle shooting sequences, and a princess to rescue who is not Peach. The result stands out, and is a reminder that the series long tolerated variants very far from its standard. It also introduces Daisy, princess of a kingdom that has almost never been seen again since, and shooting sequences in a submarine and a plane.

Super Mario Land 2The game that invents the rival

Its most lasting contribution is not its level design but its antagonist: Wario appears here, seizes Mario's castle, and would become popular enough to inherit his own series. A secondary character created for a handheld episode ended up founding a whole branch of the brand. The game also innovates by letting you choose the order of the six worlds, a rare freedom for a 2D episode of that era.

Super Mario WorldThe arrival of Yoshi

A Super Nintendo launch game, it adds the mount that would become a major character, the Cape Feather and a world map criss-crossed with secret paths. Its branching structure, with alternative exits leading to hidden areas, remains one of the most imitated in the series. It has 96 exits, including a secret Star Road that links the worlds together and opens onto a Special World reserved for those who have searched everywhere.

Super Mario All-StarsThe NES classics done up as new

Four NES episodes redrawn in sixteen bits on a single cartridge, with save files — including the second Japanese episode, never released in the West until then. The object played a discreet but real role: it allowed a generation to discover the first games without suffering their period constraints, and established the idea that the brand's old catalogue is re-released rather than allowed to expire.

New Super Mario Bros.2D returns after fifteen years

After a long period with no major 2D episode, this series revives the formula by modernising it: rendering in volume on a two-dimensional plane of play, simultaneous multiplayer, and a legibility designed for a very wide audience. The first episode became the best seller on the Nintendo DS with 30.8 million copies, while attracting the criticism of too uniform a visual identity.

Super Mario Bros. WonderThe 2D that finally agrees to surprise

A direct answer to that criticism: every level contains a Wonder Flower that distorts the rules for a few seconds — pipes that undulate, scenery that starts singing, an unexpected transformation. It is the most inventive 2D episode for a long time, and the first in which Mario speaks with the voice of Kevin Afghani. It also adds a system of badges that modify handling, allowing a struggling player to grant themselves help without changing level.

NSMB or Wonder?Two opposite ways of doing 2D

Comparing the two series amounts to setting two methods against each other: on one side a reliable, reproducible formula, on the other a succession of disposable ideas. The comparison is useful at the moment of buying, because the two aim at different audiences — the first reassures, the second surprises. The decisive criterion is often the number of players: one handles a four-player scrum better, the other rewards solitary exploration more.

Super Mario 64 vs Banjo-KazooieTwo schools of platforming in relief

Released two years apart on the same machine, the two games share a structure and diverge on everything else: one banks on purity of movement, the other on the density of things to collect and on the writing of the characters. That duel shaped the way a three-dimensional platform game is still judged today.

Super Mario SunshineA water pump on his back

An episode apart: a unique tropical setting, a holiday atmosphere, and above all F.L.U.D.D., a water device that lets you hover, propel yourself and clean. Adding a permanent tool to Mario's repertoire was a risky bet; it divided players and remains the branch's most debated episode. It is also where Bowser Jr.

Super Mario GalaxyGravity becomes a playground

By moving from planet to planet, each with its own attraction, the game solves at a stroke the problem of the three-dimensional camera: you no longer get lost, because the ground is everywhere. It is one of the brand's strongest design ideas, doubled with an orchestral soundtrack by Mahito Yokota under the supervision of Koji Kondo, and direction entrusted to Yoshiaki Koizumi.

Super Mario Galaxy 2Denser, more demanding

Designed from the ideas set aside from the first episode, this sequel keeps its mechanics and increases its density and its difficulty. It adds Yoshi as a mount and abandons some of the first game's staging in favour of pure chained levels. Scored 97 out of 100 by the press, it is preferred to the first episode by a good share of players; the debate is not settled.

Super Mario 3D Land3D designed for a handheld screen

The compromise is a clever one: keep the freedom of movement of 3D but build the levels as directed routes, short, suited to brief sessions. The Tanooki tail comes back as a safety net, letting you slow a fall — a choice that makes 3D far less intimidating. The game also opens a second set of worlds after the credits, more demanding, which almost doubles its real length.

