A panel of a 2008 issue of the Image Comics comic series “Invincible” contains a reference to Francis, the Chapter 3 boss from Super Paper Mario (shown on the shirt of the man near the right edge of the panel), as well as his catchprase, “Hi-technicaaaal!”

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In a 2002 interview about Super Mario Sunshine, Shigeru Miyamoto and Takashi Tezuka, who both were co-producers of that game, talked about changing Mario’s clothes. Interestingly, Tezuka mentions that it was Yoshiaki Koizumi who first came up with the idea of changing Mario’s clothes. Tezuka only approved of a short-sleeved version of Mario’s regular shirt, and an optional Hawaiian shirt to be worn on top of it, at the time.

It appears that Koizumi held on to that idea for 15 years, as Super Mario Odyssey, a game he was himself the producer of, finally allowed Mario to change his clothes freely in 2017.

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Top: Lulu is a character introduced to the WarioWare series in WarioWare: Gold, and who became a fully playable member of the cast in WarioWare: Get It Together. She is seen using a balloon to float around in her character trailer.

Bottom: Lulu’s design is actually based on the protagonist of a Japan-exclusive Game Boy Color remake of Balloon Kid (originally for the Game Boy), called “Balloon Fight GB”. The girl from that game has an identical outfit and similar hairstyle and bow to Lulu. While this might not be an obscure reference to Japanese players, as the game was never released internationally, most players of WarioWare would be unable to recognize that Lulu’s design is a reference.

Main Blog | Twitter | Patreon | Small Findings | Source: twitter.com user “Bee_Kirby”

Officially licensed 1995 pullback Yoshi car from Japan.

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In the Sunshine Airport track in Mario Kart 8/Deluxe, three different messages can be heard faintly over the intercom. These are difficult to hear in-game due to being drowned out by the music and the sounds of the race. Here they are extracted from the game’s files. In order, the lines are:

“Paging Galaxy Airlines, Flight 2218, passenger Ms. Birdo, please proceed to the information counter on Floor 2.”

“Passengers departing on Galaxy Airlines, Flight 2580, bound for Dolphin Shoals, should proceed to customs and immigration at this time.”

“This is the final boarding call for Boomerang Bros. International Airline, Flight 117a to Sweet Sweet Canyon, departing from Gate 3.”

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When no input is made on the title screen of Super Mario 64 for an extended time, a series of short gameplay demos will play. The game contains an extremely short unused demo input sequence that is not assigned to any level, but if assigned to the Cool, Cool Mountain demo header, reveals why it was cut short.

Watching the demo shows Mario run up against a sign and then stop before the demo abruptly ends. This suggests that the programmer tasked to record the demo either wanted to read the sign (a famously finicky action in this game, as Mario can only read signs when he is in very particular states and facing angles), or jump over it, and failed to do the desired action. Mario’s stopping seems to be a result of the programmer stopping all input in order to discard the demo and attempt to record it again.

Why this failed attempt was left in the game’s data is unknown.

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In 1986, a series of extremely rare capsule machine figurines called “Mysterious Occult Super Mario Bros.” was released in Japan. These are so rare that virtually no material regarding their origin exists, except for this low-resolution magazine ad. The set was based around a horror reimagining of the Super Mario Bros. setting.

To date, it is not entirely clear in what capacity the set was official. While the magazine ad would suggest that it was not an unlicensed operation, the style of the figurines is too different from anything Nintendo is normally known to approve for the Mario series.

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Sketches of Elephant Mario from Super Mario Bros. Wonder, drawn by Yukio Sawada, the author of the official Super Mario-kun manga.

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In Paper Mario, after defeating the Lantern Ghost miniboss in Chapter 4, he leaves behind his lamp after running away. The lamp contains Watt, who joins Mario’s party. To free Watt, Mario can jump on the lamp or break it with his hammer, which causes Watt to have a normal reaction.

However, Mario can also blow up the lamp with Bombette. Doing this causes Watt to appear in pain after being released, as well as complaining that Mario did not have to use an explosion to break it. An extremely small detail that is easy to miss during this scene is that when Watt coughs during this scene, Mario very briefly assumes his “praying” animation, likely to suggest that he feels regretful for his actions.

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1997 King K. Rool figurine from a France-exclusive Kellogg’s/Donkey Kong Country cross-promotion event.

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