September 13th, 2005

Mario Turns 20

By Sean Fisher
Contributing Writer, RealTechNews

Mario
I expect Mario to spend more and more time in Japan through the upcoming year. This is not because I expect Japan to be Nintendo’s only saving grace for the Revolution (which I do). Rather, as of today, Mario is of legal drinking age in Japan. Hit the clubs, Mario!

“The biggest icon in video games is 20 years old. Mario, the pudgy plumber is celebrating his birthday today. Twenty years ago, Mario appeared in his first true adventure in Super Mario Bros. on Japan’s Famicom system. Since then, he’s been responsible for worldwide sales of over 180 million units of software. “ Source: Kotaku

Good News-Bad News: It is great that Mario has been able to hang around this long, but with Sony as the top dog and Microsoft gaining market share I can only hope we will get to see him turn 30.

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6 comments to "Mario Turns 20"

  1. Lockergnome's Tech News Watch says:

    Super Mario Turns 20 Today

    By Sean Fisher, Contributing Writer, RealTechNews I expect Mario to spend more and more time in Japan through the upcoming year. This is not because I expect Japan to be Nintendo’s only saving grace for the Revolution (which I do). Rather, as of today…

    September 13th, 2005 at 2:07 pm

  2. Brian says:

    Donkey Kong, the arcade game that gave “birth” to the Mario character, is even older (1982 or thereabouts).

    September 13th, 2005 at 2:46 pm

  3. Bill King says:

    Over here in .au he’s been of legal drinking age for a good 2 years now :)

    September 13th, 2005 at 3:29 pm

  4. ed3 says:

    Yes, the Super Mario game is 20 years old, but the Mario character is older. Someone else mentioned Donkey Kong (1981, Mario the “Carpenter”). Then there was the first “Mario Brothers” game (1983, Mario the “Plumber”)… Either way, Mario is older than stated.

    http://www.classicgaming.com/tmk/mario_history.shtml

    http://www.atariage.com/cart_page.html?SoftwareLabelID=286&ItemTypeID=CART

    Maybe it’s actually the (US release of) NES that has turned 20…

    September 14th, 2005 at 5:37 am

  5. Sean Fisher says:

    I guess Nintendo didn’t count Mario as “born” until he debuted on a Nintendo console. This occured on the Famicom (NES) on 9/13/85.

    Or it is possible he is embarrased and simply lying about his age

    September 14th, 2005 at 9:34 am

  6. Random thoughts, opinions, and what not says:

    Mario Tturns 20

    On September 13th 2005, the video game legend known as Mario turned 20 years old. His first appearance was in Super Mario Brothers, on Japan’s Famicom System. Read all about it at Real Tech News.

    September 18th, 2005 at 6:01 pm

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