Super Mario 3D World3D playable by four

An extension of the previous game onto a home console, with four playable characters with distinct abilities and the Super Bell. Its re-release comes with a separate module that explores, over an open space, a direction the series had not yet taken. Each of the four characters has a distinct ability — Peach glides, Luigi jumps higher, Toad runs faster — which completely changes the approach to the same level. The additional module, for its part, takes place over a continuous space lashed by storms, with no division into levels.

Super Mario OdysseyTaking control of whatever you cap

The current summit of the branch: kingdoms very different from one another, an unusual freedom of movement, and above all Cappy, which makes it possible to possess enemies and objects in order to borrow their abilities. The game also removes lives, and reaches for a metropolis peopled with humans that refers straight back to 1981. The game also multiplies the outfits to be bought, several of which quote episodes thirty years old.

Super Mario RPGThe first detour through role-playing

The fruit of a collaboration between Nintendo and Square, this game invents an idea copied everywhere since: adding a button press at the right moment during a turn-based attack. It also introduces characters belonging to no other branch of the series, and has had a complete remake decades later.

The Paper Mario seriesThe kingdom in cut-out paper

An art direction in folded paper, an acknowledged humour in the writing, and a battle system that varies sharply from one episode to the next — to the point where the series has split between supporters of the first titles and of their successors. The complete path, from the Nintendo 64 to the Switch, is retraced profile by profile. The switch happens in the middle of the 2000s, when the series abandons experience points and partners in favour of systems renewed with every episode.

The Thousand-Year DoorThe summit of the branch, back on Switch

Considered by a large share of players to be the brand's best role-playing episode, this game combines a plot in chapters, carefully written partners and a badge system that lets you compose your own fighting style. Its re-release on Switch made it accessible after twenty years of rarity. Its battles take place on a theatre stage, in front of an audience that applauds or boos according to the performance, and whose mood genuinely influences the statistics.

Paper Mario: The Origami KingCombat becomes a circular puzzle

This episode replaces classic combat with a puzzle: you have to rotate rings to line the enemies up before striking. The idea divides opinion, but the writing and the staging are among the most polished in the series, with sequences that have little to do with what is expected of the brand.

Mario & Luigi: BrothershipTwo brothers, two buttons

The series gives a button to each brother, which turns every movement and every attack into a little two-handed choreography. It is a rare control principle, and it carries the series' humour: Luigi is treated there as a permanent supporting role, with a mocking tenderness that has done a great deal for his popularity. The latest episode, released in 2024 after nine years away, sends the duo off to reconnect the Concordia archipelago island by island.

Mario & Luigi: Paper JamWhen the two role-playing series meet

The two branches of role-playing cross, with a third paper character joining the two brothers. The result is a curious object, halfway between the two battle systems, which will appeal above all to those who already know the two series it brings together. It is the last original episode signed by AlphaDream, the series' historic studio, which produced nothing but remakes afterwards before closing in 2019.

In what order to play themNo imposed order, a few good paths

Since the series has no narrative continuity, there is no compulsory order — which throws those approaching a forty-year-old brand. The article proposes several routes according to the starting point: by release order, by branch, or by degree of demand. It is the question newcomers ask most. The main rule it draws out is not to start with the oldest episodes, whose conventions require a tolerance few players have today.

The best for the familyThe ones that work across generations

Not every episode lends itself to shared play. The selection keeps those whose rules can be explained in one sentence, whose difficulty can be modulated, and which tolerate a player markedly less experienced than the others without spoiling the others' game. The selection notably rules out the solo 3D episodes, whose free camera remains the main obstacle for a player discovering the controller. It favours games you can drop out of mid-session without penalising the others.

Super MushroomThe first object in the series' history

It doubles his size, lets him break bricks and offers one hit in hand before dying. It was not imagined to make Mario bigger, though, but to avoid killing the player on first contact: the hit absorbed was the real subject. The lesson comes across in the first few seconds of World 1-1. The whole vocabulary of transformations flows from that initial lesson, and it remains the brand's visual emblem.

