Voor Startselect produceerde ik een jaar lang Engelse content voor nieuwsbrieven, linkbuilding en een eigen Startselect Blog. Deze artikelen werden vertaald naar acht verschillende talen, waaronder Nederlands, Frans, Duits en Spaans. 

Voor de lancering van Super Mario Run op de iPhone, schreef ik een artikel over de geschiedenis van Mario. Hoe evolueerde het iconische personage van een timmerman genaamd Jumpman op de NES, naar een besnorde loodgieter genaamd Mario op de iPhone?

Jumpman

Most people don’t know that Mario didn’t start out as Mario. Or even in a Super Mario game, for that matter. In fact, the first time we met the red-hatted plumber, he was a carpenter called Jumpman in Donkey Kong (1981). Jumpman mistreats his pet ape, who escapes and kidnaps Jumpman’s girlfriend Pauline. The story for the game was based on Popeye, with Donkey Kong replacing Bluto and Jumpman starring as the hero Popeye.

Two years later, Jumpman even starred as the villain in Donkey Kong Jr. and it wasn’t until later in 1983 that Jumpman got his own game and was renamed ‘Mario’, after the landlord of one of Nintendo’s developers. The remarkable visual style of Mario is largely due to technical limitations at the time. Overalls made his arms more visible, his thick moustache was clearer than a small mouth, his bright red colors popped better against the dark background and his hat allowed Miyamoto to skip designing a hairstyle. Because Mario Bros. was a co-op game, Miyamoto created a second character that was identical but with a different colour template. He would later get his own identity as Mario’s brother Luigi.

Super Mario Bros.

After the relatively successful Mario Bros. – where you stomp on your enemies in a static screen – the big breakthrough came in 1985 with Super Mario Bros. The game introduced the traditional left-to-right level design, the mushroom power-ups and the warp pipes that you can use to teleport to hidden parts of the level. It was a revolution in the gaming world and instantly launched Mario into ever-lasting fame.

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