winstein

Recently I've watched a retrospective on ShiftyLook, which is an initiative from Namco to promote their lesser-known series to a new audience. Although Namco do indeed have the more well-known brands like Pac-Man and Tekken, this initiative seems to focus more on works that have potential to be revived. Some of the IPs that were included are definitely pretty obscure such as Golly Ghost. Overall though, I commend Namco for the handling of this initiative because it made good use of the obscure series, and there's the fact that the professionals who worked on it were paid well, which leads to a few successes like Bravoman and Wonder Momo. Even then, its misdirected marketing meant that it had a short life. Link to the video in question: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rw1ifbOvb2w

One thing that was brought up in the video was how Namco was the second-most noted game company to reference their past a lot, with the first (and only briefly mentioned) being Nintendo. That is what my post is going to be about: how Nintendo references their past rather frequently. It doesn't take long to see how Nintendo does it, such as the time when they talked about the Nintendo Switch back in January 2017 when they reference their past hardware in terms of combining the strengths of each into one system, and then that's not even going into how deep into the history of Nintendo the Smash series goes into (since Melee). Namco may do all these Easter egg references even as early as 1980 (Galaga ship in Pac-man), but I felt that Nintendo does it more meaningfully within the games. So going back to Namco, the fact that they extended their initiative outside of games and to hire outsiders (from game development) puts them at an advantage.

This is why I would be very interested to see what would result in this type of initiative if Nintendo makes it happen. It's true that Nintendo is a more traditional type of company whereas Namco is more open, but there are some Nintendo IPs that I can see people having fun playing with, in a creative sense. Like for example, I'm sure Ice Climber will be in demand thanks to Smash Bros shoring up its popularity, but some less popular IPs would be much preferred, like I guess Doshin the Giant or Sushi Striker. I guess Nintendo is not really in a position to accept a unique angle for their IPs, especially because they would prefer to build on what has worked. Actually I wouldn't mind it if they do want people to present their well-known IPs in a different light.

Maybe if Nintendo isn't really open to the idea, I guess SEGA might be up next, since their smaller IPs (of which they have an abundance of) have a loyal following, so maybe the fans could come up with creative ways to present them.

Thank you for reading.

Game series where the first game is the one with the most sales is pretty fascinating. The fact that the first game sold the best indeed demonstrated the viability to turn a single game into a series, which I think it's fair, but usually future games improved on the first game so one might think that they are deserving of higher sales but that is surprisingly not the case. It's as if the first game has never really been outdone.

An example of where the first game had the most sales is the Kirby series. At around 5 million, Kirby's first game on the Game Boy made a huge impact, while the next-best selling game is Kirby Star Allies, which is a distant second since the difference is about 2 million. Another example of a game series where sales of the first game is the highest is the Wario games, where not even the WarioWare games beaten out the first Wario Land on the Game Boy, though in Wario's case, having Mario in the title does that. Even Dr. Mario had never achieved the success his first games (on Game Boy and NES) achieved, since future games didn't reach a million.

Contrast this with some series where it wasn't the first game that got the most sales: Super Mario Bros. might be considered the first game for the series but it was not the first Mario game (remember that Donkey Kong and Mario Bros. preceded it), and even some of Mario's spin-offs managed to beat the first game in their respective series in sales, such as Mario Kart, Mario Party and Luigi's Mansion. A few other examples of game series that fit this criteria include Final Fantasy, Animal Crossing and The Legend of Zelda. These games have later iterations that improved from what their predecessors offered that made them a more valued package, plus there are other factors such as platform reach or mainstream popularity.

I do not know what the reason the first game didn't get beat, but I think one reason is due to how similar later games ended up in which didn't properly justify getting it after the first game. Take Dr. Mario for example, the core gameplay is practically unchanged which meant that Miracle Cure for example isn't really much different or improved from the first Dr. Mario, whereas Puyo Puyo exploded in popularity because a simple mechanic in its second game practically changed the core gameplay that made it engaging competitively. In Kirby's case, I have to imagine the lustre of a game that beginners can complete had waned off since there are many other options for casual players since the first game.

Are there any other examples of game series where the first game sold the best?

Thank you for reading.

