This article will deal with one of Japan’s biggest heroes of modern times. No it’s not about politicians or rockstars, today we will speak about Mario (マリオ). 
Mario is the hero of the Japanese game company Nintendo’s super Mario franchise and probably the most famous video game character of all times. He was created by video game designer Shigeru Miyamoto and since then he acted as nintendo’s mascot and symbol. Mario has appeared in over 200 games since his creation. Depicted as a short, pudgy, Italian plumber who resides in the Mushroom kingdom, his adventures generally center upon rescuing princess peach from the Koopa villain Bowser. His younger brother and sidekick is called Luigi.

The Mario franchise is the best selling video game franchise of all time. Over 210 million units of the overall Mario series of games have been sold. Outside of the Super Mario jump and run series, other Mario genres include racing games, sports games, party-multiplayer games and role playing games. 

Mario was created while the game “donkey kong” was programmed, acting as the protagonist, called “Jumpman”. By Miyamoto’s own account, Mario’s profession was chosen to fit with the game design. Since Donkey Kong was set on a construction site, Mario was made into a carpenter. When he appeared again in Mario Bros. it was decided he should be a plumber, since a lot of the game is played in underground settings.

Due to the graphical limitations of arcade hardware at the time, Miyamoto clothed the character in red overalls and a blue shirt to contrast against each other and the background. A red cap was added to let Miyamoto avoid drawing the character’s hairstyle, forehead, and eyebrows, as well as to circumvent the issue of animating his hair as he jumped.
Today’s Mario is fully animated and loved by millions, we are sure you played a Mario game before as well. New games are releasing every year so there will be a lot of new adventures in the future to look forward to!