Shmaluigi, Private Investigator: Case Files (lore, behind the scenes, and more)

Shmaluigi · Sep 28, 2022

Back in July 2021, I started a little 'Shroom section in Palette Swap known as Shmaluigi, Private Investigator, continuing the adventures of the titular detective after his appearances as a roleplay in Rogues in Rogueport Mafia and Sheep Mafia. While these stories are meant to be standalone, they frequently make use of content related to several years' worth of community events, games, 'Shroom sections, and in-jokes. Since these can understandably be a bit daunting and not easily accessible to newer readers, I've decided to make this thread to have all the information condensed in one place. For those of you who are already up to speed, I'll also be putting behind the scenes content including scrapped ideas in this thread, if you're into that sort of thing.

This thread also covers Too Bad, Storytime!, a companion section of one-shot stories featuring other characters started in June 2025. They're not crucial to understanding any of Shmaluigi's stories, but share the same continuity and will likely feature characters appearing in both from time to time.

I will try to keep this thread as spoiler-light as possible. There may at times be mentions of certain plot details when I deem it necessary, so if you're not caught up, tread with caution.

If there's anything not covered here that you would find interesting or have questions about, please feel free to let me know!

Shmaluigi, Private Investigator

Too Bad, Storytime!

Shmaluigi, Private Investigator

Writer	Characters	Notes
Auburn	Polly Geist (197)
Boo1268	Boo1268 (223-224) Burghnust (224) Gastronomole (223-224) Mad Scienstein (224) Rarity Alamode (224) Richter Uppercrust IV (223-224) Specture Striker (223-224) Tripliss (224)	Co-author (223-224)
ClawgripFan9001	ClawgripFan9001 (193)
Cosmic Cowboy	Detective Luigi (187; 200; 217) Yuri (187; 200; 217)
Goombuigi	Wright Forde 'Shroom (180)
Hooded Pitohui	Morris (179-180; 191; 200-201) Ema Skye (187) W. P. Hoodington (191) Lana Skye (193-195; 207) Fern Greenwood (198) Virovirokun (200)	Co-author (193-195)
Lakituthequick	Lakituthequick (180)
Luigi 64DD	The Erudite Goose (174)
Magolor04726	Dryvint (175) Magolor04726 (175; 217) Walter (200)	Co-author (176-178)
MightyMario	Cayde (200) Zerris (200)
Ninja Squid	The Sticky Warrior (183-184; 201; 203; 220-222) Ms. Mowz (202; 220-222) ??? (220-222)	Co-author (201-203; 220-222)
Reverse Input	Agent 30 (217) Detective Fulbright (173; 217) Fordley (196)
Roserade	Shmue Toad (173; 190; 200)
Shoey	Phineas J. Shoe (173; 181-182; 189) Roserade (181-182; 189)

Too Bad, Storytime!

Writer	Characters	Notes
Boo1268	Florida (219) Feathers McGraw (219) Graphite Guy (219) Lucky (219) Rook Beak (219) General Camo (219)
DryBonesBandit	Paul (219)
Hooded Pitohui	Sayaka Kanamori (219)

Characters - Bios including backstories and a list of their appearances in the section.
Lore - Brief explanations of content from outside the section that I consider important.
Behind the Scenes - Development stuff, scrapped ideas, and other fun trivia!
- 2021-2022
- 2023-2024
- 2024-

Shmaluigi · Oct 9, 2022

Things are still getting sorted out here - pardon the mess!

Characters
Not an exhaustive list of every character in the section, just the notable and recurring ones, especially if they previously appeared in other projects. For characters who aren't listed here, what you see is probably what you get, but feel free to ask if there's anyone who's not here that you think should be.

Detectives and Investigators
The chief agents of the never-ending fight against crime.

Chief Palmer
Species: Pianta

The current chief of the New Wikisburg Police Department. He got the position after his predecessor resigned shortly after the investigation of a Killing Game which took place at The 'Shroom HQ. He begrudgingly puts up with Shmaluigi's frequent, unannounced, and lengthy absences from work because he's good at what he does, but some say he's too soft for it.

Appearances

Hidden Mansion
Diamond in the Rough
If The Shoe Fits
Sticky Situation
Brains and Brawn
Uneasy Alliance
Tidal Terror
Light at the End of the Tunnel

Cici Shell
Species: Noki

The deputy chief of the New Wikisburg Police Department. In contrast to her boss, she displays a bubbly, upbeat personality.

Appearances

If The Shoe Fits
Brains and Brawn
Light at the End of the Tunnel

Detective Bobby Fulbright
Species: Human
Written by: Reverse Input

"In justice we trust!"

A seasoned detective and a close ally of Shmaluigi. His dedication to the pursuit of justice is without a doubt his true calling in life.

Shmaluigi first met Detective Fulbright when he was the head investigator while trying to bust a mafia in Rogueport. Shmaluigi credits his time working with Fulbright to being instrumental to his increased success in dealing with mafias, which he had very little success with beforehand. After the successful conclusion of the case, the two of them kept in touch.

Appearances

Hidden Mansion
Light at the End of the Tunnel

Detective Luigi Idraulico
Species: Human
Written by: Cosmic Cowboy

Famed hero turned detective, running a small agency in the city with his wife Yuri. He shares a mostly friendly rivalry with Shmaluigi.

Appearances

Tooth and Nail
Uneasy Alliance
Light at the End of the Tunnel

Ema Skye
Species: Human
Written by: Hooded Pitohui

An aspiring forensic investigator. She met Shmaluigi during the investigation in Rogueport, where she unfortunately met her end after getting involved with the mafia there. Ema's death haunts Shmaluigi to this day, and he has vowed to continue her legacy.

Appearances

Tooth and Nail

The Erudite Goose
Species: Goose
Written by: Luigi 64DD

A very eloquent goose detective. His vocabulary and manner of speaking vary depending on what object the Goose holds in his beak. His signature pipe results in his characteristic verbosity and refined speech.

Shmaluigi met the Goose while the two of them were working on a case involving a mafia in Rogueport together. The investigative skills of the two of them combined led to a fairly quick and decisive victory for the investigators. The two of them have remained in touch since then.

Appearances

Hidden Mansion
Light at the End of the Tunnel

G-XY
Model: Modified Gearmo
Known aliases: "Shmearmo"

Snarky member of the tentatively named Mystery Dudes. He has been heavily modified by Ook to be able to use a myriad of gadgetry. He hates being called Gaxy and will get extremely irritated every time.

Appearances

Through the Groucho Glass
Light at the End of the Tunnel

"Halloween"
Species: Ninji
Known aliases: "Shminji"

Combat expert of the tentatively named Mystery Dudes, although he prefers the name Truthseekers. His nickname is derived from the coloration of his ninja suit - his real name is a mystery.

Appearances

Through the Groucho Glass
Light at the End of the Tunnel

Lana Skye
Species: Human
Written by: Hooded Pitohui

An ex-prosecuting attorney and the elder sister of the late Ema Skye. She dedicated a significant amount of time to investigating the Killing Games, employing dubious methods during that time. After an encounter with Shmaluigi, she chose to turn herself in for her actions and is currently spending time in prison.

Appearances

Cruise Control
Lock and Key

Muercello
Species: Tostarenan
Known aliases: "Shmostarenan"

Leader of the tentatively named Mystery Dudes. He idolizes Shmaluigi and used to imitate him along with the rest of the group, but they would later form their own identity after an encounter with him.

Appearances

Through the Groucho Glass
Light at the End of the Tunnel

Ook
Species: Ukiki
Known aliases: "Shmukiki"

Engineer for the tentatively named Mystery Dudes, although he prefers the name Fact Finders. He is mainly responsible for keeping G-XY maintained.

Appearances

Through the Groucho Glass
Light at the End of the Tunnel

Shmaisy
Species: Human

A private investigator originating from another world. Her former target was the notorious Golden Phanto, but after their death, she decided to move to the Mushroom Kingdom for a fresh start.

Appearances

The Wildflower
Lock and Key (cameo)
Reminiscing in Rogueport
Light at the End of the Tunnel

Shmaluigi
Species: Human

A successful private investigator with a mysterious past. Following tragic events involving Monty Brando, Shmaluigi dedicated himself to taking down all mafias and joined the New Wikisburg Police Department as a detective, despite only having minimal training from a How To Be A Detective For Dummies book he bought on clearance. Finding no success in busting mafias, he eventually ran off to Rogueport on a whim after hearing of increased mafia activity in the port town. His success there and working with other more experienced investigators inspired him to become a private investigator upon his return to New Wikisburg.

Appearances

All of them. What did you expect?

Shmue Toad
Species: Toad
Written by: Roserade

A member of the New Wikisburg Police Department with a suspicious resemblance to Shmaluigi. He frequently antagonizes the private investigator during their interactions.

Appearances

Hidden Mansion
Brains and Brawn
Uneasy Alliance

Shmwario
Species: Human

Shmaluigi's big brother. A private investigator himself, he remains trapped in the shadow of his little bro, lacking Shmaluigi's detective skills, recognition, or social graces. Despite this, he cares a great deal for his brother, and he's always up for helping Shmaluigi out - even if that means he's going to hold it over his head for a while.

Appearances

Crunch Time
Tooth and Nail
Mr. White Christmas
Brains and Brawn
Cruise Control
The Wildflower
Lock and Key
Reminiscing in Rogueport
Light at the End of the Tunnel

Spectra
Species: Polterpup
Known aliases: "Shmolterpup"

Muercello's pet Polterpup and a de facto member of the Mystery Dudes. She can't speak, but communicates with the rest of the group by painting surprisingly informative pictures in ectoplasm.

Appearances

Through the Groucho Glass
Light at the End of the Tunnel

The Sticky Warrior
Species: Inkling
Written by: Ninja Squid

A mysterious ninja warrior. Shmaluigi and the Sticky Warrior first met during an investigation in Rogueport, and have crossed paths on a few occasions since. His unorthodox methods and reckless behavior tend to make Shmaluigi a bit nervous.

Appearances

Sticky Situation
Tidal Terror

Yuri Idraulico
Species: Human?
Written by: Cosmic Cowboy

Wife and investigative partner of Detective Luigi. She was originally an AI phone assistant before being brought to the physical world with Professor E. Gadd's Pixelator. She remains on more pleasant terms with Shmaluigi than her husband does.

Appearances

Tooth and Nail
Uneasy Alliance
Light at the End of the Tunnel

The Criminal Element
Mafia members, supervillains, and all other kinds of baddies.

Robert Arie
Species: Bandit
Known aliases: "Bandwich"

A petty thief who has been a recurring thorn in the side of New Wikisburg law enforcement. He's nothing too special, but has been nicknamed the Bandwich for his love of jelly sandwiches and his habit of unintentionally leaving jelly behind at crime scenes as a convenient calling card.

Appearances

Uneasy Alliance
The Most Dangerous Gameshow

Shawn Blizzman
Species: Mr. Blizzard

A flashy snowman showman. His ultimate goal is to bring about worldwide global cooling, ushering in a new ice age in which him and his kind can freely thrive.

Appearances

Mr. White Christmas
Uneasy Alliance

Bram Tyrannos
Species: Rex

A supposedly vampiric Rex whose powers actually come from a stash of Vampire Candies. His interest in the macabre at one point brought him under the servitude of the ghostly Puppetmaster.

Appearances

Tooth and Nail
Uneasy Alliance

Crawford
Species: Craw

One of Monty Brando's more incompetent lackeys, frequently assigned to odd jobs and low-risk assignments alongside Sledger. At least he's got the zoot suit and mafia voice down, though.

Appearances

Through the Groucho Glass
Cruise Control
Light at the End of the Tunnel
The Most Dangerous Gameshow

IG-11
Model: IG-series assassin droid

A deadly assassin droid working as an enforcer for Monty Brando's mafia. In addition to his mafia work, he continues to offer his services as an assassin for additional profits.

Prior to becoming part of Brando's organization, he was a member of the Bounty Hunters' Guild who traveled to Pop-Up Prairie Town to collect a bounty on Wingo. Rather than collecting the bounty, he instead allied with Wingo's minions in exchange for a larger payment. His allegiance was uncovered by the merchant Anna, resulting in the droid being salvaged for parts and being thrown into the fires of Pyropuff Peaks. What remained of him was recovered and repaired by Brando's associates, leaving the droid with a scorched and mismatched appearance.

Appearances

Hidden Mansion
Termination Notice
Through the Groucho Glass
Light at the End of the Tunnel

Monty Brando
Species: Monty Mole

The head of a powerful mafia and Shmaluigi's true arch-nemesis. Working from the shadows, he excels at pulling strings and has eyes and ears just about everywhere. He was in some way responsible for a devastating loss for Shmaluigi, which set him down the path to becoming a private investigator. Shmaluigi leaves his past closely guarded, so the exact details remain a mystery.

Appearances

Hidden Mansion
Cruise Control
Light at the End of the Tunnel

Phineas J. Shoe
Species: Shoe Goomba
Known aliases: "Michelanshoego"
Written by: Shoey

A mad doctor whose list of crimes is as colorful as it is long. Despite help from his assistant Rose, his incompetence and hubris usually keep him from being much of a serious threat. When he isn't wrangling fighters in an attempt to finally get a winner for Mushroom Kingdom Smackdown, he's usually working on a new invention of dubious utility to sell to the other villains of the kingdom.

Appearances

Hidden Mansion
If The Shoe Fits
Mr. White Christmas

Pokerface
Species: Pokey

A shifty Pokey who always seems to know a guy (or at least, a guy who knows a guy) with knowledge about what's going on in the criminal underworld. He spends a lot of time at a seedy establishment in New Wikisburg known as the Despair Pub. His most notable feature is that he always wears a trenchcoat despite not having any arms to fit into the sleeves.

Appearances

Hidden Mansion
If The Shoe Fits

Puppetmaster

A mysterious, malevolent ghost with the ability to perfectly imitate the deceased, as long as he has a puppet of them. His ultimate intentions are still unknown. Luckily, he's currently safely locked away in Professor E. Gadd's laboratory after being thwarted by Shmaluigi and his allies.

Appearances

Tooth and Nail

Sledger
Species: Sledge Bro

One of Brando's low-level lackeys, often seen accompanying Crawford on jobs that require a bit of muscle. Despite his bulk and intimidatingly large hammer, he frequently bungles assignments.