That's one mighty fine signature you got there

There seems a particular policy from the creators that can be a point of contention from fans, and that would be "mandates". The existence of mandates is reasonable from the perspective of a creator so that a creation isn't wholly mishandled. Like for example, Mario has a set of guidelines on his character in order to represent the creator's intentions better, such as the fact that he is loyal. I do think that even with the existence of mandates, it would only be a point of (the aforementioned) contention when fans felt that it interfered with a creation they liked.

In Mario's case, the mandates became a sour subject when it was discovered that Paper Mario cannot have the same types of concepts introduced in the first few games, or that original characters cannot be introduced in spin-offs any longer save for rare cases. In days past Mario was allowed to be more liberal in interpreting the characters, most notably the Mario Strikers series and to a lesser extent the Camelot games. I doubt that fans would complain about mandates if a creation is perceived as healthy, so for example, there may not be complaints about any possible mandates in the Kirby series.

Sonic is another series where mandates are a point of contention, and that is made known due to the comics. Ian Flynn did mention a number of restrictions in the characters, such as Sonic not being able to strongly emote or how certain characters are off-limits (Eggman Nega). In the case of the comics, it can be traced back to a lawsuit by a former writer who was not happy with how a Sonic RPG used concepts that he also used, and the results of the ensuing lawsuits meant that save for the current writers' characters, the previous characters and concepts had to be excised in some way, and a reboot was the perfect setup to start with a clean slate, much to some fans' dismay. The games are affected too, so things that were established can't be used like how the planet had to be referred to as "Sonic's World" when to the West it was known as Mobius (note that it's only named as such in the West). The branding unification in favour of Japan's interpretation of Sonic is not exactly liked by all in the West, since in the West Sonic has a whole lot of interpretations, evidenced by how there are a few wildly different designs for Robotnik.

In my opinion there is a place for mandates because for example, I would never want SuperMarioGlitchy4's interpretation of Mario to be portrayed officially because it betrays the reason I love Mario as a character. On the other hand, the mandates have some disappointments like how Waluigi may not appear officially in a Super Mario title, although in this case, I have a feeling that it's not one mandate that will last forever so it may change.

Thank you for reading.

Are you really from Malaysia?

I can't tell if that's Mario or Wario. (It's been bugging me as long as you've had the pfp)

It just occurred to me that of the Mario series, Dr. Mario has never gotten a full-priced game since Dr. Mario 64. The games that Dr. Mario have gotten since the Nintendo 64 game are either:

• Part of a compilation (e.g.: Nintendo Puzzle Collection, Dr. Mario & Puzzle League)
• Digital-only game (e.g.: Dr. Mario Online Rx, Dr. Mario: Miracle Cure)

Even the other Mario series have games that are priced higher and have physical games, such as Mario Party, Mario Tennis, Mario Golf, and yes, even the Mario & Sonic games. I think that might be why I was surprised that Dr. Mario got the mobile game treatment two years ago, which I should point out is a pretty appropriate choice given how puzzle games is a good fit for mobile.

But really, I think that perhaps Dr. Mario's traditional aspects are probably not very open to being fully-featured, because it's a rather basic puzzle game. Dr. Mario 64 does well to expand the concept because it has a story mode, 4-player matches, decent new modes and a story mode, which was the last time Dr. Mario got such an expansion. Every other game following it have new features yes, but the new stuff aren't quite grand. Take Dr. Mario Online Rx: it has a couple solid additions being the online gameplay and the Virus Buster mode, but I guess it doesn't do too much to elevate it beyond being digital-only. If I recall correctly, Dr. Mario games generally have a lower value going forward, as Miracle Cure is basically US$10 and is rather light in features (you can't even select the music!).

Mario Party, by comparison, is generally fully-featured, as it comes with enough features that allow it to justify its higher price and existence of a physical game. Like for example, it has several boards, a glut of minigames and new features. And while not everybody thinks it's a positive outcome, it's a series that has a good track record of multi-million sellers, which would explain why there's a subsidiary (ND Cube) that pumps out those games even when the original developer was absorbed (by Konami), but that's because the staff came from that company to continue making party games.