Fire FlowerThe ranged attack, in 1985

The Fire Flower introduces range: until then, eliminating an enemy meant jumping on him, and therefore getting close. The bouncing balls change the geometry of danger and open up solutions to otherwise impassable stretches. The white and red costume that goes with it has become a second recognisable outfit for the character. An icy variant appeared later, freezing enemies instead of burning them and making it possible to use them as platforms.

Super StarA few seconds of invincibility

The star is one of the rare objects to suspend the rules completely: no more damage, enemies fall on contact, and the music changes. Its very short duration makes it an object of tempo — it pushes you to charge ahead, which the rest of the game discourages. It has also become the most widely used metaphor outside video games for a state of euphoria.

1-Up MushroomOne more life, and an unforgettable sound

The green mushroom changes nothing about his abilities: it adds a life. Its real peculiarity is that it is often hidden, which makes it the reward for exploration rather than an object encountered along the way. Since lives disappeared from certain episodes, it has lost its original function while remaining a symbol. Its rising arpeggio, played on every pick-up, is among the three or four sounds even non-players identify at the first note.

Cape FeatherFree flight, and its secrets

The cape lets you build momentum on the ground then glide at length while correcting your altitude. It is the power that breaks levels most: well mastered, it makes it possible to fly over whole stretches and reach areas designed to stay out of reach. Timed-run players have made it a central tool. Well exploited, it also allows you to bounce indefinitely off an enemy in flight, a technique long used to stack up lives without limit.

Tanooki MarioThe tail that strikes and glides

Introduced in the third NES episode, the Tanooki Suit combines three uses: striking with the tail, slowing a fall, and flying after a run-up. Its complete version also allows you to freeze into a statue to become untouchable. It owes its name to the tanuki, the raccoon dog of Japanese folklore reputed to change shape. In 3D, it settles for gliding.

Frog SuitThe costume that makes swimming precise

Underwater, Mario drifts. The frog costume gives him precise, fast swimming, at the price of a ridiculous walk on dry land. It is a good example of the method: rather than improving swimming for everyone, the series creates an object that transforms it, and builds two or three levels around it.

Hammer SuitThe shell that protects from fire

Borrowed from the Hammer Bros, this costume lets you throw hammers in an arc and, by crouching, shelter behind a shell immune to flaming projectiles. It is rare, handed out sparingly, and remains one of the few objects to give a clear advantage against a boss. Its rarity in Super Mario Bros. 3 is such that many players finish the game without ever having worn it, when it lets you beat Bowser head-on.

Penguin SuitWalking on ice without slipping

It settles an old irritant: frozen floors that make you lose control. The costume gives grip, an offensive belly slide and improved swimming, on top of the ice balls. Three problems settled by a single object, which explains why it has stayed very popular despite a single major appearance. It does better than the Ice Flower on attack and better than the Frog Suit on dry land, which makes it one of the most complete outfits in the saga.

Super BellClimbing walls and clawing

The feline transformation adds two rare verbs to the series: scaling a vertical wall and attacking in a dive. It makes 3D more forgiving, since a wall stops being a limit. Its success went beyond the game — it is one of the rare recent transformations to have become a merchandising motif in its own right.

Double CherryTwo Marios, then four, then eight

Every cherry picked up adds a double that reproduces the player's movements exactly. Steering five characters with a single stick is as much a juggling act as it is platforming, and it turns ordinary levels into coordination exercises. The object was born of a development error, spotted then turned into a mechanic in its own right. Losing a double costs nothing as long as one remains, which makes this object a safety net as much as an offensive tool.

Mega MushroomGoing through the scenery by destroying it

The giant mushroom reverses the balance of power: nothing hurts any more, pipes, bricks and enemies shatter as he passes. The pleasure is that of pure demolition, without difficulty, for a few seconds. Born on a Mario Party board in 2002, it found its definitive form in New Super Mario Bros. in 2006, and has since served to squash opponents in the racing games.

