Tezuka talks Super Mario Bros. origins, legacy, why it’s been able to maintain such longevity
USA Today has published a new interview with Takashi Tezuka. Tezuka spoke all about Super Mario Bros., including the original game’s origins, the series’ legacy, and why it’s been able to maintain such longevity.
You can find a roundup of Tezuka’s comments below. A couple of additional questions and answers are on USA Today here.
On how the team came up with the idea for Super Mario Bros…
Tezuka: The start of development came from (Nintendo game designer Shigeru) Miyamoto’s idea of taking a really big character (bigger than what you saw at the time) and having him going across land, through water, and into the skies in an action game. That was the core of it, and we kept adding ideas to it from there.
On inspirations behind the creation of Mario and the game’s other main characters…
Tezuka: The Mario character was devised by Mr. Miyamoto. Given the limitations in color palette and resolution you had to work with in game consoles back then, we felt it was best to have this human character with a big nose and mustache wearing a hat. The other characters in the game were born in largely the same way.
Function came first. We figured it’d be fun to stomp on a Koopa Troopa, but we also added spikes to Bowser and Spiny to make them less appetizing to jump on. Peach only appeared right at the ending to the original Super Mario Bros. We drew her pretty large so her facial expressions and so on were as clear as possible.
On why mushrooms and turtles play big parts in the game and series…
Tezuka: Simplicity and ease of understanding were the things we valued a lot during production, and we wanted to have some kind of common theme to tie the game together. So the idea of this being set in the Mushroom Kingdom as they faced off against a gang of turtles was decided upon pretty early. Thus, when it came time to make enemies, we threw turtles in a lot of the time. You could say we deliberately put limits on ourselves rather than think too freely, so it’d be easier to design the game.
There was never that terribly important a reason why we went with mushrooms and turtles. Turtles were the most memorable enemy from the original Mario Bros. and wound up playing an important role in tying together Super Mario’s gameplay, so I think it was a pretty natural process as we worked out how the game world worked.
On favorite memories during the development of Super Mario Bros…
Tezuka: One thing was the way I tried my hardest to keep any bugs from creeping through. We deliberately programmed in little surprises for you to notice as you play, but some of the bugs we missed were a surprise even to us — and while it may have been mean to the programmers, we wound up treating them as features. The way that you thought you beat Bowser, but he actually turns out to be a Goomba or something had its start with a bug, too.
On the legacy of Super Mario Bros…
Tezuka: It comes down to the game design concept that comes through via the controls and the character’s reaction when you press buttons — something that feels right to players and is intuitively understandable without requiring a lot of instruction. That’s part of Mario’s DNA. I think that’s something we can’t afford to change as we bring it forward.
On why Mario has been able to maintain such longevity…
Tezuka: I think it may come down to how much care we devoted to the “play feel.”. I think games can unite people like that because — regardless of age or gender or ethnicity — everyone understands that falling in a hole is scary, or zooming through obstacles is fun, or getting hit by spikes probably hurts. It’s a common core we can all relate to, and I think it’s stuck in people’s minds because of that — they get emotionally involved as they play.