Personally to me, I also think that Dr. Mario games tend to be underwhelming because its single player mode that it's known for is not very engaging in the long term, and its VS tend to be slow until Miracle Cure. Hard drop is added in Online Rx I believe (or is it the DSi follow up?), which helps, but Miracle Cure added power ups to speed up games. But I felt that as an overall package it's not inherently engaging in a way that other Mario games like Kart, Tennis or even Party (locally) tend to be.

So what could be done with Dr. Mario that would qualify as it being a fully-featured game again? I felt that the strengths of every Dr. Mario game so far could be combined. For example, we should be able to choose every music from every game so far including a few new tunes, have a story mode like in 64, a stage mode like in Miracle Cure or World, able to choose our favourite characters like in World, and an engaging VS in World (though maybe that requires rethinking its mechanics). Heck, I wouldn't mind a Puyo Puyo crossover because after all, Tetris + Dr. Mario is there and Puyo Puyo + Tetris is too, so the next logical step is to combine Puyo Puyo and Dr. Mario.

As one of the earliest spin-offs in the Mario franchise, I thought that Dr. Mario deserves something that could be fully-featured.

Thank you for reading.

"Excellente!!" - Mario from Mario Golf 64

On the Super Mario Wiki, I am basically writing the Dr. Mario World pages that list down the stages. As of now, I have completed pages from World 2 to World 14 (World 1's partial revision is on the list). There are a few reasons I am doing this.

• The first thing is how I really liked this game the first time I played it, even though I started quite late at the end of February.
• Another thing is that on the Mario Wiki, a lot of the time there are people lining up to contribute to articles about popular games, and it's appropriate too since they have the resources to furnish the pages (such as screenshots). I often felt like I don't have much to contribute to the wiki beyond references. With this game, it appears that there's nobody who does that, so I felt that it's something that I can do.
• Because this game's on the mobile, it's really easy to take snapshots to do comparisons.
• I managed to overcome every stage in this game thus far, which means that I am practically up-to-date with what the game has to offer.
• The game has changes between versions that I don't know if anybody's willing to tackle. I noticed this when I was doing one of the Worlds and something felt off between my first completion and the next time I checked, and that was the moment I knew that the game has changes that would be worth documenting.

It's actually challenging to do these. For one, when I write the descriptions for each stage, I made sure to write down as many parts of the level that can't be seen, such as how many lines the stage scrolls, the sequence of coins unlocking and what things the flasks will shoot out. Comparing the stages between the old and the new is also something of a challenge because of the need to put the layouts side-by-side to see what's change. I admit that whatever I did isn't perfect (there are times where I changed terms in every article I written that I felt weren't correct), but I suppose what I did so far should be satisfactory.

Given how unpopular this game is compared to something like Mario Kart Tour, I kind of doubt anybody's going to care about these articles, but since it's something I felt that I can only do (within this community at least), these pages are slowly updated by me. I do get some words of compliments by a few people in the Dr. Mario World community, so it's not all that bad.

Thank you for reading.

Would you like a Mario artbook/encyclopedia dealing with all things Mario Party?

Somehow it's saddening to hear if a favourite character is gameplay-unviable, but somehow gladdening if they are super viable.

For example, Daisy is super viable in Mario Kart Wii because her inside stats are favourable, namely her +Speed. On the other hand, someone argued that Daisy is the absolute worst character in VS, citing her slow attacking speed and skill speed, and difficult-to-use skill. The kicker is that a certain word associated with defecation is used to describe her (and I have kind of a strong reaction with things described that way).

I remembered asking on another forum if people's perception of a Pokemon diminished if they found out how unviable they are (such as Farfetch'd), and surprisingly the examples are more positive. As an example, there's Heatran. If you don't know how Heatran looks like, this is Heatran:

Heatran is hardly what you call a nice-looking Pokemon, but it is one of the best competitive Pokemon. There are several things going for Heatran: great type combination backed by a good ability that negates Fire moves, stats that allowed it to be a powerful attacker, a nice tank or an annoyer and how well its qualities synergise with a great deal of Pokemon.

Thank you for reading.