Mini MushroomSmall enough to run on water

The opposite of the previous one: shrunk to a few pixels, Mario passes under closed openings, runs on water and jumps very high, but the slightest contact kills him. It is a specialist's object, indispensable for reaching certain secrets, and one of the few to make the game more dangerous than it was. Like the Mega Mushroom, it is born on a Mario Party board in 2002 before establishing itself in New Super Mario Bros.

Elephant FruitWonder's headline transformation

Mario becomes an elephant: he sweeps enemies aside with his trunk, breaks blocks by sheer mass and carries water to sprinkle plants. It is the transformation that served as the face of the episode's campaign, and the shop names it the Elephant Fruit, in line with the official translation. The object also has an unusual practical function: the character's mass lets him pass through air currents that would push back his normal form.

Wonder FlowerThe object that distorts the level itself

The Wonder Flower does not act on Mario but on the world: pipes that undulate, scenery that starts singing, gravity inverted, the character turned into a ball. Every level in the game contains one, each with a different effect. It is the first object in the series whose function is to break the rule rather than extend it.

CappyThe hat turned character

Cappy is both a companion and a power: thrown at an enemy or an object, he makes it possible to take control of it and borrow its abilities. Officially called capture, that possession replaces the logic of the costume and makes every creature in the scenery potentially playable. Cappy also has his own quest: to recover his sister Tiara, kidnapped by Bowser. It is the deepest renewal of the system since 1985.

LuigiThe twin brother, younger and taller

Born in 1983 as a simple second player in green, Luigi earned a whole personality out of differences in handling: he jumps higher, brakes less well, slides. Those technical gaps became character traits — clumsiness, fear, the eternal runner-up. He is one of the rare characters whose psychology follows literally from his code.

Luigi's MansionHis own series, in which Mario is absent

The reversal is complete: Luigi becomes the hero of a haunted exploration series in which it is Mario who has to be rescued. The character trembles, jumps and moves forward reluctantly, which provides a comic register the main series has never been able to offer. Three episodes later, it has become an autonomous branch of the brand. The first episode came out in 2001 as the GameCube's launch game, in a slot everyone was expecting a classic Mario to fill.

Princess PeachSovereign, no longer only captive

Called Princess Toadstool in the West until Super Mario 64 imposed “Peach” in 1996, she rules a kingdom, has taken part in the racing and sports games since the 1990s, and ended up getting her own games. Her profile is markedly fuller than Mario's, because she has a political function, a seat of power and powers of her own — three things the hero does not have.

Peach and MarioForty years of maintained ambiguity

Cakes, letters, kisses on the cheek, tender gestures: the clues exist, no official statement confirms them. Nintendo maintains the vagueness consistently, for the same reason it refuses to give Mario a past — an established relationship would close narrative doors and date the character. The article lists them without deciding, right up to the marriage proposal in Odyssey in 2017 — which Peach turns down, Bowser's included. The role-playing episodes, more talkative, are the only ones to go a little further — and they do so in a joking register.

Peach, Pauline, DaisyThree trajectories over forty years

Comparing Pauline, Peach and Daisy tells the story of how the female role in the series has changed: from the silent captive of 1981 to the mayor of a metropolis, by way of a sovereign who became playable and then a heroine. The change is real, uneven, and follows the rest of the industry fairly closely. The article also compares their roles in the spin-off games, where they became playable well before they did in the main series. It is often through sport and racing that the change began.

Princess DaisyThe princess who came from the Game Boy

Introduced in the first handheld episode, Daisy rules over a kingdom that has almost never been seen again since. Forgotten for eleven years, she was recalled by Mario Tennis on the Nintendo 64 in 2000, and has survived since through the sports and racing games, where her sharply drawn temperament contrasts usefully with Peach. It is a typical case of a character saved by the spin-off series rather than by the main one.

RosalinaThe one who gets a real past

Guardian of the space observatory in the Galaxy episodes, Rosalina has something unique in the series: a past that is told, in the form of a book readable chapter by chapter, melancholy and surprisingly sad. In a universe that refuses biography, it is the exception that confirms how deliberate the choice is elsewhere. Her book is not compulsory in order to finish the game: it has to be looked for, chapter after chapter, which makes it a story reserved for curious players. Few people have read it all the way through.