Appearances

Through the Groucho Glass
Light at the End of the Tunnel
The Most Dangerous Gameshow

Albert Koopone
Species: Koopa
Known aliases: "Terrakingpin"

An up-and-coming mafia boss. He's not so much into it for the criminal lifestyle as he is for the glitz and glamor. His initial efforts to muscle in on New Wikisburg failed thanks to the efforts of Shmaluigi and the Sticky Warrior, landing him in prison.

Appearances

Sticky Situation
Uneasy Alliance
The Most Dangerous Gameshow

Emperor Zurg
An unstable, deluded toy who fully believes that he is the "real" Emperor Zurg. Currently stranded in the Mushroom Kingdom, he is desperate to return to space and take his "rightful place" on the throne of his empire. He assigns his own nicknames to everyone he meets rather than using their real names.

His journey started when he was delivered to the Comet Observatory by Al's Toy Barn for unknown reasons. Breaking free from his packaging, he enlisted the help of a group of so-called minions, only to be launched from the space station and ending up stranded.

Appearances

If The Shoe Fits
Uneasy Alliance

Citizens
The good (and maybe not so good) people of New Wikisburg and beyond.

Charles "Chuck" Charger
Species: Chargin' Chuck
Known aliases: "Chuckgor"

Waluigi Time's security expert, serving as the head of security for Waluigi Time Cereal Incorporated and formerly Mushroom Kingdom Smackdown. He's a fairly quiet, easy-going guy who doesn't have much to say and usually just goes with the flow when it comes to his boss' bizarre antics.

Appearances

Hidden Mansion (cameo)
Crunch Time
Cereal Killer

ClawgripFan9001
Species: Clawgrip
Written by: ClawgripFan9001

One of the writers for The 'Shroom's Fake News team. He's best known for his cooking column and former coverage of sporting events.

Appearances

Cruise Control

Dryvint Bonep
Species: Dry Bones
Written by: Magolor04726

The battle-worn head of security (and handyman) of M-corporated. At some point before being employed, he was a general in an unidentified country during a revolution, and was exiled following the loss of his side.

Appearances

Parabnormal Activity

Jonathan Morris
Species: Beanish

The owner of Jonathan's House of Weights, a fitness center in New Wikisburg. In terms of personality, he's a bit like a hip surfer.

Appearances

Diamond in the Rough
Uneasy Alliance

Lakituthequick
Species: Lakitu
Written by: Lakituthequick

An expert at technology who is fittingly the Website Manager and Programming Manager for The 'Shroom. He really likes coffee, though unfortunately for him, he has to work a bit harder to get it at work following budget cuts.

Appearances

Termination Notice

Magolor04726
Species: Human
Written by: Magolor04726

CEO of M-corporated, journalist, and author, among other distinctions.

Shmaluigi first met Magolor during an ill-fated investigation at Fred Pasture.

Appearances

Parabnormal Activity

Morris
Species: Human
Written by: Hooded Pitohui

The Joja Corporation's regional manager for the New Wikisburg area, who also happens to be one of Shmaluigi's least favorite people in the known universe.

Shmaluigi first encountered Morris during an investigation at Fred Pasture. Unbeknownst to Shmaluigi until it was already too late, Morris was actually leading the charge, seeking to acquire the pasture for the Joja Corporation's purposes, allowing JojaMart to achieve practically uncontested dominance in the New Wikisburg market.

Appearances

Termination Notice
Brains and Brawn
Uneasy Alliance

Ms. Broxy
Species: Magikoopa

Shmaluigi's gruff landlord with a booming voice. She gets very unhappy when her tenants fail to pay their rent on time, something that Shmaluigi knows a bit too well.

Appearances

Diamond in the Rough

Mr. Shbeeg
Classification: Unknown
Known aliases: Shbig Changes (formerly)

An artificial intelligence unit built to serve as the president of Waluigi Time Cereal Incorporated. He is almost always frustrated with Waluigi Time's wild ideas and apparent inability to properly run a business. Many who encounter him feel oddly unsettled by his presence.

Appearances

Crunch Time
Uneasy Alliance

Robirda
Species: Birdo

Waluigi Time's personal secretary. No one's getting in or out of his office doors without her knowledge.

Appearances

Crunch Time
Cereal Killer

Roserade
Species: Roserade
Written by: Shoey

The 'Shroom's Fun Stuff Director who also moonlights as the beleaguered assistant of the mad doctor Phineas J. Shoe, a connection that no one seems to have made, somehow. Despite their attempts to point out Phineas' mistakes, they are usually ignored until it's already too late.

Appearances

Hidden Mansion (cameo)
If The Shoe Fits
Mr. White Christmas

Waluigi Time
Species: Human

The infamous CEO of Waluigi Time Cereal Incorporated, former owner of the Mushroom Kingdom Smackdown tournament, and Fake News Director of The 'Shroom, among various other roles. Best described as a man with too much ambition and not enough competence, he's frequently running all kinds of schemes that he's definitely not qualified for.

Appearances

Crunch Time
Cruise Control
Cereal Killer
Uneasy Alliance
Light at the End of the Tunnel (cameo)

Wright Forde 'Shroom
Species: Toad
Written by: Goombuigi

A notorious shill with one goal... Get people to write for The 'Shroom! Anyone who strikes up a conversation with this Toad can expect to be encouraged to write 'Shroom sections basically the entire time.

Appearances

Termination Notice
Brains and Brawn (cameo)

Shmaluigi · Oct 9, 2022

Lore
Rogues in Rogueport Mafia
Having made no progress on busting mafias with the New Wikisburg Police Department, Shmaluigi ran off to the port town of Rogueport on a whim after hearing of increased mafia activity. He found himself in the middle of an investigation with several investigators, including seasoned detective Bobby Fulbright, the Erudite Goose, the mysterious Sticky Warrior, and Ema Skye. The case ended in the successful elimination of the mafia, and emboldened Shmaluigi to set out on his own as a private investigator.

Notable characters: First appearances of Detective Fulbright, Ema Skye, the Erudite Goose, Shmaluigi, and the Sticky Warrior.

Timeline: Prior to the beginning of the section.

Sheep Mafia
After his successful case at Rogueport, Shmaluigi's next outing at Fred Pasture went much worse. Morris, sent by his superiors at the Joja Corporation, led the charge in a takeover of the pasture that Shmaluigi was unable to stop, finding himself dead before the end of the investigation, albeit temporarily.

Notable characters: First appearance of Morris. Shmaluigi returns.

Timeline: Prior to the beginning of the section.

Awards Killing Game: Odyssey
In an alternate world, the S.S. Circinus and S.S. Cetus embarked on a cruise to observe the Sargasso Vermelha comet. Both ships were hijacked by MB-Kusagi and forced to endure a Killing Game. Both ships sunk and the survivors became stranded on Circitus Isle. After many months, MB-K washed up to see the game to its ultimate conclusion.

Notable characters: First appearances of Cel Winters, Fern Greenwood, and Polly Geist. Shmaluigi returns.

Timeline: The events of the S.S. Circinus, which Shmaluigi were directly involved in, take place between "Crunch Time" and "Tooth and Nail". ("Brains and Brawn" also takes place during this period of time after the Circinus events.) In-universe, the entirety of AKGO takes place over about 7 months, so it probably wraps up not too long after "Mr. White Christmas".

Shmaluigi · Oct 9, 2022

Behind the Scenes (2021-2022)
This post covers stories from Issue 172 to 189.

Part 1

This arc was originally intended to serve as a prologue to Shmaluigi in Awards Killing Game 5, which ended up not happening (I'll get back to that later). The game would have been a rehost of AKG1 which was based on Luigi's Mansion, so the title comes from the Hidden Mansion mode in that game.
I went with this arc to kick off the section because I felt like having something specifically tied to strategy games was a good idea, since that was pretty much the core of Shmaluigi as a character at the time. Rogues in Rogueport and Sheep Mafia are both referenced pretty heavily here to kick off Shmaluigi's motivations.
So something that may have been obvious get-go is that despite Shmaluigi speaking in third person most of the time, his inner monologue is entirely first person. I mainly did this because I felt like having the entire section be narrated in third person would get annoying really fast, but there's also lore reasons to back this up.
There's a pretty obvious reference to News Flush, a recurring volunteer Fake News section, as Shmaluigi wanders the streets of New Wikisburg.
The name of Sipping Time Cafe was suggested by Pitohui. When I asked for suggestions, LTQ also suggested the Club Sandwich Shop, which I ended up not going with but I still wanted to use in some way, so Shmaluigi mentions it in response to Sipping Time's rising prices.
Case LT-5 references a post made by Rose in my RP ask thread, where the case file was given to him by Shmue Toad. He ends up appearing in the section proper in the second part of this arc.

Part 2

In the opening monologue, Shmaluigi talks about the previous Killing Games, specifically mentioning the existence of 'Shroom Killing Game. He also talks about "a rabbit hole of conspiracy theories" involving bad futures and alternate timelines, in reference to how Awards Killing Game 3 and 4 were retconned through time travel. And yes, the use of "rabbit hole" was an intentional nod to Big Changes.
Shmaluigi's bad intel leads him to Mushroom Kingdom Smackdown instead of a Killing Game. It's not just a vague appearance of Smackdown though, this one ties directly into the one I had written two issues earlier, in Issue 173. All of the fighters mentioned by the people waiting in line were actual nominations from that cycle! To add to that, Shmaluigi bumps into Phineas J. Shoe in his Michelanshoego disguise, who appeared in that issue to throw a wrench into the match.
Speaking of Phineas J. Shoe, he's the first character in the history of the section to have his dialogue written by someone else. Although, ironically, of the three guest characters in this issue, he was the last one I ended up adding. Pretty early on (as in, before the section was even public knowledge), I decided that for authenticity, I wanted to bring other users on board to write the dialogue for their characters and to provide input on how they were portrayed.
Chief Palmer is introduced in this issue! Since the first mention of "the chief" was in the post that introduced Shmue Toad, I talked a little bit about him with Rose beforehand, who said that he envisioned the chief as being either a Pianta or a Noki. I went with him being a Pianta, and ended up using the idea of a Noki character much, much later, when I introduced Deputy Chief Cici Shell in issue 181. Since the character was a blank slate otherwise, I came up with the rest of the details and wrote his dialogue myself.
The name of Despair Pub is also a nod to the four original Awards Killing Games, since despair was a common theme throughout those.
Shmaluigi replying to Chief Palmer with "true, true" is a reference to an emote used in various community Discord servers with the same name.

Part 3

So, I mentioned earlier that AKG5 ended up not happening, and this is where that comes into play. Luckily, I had a backup plan to salvage the arc, and I have to credit that to Pitohui for giving me a nudge to come up with something else in case things didn't pan out, based on how development was going at the time. Part 2 remained relatively unchanged, but Part 3 would've gone in one of two directions. The original plan was that the progression of the story would lead Shmaluigi to the actual Killing Game, where he would possibly end up meeting up with some other RPs from the game on the way there. The backup ending was obviously what ended up in the section. The backup ending ended up being way more interesting than what would originally have happened in my opinion, and, among several other reasons, I think it's a good thing that AKG5 didn't happen.
Aside from the original ending, this is the first issue where I get to talk about scrapped content. At one point, one of the characters that Shmaluigi would've met was a Shaman named Mertle, who would've used her fortune telling abilities to "help". I ended up deciding not to use her, but I kept the character in the back of my head, and ended up using her for an Awards presentation in 2022.
Shmaluigi being woken up specifically at 2:01 am is a little easter egg as a reference to the date he first appeared on the forums, February 1st.
The mysterious voice telling Shmaluigi to be in Boo Woods on Tuesday at 9:00 pm is also a reference. Had things panned out with the game, sign-ups would've opened at 9:00 am in my timezone on Tuesday, July 6th. The day of the week was kept as-is, but I changed the time from am to pm because it needed to be at night!
Shmaluigi's archnemesis, Monty Brando, is introduced here. His name is of course a reference to actor Marlon Brando from The Godfather. Monty Brando was conceptualized quite a bit earlier, as one of many contingencies I came up with in the event that I ended up rolling mafia while RPing as Shmaluigi (two ideas involving him would've been Brando creating a Shmaluigi clone, and him blackmailing Shmaluigi in some way). IG-11 is also shown working for him here for the first time, which I set up in a post following the end of Toad Brigade Mafia.
The barista at the Sipping Time Cafe telling Shmaluigi he should write about his escapades is a nod to this being a 'Shroom section, that should be pretty obvious.

The name's not a typo, it's a pun on "paranormal activity" and "abnormal".
This was the first time where the logo was swapped out, changing it to Shmaluigi, Paranormal Investigator! This was an idea that Magolor suggested and it sounded fun.
This issue marks the first mention of Shmwario in the section, although it was quite a while before he ended up making an actual appearance.
Shmaluigi also mentions Frankentime's Monster Cereal, a Halloween-themed WT Cereal product that was at the time not very utilized otherwise. I didn't even have a recipe in mind for it when I wrote this.
The idea to go with a Scooby-Doo type story (criminals posing as spooks and taking over) was set from the start, but I went through a few different ideas of what location Shmaluigi might be investigating here. My initial idea was that Shmaluigi would be investigating some sort of warehouse owned by The 'Shroom, but it didn't seem likely that anyone would be able to pull a stunt like that when Perch is around. I also wasn't sure if it would make sense for The 'Shroom to have a warehouse at all, and I probably would've asked Pitohui, but I never got that far with it. Other ideas included JojaMart or something completely original, but I liked the idea of using M-corporated better, so it's what I went with.
M-corporated actually had a similar problem as The 'Shroom though, with its head of security being a Dry Bones. Magolor was actually the one who solved that problem by suggesting that Dryvint would go to explore the warehouse and then disappear.

