Super Mario Bros. Wonder team once experimented with live commentary

The new voice actor behind Mario in Super Mario Bros. Wonder is also the new voice of Wario in WarioWare: Move It!, Nintendo has confirmed. Voice actor Kevin Afghani has taken over for Charles Martinet in the roles of Mario and Luigi and, now, Wario.

There are many mysteries in the video game space that we’re not likely to get answered anytime soon. Then, there are the “curiosities” that honestly don’t make sense even WHEN someone in charge explains them. Case in point, Super Mario Bros Wonder was a landmark title for Nintendo both upon its announcement in June and its release last week. But not just because the game pushed the bounds of 2D platforming in unique ways but because there was a key change behind the scenes. Specifically, the longtime voice of Mario, Charles Martinet, was replaced. But despite that big departure, we didn’t find out who was the voice of Mario until MUCH later.

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Super Mario Bros. Wonder fans are now comparing the quality of Mario’s new voice actor with his old one. This is due to Kevin Afghani taking over the Mario role from Charles Martinet in Super Mario Bros. Wonder.

The original Super Mario Bros. on NES was made by a team of five people, and it seems every single one of them is still at Nintendo and was credited on Super Mario Bros. Wonder.

Super Mario Bros. Wonder is one the most unusual and surreal spins on a 2D Mario game that Nintendo has released in a long time, and so far, fans have embraced the new style and liveliness. One of the game's most interesting stylistic upgrades is expanded voice-over work from characters, and apparently, this was once planned to be much more ambitious. In a recent Ask the Developer blog post coinciding with the launch of Super Mario Bros. Wonder, game producer Takashi Tezuka and designer Koichi Hayashida spoke about many of the ideas that were worked on yet ended up being tossed into the development trash bin, including a live commentary feature that would praise - or judge - your every move.  According to game director Shiro Mori, Takashi pitched the idea of having live commentary on the game - just one of the ideas that the developers received via 2,000+ sticky notes. The concept went pretty far into the development, with a full six months of work done. It was used in internal play-tests and even included tsundere-style commentary, a personality that hides genuine tenderness behind a cold exterior and is especially popular in Japanese media .

It turns out that Super Mario Bros. Wonder had a “live commentary” feature during its development that would have matched players’ actions as they progressed through the 2D platformer’s levels, with the option to switch the generic default voice to “tsundere commentary”. However, it didn't make the final cut.

Super Mario Bros. Wonder is a pretty major shake up for the plumber's 2D outings, and despite there being a lot of creativity on display, not every new idea that Nintendo had will have made it into the final game. Some weird and wonderful concepts will have been left on the cutting room floor, which is exactly what happened with a live commentary feature that almost made it in, one which would have had an optional "tsundere" mode.

Super Mario Bros. Wonder almost had running 'live' commentary, like a sports game.

I’ve waited 30 years for Nintendo to release a game like Super Mario Bros. Wonder.

Nintendo has always been fully aware of the importance and popularity of the 2D line of Mario platformers, even as the 3D games have continued to enjoy increasing success, and after New Super Mario Bros. U on the Wii U back in 2012, the Japanese company had clearly decided that whatever came next for the 2D Mario series would have to be a major shake-up, regardless of how long its development process could end up being.

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