YoshiThe mount turned character

Miyamoto had dreamed of a dinosaur mount since the NES without the machine allowing it. Introduced in the Super Nintendo episode on a design by Shigefumi Hino, Yoshi followed the opposite path to most supporting roles: from game object to character, then to hero of his own series. His tongue, his ability to swallow and to transform what he swallows gave the designers a verb Mario will never have. He also exists in several colours with distinct abilities, and his own adventure series adopts a child's-drawing aesthetic with no equivalent elsewhere.

ToadThe mushroom people, in a single character

Toad is less an individual than a function: the one who greets you, informs you, and announces that the princess is in another castle. The series long played on that ambiguity between a single character and a whole species, before giving him his own exploration adventures, in which he does not jump. The species has existed since 1985, but you have to wait for Super Mario Bros. 2 in 1988 to play as him. His solo adventures rest entirely on rotating the camera to reveal hidden paths, since he cannot clear obstacles by jumping.

ToadetteCreated for the spin-offs, and here to stay

Having first appeared in the racing and party games, Toadette earned her place in the main series, to the point of having a transformation of her own. Her path illustrates a constant: at Nintendo, a secondary character created for a spin-off regularly ends up joining the main canon. Her own transformation, obtained with a crown, set off an internet phenomenon on a scale Nintendo had clearly not anticipated.

BowserThe opponent of a whole career

King of the Koopas since 1985, Bowser is, along with his brother and Peach, one of the rare constants in his life. That constancy is what allows the series to do without a plot: the conflict is a given, it never needs to be set out. Miyamoto had imagined him as an ox; it was Takashi Tezuka who made him a turtle, and Yoichi Kotabe who covered him in spikes. He also has a family, a kingdom and a son — that is, more biography than the hero.

Donkey KongThe very first opponent, turned ally

It is through him that Mario exists: without the 1981 gorilla, no Jumpman. Their relationship has followed a rare trajectory — antagonist, then racing and sports rival, then a character in his own right with his own line of games. Few original villains have been so completely rehabilitated. The character also had his own trilogy on the Super Nintendo, developed in England, which ranks among the machine's best-selling games.

WarioThe hero's negative, literally

His name mixes “Mario” with the Japanese warui, “bad”: everything is said. Greedy where the other is disinterested, brutal where the other is agile, Wario quickly escaped his role as antagonist to found his own series, from platforming to microgames. He occupies a strange place: neither enemy nor ally, simply elsewhere. His microgame series, in which you have to react in a few seconds to absurd instructions, has become one of the most inventive in the Nintendo catalogue.

WaluigiCreated to complete a doubles team

His origin is prosaic: Wario was missing a partner for a doubles tennis game. His emblem is, appropriately, an upside-down “L”. Out of that utilitarian birth came a character with no game of his own, whose perpetual absence has become a lasting joke among players. He is probably the member of the cast whose popularity rests most on what he does not have.

Kevin AfghaniThe successor, since 2023

Kevin Afghani takes over the role from Super Mario Bros. Wonder, in 2023, along with Luigi's. The brief seems to have been continuity rather than reinterpretation: most players did not hear the difference before it was announced. That is probably the greatest compliment you can pay a takeover of this kind.

The voices of Peach and BowserThe kingdom's other voices

Peach, Bowser, Daisy and the Toads have also had successions of performers, even more discreet ones. Samantha Kelly held Peach — along with Toad and Toadette — for eighteen years, until she was replaced by Courtney Lin in 2025. Kenny James, for his part, has been roaring for Bowser for some twenty years. Those changes go almost unnoticed because the characters speak so little: a few words per game are enough to maintain the illusion of continuity.

Koji KondoThe author of the basic repertoire

Hired by Nintendo in 1984, Koji Kondo wrote most of the brand's founding themes, often alone, with three sound channels and a draconian memory constraint. His stated principle is simple: the music must support the player's gesture, not illustrate it. That is what explains the tempo of his themes, set to the character's running speed.