Part 1

This was actually the first story arc of the section that started development! Magolor started writing this in April 2021 as a section demo of sorts after suggesting the idea of a Shmaluigi 'Shroom section to me. I liked where he was going with it, and at first I planned to incorporate it into Hidden Mansion, but it ended up spinning off into its own thing pretty early on to make sure both stories had enough room to breathe. At the time, we were referring to this arc tentatively as "Shmaluigi Needs To Pay His Rent" just to have something to call it.
Also, this arc was pretty much 90% Magolor. I helped with aspects of the lore and did some rewrites and other edits of my own where I felt appropriate, but for the most part, he came up with the story and wrote it himself.
Shmaluigi's landlord Ms. Broxy was originally written as a human, but ended up being changed to be a Magikoopa in the final story. I did this because I wanted to use humans sparingly like they are in the Mario franchise, and it felt like she would fit better into the world as a Mario species. For the most part, humans in the section are limited to pre-existing characters, though that's not completely set in stone. I also had the idea of making her a Whomp instead, because the idea of a Whomp wearing lipstick popped in my head and I thought it was funny, but her being a Magikoopa seemed like a good fit.
Since Sheep Mafia was ongoing when the demo was written, it originally took place concurrent with those events, which Shmaluigi would've mentioned. This was changed for the final story, mainly because it didn't seem likely to me that Shmaluigi would leave Fred Pasture during the case, but also because Chief Palmer ended up appearing later on in the story, and leaving the timeline as-is would've contradicted dialogue between them from Hidden Mansion. I don't think there's much that indicates when it takes place in the final story, but I envision it as being some time after Parabnormal Activity for simplicity.
Along with a timeline shift, the reason that Shmaluigi was behind on his rent was also changed. Originally, he was just going to be low on funds due to not being able to get much work, but as Shmaluigi became more of a "celebrity" character, that didn't seem to work as well anymore. So instead, he ended up wasting a ton of money on the fictional gacha game Rose Garden Heroes, a reference to NS' Awards presentation for Worst Game Mechanic in 2021. Presumably, he was trying to unlock himself.
While Shmaluigi is being taken to his destination, he sees a masked Inkling freaking out in an empty lot. This is a little reference to a Mindless Junk thread by Rose called Just Another User Fanfic where NS goes to work at The 'Shroom HQ but the building is just gone. That doesn't necessarily mean Just Another User Fanfic is "canon", but you can interpret it however you want. Originally the monologue just referred to the Inkling as a "squid thing", but I figured Shmaluigi would probably know what Inklings are from exposure to the Sticky Warrior/NS. If nothing else, Inklings have some Mushroom Kingdom presence confirmed by Mario Kart 8 Deluxe.
A scrapped idea was that the corridor leading to Montgomery's office would have portraits of past 'Shroom directors (specifically mentioned were a "small blue alien thing", a multicolored Yoshi, and Meta). This was dropped and replaced with various jewelry pieces pretty early on since Montgomery doesn't actually have any association with The 'Shroom.
Since Montgomery's last name is Morris, Shmaluigi initially referred to him as "Mr. Morris", but this was changed in rewrites because that name has too many associated bad vibes for Shmaluigi to throw around like that! It's a rare case of Shmaluigi referring to someone by their first name when their last name is known, or at least when it's someone he's not well-acquainted with.

Part 2

Montgomery's driver, Heavy, was originally named Sledge, but I changed it to avoid any confusion with Sledge Shades, an NPC from AKG4. His new name was inspired a little bit by Hevy, a character from Star Wars: The Clone Wars.
The Club Sandwich Shop pops up again here! The restaurant that Shmaluigi mentioned stopping at was originally McDiddy's, but I wanted to sneak a little reference in there.
Before looking at the crossword, Shmaluigi was going to read a few news stories, including another reference to Just Another User Fanfic, a water tower catching fire, and the Wikisburg Newsletters winning a regional basketball tournament. I ended up cutting the basketball one because naming a basketball team for New Wikisburg wasn't something I really wanted to commit to for a throwaway thing (I can be a stickler for continuity sometimes) and there wasn't much left after I took that out, so I just skipped ahead.
Originally, Shmaluigi was going to take his car back to Jonathan's House of Weights at the end, but between the time of that part being written and it going to The 'Shroom, it ended up being established that Shmaluigi didn't really have anywhere to park it outside of his office, so I added the bit about it being in a parking garage and he runs off on foot in his rush instead.

Part 3

The end of this story features a very brief epilogue with Jonathan and Kyle, which is the first scene in the section not from Shmaluigi's point of view. These are pretty rare, but every now and then there's a good reason to break off. Some future arcs use these on a much larger scale.

Part 1

The title has a double meaning, referencing Morris being in the corporate world and IG-11 terminating things.
This was an idea I had for quite a while, going back to before the section was even accepted. Originally, this arc was just going to be the IG-11 chase, with the first part being the conversation between Shmaluigi and Morris, and the second part being the chase scene, and it would just end with Shmaluigi defeating IG-11. As I got closer to working on it though, I felt like this squandered too much potential for the story and the dynamic between Shmaluigi and Morris, so those two ended up being combined into one part (based on the length, probably a good thing!) and the second part became an investigation into who hired IG-11.
I also had an idea for a separate story that would have had IG-11 coming for Shmaluigi himself, but I ended up scrapping it completely because it just seemed like a less interesting version of this story, and it wasn't really needed anymore since IG-11 ended up being introduced to the section in the final part of Hidden Mansion.
At the beginning of the story, Shmaluigi rattles off some of the things he needed to buy at the store - "bread, eggs, milk, Waluigi Time Cereal". This is a little nod to the "Bread, Eggs, Milk, Squick" trope, which is basically when a list starts out mundane and then ends with something bad/disturbing/gross. Not quite a use of the trope per se, but your mileage may vary.
Up to this point, Pitohui was probably the guest writer that I worked the closest with, since the story revolved so much around Morris. There's a bit of extra backstory to the Jojanana Bites promotional event that he came up with that wasn't actually mentioned in the section (but as far as I'm concerned it's still canon). The idea behind these was that Joja was concerned that Tesco (from Rose's first Mario Boards Investigations game) would try to break into the New Wikisburg market with bananas as their flagship product, so to undermine them, they wanted to flood the market with cheaper banana-flavored candies. Also not mentioned in the story is Joja's new vtuber, Joja Aje.
Morris brings up the possibility of Shmaluigi working for Joja in the future, causing Shmaluigi to envision himself as a cashier and CoCo's Detective Luigi showing up to make fun of him. This is a reference to my final scribble from 2021's Scribble Deathmatch, which featured a confused Luigi at the checkout counter being assisted by a very miserable Shmaluigi.
Towards the end of the section, there's a very blatant reference to Yoshi876's Obituaries section. I just like mentioning these.

Part 2

Oh boy... So, in hindsight, I probably should've split this one up, but I had already scheduled most of the year at this point, so no turning back now. As of the time of writing this (October 11, 2022) by filesize this is not only the longest Shmaluigi, Private Investigator section, but also my longest 'Shroom section to date.
The layout of The 'Shroom HQ comes from the map that we were working on for 'Shroom Mafia 4 at the time, which was based on the original map from 'Shroom KG. This is why the elevator doesn't go all the way up to the third floor!
Pitohui was unaware at the time, but the ominous statement from Morris regarding Wright Forde 'Shroom in the elevator was actually meant to foreshadow 'Shroom Mafia 4, since we used Morris as the character for the Godfather role in that game. Canonically speaking, this doesn't go anywhere, since we booted 'Shroom Mafia 4 off into its own timeline.
I originally wanted to have NS make a cameo appearance, either sneaking into the Sub-Director's Office with Draq posters, or sneaking out of it and stealing WT's Super Arrow posters (I don't remember exactly which one). This was mainly because issue 180 was NS' 50th issue as Statistics Manager, as well as LTQ's 50th issue as Website Manager, so I thought it would be cool to feature both of them. Unfortunately, I had to cut this because the layout of the headquarters meant it would've been impossible for Shmaluigi to actually see NS outside of the Sub-Director's Office.
Shmaluigi notes that there's no coffee in The 'Shroom's vending machines, referring back to the Warm Beverages vs. Cold Beverages 'Shroomfest which resulted in a victory for Team Cold Beverages. The story that followed resulted in only cold beverages being offered in The 'Shroom HQ.
During the scene in Shmaluigi's office, Morris notes the dartboard with a picture of his face on it, and a picture of Shmaluigi with Fulbright and the Goose from Rogueport. Both of these decorations first appeared in my Awards presentation for Favorite Modern Game in 2021.
While the exact motivations for producing Jojanana Bites aren't mentioned in the section, Morris does specifically name drop Tesco here in private conversation with Shmaluigi, as well as Mr. White.
One of my favorite parts in this arc is the climax of the story, where Shmaluigi finds the Wiggler family in a cheap, run-down house and finds out that they have children. I really wanted to drive home that, although Morris isn't really the "villain" of this story, he's not morally in the right here by any means. Basically, I wanted to avoid there being any sympathy for Morris while being able to preserve sympathy for the Wigglers instead, who got their lives ruined by Joja's actions in more ways than one.

Part 1

Even before the section was accepted, I knew that at some point I wanted to do a story featuring Phineas J. Shoe as the main villain, but I didn't come up with the idea for this story until August 2021.
I originally toyed around the idea of having the introduction with Phineas J. Shoe be a cold open, and have the Shmaluigi, Private Investigator logo and story title come afterwards, but I ended up deciding not to do that.
In addition to Phineas J. Shoe being the first character in the section to be written by a guest when he first appeared in Hidden Mansion, he's also the first guest character to return in a second arc!
Whenever Phineas J. Shoe is involved, Shoey writes Rose's dialogue, making him the first (and only, as of now) user OC to be written by someone else.
Phineas takes the reins here, having several scenes throughout the arc that are written in third-person narration.
The 2022 Favorite 'Shroom Writer powered ray gun is a modification of one made for the previous year, which was seen in Shoey's Awards presentation for Favorite Active 'Shroom Writer in 2021.
Originally, Rose was going to be suffering from allergies and would keep sneezing out poison dust, which would be how Shmaluigi linked the two of them to their crimes. This would've been foreshadowed in the opening by Rose sneezing into Phineas' tea, causing him to get mad at Rose and throw the tea away. This got dropped as I worked with Shoey, and Rose just ended up... whatever the plant equivalent for shedding is.
Phineas J. Shoe is of course a fan of Etemon, who was Shoey's RP in Lost in Space Mafia, and was a rival of Zurg as a fellow emperor.
Zurg's letter mentions that he commissioned a spacecraft from the Joja Corporation, which refers to an interaction between Zurg and Morris in Pitohui's RP ask thread.
I briefly mentioned her in the notes for Hidden Mansion, but Deputy Chief Cici Shell makes her debut here. When I talked with Rose before coming up with the character of Chief Palmer, he said he envisioned him as either a Pianta or a Noki. Since Chief Palmer ended up being a Pianta, I thought it would be fun to have a Noki character too.
Johnson, the cop that interrupts the meeting, is named in reference to the running gag in the Paper Mario series of random background characters named Johnson.

Part 2

In the opening monologue, Shmaluigi mentions a few of Phineas' past crimes. Trespassing on protected grounds and conducting ethically questionable science experiments refer to Shoey's Mushroom Kingdom Smackdown nominations for Angry Watermelon and Goomerang Brother, respectively, while waking up a neighborhood with a helicopter intercom refers to Shoey's Awards presentation in Favorite Active 'Shroom Writer in 2021.
Phineas also pins his 2021 Favorite Active 'Shroom Writer bronze medal to his coat, which appeared in the same Awards presentation.
Despite Phineas' outrage at being paid in Monopoly money, Zurg wasn't actually trying to rip him off. He just doesn't realize that he's a toy, and can't quite distinguish board game money from the real thing. Of course, he's not well acquainted with "FOOLISH EARTH CURRENCY" anyway.

Part 1

This arc was done kind of spontaneously, I had a gap in the schedule for the year and I knew I wanted to bring in the Sticky Warrior at some point. By now I knew NS was planning to retire, so it was basically now or never.
Something we had to work out pretty early was whether Shmaluigi would get involved in the Sticky Warrior's active case, or vice versa, or whether they were initially working on the same case separately. We went with the last one, kind of - NS suggested the idea of making it look like they were working on separate things that would actually end up leading both of them to the same villain by the end.
NS and I talked quite a bit about what the Sticky Warrior's combat style would look like. Some of his combat moves are inspired by Impa and the Yiga Clan from Hyrule Warriors: Age of Calamity.
Ever mysterious, the Sticky Warrior pulls some Batman moves throughout the arc - first you see him, now you don't! (Or the other way around.)

Part 2

With the idea that Terrakingpin was newly moving operations into New Wikisburg, I thought it would make sense if some of his goons came from out of town as well. Claude Boomer hails from Neo Bowser City, most notable in the Mario Wiki lore for eventually absorbing New Wikisburg and being the setting of AKG4 in a bad timeline.
Shmaluigi mentions "How To Be A Detective For Dummies", a book that he previously mentioned in Rogues in Rogueport. Before working under Fulbright, pretty much everything he knew came from there.
It's a blink and you'll miss it moment, but the Sticky Warrior's sudden re-appearance in Shmaluigi's apartment briefly scares him out of third person.
Turns out Terrakingpin tried to hold a nobody for ransom, and then goes down very anticlimactically. I wanted him to be a villain who you could tell was just starting out. He's into being a mafia boss for the glitz and glamor of it, so he's pretty much all flash and very little skill.
Shmaluigi mentions needing a vacation at the end, foreshadowing Awards Killing Game: Odyssey.

Part 1

This was another one that was in the works for a while in various forms. Magolor first suggested the idea of sabotage going on at the Waluigi Time Cereal Factory in August 2021, and later in November Pitohui made a half-joking comment about an arc where the company was on the brink of bankruptcy and a saboteur within the company was trying to push it over the edge. Since I was already planning to do something like that, I took Pitohui's idea and ran with it. I ended up doing it specifically in August/September 2022 because I wanted an arc that I could write pretty much by myself in this timeframe, to avoid pulling anyone else into it while we were already busy with Awards.
Shmwario finally makes his debut in the section! It was a long time coming, but I felt like if Shmaluigi was going to be at WT Cereal, I couldn't leave him out of it.
I was originally planning on having this story take place after Awards Killing Game: Odyssey, but ended up pushing it back instead.
Waluigi Time namedrops Nathan Fielder, MCD's roleplay in AKGO, having tried to contact him for his business expertise with no luck getting his calls returned.
When Shmwario is the only other person around, Shmaluigi drops talking in third person. He's the only character he does this with.
Before I changed the timeline, the "case" that Shmwario mentioned would've taken place during AKGO, and would've been the only case that he got while Shmaluigi was on vacation.
Robirda, the Birdo receptionist, made her first appearance in Shoey's Awards presentation for Favorite Active 'Shroom Writer in 2021, making her one of the few WT Cereal-associated characters not created by me. She was unnamed at the time (and technically still was - she wasn't named until I wrote the second part of this arc) and until I wrote this, hadn't appeared since.
For the employee interrogation bit, several characters ended up getting cut from this arc. I originally planned for them to talk to all the employees, so Kameron and Lakilarry would've both appeared. I also came up with two new characters that got cut - Bo Tanica, a sleazy Piranha Plant and head of legal, and Bumper, a Bumpty who works in HR. Bumper did still get a mention, though. The reason I cut them was because they wouldn't really have anything to say about the case, so interviewing all of them would've just been dull.
Chuck's full name, Charles Charger, is revealed for the first time, but he doesn't really like it. Deep lore!
In addition to Bumper and Bo Tanica, Murda Crowe, the company's CFO, was created for this arc. This wasn't her debut though, she managed to sneak into a Waluigi Time Comic during the Beaches vs. Amusement Parks 'Shroomfest instead. She's a Crowber, so her name is derived from "murder" and "crow".
Spanner's real name, Rocco Moles, is also revealed, confirming that Spanner is just a nickname.
I wanted to keep readers guessing about who the culprit might be, but admittedly, throwing suspicion onto Shbig was a bit of a last minute thing that just sort of happened naturally.

