What if a Mario game had 2D animated cutscenes?

Okay, let's get this out of the way for all you jokers
Okay, the real question is what if a Mario game had GOOD 2D animated cutscenes?

Now, the closest to that right now is Wario Land: Shake It, but I'm personally talking about a game that stars Mario himself, would he lend himself greatly to them or would it not work? I think the best they can do is a classical mime cartoon style where Mario doesn't talk too much but is left to funny stuff that happens in the environment, letting actions speak for themselves, the cutscenes themselves being transitions for the levels.
What do you think?

Depends. If he's fully voiced, NO. If others talk for him, like Sunshine, maaaaybe. You said 2D in the title, and I don't think 2D works for any type of cutscene.

I'm actually okay with the concept of Mario speaking in cutscenes, if they can handle it as gracefully as they did with Luigi in Luigi's Mansion: Dark Moon and Wario in the WarioWare Gold I don't see it being a problem here. In games like Fortune Street and the Mario vs. Donkey Kong series, we've seen that Charles Martinet can deliver on a good talkative Mario when he's given the opportunity.

Mario speaking is not really a good idea, and I like him more when he's speachless and just moves his hands to talk like in the Paper Mario games. However, other characters talking works.

Mewta said:

Okay, the real question is what if a Mario game had GOOD 2D animated cutscenes?

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What do you mean this isn't good, I'm pretty sure that it's common consensus that this is one of the greatest pieces of animation ever.

Like, at the time it was a masterpiece. Even compared to the Zelda CD-I games, because there the cutscene had (very) bad perspective.

Moldomré said:

Depends. If he's fully voiced, NO. If others talk for him, like Sunshine, maaaaybe.

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Toadgamer said:

Mario speaking is not really a good idea, and I like him more when he's speachless and just moves his hands to talk like in the Paper Mario games. However, other characters talking works.

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LeftyGreenMario would find these posts offensive.

Moldomré said:

Depends. If he's fully voiced, NO.

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Toadgamer said:

Mario speaking is not really a good idea, and I like him more when he's speachless and just moves his hands to talk like in the Paper Mario games. However, other characters talking works.

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NanoPhoenix said:

In games like Fortune Street and the Mario vs. Donkey Kong series, we've seen that Charles Martinet can deliver on a good talkative Mario when he's given the opportunity.

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Fortune Street doesn't have speech, there's just speech bubbles.

But it's so refreshing to see Mario talk and have no awful middlemen standing for him and denying his agency.

Bland silent protagonists who are clearly supposed to be their own characters (like the hero characters in Persona or Gordan Freeman) are pretty much an outdated trope and it doesn't work with Mario, who is shown to speak himself in the past, even in nonvideogame material as Charles Martinet. The only places I see it work are if your characters are your own personal ones like in Skyrim or Spore or the Doomguy where his actions just work, something incredibly challenging to pull off without making him bland too.

Mario being silent is just one of the main reasons I don't think he's a fun character to use as compared to the other Mario characters who are allowed to be portrayed as themselves, such as Luigi (even though Luigi sometimes falls victim to the bland silent character syndrome).

There's only so much you could do with just body language as your only means of communication especially for your main protagonist. There's a point in animated cutscenes where it looks extremely awkward instead of charming. Super Mario Sunshine especially showcased how it looks awkward with Mario being unable to speak at all. The same thing with Wario Land: Shake It, where characters don't even lip sync and just awkwardly stand there while you read subtitles (which additionally distracts from what's going on in the visual medium; I don't mind subtitles myself but some people don't like them because of that reason)

...Paper Mario...?

Paper Mario, one of the blandest Mario's out there. He is very limited. His walking tools are as bad as that rotten fungus or that floating yellowed tennis ball, arguably even worse because of how they work (only one out at a time), they make some generic quip when Mario is clearly more suited to express something that actually stands out. Mario still mostly awkwardly stands there most of the time. He makes a few gestures, yeah, but character interaction with him there never stood out to me. At least Mario & Luigi, there's actual character interaction between Mario and his perma partner.

Princess Mario said:

Fortune Street doesn't have speech, there's just speech bubbles.

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It doesn't? I haven't played Fortune Street yet but I knew that Mario had dialogue in it from what I read on the wiki, I just didn't know it was in speech bubbles.

Yeah, that's what you see from above. They meant speech in the bubbles. I hope that wasn't TOO disappointing for you, because I love Fortune Street Mario nevertheless.



He's so cute when he's mad! :3