Shigeru Miyamoto explains why Mario is fat

Moustache was used to define the nose. Overalls so you could see his arms moving.
 
Mario was given a hat because his hair couldn't be animated.
He was given overalls to show he had arms.
He was given a moustache in place of a mouth.
It's just cool that the limitations of video games from back in the day made Mario who he is today. :D
 
I thought it was because he's bad at his job. I mean, he's a plumber, yet he never seems to do it except for that one game. He's had to have been doing other stuff the rest of the time. Eating disorders seems like it would hand and hand with Mario.
 
I just never even thought about why he was fat XP It's interesting to know what thought and consideration affects the end design sometimes. I wonder what he would've looked like if there weren't those limitations back in those days.
 
!!!
Mario was not supposed to be fat? I thought he is fat because ate too much mushrooms.
 
So why didn't Mario change over time as systems got more powerful? Like, Reimu Hakurei did... a rather poor example, but you get the point I hope.
And why is Luigi slimmer?
 
THAT WONDERFUL PIXY GUY! said:
Mario is nothing but software limitations. His mustache, his hat, his two colour design scheme. Everything was because Nintendo could only do so much graphically with the NES/Famicom.
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All the better reason of why he's essentially the mascot of videogaming, arguably alongside Pac-Man. :) A very interesting piece of trivia indeed, to complement the reasons for the devising of Mario's trademark mustache and the overalls. Collision boxes paving the way for Jumpman's plumpness...who'da thunk it? Next, we'll be hearing a reason for his red and blue coloration. XD
 
I used to think that Mario was fat because he ate a lot of food and didn't get enough exercise. But the reason explained above is pretty logical, to say the least.
 
Cassino said:
So why didn't Mario change over time as systems got more powerful? Like, Reimu Hakurei did... a rather poor example, but you get the point I hope.
And why is Luigi slimmer?
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コナンくん said:
Well, I like Mario the way he is. He is better being fat imo if he was skinny...wouldnt be so awesome. Luigi is fat in the old ones. But isnt he like skinny now? xD
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Prior to Super Mario Bros. 2 (the North American version), Luigi was just a palette swap of Mario. This continued afterwards as well with Super Mario Bros. 3 and Super Mario World.

Luigi had a distinct appearance only a handful of times, usually in a few cameos (like Tetris). These were larger, non-playable sprites so it makes some sense

By the time Luigi had his own appearance in the Super Mario All-Stars compilation, it was the SuperNES era so they had more graphical power and colours.

But really Luigi could have been slim on the NES XD They were just too lazy to give him his own appearance and they kept him as a palette swap for a long time.
 
[PokeCommunity.com] Shigeru Miyamoto explains why Mario is fat


Luigi is taller and slimmer, but I wouldn't call him thin.

I find this incredibly interesting, speaking as a Mario fanboy. It's awesome that the initial shortcomings can create the Mario we know and love today.
 
So it's not because Mario ate too much pasta?
That's interesting to know...
 
I actually knew why Mario had his trademark cap, mustache and overalls. But him being fat to make him fit the squarish collision handling is something new to me, and I find it interesting. :P

I sort of have a technical theory for Luigi's taller appearance, though. In the US Version of SMB2 (which was the replacement for a really difficult Jap SMB2 using the base game Doki Doki Panic), Luigi had to replace a character named Mama, iirc, and she was taller than the character that Mario replaced. Mama also had higher jumps that the character Mario replaced (whose name escapes me at the moment), which would explain Luigi's distinguished higher jumps in later games. If that's really where Luigi's tall appearance originated, then it'd be also interesting to note that the Bob-ombs and and Shy Guys originated here, too.
 
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I always thought that it was because of the fat, spaghetti eating Italian stereotype, but I guess this is far more interesting.

Nice find :P
 
Cid said:
I actually knew why Mario had his trademark cap, mustache and overalls. But him being fat to make him fit the squarish collision handling is something new to me, and I find it interesting. :P

I sort of have a technical theory for Luigi's taller appearance, though. In the US Version of SMB2 (which was the replacement for a really difficult Jap SMB2 using the base game Doki Doki Panic), Luigi had to replace a character named Mama, iirc, and she was taller than the character that Mario replaced. Mama also had higher jumps that the character Mario replaced (whose name escapes me at the moment), which would explain Luigi's distinguished higher jumps in later games. If that's really where Luigi's tall appearance originated, then it'd be also interesting to note that the Bob-ombs and and Shy Guys originated here, too.
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Luigi's higher jumps actually originate from Super Mario Bros. 2: For Super Player's, the Japanese SMB2. It was sort of a coincidence that he had similar physics in the US version (assuming that Miyamoto was not involved in that game's transition)
 
Miyamoto was involved in Doki-Doki Panic (and Koji Kondo wrote the music, now that we are at it :P), so I don't think they didn't mention him about the transition. The game already had a lot of Mario elements doing cameos so there are rumours about DDP being made with Mario in mind (although those will always be rumours, I think).
 
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