Part 2

It's never mentioned, but Mrs. Pincher's first name is Penny. She's married to a Huckit Crab.
I wanted to throw in a mention to Vincent Van Gore from Luigi's Mansion when WT talks about great artists not being appreciated until they're dead, but apparently, even in death Van Gore never achieved notoriety, so he didn't make the cut.
WT mentions the "incident" when Shmwario suggests sealing the building, referring to the events of Waluigi Time Cereal Mafia.
Shmwario being the one to take down the Spike in the factory after Shmaluigi was unable to was mostly done to justify his presence in this arc, since up until now he'd basically just been used for comedy purposes.
Gwen Coolidge mentions the cereal industry crash, which was based on a Mindless Junk fad that happened mid-2021 and has since been referenced in a few other 'Shroom sections and Awards presentations.

My earliest plans for this story were quite a bit different. The idea was to have Shmaluigi investigating stuff caused by a vampire character. I thought of making the character a Goomba, but decided against that because Phineas J. Shoe is also a Goomba villain and I like to try to go for species variety when I can, so instead I went for a Rex, creating Count Tyrannos. (Tyrannos also would've been a real vampire - specifically of the Super Show variety - rather than someone using the Vampire Candies from Mario Party 8. The Super Show influence stuck around with the tomato sauce obsession.) Later I decided that it would be funny to work in the puppet ghost (more on the origins of that character later) and as the story developed, the puppet ghost ended up being the main villain while Tyrannos was demoted to minion status.
Earlier on, I planned on having this story open with Chief Palmer briefing Shmaluigi on the situation, but I decided to cut this because it felt like it took up too much time. Tyrannos was also planned to be responsible for an entire crime spree, but that didn't really do anything for the story, so I just did the JojaMart robbery.
Usually when I make characters, I try to make species pun names, Paper Mario style. The Koopa Troopa working at JojaMart is just named Jerry because I thought it would be funny.
The mind control/hypnosis powers given by the Vampire Candy aren't something seen in the original game at all, but it's my take on an in-universe explanation for why it lets you steal coins from other players.
The name of the candy store, Kokako, was a suggestion by LTQ. The name comes from a blue mushroom from New Zealand called entoloma hochstetteri, which was at one point investigated for potential use in food coloring (used heavily in candy, obviously). In the Māori language it's called "werewere-kokako" because of a resemblance to the kōkako bird. It's a really neat suggestion and I felt like it fit the feel of the store that I wanted.
A pink Boo works the counter at Kokako because they also run the Candy Shops on King Boo's Haunted Hideaway in Mario Party 8. Since it's a Halloween story, that felt like the best one to go with.
The writing process for this story, specifically involving the guest writers, was different than what I usually go with. Normally, I'll write up the scenes involving other characters myself and leave some brief directions just to make sure that the story goes in the direction it was planned to, while still leaving it open for anything to be tweaked as would be appropriate, and then send it on the Boards for the guest writer to work on whenever it's convenient. For this one, I worked with Pitohui and CoCo in real time on Discord instead to get things to flow better (I also did this with Pitohui in Termination Notice for a few select bits of the story). As a result, the two of them had a lot more influence on the direction of the story than normal. I think it worked really well and I like the final results a lot.
Shmaluigi references the events of Living Game in his inner monologue just after meeting the apparently-revived Ema Skye.
Pitohui threw in some really sneaky dialogue towards the end of the scene in Shmaluigi's office - Ema says that she had spent a lot of time alone while she was dead. There's some dialogue that's meant to subtly tip off Shmaluigi that something is wrong (and he acknowledges them later), but this one is specifically meant for the readers. For anyone who kept up with Ema post-Rogues in Rogueport (mainly through Pitohui's RP ask thread), they would know that she actually spent a significant amount of time in the ghost zone (or whatever it's called) with Jake Marshall.
Shmaluigi mentions being Luigi's groomsman, referring to the events of Issue #1 of CoCo's section, Luigi and Associates Detective Agency.
The address of the mansion, 154 Maple Boulevard, is cobbled together from a few different sources, mainly because I'm terrible at coming up with these kinds of things on my own. 154 is Ema's height in centimeters at one point in the Ace Attorney series (doesn't quite align with the design she uses, but it's close enough). Maple was the result of looking through items from Paper Mario to use and picking out Maple Syrup, which seemed like a good fit for an area of New Wikisburg that was affluent at one point in time (I also picked boulevard because it felt fancy enough, but there wasn't any more thought behind it than that).
Count Tyrannos' name comes from tyrannosaurus (he's a Rex after all), as well as Count Dooku (also known as Darth Tyranus) from Star Wars.
Alrighty, the puppet ghost! This concept comes from an interesting story from Lightning Mafia+, where Pitohui used an ability that let him see the character on Goombuigi's role card. The character was a Shmaluigi-esque version of Shantae but Pitohui saw it as a purple ghost holding a Shmaluigi puppet, and the description convinced everyone that Goombuigi was evil. It was a pretty memorable moment in the game, and I thought it would be funny to make the misinterpretation an actual character.
The actual Shmaluigi puppet was originally going to be shown off for an ominous reveal, but I cut it as the direction of the story changed.

Due to a scheduling change, this one came up on fairly short notice. Rose threw out the prompt of "Shmaluigi investigates a glasses shortage" when I asked, and I decided to do something specifically involving Groucho glasses for obvious reasons. I ran through several different ideas for how this would work, but I had difficulty thinking of who would be hiring Shmaluigi and who would be the character(s) with the glasses. Eventually I came up with something I was happy with but did run up against the deadline pretty close!
I envisioned the Conkdor Lodge as being an "elite" group of characters who don't do much more than sit around and try to feel like they're important.
I thought of a character named Johnson being responsible for the barbecue accident (referencing the Paper Mario games again, but a separate character from the one in Sticky Situation), but they went unnamed in the final version.
Shmaluigi once again refers to case LT-5. See the behind the scenes section for Hidden Mansion: Part 1 for an explanation of this one.
The mystery solving kids are loosely inspired by Scooby-Doo which you can probably easily guess. Shmostarenan was even going to refer to the group as the "Mystery Gang" but a quick search and I realized that name has already been used to refer to Mystery Incorporated so it got changed to "Mystery Dudes". There were originally only going to be four to have it be a little less blatant, but I ended up with five anyway because of the spread of characters I wanted to use. Each one of them was meant to be one of the less utilized Mario species, but they also had to be physically able to wear Groucho glasses (so no Koopa Troopas, for example).
It's a short story so it's not explored much, but each of the kids are intended to have their own unique role in the group. Shmostarenan is the leader, Shminji is the fighter, Shmukiki is responsible for supplies, and Shmearmo is the tech/gadget expert. Shmolterpup is the dog.
Sledger and Crawford were first seen (albeit unnamed) way back in a post after the end of Toad Brigade Mafia, where they pulled IG-11's remains from Pyropuff Peaks on Monty Brando's orders. Crawford refers to these events in the story.
The ending where the kids plan to sell their glasses off to the Thwomp from the beginning of the story wasn't always planned, but was a bit of a happy accident. I'd like to revisit these characters in the future and explore them more without them being Shmaluigi derivatives, so it was a good way to set them up for being their own thing later on.

The idea for this one is actually pretty old, and not even related to this section at all, at first! A little over a year before this issue, I had the idea of doing a revival of The Devious Workings of Phineas J. Shoe (with Shoey's permission, of course). The only story I ever came up with was the vague idea of Phineas (under the alias of Ebenezer Shoege) and Rose working with Bleak from Donkey Kong Country 3. I never ended up going through with it, but kept the story idea under my hat. Bleak was ultimately dropped in favor of Blizzman, and the Ebenezer Shoege alias went unused when Shoey pointed out that it would probably work better if his plot was anti-winter.
Shmaluigi heavily alludes to the events of AKGO in the opening, as well as MB-Kusagi, a jackalope who was one of the main antagonists of the game.
The singing fish Baron von Hooks was originally GBA's roleplay from Murder Party. He ended up being on the evil team, and Snack wrote an edition of Peddler's Place in Issue 180 that added bonus layers of ominousness, so that's why Shmaluigi gets a bad feeling about it.
The poor power supply in Blizzman's cavern was a bit of a "cost-cutting" measure on my part. I wanted Blizzman to have a big, flashy, musical entrance to go with his theatrical personality, but, to be completely honest, I just didn't want to write a song! (It was either that or have him straight up steal the Snow Miser song, which was just a no.) So I got around that by making it implied - my other idea to this end was to have either Phineas or Rose interrupt the intro before it gets going, but I had a feeling Rose would appreciate it, and Phineas, if nothing else, would be too distracted by the flashing lights.
As things usually go when writing things involving Phineas J. Shoe, Shoey had a lot of input on the direction of the story. The Crown Jewel of the Mr. Blizzards was one of his ideas.
The Blouper that Phineas mentions was Shoey's submission for Blooper Race in Issue 183. You can read the original post with Phineas and Rose here.
Blizzman switches back and forth between "The Blizzman" (somewhat of a stage name) and just Blizzman in the narration, which was fully intentional. Shmaluigi only knows him as The Blizzman, so when it's from his POV, that's the name used, while the scenes with just Phineas use a third-person narrator.
The misspellings of Shmaluigi's name in Phineas' dialogue were kept because I thought it would be funny if he kept messing up his name.

Magolor · Oct 16, 2022

I am very proud to have been able to help with many early stages of this section (and yes, I plan to return to help at some point, I just don't know when lol).

Shmaluigi · Aug 20, 2023

Behind the Scenes (2023-2024)
This post covers stories from Issue 190 to 208.

Part 1

In a couple of firsts for this section, it takes place from the perspective of someone besides Shmaluigi for the entire arc (previously, I'd only done perspective jumps in the stories with Phineas J. Shoe), and it explicitly jumps back on the timeline, taking place over the summer of 2022 between the Crunch Time and Tooth and Nail stories.
The framing of this story was a lot different originally. It was going to take place in the present from Shmaluigi's point of view, with him and Shmwario out to lunch with Detective Luigi and Yuri. Shmwario would've told the story and been more of an unreliable narrator, with Shmaluigi chipping in with his own commentary. In the end, I dropped the present day framing device and just settled for the "JUNE 2022" text at the beginning of the arc to signal to the readers this was going back a bit.
Shmaluigi's eggplant is a callback to the Diamond in the Rough arc, where it was first mentioned.
Shmwario mentions A Vandalised Life, a TV show based on Super Mario Sunshine that appeared in TV Tomorrow in Issue 183. He originally had a more favorable opinion of it, but I rewrote it to make him less charitable toward Mario.
The cruise line that Shmaluigi was supposed to be on, Noble Clipper Cruises, was suggested by Pitohui. (Some other, less usable suggestions included Shmtarline Cruises, Shmaisy Cruiser, and my personal favorite, Dumb Starline Cruises.) The S.S. Dolphin came from the dolphin imagery in Sunshine.
Shmaluigi's appearance as a zombie is based on the drowned from Minecraft.

Part 2

The "green bean" that Shmwario mentions in his opening monologue is of course Detective Luigi.
The Joja Corporation's banana-themed ambitions from Termination Notice apparently have continued to go well, since Morris tries to peddle banana-scented air freshener to Shmwario.
As is to be expected from an encounter with Morris, both him and Shmwario reference the events of Sheep Mafia.
There's a brief appearance by Wright Forde 'Shroom, though he doesn't have any dialogue and Shmwario glosses over the encounter in his narration. I originally planned for a full appearance, but Goombuigi wasn't really active at the time and I was running up against the deadline anyway. Since he'd already appeared in Termination Notice with pretty much the same role, I figured it wasn't too big of a loss.
Shmwario's description of The 'Shroom HQ's broom closet comes directly from 'Shroom KG.
In Shmwario's search for information about zombies, he comes across some reviews of zombie movies in Van Shoeul's House of Ghouls. Based on the timeframe, he would've read Issues 182 (Day of the Dead) and 185 (Night of the Living Dead).
Originally, I was going to have Shmaluigi wander off in the middle of Shmwario reading the issues, and having a cameo by Rose where he would drag Shmaluigi back into the archives and tell Shmwario to keep an eye on him. I felt like the pacing was awkward though, so Shmaluigi wanders off not too long before Shmwario finishes up. I ended up cutting the Rose cameo because of time constraints, leaving behind a scream coming offscreen from an unknown character. The reason I wanted to go with Rose was because based on the layout in 'Shroom Mafia 4, only the offices for Fake News, Fun Stuff, and Strategy Wing are on the first floor. The only other options would've been me, which I didn't really feel like doing, or Pitohui, who was already making a guest appearance as two other characters in this part anyway.
It's a bit of a blink and you'll miss it detail, but Shmaluigi flinches when Hoodington drops the metal rod and it clangs on the ground. Considering that the last thing he saw in AKGO was a hallucination where he was beaten to a pulp with a crowbar by MB-K, you can probably understand why!
Shmwario's thoughts on the existence of Bone Piranha Plants are basically my own. Pitohui gave me a few other suggestions for things Shmwario could look at that didn't make the cut, including some planters with live Nipper Plants and Munchers and other sciencey stuff.
The toxin that Hoodington finds in Shmaluigi's system is... one I don't quite remember the specifics of actually, but it was injected by the proximity bracelets in AKGO.
Hoodington mentions Anna, who was previously roleplayed by NS in Toad Brigade Mafia and Waluigi Time Cereal Mafia.

