On 13 September 1985, I was five years old. It was still about a year and a half before Mario would make his debut in Europe (15 May 1987), and of course I had no idea what an impact the chubby little plumber would have.
Not just on me - but on the whole world. But it would take some time.
Because even though Super Mario Bros was, and is, a fantastic platform game, there are many other factors that are important when something is to become truly genre defining. Both for what it has been and what it will become. One such thing is, of course, merchandise. In 1987, we had nothing of the sort for Mario. There were no specially designed NES consoles, no amiibos or other collectible figures, no controllers with character motifs. The first thing I can possibly remember that appeared in this vein was perhaps a T-shirt and maybe a bath towel.
Collectible figures from games were rare, almost non-existent. While the film world was pumping out action figures representing just about everything, it would take years before games got anything even close to an equivalent. Perhaps a sign that games, at that time and place, were not nearly as popular.
Course 1-1 is one of the most famous game levels in history.
Forty years later, of course, everything is completely different. Today, we are waiting for the second animated Super Mario Bros film, we have amusement parks, museums and numerous Nintendo shops overflowing with gadgets to buy. Game posters, clothes, Lego... Everything is available.
That is partly how a superstar is born: by being visible. Everywhere and on everything. But of course, it grows most through absolutely fantastic games. The question is whether any game series, at least one with anywhere near as many titles, has had such a consistently high standard as the Super Mario series. Where Sega has struggled against the odds with Sonic on several occasions, and where Crash and Spyro have certainly offered many entertaining games but have not come close to having the same impact, there are really only two other game series in the same genre that I can think of right now. One is called Ratchet & Clank. The other is called Astro Bot. But the first one falls a little short of being more of an action game, and the second one has only two (and a half) games released.
There is no doubt that Mario is the greatest. However, we already know that.
If you want some background information, it was Mario Segale, the landlord of Nintendo's American headquarters, who the plumber was named after. Shigeru Miyamoto actually wanted to use the character Popeye, but licensing issues meant that Miyamoto had to come up with his own. He was originally called Jumpman, created in 1981, and was supposed to make his way to the top to the big monkey at the top of the screen in the arcade game Donkey Kong. But it's all the fantastic platform games that have come about since that we mainly know Mario from and celebrate him for.
This is how gaming history begins.
In the mid-1980s, this character seemed to be present in every other living room. I recall how my parents played, using the classic 'jerk the controller upwards' movement to make Mario jump. The three NES games were fantastic in themselves, but there are two in particular that stand out as truly defining: one was Super Mario World. Considered by many to be the world's best platform game and, in many ways, the ultimate 2D platform game, both visually and conceptually, of everything that came before.
Then, of course, we have Super Mario 64.
I could have made this text solely about that. Because it was so fantastic and so significant. When you picked up the Nintendo 64 controller for the first time, Mario jumped out of the green pipe and you guided him towards the castle, it was like seeing a glimpse of the future. It was also here that Mario got his iconic voice from Charles Martinet, a voice that would stay with us until 2023 when Kevin Afghani took over the role in the games.
In 1997, my father worked for a newspaper and through a co-operation with Bergsala I got to test and review Nintendo games. When he came home one day he brought a Nintendo 64 for us to borrow for a week. In addition to being completely engrossed in the game myself, friends wanted to come over and play and when I was going to write a review of Super Mario 64, I used clichés like "the future is here" and similar superlatives. There was so much to say and both myself and the rest of the gaming publications in the world tried to outdo each other in saying it all. There are a bunch of games that we'll probably always mention, top list and chronicle as the one that "changed everything" and "laid the groundwork for" and so on.
Next year, the brothers will be back with a new film.
In addition to being a fantastic game, that's really what Super Mario 64 has become. Something to compare with. Something to measure everything else against.
In the same way that Super Mario World perfected 2D games, the two Super Mario Galaxy games are a bit like that in their own right. Six years after Super Mario 64, Super Mario Sunshine was released, but if there is one game, without being particularly bad, that feels like a bit of a parenthesis in the history of the series, it is probably that one. Instead, Super Mario Galaxy became a bit of a comeback, and I would say that the series has never been as good as it was with those two games. A release with both games was announced for Switch, and when it arrives, it will be another playthrough of them.
It has now been eight years since Super Mario Odyssey came out. It definitely feels like Nintendo will soon have to lift the veil and give us the next game in the 3D series. We got Super Mario Bros Wonder two years ago, and that's kind of how this game series has worked; the really big titles are followed up by side-scrolling adventures that in many ways capture the essence of what Mario has always been about.
A small part of my own Mario collection.
There is one thing in particular that I like about game series that have been with me since my childhood. It's that I can remember where I was in my life just by thinking back to a specific title. I remember things like where I lived and where I sat and played. I remember who my friends were, what class I was in, and so much more. Games are more than pixels and polygons on a screen. They are like a frozen moment in time. It doesn't really matter which title you choose, although some have obviously made a much bigger impression than others. Mario and I grew up together, all the way from a living room in a small village outside Trollhättan, to other cities and other countries. From a seven-year-old whose greatest wish was for Mum and Dad to let me stay up an extra hour to play in the evenings, to a 45-year-old who sits and feels nostalgic about all those years and has the privilege of writing about it.
In many ways, it's quite strange that a character like Mario has become such an icon. But it's just as easy to understand why. It's probably also a lot about perfect timing. Whereas today we tend to look for 'coolness', back then it wasn't necessary. And basically, there's something very simple about it all; Mario reminds us of our childhood. And he's in fantastic games.
In many ways, even Mario makes me feel old. But there's something nice in that too. So, what a life we've had together, you and I, Mario. Thank you for that. And happy birthday to you.