The World 1-1 themeProbably the best-known tune in video games

A few bars in C major at a hundred beats per minute, fed on Japanese jazz fusion, written to accompany horizontal scrolling. The World 1-1 theme long ago outgrew its medium: you hear it in symphony concerts, as a ringtone, in street covers, and in 2023 it entered the National Recording Registry of the US Library of Congress. Its strength comes from its construction — a memorable phrase from the very first second, with no introduction, because the player starts playing immediately.

The underground themeThe piece built on the gaps

The theme of the underground passages works the opposite way round to the previous one: few notes, a great deal of silence, a descending bass. The sonic emptiness does the work of atmosphere, in a game that had no means of producing an atmosphere through the image. It is one of the most quoted examples of composition under constraint. The piece has been taken up and distorted in dozens of later episodes, often to signal that a passage is hiding something.

The underwater themeThe waltz written before all the others

It is the first piece Koji Kondo finished for the game. Its waltz in three time stands apart from the whole of the rest of the soundtrack and gives the underwater passages a sway, in keeping with the floating handling of those levels. It has survived every generation of machine, reorchestrated from the three-channel synthesiser through to the full symphony orchestra, without its melody changing.

The Starman discoThe riff that goes with the star

A few seconds of accelerated tempo, borrowed from the disco aesthetic of the time, which signal invincibility better than any visual effect. The piece serves a precise function: telling the player, without looking at the screen, how long they have left before becoming vulnerable again. Its very short structure, designed to loop without an audible join, makes it a textbook case of composition under memory constraint. It has barely been modified in forty years.

Gusty GardenThe orchestra enters the saga

This theme from the space episodes marks the brand's move to the recorded symphony orchestra. The whirling waltz accompanies a weightless planet, and illustrates a change of method: the music no longer merely paces the gesture, it carries an emotion of its own, independent of the action on screen. It has become one of the most played pieces in video game music concerts, often as a programme opener.

Jump Up, Super Star!The series' first sung song

A vocal jazz number performed by Pauline in Super Mario Odyssey, with lyrics, brass and a chorus. It is the first time the series has entrusted a high point to a complete song, and the piece serves as a thread through the whole end of the game. A musical rehabilitation, for a character silent since 1981. The piece exists in several languages and in an instrumental version, and the game uses it as a reward rather than as background sound.

The sound effectsThe coin, the jump, the mushroom

The sound of the coin, that of the jump, the arpeggio of the mushroom picked up: those noises lasting a few tenths of a second are as identifiable as the melodies. They serve a feedback function — confirming an action without taking up the screen — and that function explains their brevity and their sharpness. The coin's “bling” does not even date from Super Mario Bros.: it comes from the 1983 arcade cabinet, simply transposed two semitones lower on the NES.

Mahito YokotaThe orchestra of the 3D episodes

Composer of the great space adventures, Mahito Yokota worked alongside Koji Kondo on the series' symphonic direction. He recounts having first written scores that were too well behaved, before he was asked to embrace the emphasis more fully — an example of the way Nintendo steers its composers without writing in their place. Having passed through another publisher as sound director before joining Nintendo in 2003, he rewrote everything for fifty musicians on Galaxy — after Kondo had rejected his first demos.

Yoko ShimomuraThe scores of the role-playing episodes

Composer of the brand's first role-playing episode and of the fraternal adventures that followed, Yoko Shimomura gave that branch a melodic colour different from the rest of the series, closer to Japanese role-playing. She is one of the catalogue's rare musical signatures to be identifiable independently of Mario. Having passed through Capcom, where she wrote the music for Street Fighter II, she carries a stubborn received idea around with her: the soundtrack of Super Mario RPG is regularly attributed, wrongly, to Nobuo Uematsu.

Kenta NagataThe sound of the circuits

Having joined Nintendo in 1996, Kenta Nagata composed the entire soundtrack of Mario Kart 64 alone — while explicitly refusing to write “racing game music”. He was aiming for pieces that stand up outside the game rather than a background wash, and he later became sound director on several of the house's productions.