Some characters seem to only be recognisable when they wear certain things, such as how Batman is most recognisable with his bat suit on, or basically most superheroes for that matter. This comment is inspired by Skull Kid, who I noticed something about it. Take a look at how he's originally portrayed:


However, this is the most recognisable version of the Skull Kid, and in fact is what the Smash Bros. games normally used to represent him:


In case you can't see the images, basically it's only when the Skull Kid wears the Majora's Mask is he more well-known compared to his lack of it.

On the other hand, some characters are not dependent on the clothes they wear to be recognisable. For example, even though Mario's perfected his overalls look, he's still known as Mario even though he donned his doctor's outfit, a tennis uniform or even his cat suit. Characters who don't wear clothes seems to benefit more from this, such as Sonic or Pikachu, so even though they wear a hat or put on a coat, they are still distinctive.

Thank you for reading.

There is a topic on the Marioverse boards that I've glanced, one that's about the first Mario game played. Mine would be the first Super Mario Bros. game (1985) despite not playing this on that very year, but that's not what I am here to talk about. When I recalled my first Mario game played, another thought came to me: the games that got people into Mario tend to be from the past that I can think of, like mainly from NES or SNES, such as Super Mario Bros., Super Mario World, Super Mario Kart and so on.

This got me into a bit of a despair because I can't think of a concrete example of a newer Mario game that got people into Mario in a mass scale. Now, I need to point out that there are certainly examples of newer Mario games that did got people into it, with New Super Mario Bros DS and Wii being the biggest ones, but I do not really think it's as big as I thought, given how the boards are still kind of small fry compared to the likes of Sonic and Pokemon. It's just that... there are some Mario games that do not have this sort of influence, at least not something like the newer Mario Party games or newer Paper Mario games, even though I do not mind those games myself. Like there are games that I can see the positive sides of, like the newer Paper Mario games, but when I'm probably asked about it, I would struggle to think of the type of people who would cite those games as something people would see the positive sides on, especially if they already developed a negative reputation.

If you don't fully understand what I am meaning to convey, I understand: as it does feel a bit scattered. The gist of it is that: for any Mario game that I liked or able to find the plus sides on but are popularly disliked, I am kind of sad about those. Mainly because: I sometimes questioned if optimism is even welcomed.

Thank you for reading.

Adding birth dates to characters is something I thought was strange because it usually felt like adding unnecessary details to a character. Related to this is adding the blood types to characters, which as far as I know, is mainly a Japanese thing. The first time I found out about birthdays is on the Puyo Puyo Fever 2 website, where every character featured had a birthday.

What seems silly to me is undoubtedly celebrated by a lot of people though. As an example, Mewtwo's birth date is mentioned to be 6th of February.


It's a minor detail, but one that fans are willing to celebrate. Undoubtedly, any series that specifically list character birthdays would get a similar treatment.


It really goes to show that not everything that is seemingly superfluous is not appreciated, because there's always someone who would appreciate certain tidbits about their favourite characters.

Thank you for reading.

I think I will bring this question up again, given that it's already buried by a number of profile posts as to be out of view:

I have made a thread called "Gauging Popular Opinions" around five weeks ago, and I am interested to know what did you all think about it so far? I am a bit concerned that the relatively small activity means that not many people are interested, but at the same time, it's not that bad since it's not single-digit results.

Some feedback is also welcomed.

Thank you for reading.

I have made a thread called "Gauging Popular Opinions" around five weeks ago, and I am interested to know what did you all think about it so far? I am a bit concerned that the relatively small activity means that not many people are interested, but at the same time, it's not that bad since it's not single-digit results.

Some feedback is also welcomed.

Thank you for reading.

There is a pretty common sentiment, although probably only by a vocal minority that Japanese voice acting is superior, even by non-Japanese fans. However, something I have noticed is that Mario is very much an English voice-acted series, even in Japan. I like to imagine that even in Japan, Mario's English voice acting is the superior one because it's the only one they've stuck with, unlike say, Sonic. That would be amusing to think about because it's a rare inverse case.

Thank you for reading.

According to Wikipedia, cohabitation is pretty common in the Western countries, so much so that when the media reflects on this trend, it surprised me that the characters aren't married. For the uninitiated, cohabitation is the practice of a couple living together without going through official marriage. I think the cultural differences are in play here since such a practice is pretty common in the West, but practically rare (if there is ever any) in the East.

