Super Mario 64 and some curious facts about its development

Super Mario 64 and some curious facts about its development.

Super Mario 64 It is considered by many as one of the best video games in the industry and despite the fact that its premiere was released more than 20 years ago, today it continues to surprise us.

Thanks to the professional translator Shmuplations, who has transcribed from Japanese to English two official guides from 1996 of the aforementioned Nintendo title, we have been able to access interviews of figures recognized in the world such as Shigeru Miyamoto, Takashi Tezuka or Yoshiaki Koizumi, which tell us about different decisions taken during the developing of Super Mario 64, such as the location of the Mario’s center of gravity, the why Luigi couldn’t appear in the title or how they coped levels creative process.

● In this first excerpt from the interview, Shigeru Miyamoto tell us where the Mario’s center of gravity and how this influences the rest of the movements:

“His hips it is a great “joint” which determines the way his body moves. We create all his movements taking this area as a starting point. source: when it accelerates and leans forward, when it turns and consequently banks to the left or right, etc. We could say that Mario runs like Arale (manga and anime character dr slump).”

● On the other hand, Miyamoto also tells us about the difficulty what did the change from 2D to 3D:

“Until now we had carefully designed each stage and level taking pixels as a reference. The move to 3D brings certain difficulties, such as the jumps.

In previous installments of Mario we could calculate the exact height that this could reach when executed a jump and therefore what he was capable of. However, with Super Mario 64 we had to design the levels so that no matter how hard the jump was, the player would reach the platform.”

● About why Luigi is not present in the title, Shigeru replies as follows:

“Well… Luigi was in the title, at least until February. Due to memory problems, we had to remove it from the title. Later we thought to include it in a minigame Mario Bros. style, but because most players would probably only have one controller and for other reasons, we decided against it.”

● In response to the interviewer’s question about whether the team used models or blueprints for the level design, Miyamoto responds as follows:

“Leaving aside some other illustration or note, no. To give an example, I told Yōichi Yamada an idea he had in mind for one of the levels, Yamada made some quick sketches and then we discussed how we could further develop that idea.”

● Miyamoto Y Tekuza They also tell us about some characteristics that they were unable to incorporate lack of time:

–Initially, Mario could throw rabbits. If we had one more month, we could have added an animation where Mario grabs the rabbit by the ears… but we had reached our time limit. Anyway, I would have liked to be able to incorporate it. -Miyamoto

–I would have liked to add more monkeys. In an earlier version of the game, they were found in more places, and you could chase them. -Tekuza

–If Mario ran into three of them at the same time mocked of the. -Miyamoto

–Exactly, and if Mario caught one of them, he could throw them from a very high hill. I would have liked to have done more things with the monkeys. -Tekuza

● Finally, Shigeru tells us a little anecdote starring your son and a group of children:

“All told, with Super Mario 64 we did something we don’t usually do: let kids try the game. we gather to 10 schoolchildren and we leave them playing the scenario of King Bob-omb during midday.

My son was one of them… he tried to climb the mountain dozens of times, over and over again, as a parent I couldn’t help but think “god, don’t they think?”. We asked them what they thought of the game, they said it was fun and they wanted to play it again.

I think that, until now, they have been considered bored those games that they can’t finish. Nintendo lives by this philosophy, but I have realized that if this game, even without getting anywhere, manages to entertain the player, perhaps there is no need to pursue an end for a game to be entertaining.

We hope you’ve enjoyed these various anecdotes about the development of Super Mario 64!