Part 3

This part served a twofold purpose. It had to recap the Shmaluigi-relevant parts of the Circinus portion of AKGO for readers who hadn't followed it, so pretty much everything mentioned here were actual events and characters in the game. It also had to tie up a lot of loose ends, since I was a lot more concerned with trying to stay alive than storytelling in that phase. As a result, it ended up being almost all dialogue.
There's a small :retcon: here, Shmaluigi refers to all of the AKGO NPCs by their last name, which is more consistent with how he usually refers to people. During the actual game, I used their first names (except for Dr. Acraman), for some reason. Don't ask me why I did that, I don't remember.
Shmwario mentions the Bandwich, a character I'd previously used for my Favorite Modern Game Awards presentation back in 2021.
Something interesting that came up while writing this is that Shmaluigi has no knowledge whatsoever of the Mazza villain reveal! He's probably the only character from the game who doesn't hate their guts as a result. To play with this a little, I specifically threw in a comment that Mazza seemed nice. (Incidentally, Shmaluigi never witnessed Storm's character development either, but that didn't have any impact on the section.)
It's been well established at this point that AKGO took place in its own parallel universe (cometslurping notwithstanding), but Shmwario knows about Dr. Coyle. It's open to interpretation how that's the case, but I figure that the other Nintendo franchises exist in the MarioWiki "canon" to some extent, so there could potentially be a version of Dr. Coyle in both worlds, if nothing else.
Swooperman is a Mario-fied version of Batman, because, well, Swoopers. Although not specifically stated, the mention here is intended to reference Batman's no-kill rule.
In the original plans with Luigi and Yuri, Shmaluigi coming to terms with the whole Coyle situation would've happened in private after the bros. left, obviously, though less emotionally charged since he would've had more time to process it offscreen. Similarly, Shmaluigi would've already been well aware that AKGO seemingly never happened. With that in mind, I think dropping the present day idea was a lot more beneficial for the story.
In slightly less old plans, I thought of leaving a remnant of the Luigi and Yuri idea by having the bros. go out to meet them at the end of the story and have Shmaluigi explain the events of AKGO. That also got dropped because it didn't really make sense for Shmaluigi not to just explain it to Shmwario first, and I didn't see much value in him doing it a second time. Plus Shmaluigi went through a lot, so he probably wouldn't want to see anybody (especially Luigi) so soon.

Part 1

This arc was a loooong time in the making, with roots all the way back in Shmaluigi's very first appearance in Rogues in Rogueport in 2021 and encountering Pitohui's RP, Ema Skye. The interactions between Shmaluigi and Lana Skye were intended to play out in a Killing Game, but that never happened because 2021 was an off-year and in 2022 Pitohui was one of the hosts, which for obvious reasons, kind of prevented him from being a player in that game! After the scale of AKGO, 2023 looked to be another off year so I suggested doing it as a collab in this section instead. That also made this the second arc that was a full collab with another user, though I feel like the workload of this one was better balanced between us.
An unused idea was to have a monologue from Lana's point of view at the beginning of the story to parallel Shmaluigi's. We ended up scrapping this because it would've revealed too early that there were multiple investigators working on the case.
The Sipping Time Cafe makes a return from the Hidden Mansion arc as a brief mention.
Some suggestions that got thrown around for Shmaluigi's client included Jonathan Morris from the Diamond in the Rough arc and Renne, who has been used as an RP by Perch in several games (the latter suggestion being retracted since the girlboss squad likely would've solved it on their own). I didn't really want to use Jonathan since Magolor was on hiatus at the time and I didn't feel right doing it without his input, so I just created Woodrow Oakley instead. He's very Kolorado because he wouldn't leave my brain, but I felt that Kolorado himself wouldn't quite fit the role.
The name of Scarlet Rose Cruises came from an idea by Pitohui to parallel Daisy Cruiser, and roses came about as a joke (because Roserade) but then it actually worked as a nod to the rose worn by Marlon Brando's character in The Godfather.
The scene in the Despair Pub served two purposes of allowing Shmaluigi to figure out what kinds of people were invited to the cruise, while also planting the seed of Monty Brando being present so readers would remember him later - originally he was going to physically appear, but I couldn't figure out how to work it in naturally. To avoid it being too obvious that he was important, he just got dropped in a sea of other names. Mentioned here are several canon Mario characters, including Carpaccio and Count Cannoli from Wario: Master of Disguise; Lumpy, Goldbob, and Don Pianta from The Thousand-Year Door; and Bluster Kong from the Donkey Kong Country cartoon. Renne and President Haltmann, Rose's RP from 'Shroom Mafia 4, also got mentions.
Other characters that Pitohui suggested for this scene were the Enigmansion forebear from Sticker Star, Captain Syrup, Tuxedo Mask (Turb's RP in a few games), and Varona (Pitohui's own RP from Murder Party). They didn't make the final cut to keep that bit from dragging on too long. Wario was also suggested, but I didn't use him for obvious reasons.
Waluigi Time mentions the four News Flush reporter characters at the time, Walter G. Timeson (me!), Parshow G. Shoelow (Shoey), Ramona Tidings (CoCo), and Claw Gripstofferson (ClawgripFan). This was another instance of dropping something important for later, in this case Black Shell, alongside other info so it doesn't seem as important. Sigil Securities was also name-dropped as a red herring, since it's Carpaccio's company and he was mentioned earlier. Shoelow and Gripstofferson's news stories are nods to What's in a Campaign? and Sport Report, respectively.
The Place Holdings Company was originally a placeholder name (get it?) that I kept because it worked and was funny.
In a departure from how he usually refers to people, Shmaluigi exclusively refers to Lana by her first name in his inner monologue. The reason for this is that he associates the name "Ms. Skye" too closely with Ema.
Black Shell's address, 1010 Roja Street, Pipe Path, is a nod to red links and piped links on the wiki.
Earlier plans for Black Shell were that they would've revealed to Shmaluigi that the AI host they had sold was a scam and didn't actually work. At the time the idea was that they wouldn't have actually needed a working host, but that the information would leak anyway to create enough of a trail for Shmaluigi to follow, so it would make more sense to the readers once the Killing Game was revealed to be a trap. We changed this pretty quickly since the reveal that the AI host was a dud would've undermined any sense of urgency,

Part 2

The search engine, Tiptro! is named after Tiptron from Super Paper Mario, based on her tattle ability.
The name of Bassarao Tickets is derived from the Japanese name of Basculin (Bassaro), because unlike the other ticket company, good news, it's still alive. While never mentioned, the full name of PDT Tickets coined by Pitohui was "Prismatic and Dolphic Tourist Ticketing Company".
Another use of the hiding information for later strategy is here, with Squeaky Cleaners among the financial news. Krem Brûlée Katering references some of Rose's scribbles, Hot and Cold Records references the old Hot Records section from Fake News, and M-corporated is Magolor's company that previously appeared in the section.
Continuing with the Mr. Basculin nod, the Bassarao Tickets employee is a Deep Cheep (a green fish) who says "good news".
I considered including a reference to Ray Trace somewhere in the scene at the post office, but I couldn't think of a way to work it in naturally.
The address for Place Holdings, 2120 Whomp Works Way, references the year that AKG4 took place.
At the end of this part, Shmaluigi mentions the events of the Hidden Mansion arc.

Part 3

This part is not only the largest installment of the section to date, smashing the previous record held by part 2 of Termination Notice, but my largest overall 'Shroom section so far. In fact, it was so big that the forums wouldn't let me post it. It's a running joke between Pitohui and I that whenever he's a guest writer, these get very long!
The Ukikis at the docks are a reference to Mario Party 7.
During their heart-to-heart and afterward, Shmaluigi intentionally drops the third-person when talking to Lana.
While pointing out the flaws in Lana's plan, Shmaluigi asks what will happen a hundred years from now when she's long gone. This was specifically meant to be a nod to AKG4, which took place about 100 years in the future in the bad timeline.
Coming up with the "final boss" was tricky and we ran through several enemies trying to come up with something! It started as a Sledge Bro. but I didn't really want to do that since Sledger was an already established character who worked for Monty Brando (and definitely wasn't bodyguard caliber). Other suggestions we threw back and forth were Broozer, Magon, Clubosaur, Sherm, and Naplock. The idea of "big Dry Bones with a bone club" was initially just an idle thought I had as something that would be neat in the Mario series while browsing enemies, and then... voila!
Although he could fulfill the role of one of Brando's guards, IG-11 was intentionally left out. My thought was that with the lengths Brando was going to to avoid being connected to this operation, he wouldn't have wanted any data related to it in the droid's databanks.

Part 1

Oh boy, this arc! This was originally two completely unrelated arcs. One would've tied up the remaining loose ends from AKGO and explore Perry's origins, and the other would have focused on Shmaisy. During a conversation with Pitohui and Rose about half a year earlier, I jokingly threw out the idea that Shmaisy was actually Shmaluigi's counterpart from the AKGO world and got pulled to the "main" world, but then we all thought that was pretty cool so I just rolled with it. As a result, Shmaisy got pulled into the AKGO story and the original story concept with her was scrapped entirely since it didn't fit anymore.
The idea of Shmaisy existed for a long time before this arc finally happened, but she kept not getting to exist for various reasons, and during that time she went through a lot of changes. Daisy's energy made her start out as a much more manic character, to the point of being actually crazy. The original arc would've had her as kind of a twist villain - she was going to be an obsessive fan who sought out Shmaluigi's help in solving a crime of some sort, only for it to be revealed at the end that she orchestrated it herself to get his attention. Also, she was going to be a Toad who used a Sneaky Parasol on the real Daisy. Later, she got reworked into the more traditional noir dame archetype, but still kept a very high energy personality until pretty late in the game. The final version of Shmaisy still has a few moments where she loses her composure, hinting that she's not as cool and collected as she lets on.
Shmaisy's reponse to seeing Shmwario was an intentional paraphrase of the memetic quote from The Phantom Menace, "This is getting out of hand, now there are two of them".
While not explicitly stated, it's implied that Shmaisy's parents were out of the picture for a long time because she grew up with her cousin, which was inspired by the original Super Mario Bros. film where Daisy's mother dies while she's an infant. The cousin herself is a stand-in for Peach since those two have been stated to be cousins in some materials (much like Wario and Waluigi, it's very inconsistent), and mostly exists to give Shmaisy a motivation for going after the Golden Phanto. (Canonically speaking, Vicia from AKGO is Peach's direct counterpart in that world.)
Chaos Town originally appeared as the setting of a couple of Revin's games, and often involves a lot of dimensional nonsense! It seemed like the perfect way to get Shmaluigi and co. across worlds while tying in a pre-existing community concept.
Fordley and Grunkle Science was largely the work of Revin, who came up with the idea of it being this dingy tourist trap sort of place. Fordley himself is a combination of Stanford and Stanley Pines from Gravity Falls (apparently, he even met them in his dimensional travels), continuing the theme of residents of Chaos Town being combinations of existing characters. He's the first ever guest character to be an original character created for this section.

Part 2

Polly was always my first choice to bring in here since she had the most substantial/memorable interactions with Shmaluigi of the player characters in AKGO, but I wasn't entirely sure about Auburn's availability to write for her at the time, so I came up with a backup plan just in case. Instead of being dropped in Monstropolis, they would've instead landed in London, where they would ideally run into Sholmes and Bushroot (if that didn't pan out, the backup backup plan was to bring Fern in). As much as I'm a fan of those two, I'm glad the original vision worked out.
Shmaluigi's speculative quip about the residents of Monstropolis really getting into Halloween in the middle of the summer is another little nod to Gravity Falls, specifically the Summerween episode. If I remember correctly, I thought about going further and having Shmaluigi allude to hearing about that happen before, but I must have pulled back on that since it's not there now.
The Monstropolis seen in this story is from Monster Prom, not Monsters, Inc., but Shmwario quipping about the odds of two Monstropolises existing is a little nod to both of them.
Auburn gave me a few ideas for how the group could meet Polly, which also included haunting a hotel or just hanging out at some AKGO-relevant location like the docks. I liked the graffiti summon idea the best since it was funny and was the easiest way to move the story along.
An idea that I cut was to have Shmaluigi suddenly get apprehensive while reading the graffiti and hesitate, only for Shmwario to finish reading it off and summon Polly anyway. Before I talked with Auburn, I thought maybe they would go to her house, where Shmwario would've done this with the doorbell instead.

Part 3

Originally I thought about doing a more direct counterpart of Ms. Broxy for Shmaisy's landlord, but instead I ended up going with Norris instead. Yeah, he's a pretty thinly-veiled nod to Morris, who has appeared many times in this section. I'll leave it up to Pitohui whether he's a direct counterpart, but there's enough of a resemblance to make Shmaluigi feel uneasy (though not quite able to place why). Either way, I thought it would be funny for Shmaisy to have to deal with a similar character while still putting a twist on it.
While searching for information on Perry, Shmaluigi brings up "creepy ghost-tree whatever things", referring to the HellValleySkyTree creatures from Super Mario Galaxy. They seemed like a good Bigfoot equivalent for the Mario world.
Jim Adhesive's name is a James Bond spoof, while Ulysses Rika is meant to be a counterpart for Professor E. Gadd. His name is similarly a pun on "eureka". Rika's address, 9297 Criminy Parkway, is a combination of the address of Doofenshmirtz Evil Incorporated from Phineas and Ferb (9297 Polly Parkway) with an E. Gadd-ism which came from a list that Pitohui gave me. Finally, Rika's receptionist, Billy, is paired with a symbiote based on Mike Wazowski from Monsters, Inc., and I originally thought about being more on the nose and calling him Michael, but instead he's named after Mike's voice actor, Billy Crystal.
Dr. U. Rika's studies into the multiverse came about mostly out of need for a return trip. I also wanted to give my take on all the extra things being transported between worlds since there was really no explanation for it up until then. The exposition was something I thought of including at the end of the first part, but Fordley didn't seem quite right to deliver all of that.
I didn't necessarily want Dr. U. Rika to be a complete unashamed villain, mostly because I needed him to be okay with Perry targeting evil scientists, but I still needed there to be a conflict with him. His motivations were inspired by thinking about behaving ethically in scientific research and the limitations that necessitates. He doesn't intentionally set out to be evil, but he has no concern whatsoever what the effects of his research are for others or the world at large.
For those unaware, the Experiment 626 symbiote takes the appearance of Stitch from Lilo & Stitch.
Shmwario saying that he thinks he'd be a farmer if he wasn't living in the big city is a reference to Wario Land II.
Because we were getting really close to Issue 200 at this point, GBA and LTQ were both really busy, so Cel is the first time I've written someone else's character in this section - with permission and their final approval over the dialogue, of course. I believe this is the first time she's been depicted with a cybernetic arm, after losing one in the finale of AKGO.