Take this comic from Our Super Adventure, a webcomic by an English (as in the UK) woman, which is more or less autobiographical. No kidding: I always thought those two characters were married all along, given that "Our Super Adventure" could also imply that it's about a married couple.

Amusingly, the source of this comic mentioned that the mothers of those folks saw it coming: https://www.oursuperadventure.com/comic/a-super-question/

Obviously, there are American examples too. Take this On a Claire Day comic strip dated 21st January 2009, where Paul had made the momentous decision to move in with Claire to alleviate her apartment's maintenance. The context is that Claire was fired from her second job as a retail worker (she still kept her librarian job until the end of the comic), which caused her to worry about her financial future. Like real life, one of the justifications for cohabitation is to bear the burden of the cost of living, which I imagine is huge in Western countries. If one were to read this comic after this event, one might also mistake them for marriage, as I did. It's only when I read the archive that some things are not what they are assumed to be. Actually, this comic strip is an example of one that does not abide by the status quo, which is refreshing. If the time comes, I will write an article about it.


Unfortunately for me, I can't find examples of cohabitation in other types of media like a TV show, a cartoon or a video game, so if you managed to spot on, feel free to mention it.

Thank you for reading.

Nickelodeon officially put Garfield in their line-up

Something I have realised is that when somebody likes the same thing that I do, I take a bigger interest in that person compared to someone who like something I am either neutral on or dislike. For example, if somebody likes Mario the character, then I felt like I have a bigger affinity to that person as opposed to somebody who prefers Luigi. Another example would be if somebody likes a comic strip that is outside the two comic strips that people claim are the last great comic strips, such as Garfield, Pickles and Zits. As an example, I like BourgyMan because he's one of the cartoonists who likes Garfield and Mario, and there's also the creator behind Bee and Puppycat.

That isn't to say that I don't like it when somebody liked what I didn't like, which is a prevalent attitude. After all, it would be bad form to convince somebody to stop liking something that they find valuable. That is mainly because I often felt that what I like aren't very popularly liked, so I know how it feels when somebody told me that I am not supposed to like a certain thing (example: Garfield).

Thank you for reading.

I had a discussion on Mario's strengths and weaknesses and I just thought about you forming a detailed opinion on that. I don't see much of drastic power inconsistencies in a single game series as much as Mario has.

The balance between control and freedom for the largest intellectual properties is interesting, because in a lot of known cases, a bias towards control tend to happen. Disney, for one, is quite notorious for this as they are the ones who appears to be sensitive about any unlicensed uses of Mickey Mouse, including as murals on daycare centres. They are, after all, the ones who fought to extend copyright periods to longer than the expected human lifespan. Another company that's notorious for control over their property is Nintendo, who is not exactly fond of the presence and popularity of certain Mario fangames. This include the Mario fangame where several people control their own Marios (Mario Royale) and a Mario spin on No Man's Sky. Overall, it's more frequent to hear of cases where a company exerted their need to control how their properties are handled by others, as cases of dissatisfaction are more frequent and louder.

The way companies exerted this control is also an opportunity for smaller companies to boost their image by showing that they are more lax with how other companies represented their properties. In the Disney example I mentioned, Universal Studios Florida and Hanna-Barbara Productions allowed the daycare to use their characters. Sonic is another example, as they've once famously made a comment that they won't resort to the takedown that Nintendo famously used.

While those companies do present better freedom for fans to use their properties, that doesn't mean that there is a laissez-faire with how their properties are treated, as they are just as ruthless on certain cases. This included a time when SEGA ordered a takedown on a fan-made Streets of Rage remake.

On the other side of the scale, Garfield is probably one of the big IPs with a freedom bias. While it's certainly true that they still have certain legal rights (and amusingly, their Terms of Use page has an informal intro), there are practically no objections to how fans portrayed the cat. In fact, a lot of people made fun of Garfield, such as the various horrific images of portray Garfield as an abomination that sought to hunt for Jon. Jim Davis is even famously very supportive to such efforts, and he's famously supported Garfield Minus Garfield. I suspect that if it were other comic creators, they would be unhappy about remove the titular character and making a mockery out of their work, but since Jim Davis set a precedence, they would balk at that idea of a takedown.