Gunpei YokoiThe mentor, and his doctrine

An engineer who joined Nintendo to maintain the production machinery, Gunpei Yokoi invented the handheld game and trained Miyamoto. His doctrine, often summed up as the inventive use of an already proven and inexpensive technology, still runs through the house. He supervised the first handheld Mario. He is also the inventor of the directional pad, drawn for a small console with a liquid crystal screen, and since become the standard for the whole industry.

Takashi TezukaThe co-designer of the founding levels

Present from the very first episodes, Takashi Tezuka co-built the levels that fixed the series' grammar, then supervised decades of 2D production. He has stayed markedly less visible than Miyamoto while carrying a considerable share of the actual work, which is common in Japanese studios of that generation. He is notably behind the idea of letting players build their own levels, long before it became a product.

Yoshiaki KoizumiThe architect of the three-dimensional episodes

Trained in cinema, he cut his teeth on Zelda before directing Sunshine then Galaxy, and producing Odyssey. To him we owe part of what, in the 3D episodes, is a matter of staging rather than of mechanics alone — including a few moments of emotion unusual for the brand: he is the one who wrote the tale ofRosalina.

Hideki KonnoThe man behind the racing branch

Involved very early in the series, then producer of the karting branch, Hideki Konno defined the balance that characterises it: items that penalise those in front and help those behind, so that a race stays undecided to the very end. That choice, often contested by expert players, is what makes the series playable as a family. He left Nintendo in 2025, having also worked on Yoshi's Island and Luigi's Mansion.

Satoru IwataThe programmer turned president

A programmer by training who became president of Nintendo, Satoru Iwata took the brand to its commercial peak at the time of the wide-audience consoles. His particularity was to go on putting his hands in the code, including to unblock projects in difficulty. To him we also owe the “Iwata Asks” and Nintendo Direct formats, which changed the way the industry talks to its players. His death in 2015, at 55, left a lasting mark on the sector. He had notably rewritten the data compression of a struggling game himself, allowing it to ship on time — an anecdote often quoted to sum up his method.

The 1993 filmThe live-action film of 1993

A dystopian, rainy universe, evolved dinosaurs, Bowser as a businessman: the 1993 film resembles nothing players were expecting. The shoot was chaotic, the reception disastrous, and Nintendo drew a lasting lesson from it about licensing out. It has since become a cult object for its acknowledged strangeness.

The 2023 filmThe animated film of 2023

Thirty years later, Nintendo co-produces with Illumination and keeps control. The animated film passes 1.36 billion dollars at the worldwide box office and becomes one of the biggest takings in the history of animated cinema. The choice of staying faithful to the games' imagery rather than reinterpreting it proved a winner with the general public and with players alike.

The Super Mario Galaxy MovieThe sequel, released in April 2026

Entitled Super Mario Galaxy: The Movie, the sequel came out in the spring of 2026 and passed a billion dollars, becoming the first film of the year to reach that threshold. It moves the action into space: Bowser Jr. kidnaps Rosalina, and the Lumas have to be saved. For a long time, though, rumour had it centred on Yoshi. Its release confirms the schedule announced by Nintendo, which now treats cinema as a lasting branch rather than as a one-off operation.

The Super Mario Bros. Super ShowThe television series of 1989

A mixture of animated sequences and live-action sketches, this daily series installed the character on American television before most households even had a console. Its tone, a long way from the games, lastingly shaped Mario's image in the United States, including his most caricatural expressions. Its live-action sketches starred the wrestler Lou Albano as Mario, across sixty-five episodes broadcast in the autumn of 1989.

The animated seriesThree decades of cartoons

Several series followed one another, modelled on the games of the moment and produced at an industrial pace. They stop dead in 1992, and Mario then disappears from television screens for thirty years. Their canon is fanciful, but they made the secondary characters known to an audience that did not play, well before the games developed them themselves. Three series followed one another in four years, at the pace of the game releases.