The concept for this one goes back quite a while, it was actually pitched to me by Magolor back in May 2022! I decided to save it for later because I was already developing Tooth and Nail at the time. It also would've immediately followed Crunch Time, and I didn't really want to do two stories in a row revolving around WT Cereal. But we finally got it for the Halloween 2023 special! The name was also Magolor's idea, and uh, I'm shocked I didn't think of it myself.
The new candy that WT mentions is Dr. Frankentime's Mystery Candy, which appeared in Consumer Corner in the same issue. Cross-promotion!
Shmaluigi mentioning that his sporting equipment was being used more often as makeshift weapons calls back to Tooth and Nail. This time around he uses golf clubs since his tennis racket busted in that story.
WT's weird gun first appeared in the final Waluigi Time Comic I made for the Cool Colors vs. Warm Colors 'Shroomfest. It can also shoot cereal bits and streams of ketchup and mayo!
Bob first appeared in one of the Waluigi Time Comics I made for Issue 175. He had a pretty big appearance gap, so I considered also putting him in Consumer Corner in this issue to remind people that he exists, but I decided against it.

Several villains from Shmaluigi's past cases reappear in this one! Had to be big for 200, right? They were all the villains of previous arcs, except for Bandwich, who was from my Favorite Modern Game presentation for the 2021 Mario Awards. Not every villain comes back - I picked these five because I wanted ones who were career criminals and already arrested to be part of a prison break (therefore excluding characters like Monty Brando or Phineas J. Shoe).
The returning villains have their full names revealed for the first time. Robert Arie (Bandwich) is a pun on robbery, just shorten his first name to Rob. Albert Koopone (Terrakingpin) is a reference to who else but Al Capone, who Bowser already spoofed in the Super Show but I'm doing it again! Count Tyrannos' first name, Bram, references Bram Stoker, the author of Dracula. Finally, Blizzman's first name, Shawn, is a reference to Dick Shawn, the original voice of Snow Miser.
Earlier on, I planned to have Shmaluigi visit E. Gadd after learning about the prison break to check on the Puppetmaster. I ended up cutting this because it didn't really add anything to the story.
Lots of suggestions went around for the species of Shmaluigi's partner! Beanie, Kremling, Shy Guy, Sumo Bro., Rabbid, Tiki, Toad, Wiggler, and Doogan were all suggested before I went with a Yoshi.
Detective Yosh's name is more interesting than it seems, I was going for a pun on the name Yost.
Just like the villains, the other characters during the crime wave are mostly returning from previous arcs, except for Cayde, Zerris, Virovirokun, and Walter. The locations are mostly new with connections to previous characters, except for JojaMart and M-corporated, which showed up before.
I wanted to squeeze in a few extra cameos, but unfortunately I was running up too close against the deadline so they ended up not happening. Had plans not fallen through, at one point Shmaluigi and Yosh would be listening to the radio and hear the opening of an interview between Andergoom Shoeper from Interview with a Shoe and Cornelius. After that, they would've switched stations, and the DJ would mention "The Worst Enemies" from Zange's 2023 Worst Enemy presentation. I was also considering having Anna from Toad Brigade Mafia appear during the WT Cereal segment.
It's not really elaborated on much here, but the idea with Cayde being cagey about the contents of her purse is that she had an engagement ring in it, so it ties into MightyMario's special feature in this issue.
Alongside the Waluigi Time Comic in the same issue, this is the first appearance of Shbig's character rework, so he's Mr. Shbeeg now.
The Cereal Bob-ombs return from Issue 189's 'Shroom Holiday Scavenger, but WT's inability to sell them is a reference to Rose's Favorite 'Shroom Special Issue presentation in 2023.
The Toad and Koopa Troopa outside JojaMart are the same ones appearing in Tooth and Nail.

Part 1

When NS and I were working on the title for this arc, he pointed out that the last one we did, Sticky Situation, coincidentally shared a name with a Donkey Kong Country Returns level, so we did that again! Reckless Ride was another one we considered.
Writing the JojaMart intro was an interesting experience because it was the first time I'd done real-time collaborative writing with more than one person. It went pretty well, though!
An alternative idea was to have the Sticky Warrior staking out on top of a Joja warehouse rather than JojaMart itself. The meeting would've still taken place at JojaMart though, implying Morris dragged him all the way across town!
Morris' mention of a robotic assassin is a callback to the events of the Termination Notice arc.
"Gil" is revealed later in the arc to be an associate of the Sticky Warrior. I intentionally made him a Goomba as a nod to Goombuigi, since he'd worked with NS on several projects before. They're not the same character, though.
The reappearance of the docks is a nod to their appearance in Sticky Situation, and Shmaluigi makes reference to those events.
We wanted a powerful villain who would be able to go toe-to-toe with the Sticky Warrior, showing that neither of them were to be messed with. To emphasize that, we wanted them to be someone more focused on combat technique than brute strength. I suggested having someone who was still physically powerful to emphasize Sticky Warrior's prowess, staying in the fight against a clearly powerful opponent who was much bigger than him. My mind pretty quickly went to Kong, but NS suggested making them a Kremling and I liked that a lot better, and Kreep was born! His name is pretty on the nose, but that's very fitting for the Kremlings.
In an alternate timeline, Kreep had a monocle instead, spy villain style. We went with the eyepatch to make him feel more experienced in combat.
Since Kreep was written as an international criminal, I wanted him to have some minions from other Nintendo franchises, like Kirby. That never really happened because I just didn't have a good opportunity to write it in, but it's still canon. This somewhat survived through mentions of his actions in places like Inkopolis and Planet Popstar.

Part 2

Ms. Mowz is, I believe, the first canonical Mario character to appear in the section (not counting Detective Luigi, who I consider a unique interpretation). She was previously a prominent character in The Odyssey of a Squid, so naturally it made sense to have NS write her dialogue.
I needed a bit of scenery for Shmaluigi to look at before spotting the Sticky Warrior, so naturally, throw in a very distracting hot dog stand! It's a callback to the Most Disappointing Game collab I did with CoCo back in 2022, where it appeared as an important plot point.
Kreep's victim being a Chomp Bro. was a suggestion from NS when I asked for a tough enemy.
Shmaluigi hiding in the trashcan is a callback to Rogues in Rogueport Mafia, where he did this frequently.

Part 3

The choreography of the fight was drafted by NS, because he's a lot better at coming up with this sort of thing than I am! Kreep's moveset takes heavy inspiration from the Hyrule Warriors games, while Sticky Warrior uses a lot of Splatoon-based moves. The forbidden act, in terms of fighting style, is inspired by the chain attacks from Xenoblade Chronicles.
Though not mentioned by name, because Shmaluigi probably wouldn't recognize him, the Paratroopa spirit is Tucayo. Him, Meta, and NS (the Sticky Warrior is NS incognito, if you weren't already aware) were all Statistics Managers of The 'Shroom, hence the Trinity of the Statistics. I really like Sticky Warrior talking to Kreep like he's rejecting a 'Shroom application.
Shmaluigi's musing that Sticky Warrior would probably enjoy a KG is sort of a brick joke. He previously considered the possibility in part 3 of Cruise Control.

Part 1

This story was based on a concept Pitohui suggested a while back about a case revolving around a "stolen" key. It's not until later that the key is revealed to either be a Keyzer from Wario Land or a Yakkey-like character and they cut a deal with the main villain and just got up and left. I ended up going with the Keyzer since it seemed easier to make work as a species.
The idea of a guy being the last person in his neighborhood and refusing to sell to the real estate developer was inspired by real life stories of the same thing. Did you know that there's houses out there built in the middle of a highway because they wouldn't sell? Wild stuff.
"Dooglas Cain" is a pun on Doogan and Douglas, and the real last name Cain, in this case referencing canine.
The secretary being a Goombrat was another suggestion from Pitohui because I wasn't sure what species to commit to.
Mr. White is a recurring character from Rose's MarioBoards Investigations games, and a proprietor of Tesco. I thought it would be fun to namedrop him as a potential idea for what Cain would be doing with the new development. While not specifically mentioned here, there's a hint towards Tesco's business rivalry with the Joja Corporation.
The demolition crew is made up entirely of Wrecking Crew enemies! Those guys don't get enough love.

Part 2

Shmwario's stint as a treasure hunter refers to my Worst Obstacle collab with Blathers and CoCo from 2023, which shows him doing just that!
Oh boy, lore is happening in this part! Shmaisy returns to New Wikisburg, implying that the events of this story take place not too long after her appearance in MarioBoards Investigations 4. Her presence ultimately doesn't affect the story (she's not even heard over the phone), but I wanted to get that worldbuilding in. Shmaisy hassling Shmwario about his soda getting warm is also a reference to that game, where bottles of Squirt soda served warm from a vending machine (and the negative reactions from basically everyone) became a running gag.

Part 3

Lana Skye is back, following her appearance in the Cruise Control arc, so we get to see how things are going for her roughly a year later. I thought it would be fine to complicate things a little more beyond a simple find out who did it and arrest them, and what's more complicated than legal loopholes?
My original outline for this part played out a lot different, and honestly, worse! Originally, Cain was simply going to be bluffing and stalling for time, which would've been easily exposed by Lana. Shmaluigi would then return to Cain's office only to find he had left for Mushroom Hills already. Once Shmaluigi got there, Cain would've taken over one of the demolition cranes and then try to kill both Shmaluigi and Bubba in a "construction site accident", only to be stopped by the foreman, Eggbert Plante (more out of concern for his own reputation and equipment than anything else). Thankfully, Pitohui came up with a much more interesting angle pretty much on the fly when we started working on Lana's scene that changed Cain a lot and made him a more nuanced antagonist. In the final story, he's a lot less overtly villainous - he's a pretty unethical slimeball, but he genuinely believes that he's not doing anything that's actually criminal.
With the upcoming (at the time) The Thousand-Year Door special issue, I couldn't help but have it on my mind when Shmaluigi made a comment about backtracking in video games.

This originally wasn't on my schedule for the year at all, but the TTYD special getting pushed back to July gave me a good opportunity to slot this one in, considering Shmaluigi's roots in Rogues in Rogueport and all. Naturally, there's plenty of references to that game and namedrops for Detective Fulbright, the Erudite Goose, and the Sticky Warrior.
Lots of characters from The Thousand-Year Door appear, naturally! It's the most canonical Mario characters ever used in one of these stories, beating the previous record of a whole one.
Zess T.'s fiery temper towards Shmwario despite being a lot smaller reminds Shmaluigi of a similar situation with his landlord Ms. Broxy. We haven't seen her in a while, but she still gets mentioned from time to time.
I originally created Dr. Thomas Wattson for Rogues in Rogueport 2, which was planned to happen in 2023 but ultimately canceled. He's been sitting on the backburner since then, so now seemed like a perfect time to finally use him! Probably obvious, but he's a spoof of Dr. Watson from the Sherlock Holmes stories. His first name is a nod to Thomas Edison, because, well, electricity!
Originally, there was just going to be one Spania villain that they were after, but I couldn't come up with a good "spin" pun name. While I was thinking with similar words, I started with "rotate", so they got doubled to make the pun - Rowe and Tate. Also, one of them was going to be an ordinary Spinia at first, but describing them in writing just ended up being clunky, so they both became Spanias to make it easier.
Shmaluigi wishing he could quickly spin across town is a reference to the Spin Dash move from the original Paper Mario, and its absence in The Thousand-Year Door.
I considered having Gus appear to block the road leading to the Robbo hideout, but that wouldn't have made much sense because Shmaluigi already visited the Trouble Center earlier in the story. I could've gone back and added him there, but it didn't seem very good for pacing. Maybe it was his day off.
Shmwario's Bros. Stack move references the various techniques from the Mario & Luigi games. Shmaluigi and Shmwario also used Bros. Moves in the Mario Boards Mega Brawl, but this is the first "canonical" depiction of something like that happening.
I like to look up names before I use them! Apparently Tate is English in origin, so they both get accents.
Building off of "elementary" and Dr. Wattson already being a Lil Sparky, it made sense for his former companion to be an elemental-based enemy as well. I was originally thinking Lava Bubble, but Li'l Cinder worked better for the Charredrock pun.
Charredrock Holmes dying alongside his archnemesis is a nod to the Sherlock Holmes story "The Final Problem", where Holmes (apparently) dies alongside Moriarty. (At least until he got retconned back to life because the fans wanted more Holmes stories!)

Shmalu Sniffer · Feb 16, 2025

Waluigi Time said:
Things are still getting sorted out here - pardon the mess!

Characters
Not an exhaustive list of every character in the section, just the notable and recurring ones, especially if they previously appeared in other projects. For characters who aren't listed here, what you see is probably what you get, but feel free to ask if there's anyone who's not here that you think should be.

I think it's about time this was update wouldn't you say? Especially with all the new lore we have?

Shmaluigi · Apr 20, 2025

Behind the Scenes (2024-)
This post covers stories from Issue 212 onward.

Part 1

Oh boy, here we go. The very earliest concepts for this arc go all the way back to 2021, believe it or not, but I kept it on the backburner since I wasn't sure what the best time to do such a status quo-changing arc would be (and if I should make it the finale of the section or not). At the time, it played out a lot differently as a more standard three-part arc. It would've started with Shmaluigi working on a pretty standard case, only to be interrupted at the end of part 1 by IG-11 barging into his office with the news that Monty Brando was dead. After a flashback that revealed Shmaluigi's backstory, the two of them would begrudgingly team up, the idea being that Brando's underlings would be going for a power grab in the wake of his death and that Shmaluigi would want to bring them to justice properly while IG-11 would want to eliminate any threats and set himself up as Brando's proper successor. Shmaluigi would've reunited with Jasmine at some point during this and get married for the finale. Obviously, this went through a lot of retooling over time. The biggest thing I grew to dislike about this was that Brando dying offscreen felt anticlimactic and wouldn't have given Shmaluigi real closure, which is why the final product is double length to fit in a final confrontation with him.
I felt like a final confrontation needed some plausible reason to kick it off instead of just happening, so it picks up on some plot threads from the earlier Tidal Terror arc. Since Spiky Don and the Bone Crusher return, there's also a few references to the events of Cruise Control.
Shmaluigi offhandedly mentions seeing a Dry Bones skull without the rest of its body in magic show advertisements. This is, of course, Legend 8's character Kroop from The Sorcery Show! (It's not magic though, it's antilogic.)