Thank you for reading.

I felt that there are some disappointments about the Mario series here, which I suppose is a given since the nature of a community is in some ways, insular. Even then, I am of the opinion that the Mario series is overall well-treated compared to many video game series, which is pretty amazing.

Perhaps if one were to appreciate what Mario has, one has to look at properties that are treated less well. Sonic is a very prominent example, so let's look at some things that Sonic had faltered.
- For one, Sonic had a very fractured view of the franchise, because at his early years he's already established at least 3 different continuities that include the 2 DiC cartoons, and the more serious cartoon is the one that fans preferred at that time (helped that the comics from Archie are based on this version), so much so that it's endured until now. That's not to mention the rebranding of Sonic since Adventure, his Boom continuity and son on. Whereas with Mario, his differing continuities are more consistent even with various tones, as they have the same main characters and they have the same general personality that doesn't clash much between continuities.
- Sonic's original development members are not exactly attached to the franchise, which might have affected the passion the games have. That's not to say that there aren't any passionate developers, but it's clearly not enough. Although Iizuka made Sonic Heroes possible, his dedication to making the game happen was clearly not enough to make it a top-notch title. The Mario series, especially Super Mario, has developers who are into making the games as great as they can be, and it shows.
- Sonic had a game that marked his overall plunge, namely his 2006 game "Sonic the Hedgehog". That game basically tainted the franchise even if there are some good games since then. Sure, Mario has some games that fans consider to be the equivalent of sin incarnates, but I never found them to be a game-breaker for the series, and in fact they're still very competently made.

Now for a few other things that are not comparison-based:
- Mario has a nice character design that is not based on trends, and is unusual for this. He's incredibly cartoonish, yet he's also the face of gaming, more so than game icons with a more idealistic and realistic figures. Some people consider Mario to be bland, but his design and his character are hardly "bland" in the grand scheme of things.
- Mario's spin-offs are generally successful, which is not something any series could claim. He has a successful puzzle series (Dr. Mario), a genre-defining racing series (Mario Kart), an unrivalled party series (Mario Party) and side characters that have generally successful series (Yoshi, Donkey Kong, Wario).

That's a few things I felt that fans might have taken the Mario series for granted. Are there anything else that I have missed?

Thank you for reading.

Anybody can be adapted to their environment, and so is the case when it comes to learning what characters say in video games, movies, books and so on. I do have quite a few myself.

For one, I have a tendency to say "Oh, my!". You might know that it's famously said by Kamek if you defeated Naval Piranha while it's dormant in Yoshi's Island, allowing the player to skip the boss battle. The same can be done in Woolly's World but since Piranha Plants are wrapped in wool (instead of popping off), the boss battle cannot be skipped.


I might even sometimes say "Mamma Mia!" because that's what Mario said quite regularly in Super Mario 64, and certain games. I guess the delivery of that line by Mario was memorable, so I kind of picked up that line.

One of Inspector Gadget's lines is "Wowzers!", and while I did say this before, what inspired me to say this line was from "Inspector Gadget's Field Trip", a show where Inspector Gadget in animated form explores cities from around the world. What struck out to me was his reaction when Australia's teachers have to travel long distances to provide education for children. Currently I can't find the part of the video, but hopefully if you do watch it, you will know what I mean. It's also helped that Mii-guel from Mario's Press Conference said this line ("Wowzers, love me some Mii!") when he enjoyed the moment he blocked off Mario's basketball dunk.

It might not even have to be watched to catch a phrase. As an example, there was a show called Goodness Gracious Me, which is basically an England-made Indian comedy show. But sometimes I would say "Goodness Gracious" where most people would prefer to use profanity. As you can tell, I am against the use of profanity even if it's standard vocabulary for many people.

Perhaps there can be an adaptive way to say a line. I used to say "Humma humma hum-tum", which was adapted from Wario saying "Wow, humma-humma ding-a-dong, you sure are!" in Wario's Press Conference. The context is different though: Wario said this because he was wowed by a female reporter (probably by her looks; the only record of this conference is through audio so I can't tell), but how I used it is as a general reaction of things.

Thank you for reading.