Super Mario-kunThe manga published without a break since 1990

Published in Japan since 1990 and still running, this manga follows every new game with an absurd humour and a pronounced taste for the grotesque. A single author, Yukio Sawada, has drawn it since the first volume. It is the series' longest adaptation, and the freest: Nintendo tolerates a latitude there that the rest of the merchandise has never had. It appears in France under the title Super Mario Manga Adventures.

Super Nintendo WorldThe Mushroom Kingdom in bricks and mortar

Opened first in Japan then rolled out elsewhere, this park reconstructs the settings at full size, with blocks to hit, pipes to take and connected wristbands that count coins. The bet is to transpose a game mechanic into physical space, and not only a set — which sets it apart from most licensed parks.

LEGO Super MarioBricks that keep the score

The range does not merely reproduce settings: an electronic figure reads the colours and codes of the bricks, reacts to enemies and displays a score. It is a hybrid object, halfway between toy and video game, and one of the rare partnerships in which the two brands designed together rather than one for the other.

The amiiboThe figures that talk to the consoles

Chipped figures, they unlock content when you place them on a controller. The Mario catalogue is vast, with editions that have become hard to find and compatibilities that vary sharply from one game to another. The article lists the rarities and what each figure actually unlocks. Some sold-out figures have never been reissued, and their price on the second-hand market far exceeds that of a brand-new game.

The collector's consolesThe machines in the plumber's colours

Red consoles, screen-printed controllers, anniversary boxed sets: Nintendo regularly turns out its hardware in the character's colours, often in limited quantities and to mark round dates. Those editions now make up a collectors' market in their own right, with considerable differences in value according to the state of the box. The anniversary editions, produced every five or ten years, are the ones whose value climbs fastest once production stops.

The collaborationsThe authorised crossovers

Zelda as early as 1999, Sonic in 2008, Animal Crossing, the Rabbids, LEGO: the list of official crossovers is longer than you would imagine for a house reputed to be protective. It shows where the line falls — Nintendo readily lends the character out, on condition that it keeps control of the way he is represented. It also explains why some crossovers much in demand from players have never happened: control of the image takes precedence over commercial opportunity.

MAR10 Day10 March, his official day

Written the English way, MAR10 reads as “Mario”. Having started as a joke among players, 10 March has become an official date that Nintendo uses for its announcements, its promotions and its special editions. It is one of the rare cases where the house has adopted an invention of its community rather than letting it live alongside.

20 anecdotesTwenty details players do not know

The clouds and the bushes in the first game share the same drawing in two colours, for want of available memory. The character was a carpenter before being a plumber, and very nearly ended up called Jumpman for good. The article gathers a score of details of that kind, all verifiable, several of which say something about the manufacturing constraints of the time.

Mario vs SonicThe commercial rivalry of the 1990s

For a decade, the two mascots embodied two camps, two consoles and two opposing advertising pitches — precision against speed, family against attitude. The rivalry died out with Sega's withdrawal from hardware, to the point where the two characters today share the same Olympic Games. Sega's advertising campaign attacked its competitor by name at the time, a practice extremely rare then and unthinkable since.

Mario vs LinkTwo doctrines in the same house

Comparing Mario with his neighbour in the catalogue sheds more light on the character than any external comparison. Both were born from the same creator, a few years apart, and embody two opposing doctrines: one carries a legend, a past and a quest; the other deliberately stays empty so as to be able to do anything. The comparison also covers sales, where the plumber's series is clearly ahead of the sword-wielding hero's despite criticism often more laudatory for the latter.

An indestructible communityA community that does not die out

Timed runs, level creation, exploration of the code, exhaustive documentation: the activity around the series no longer depends on game releases. It sustains itself on forty-year-old titles, which is rare, and is partly explained by the simplicity of the rules — a game that is easy to describe is a game that is easy to discuss.

Gift ideasGiving Mario without getting it wrong

The character appeals from the age of three to seventy, which makes the gift harder than it looks: what delights a five-year-old bores a teenager, and vice versa. The guide sorts by age bracket and by budget, separating what is played, what is worn and what is displayed.