Part 2

Brando's storage unit G072 is a nod to The Godfather, which released in 1972. References are an easy way to name things! The storage facility itself is the same one from the If The Shoe Fits arc, which Shmaluigi hints at.
For this arc, I dabbled a little in the philosophy of just because something happened, it doesn't mean you have to write about it. That way I can cut out a little of the more "fluffy" investigations and keep the story moving along. The investigation into ShellCo is one of those parts, mainly because I already did this whole shtick back in the Cruise Control arc so I didn't think it would be very interesting to show again. I was also running against a deadline here! In hindsight, if I had more time I probably would've asked another one of the Fake News writers to make a guest appearance here, but it is what it is.
Shmaluigi's quip about getting a bad reputation with receptionists is a callback to the Lock and Key arc.
Chief Palmer's hesitation to follow Shmaluigi's initial lead was a contribution from Pitohui, and came about entirely because I needed the confrontation with Spiky Don at the end of the part. It also led to Shmwario and Shmaisy getting an earlier role in this arc, originally they weren't planned to appear until part 4 or 5.
At first, I planned a more extended sequence of Shmaluigi getting led around by Spiky Don and stopping the moves, causing Brando to become increasingly frustrated with his interference. I decided this would've been very boring to read, so most of them are cut down to a brief summary in the narration.
Bone Crusher's ARMS suit was an idea I had while Pitohui and I were still working on Cruise Control. Since the rest of his body was scattered during the fight in that arc, he needed a replacement and it seemed cool! The fight between Shmaluigi and the Bone Crusher in this part also has a nod to AKGO - Shmaluigi bashes him in the head with a crowbar, the same way he took out Dr. Coyle under Perry's influence in that game. The narration also makes a more direct reference to the resemblance to Coyle bringing up unpleasant memories.
Spiky Don being the mole is because, well, I didn't have too many options, really! I wanted the reveal to have some impact and felt like it wouldn't really do that if it was a character the readers had never seen before. Out of the pre-existing characters working for Brando, he seemed like the best choice. I debated whether I wanted to have Spiky Don reveal himself to Shmaluigi or if it should only be revealed when meeting Brando in the next part, but decided to go with the former to reveal his character motivations.

Part 3

The Golden Phanto is Dr. Acraman meme lives!
Shmaluigi wakes up Shmaisy five minutes before they have to be at the harbor, a little nod to how memetic the phrase "in five minutes" has become around here since GBA first used it in reference to AKGO2.
The confrontation with Monty Brando was one of the big set pieces of this arc. I had a pretty good idea of the basics, which are pretty much unchanged from what you see in the final version. The train setting and addition of the Bone Crusher came later as the arc took shape. At one point, I considered having Shmaluigi shout "ghosts don't die" after tanking a few of IG-11's shots, hinting at the reveal in the next part, but that felt a little cheesy.
I intentionally skipped my usual outro after the train blew up to make things more dramatic!

Part 4

You may notice throughout this arc that Shmaluigi makes several comments related to his Waluigi form (or just being in a mortal body in general). Those were intended to be something interesting to look back on after the big reveal.
I'm going to clear this up now - Monty Brando is 100% dead. Shmaluigi not finding the body is entirely because encountering his charred remains doesn't really gel with the vibe I'm trying to go for in my stories. Hopefully, finding a bit of his suit and the repeated assertions that no one could've survived that cleared things up.
There's a bit of narration here referencing the lyrics of "A Horse with No Name".
Another reference to warm Squirt soda in this part now that it's a recurring community joke.
The Duplighost backstory wasn't something I came up with when I first made Shmaluigi (he originally was intended to be Waluigi in a lame disguise), but it's pretty old, going back to 2021 as well. I'm pretty sure it was already established by the time I started the section, but since I never talked to anyone about it back then, I can't say for sure.
The Paper Mario games didn't give me a lot to work with for Duplighost names! Connor is derived from "con", while Russo (not named until part 6) is derived from "ruse".
I didn't want Jasmine's elemental magic to overlap with any of the Shadow Sirens, so water was the most obvious choice.
"Ghosts don't die" pops up here instead of at the end of part 3, and I think it works a lot better in context.
The explanation of Shmaluigi's revival after Sheep Mafia is, admittedly, a retcon. Originally it was played completely straight, but as I worked out more of the details of Shmaluigi's backstory, I decided it didn't make much sense anymore and changed it to be a fabricated story for the public. The concept of a Duplighost's disguise being able to "die" and eventually regenerate is something I believe I came up with around the time of AKGO to have a more interesting explanation for his second revival than 1-Ups again. (Speaking of AKGO, that one was not a retcon, I had it planned when I wrote the Brains and Brawn arc.)
I also had Shmaluigi downplay the effectiveness of 1-Ups here, because their impact on the lore is... tricky. (I remember someone saying something about 1-Ups existing in the same continuity as KG at the time!) If they were powerful enough for full-blown resurrections, it raises a lot of questions like why Shmaluigi would dedicate his entire life to avenging Jasmine if anyone can come back at any time, why things like KGs have any impact, or why certain characters don't return. Needless to say, I will not be using 1-Ups (or Life Mushrooms, for that matter) that way in my stories going forward. The explanation here is more in line with what the Puppetmaster (as Ema Skye) said about them back in Tooth and Nail.
Shmaluigi annoying himself with the third-person is, well, a bit of author commentary! It kind of grates at times, which is why I've expanded the amount of characters he drops it in conversation with over the years, or sometimes I just write around it so he doesn't have to. From this arc going forward, it's dropped entirely now that keeping up the Shmaluigi disguise is less important.
Shmwario's friend in robotics is a Kong character I've had in mind for a while but haven't used in any projects as of writing. Maybe you'll meet him soon. I do like the idea of Shmwario being associates with analogues of the WarioWare cast, so he's the Dr. Crygor.
The Mystery Dudes return from Through the Groucho Glass, now thoroughly de-Shmaluigified! Muercello and Spectra previously made an appearance in Amusing Awards Artifact Adventure, but this is the first time the other three have reappeared since their debut.
G-XY's name is perhaps obviously derived from Galaxy, and his serial number is 20071101, the North American release date of Super Mario Galaxy.
IG-11's personality matrix being fried is pretty much a death sentence for him as a character, a far cry from the earliest version of this arc. With Brando gone, I didn't really need or want him around anymore, so I set this up to be his last hurrah.
Pianta's Eatery came from a suggestion by Rose for Brando's fancy restaurant to be Delfino-themed, because I couldn't come up with anything at the time.

Part 5

Shmaluigi's line after going through all of G-XY's data references The Wizard of Oz.
Shmaluigi mentions ? Panel, which is a reference you should probably get if you're reading Palette Swap! It's winstein's excellent comic section.
In earlier plans for this arc, IG-11 would've self-destructed in the confrontation with Brando, and Shmwario would've directly joined in Shmaluigi's undercover mission disguised as him. As plans changed and IG-11 stuck around as a useful source of information, Shmwario ended up having to hang back because I didn't have any other characters for him to reasonably disguise as.
Woodrow Oakley's Museum of Curiosities calls back to the character from Cruise Control and Uneasy Alliance. His museum only appears in the latter story, though. The art dealer angle was another one of Pitohui's contributions to this arc.
Jasmine's fate after disappearing was something I thought about different directions for over time. One angle would've put her as a higher-ranking member in Brando's organization, while another would've had her not actually be brainwashed and be working against Brando, ironically unable to reunite with Connor because he was disguised.
Brando's Seedy Pod secretary was another suggestion from Pitohui. There's actually some thought put into this, with the idea that Brando would've taken them out of Delfino so they'd be dependent, plus they have a biological security system.
Darcane being able to magically sense Connor's Duplighost disguise raises some interesting questions, since he's able to be disguised around other magic users like Ms. Broxy and Jasmine with no problem. I like to imagine Wizzerds, being a rare species in The Thousand-Year Door, are especially potent magically and higher on the totem pole, so to speak. His ability to zap Connor out of the disguise was directly inspired by Kammy Koopa neutralizing the Sneaky Parasol in Paper Mario.
Shmwario remembers Mertle from Amusing Awards Artifact Adventure, the trip he mentions is a reference to that game as well as one of the quests involving her. Her appearance in this section brings things full circle, as she was originally conceptualized for the Hidden Mansion arc but was cut.
I wanted Mertle's spell to be her saying "Read The 'Shroom" in Latin as an easter egg, but mushroom in Latin is literally fungus, so...

Part 6

The nightmare sequence with Monty Brando wasn't originally planned, I stuck it in last minute because I felt like being a little evil in this part.
Jasmine reacting to Waluigi Time Cereal was an interesting little bit for me, she's been out of commission so long that she's never heard of it before.
Shmaluigi and co.'s infiltration of the Safehouse was, in part, yet another one of Pitohui's contributions to this arc! I was unsure of how to make the final confrontation with the rest of Brando's underlings interesting, since it was kind of uninteresting on paper at first. Shmaisy setting off the smoke detectors was his idea, and to some extent the garlic breakfast burrito (the original idea was a Shmwario Waft but I changed it to be a bit more couth). It's also a fun callback to Wario's penchant for garlic burritos in the long-inactive World of Plight, which I've referenced a few times in this section.
I originally considered Kellonald's, but a return to the Sipping Time Café to call back to the first edition of this section seemed appropriate.
For the officiant for Connor and Jasmine's wedding, I tried to think of community characters who could pull off the role... and my first and only thought was Agent 30, given his penchant for every disguise under the sun. I talked with Revin about it and, luckily, he did have an unused minister in his folder of disguises!
Despite working with Agent 30 in Investigations 4, Shmaisy is unable to fully recognize him as Father Mac. Canonically, she was never able to piece together that all of his disguises were actually the same person.
Unfortunately, 64DD hasn't been around for a while, so I took a swing at the Erudite Goose myself to get the Rogueport gang back together one more time. (As an aside, please be respectful with use of legacy characters!) Sticky Warrior's absence is a little more intentional...
The dialogue between Connor and Russo just before the ceremony is another, much less subtle "in five minutes" reference.
I floated the idea of Detective Luigi speaking up during the "speak now or forever hold your peace part" just to be a little bit of a troll, but CoCo was against it, so we didn't do that. The Chief Palmer gag probably works better anyway!
According to Revin, Father Mac's book may or may not be the Dark Prognosticus. Don't worry about it.
Another unused idea for Luigi was for him to make a comment about not being in the wedding party, even though Shmaluigi got to be a groomsman in his.

First edition of Too Bad, Storytime! The opportunity to write stories featuring other characters was something I wanted to do for a while, and this idea popped into my head with Shmaluigi still being on hiatus during the villain special. I expected it to be a lot shorter than it was but it ended up being my longest story for The 'Shroom to date. Whoops! It's kind of funny that WT has nothing to do with this story even though the section title evokes him and he's in the banner.
This is, I believe, the first time I've explicitly acknowledged Mario Boards Mega Brawl in a canonical project? So let me set the record straight here - I don't consider it canon to the stories of any of the characters I've submitted to be brawlers, but it's still a thing that happened (chalk it up to AU shenanigans) and it's canon for Teller specifically since he's tied to the greater lore of the event itself.
Flambé first showed up in my Favorite Written 'Shroom Section presentation from 2024, so that's a fun little callback.
Teller's comment about the personal assistant ad is a reference to the Classifieds staff collab! See if you can spot him...
She's not mentioned by name, but the Magiblot figure is Hekki, Pitohui's RP from ARKG, since it was mentioned at the end of MBMB2 that the top ten brawlers got merchandised. Aside from Teller still being a little bitter about the outcome of ARKG, Hekki also just barely pushed MBMB!Teller out of the top ten, so no merch for him...
Redwood Reserve is actually the setting of a forum game idea I haven't hosted yet! Felt appropriate to bring it out here, though. The gameshow Teller hosts was heavily inspired by the many Lemmy's Land fanfics based on Survivor that I read back in the day.
I originally had plans for an earlier scene with The Vanisher, showing Teller making the deal with him. I ended up cutting it for the sake of pacing, so now Teller's explanation of the show to Florida doubles as one for the readers instead of repeating stuff they already know.
Oh yeah, another in five minutes reference.
Teller's comments at Feathers' expense when he thinks he's a chicken is a reference to Werner Herzog, the dialogue is lifted almost verbatim from him because it's funny.
This arc actually sets up a lot of lore! Lucky and Graphite Guy (along with General Camo, who we'll see later) were created for future story ideas, but they get to appear here first. Also, when I first created Terrakingpin, I had him in mind as someone who would play a bigger role after Monty Brando's defeat, so this was a fun way to bring him back into the fold that wasn't just escaping offscreen and suddenly he's back.
Teller's specific word choice of not being a charity shop is a callback to the Charity Shop room from ARKG.
Boo1268 pitched the idea of Florida hiring a character named Sparky to handle lighting, who would prove to be a massive annoyance to even Teller (and ultimately drain his bank account at the end of the story). Ultimately, I ended up not using this because the story was already pretty long and I felt Teller was getting enough focus already.
The Tellies are based on Telly Vision (no relation) from Chibi-Robo.
Speaking of word choice references, "OKAY CAMPERS, RISE AND SHINE!" is a Pizza Tower reference!
The whole notion that some of the characters think the Shroobs were ever at the facility is kind of funny because I think it might stem from a misreading of Teller's dialogue that I never bothered to correct because it ultimately didn't matter! But yeah, the idea was that the Shroob invasion from Partners in Time pretty much brought the search for extraterrestrial life to a screeching halt by confirming that yeah there are aliens.
I had to pull out Invasion of the Uncomfortably Slimy Space Creatures as a 'Shroomfest reference here! Of course, since Feathers was used in the Fantasy vs. Sci-Fi thread, he's well familiar with the event.
Teller pretty clearly alludes to the ARKG survivors when the villains turn on him. His Doctor Octopus-esque cable limbs (hence the reference to looking like something from a comic book) come straight from the ending of that game.
Teller switching to different channels if his antennae get messed with enough is new, but I thought it would be fun! Cowboy Teller is an idea I got from thinking about Mario Kart World alts and the Mario Day drawing I did where he got a Mario mustache, but shows up here specifically because of the Deltarune Woody theories. Let's just say some of his word choice was very intentional... The second form alludes to Shbig Changes, the former design of Mr. Shbeeg, thanks to Revin using his lore generating power from ARKG to make Teller based on Shbig's OS. There's no explicit references to Shbig because that character design has been fully retired.
Teller's exclamation of "HOLY FARNSWORTH" is again lifted from ARKG, and refers to Philo Farnsworth, who received the first television patent.
Feathers stealing Teller's voicebox was Boo's idea. He'll be fine, but for now he deserves a little misery!

Part 1

We're sticking with the running gag of Sticky Warrior arcs being named after Donkey Kong Country levels, but this one was pulled from Tropical Freeze instead of Returns. It's a little tangential here, but is meant to reference the team-up between Shmaluigi, Sticky, and Mowz.
Remember when I said Sticky Warrior's absence at Shmaluigi's wedding was intentional? Yeah, this is why! He was messing around with Circle of Six stuff during that whole arc. NS and I were already planning to do this collab for a while, and I asked him if he wanted to have the Sticky Warrior there, but we decided it would be better to hold off.
I intentionally set this arc immediately after Connor and Jasmine's honeymoon because of the plot thread with Chief Palmer at the end of the last arc. NS approached me about this collab a while ago (I think it was early on when I was working on Light at the End of the Tunnel, but might've even been before that), so I didn't want to push it off any longer, but I also didn't want to make it look like that plot thread was being totally brushed aside.
I had the idea of the Sticky Warrior jumpscaring Connor and Jasmine the moment they arrive back home, but that was moved to later in the story. Consequently, Sticky never sees Connor in his Duplighost form.
An alternate version of the introduction pitched by NS was to have Shmaluigi working on something unrelated with the NWPD when Kreep's old hideout exploded and they saw the Sticky Warrior afterward, then he would splash Shmaluigi and Chief Palmer with ink before disappearing. Naturally, this would cast a lot of suspicion on Sticky and make things very awkward for Shmaluigi when he was working with him later! This was actually pretty cool, but since Chief Palmer is tied up in unresolved plot thread land at the moment, I didn't want to use it.
Shmaluigi was originally going to see the hideout explosion when he was by JojaMart, as a rework of the above idea. As we developed the story further, it started to feel a little too chaotic since it would've happened immediately before the phone call and E.M.M.I. chase, so that was moved.
The mention of cryptic phone calls during Shmaluigi's last investigation is of course a direct reference to Spiky Don in the last arc.
I already spoiled it, but the robot that chases Shmaluigi is indeed Sticky's pet E.M.M.I., even though it's never mentioned by name.
Ms. Mowz having extremely keen intuition on the baddies in Despair Pub goes back to Rogues in Rogueport Mafia. Luigi 64DD had an extremely powerful investigative role with Ms. Mowz as the character on the rolecard, so she's similarly busted here.
"Go everywhere and touch everything" is a classic example of what not to do in a KG! Mostly because the hosts won't let you.
The mysterious informant, as is pretty typical, went through a few potential species options before we settled on one! Him being a Cleft and Rex were also floated, but Clefts didn't seem intelligent enough and I'd already done a powered-up Rex character in this section before. Lantern Ghost was pretty much perfect though and I got a design in my head almost immediately. I listened to "Fireplace" from Deltarune while writing him.

Part 2

Who's ready for scrapped plotlines? NS suggested the idea that Sticky, to have a wildcard up his sleeve, would temporarily absorb Jasmine's soul with his katana, granting him use of her water powers. We discussed exactly how to do this quite a bit - how to portray Sticky, whether Jasmine would be willingly going with it or not, what risk there would be (whether that's how the katana works itself, or some external force) - but ultimately we decided not to do this, and eventually this was replaced with the Spray Fish. I think, had we gone through with this, it would've driven a major wedge between Shmaluigi and Sticky regardless of the specifics and outcome.
Because discussing minute details is fun, we had to figure out whether they would travel to Inkopolis by plane or boat. The story's written in a way that doesn't explore the reasoning, but I thought boat might make more sense as something that would be more difficult to sabotage (and with less collateral) since the Circle of Six was watching them.
A lot of the little details and asides in the narration throughout this arc, like Sticky Warrior's boat joyride, came from offhand comments, observations, and jokes we made while writing that felt worth using somehow.
Captain Hairbanks is a returning character from Amusing Awards Artifact Adventure! Since Shmaluigi was only present for the Circinus portion of AKGO, he has no idea about the resemblance to Fairbanks.
"Chicken on a Raft" is an actual sea shanty! It's specifically referenced here in relation to raft-related events that happened involving Rose in an offsite game and I'm told they created tremendous brainrot.
As an alternative to the Spray Fish, we considered having a Nep-enut attack the boat. Spray Fish was funnier so it won!
NS helped a ton with the Splatoon elements and references, since my knowledge of that series is very lacking!
Here's some extra behind the scenes content: For some reason we ended up set on joking about a plot twist that Zurg was the true villain of this arc. By the time we got to the third part this also included six Morris clones in the basement! (Direct quote from me: "circle of six more like the zurgle of six")

Part 3

Sticky's father is without a doubt the most despicable character to ever grace this section and dang if NS didn't do a great job writing him to be the actual worst!
Sticky's more recent backstory includes events from NS' old Fake News section The Odyssey of a Squid. His father's comment about a "tragic little odyssey" also references the title of that section.
Shmaluigi's monologue when seeing the shapeshifting shadow creature references Shadoo (along with the Pit of 100 Trials) and Doopliss, though not by name. I tried to play a little bit with established Mario lore, so this is my explanation for why Doopliss wasn't able to copy Mario's form initially, while other Duplighosts have no problem with transformations - he was diverting too much magic to turning the villagers into pigs.

Part 1

If I had a nickel for every Halloween story someone suggested to me that ended up sitting on the shelf for a year, I'd have two nickels, which isn't a lot but it's weird that it happened twice. Boo pitched this one last year but I didn't do it at the time since I was preparing for Light at the End of the Tunnel. I also didn't want readers to have Duplighosts on their mind too much before I revealed that plot twist.
I'm told the Devil's Eye is a reference to a gem of the same name from the film The Rescuers.
Earlier on, I planned a scene where Shmaluigi and Shmwario went costume shopping (originally taking place in Shmwario's apartment before I realized it didn't make sense for him to have costumes in Shmaluigi's size). It would've featured a gag where Shmwario transformed into Morris and added a devil tail and horns. I ended up not writing it for the sake of length, and it was pretty tangential to the actual plot anyway.
Boo wanted to have a scene where Shmaluigi went to Killmore Hill with Jasmine beforehand to warn Boo about Tripliss and offer his services at the party later. I felt like the pacing was kind of rough and that this didn't need to be a whole extra scene, so I took what Boo had already written and repurposed what I could for the scene where Shmaluigi and Shmwario go to the party.
Putting Shmaluigi in a jester costume made me think of Jevil, so I couldn't help but make Shmwario's costume something kind of Spamton-esque. I considered just going with a telemarketer but it didn't feel right, then Pitohui helped me out with the car salesman angle and I decided it would be fun to go with Cowboy Jed from the Mario Kart Wii commercials. There's a nod to Spamton's "clown around town" line in Shmaluigi's narration and the more obvious reference of Shmwario calling Jed a big shot.
I couldn't help but toss in the haunted house gang from Amusing Awards Artifact Adventure for a fun little cameo in the Lich Yard, even though they don't show up at the party later. I've been wanting to do more with those guys. The Cereal Box Ghost doesn't appear but is mentioned by Bela, Cal is his real name.
As Shmaluigi realizes later, "Shmwario" wiping his shoes off on Boo's welcome mat is the first sign that something's off. Aside from serving that purpose as something out-of-character for Shmwario, it also just makes sense that a thief wouldn't want to track muddy footprints around.
Boo wanted to have Chief Palmer as one of the guests at the party but he was once again cut as I still haven't resolved those plot threads with him. Soon! In the meantime, he still gets a couple mentions in the story.
Richter Uppercrust IV is named after Richter Belmont. Originally his name was Richard Uppercrust III, but since that was almost identical to a character from Light at the End of the Tunnel, I asked Boo to change it. I'm not super familiar with the earlier Donkey Kong Country games so I originally thought he was supposed to be a Bristle from The Thousand-Year Door until Boo showed me the drawing he made of him, so that's kind of funny.
Boo wrote Mad Scienstein and Burghnust as appearing in the foyer when Shmaluigi and Boo rushed to lock the door, but when I rewrote that sentence to fit Shmaluigi better, I couldn't get them included in a way that didn't feel awkward, so the mention of them was cut. They're still meant to be there, and Shmaluigi recalls Mad Scienstein's presence later, just not acknowledged at the time.

Part 2

Shmwario calling Richter "Pricklepants" is a reference to Mr. Pricklepants from Toy Story 3.
Rarity was named after the My Little Pony character. Her middle name is Lorisa, but that was never used in the story.
Mad Scienstein's dialogue alludes to Boo's Mega Brawl Mines game. Boo's original writing for him directly mentioned the location, but I had him change it because of the close ties to the Mega Brawl and its weird state in canon. As-is, it's still a vague reference to the game's lore, but written in a way that it could plausibly refer to something else in-universe.
Although not mentioned by name, the Jibberjay is Jibber J. Walker, a returning character from The Most Dangerous Gameshow. I didn't really plan to use him again after that but he fits in pretty well here.
There was originally going to be another character interrogated after Jibber named Dion, a Moe-Eye wearing a tiki mask. (He also would've appeared in the foyer scene last part, but was cut for the same reasons. Worked out pretty well in hindsight.) We wrote his whole scene, but I ended up cutting it while doing my editing pass because the story ended up pretty long and I didn't feel like he was adding anything too unique.
Shmwario's "in five minutes" reference here was actually Boo's doing. I'm so proud of him...
Shmaluigi's narration in response to Shmwario's fury at Tripliss is pretty obviously a Pizza Tower reference.
Tripliss' Porcupuffer transformation replaced him turning into a Maw-Ray, which I didn't think made much sense because he was the only one in the water.
Specture's mention of him and Boo solving an earlier jewel theft references the events of Boo's Awards presentations for Outstanding Community Achievement and Favorite Non-Bowser Boss Battle this year.
Boo (user) originally wanted to have Boo (character) reveal that he knew Shmaluigi was a Duplighost at the end of the story. I didn't really want to do that because I want to keep that as something really impactful when it happens, and the more characters there are who are just able to have a sense about it, it raises questions about how Shmaluigi was actually able to keep the disguise up for so long with no one getting wise to him. I cut a line where Tripliss called Shmaluigi a Duplighost as well for the same reasons.

I made a new banner for this one, mostly for the sake of giving readers visual references for Commander Nebula and Captain Stardust. Depending on the featured characters I may swap it out more in the future.
Captain Stardust was named for one of the endgame Lunar Events in Terraria, which came about when I was playing the game in the months leading up to writing this and took notice of one of them being called Nebula, so it seemed like a fun idea to make some supporting characters for her named after the others. I almost went with Vortex instead, but it seemed better suited to a more authoritative character.
Nebula's opening monologue references the Toad Brigade's search for Planet Stasiak, as shown in Shoey's trilogy of News Flushes that concluded this issue. Thought that would be a fun little nod.
Super Mario Galaxy 2 is a lot lighter on worldbuilding than the first game (read Quizmelon's special about this, it's good!) but I tried my best to try and make Puzzle Plank feel like a lived-in place for the brief time we spend there in this story.
The concept of Nebula dealing with insects originating outside of known space is very very loosely based on a story concept Boo pitched to me, but that one was a lot higher stakes and I wanted to do something shorter and low-key for this issue. They're otherwise wholly distinct stories.
The art pieces Nebula remembered are supposed to be a nod to some of the earlier Scribble tournaments, where Hungry Lumas gained a reputation for being particularly cursed in the game! Thanks Hearts.

Shmalu Sniffer · Apr 20, 2025

Alright now all we need is the character updates then this will be FULLY UPDATED

Cloudwalker · Apr 22, 2025

Reading through the older issues of this; dang, this is a great work!

Cloudwalker · Apr 27, 2025

Was wondering, what happened to the section's YouTube channel?

Shmalu Sniffer · Apr 27, 2025

DryBonesBandit said:
Was wondering, what happened to the section's YouTube channel?

yeah i was kinda wondering that myself

Shmaluigi · Apr 27, 2025

That was entirely run by Magolor, I think he got busy with other commitments so it fell to the wayside.

Magolor · Apr 27, 2025

Yeah, that's on me. I'd like to get back on that, but also I need to focus on school lol.

Shmalu Sniffer · May 2, 2025

Hey i just realised wheres Bandwitch?

Cloudwalker · May 2, 2025

The big house, last I checked.

Maybe not last Shmaluigi checked…

Shmaluigi · May 2, 2025

Boo1268 said:
Hey i just realised wheres Bandwitch?

His section debut was in Issue 200 and I haven't gotten that far with the expansion yet.

Shmalu Sniffer · May 2, 2025

ah i see
also just to clarify a character only gets addaed to this list if they make more than one appearance in multiple storys.

Shmaluigi · May 2, 2025

Boo1268 said:
ah i see
also just to clarify a character only gets addaed to this list if they make more than one appearance in multiple storys.

Not necessarily, a one-off character with a notable enough role could be included here. Also, guest characters get added no questions asked since they almost always have some history behind them outside of the section.

Cloudwalker · May 2, 2025

Waluigi Time said:
Not necessarily, a one-off character with a notable enough role could be included here. Also, guest characters get added no questions asked since they almost always have some history behind them outside of the section.

~~so, Jasmine added when?~~

Shmaluigi · May 2, 2025

DryBonesBandit said:
~~so, Jasmine added when?~~

Depends on how long it takes me to get around to catching up...

Shmalu Sniffer · May 2, 2025

Wait now I'm confused why was Bandwitch removed then?

Shmaluigi · May 2, 2025

Boo1268 said:
Wait now I'm confused why was Bandwitch removed then?

He wasn't removed, I just never got around to adding him in the first place.

Shmalu Sniffer · May 2, 2025

Ah I see forgive my Idiocy.

Shmalu Sniffer · Sep 3, 2025

Mavero: Hold on there a moment bub! Wheres my cousin Jackston!? Hes an intergral part of these storys! And was a Major Feature in MY Story too! So wheres his credit?

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