Mario: Nintendo Reveals He's No Longer a Plumber, But Fans Wonder: Has He Embraced the Gig Economy?

Japanese video game company Nintendo has angered hundreds of fans on social media by revealing its synonymous character Mario is officially no longer a plumber.

In a recently updated Mario profile, the company's website said "Mario was once a plumber … but that was a long time ago."

"All around sporty, whether it's tennis or baseball, soccer or car racing, he does everything cool. As a matter of fact, he also seems to have worked as a plumber a long time ago," the website said.

Although the games rarely feature Mario utilising his plumbing skills, the sudden announcement of his retirement has shocked fans and left many feeling betrayed.

"If Mario doesn't work as a plumber, then why is he dressed like one?" several fans asked.

While many others pointed out that Mario has actually practiced several professions since he first debuted as a carpenter in 1981's Donkey Kong.

"The game's stage was a construction site, so we made him into basically a carpenter," creator Shigeru Miyamoto, who is also responsible for Donkey Kong and Zelda, said in a 2011 interview.

"[In Super Mario Bros] we brought in Luigi and a lot of the game was played underground so we made him to fit that setting and, we decided he could be a plumber."

While other high-profile games like Sega's Sonic the Hedgehog and PlayStation's Crash Bandicoot struggled to transition through generations, Mario has continued to evolve with the times.

Mario has held a range of occupations including a doctor, archaeologist, Olympic athlete and painter.

Mr Miyamoto told National Public Radio in the US in 2015 that his vision of Mario "has always been that he's sort of representative of everyone".

"He's kind of a blue-collar hero. And so that's why we chose those roles for him that were things like carpenters and plumbers," he said. But with freelancers now making up 35 per cent of the US workforce and with more than a million independent contractors in Australia, it should come as no surprise that Mario has decided to embrace the gig economy.

"In this gig based economy, of course he isn't [a plumber anymore]. He drives for Uber now," joked Paris Lay on twitter.

Nintendo joins a number of companies who have changed their veteran characters to evolve with society.

In early 2016, Mattel launched a range of curvy, tall and petite Barbie dolls in seven skin tones to be sold alongside the original.

"Barbie reflects the world girls see around them," Mattel president and chief executive officer Richard Dickson said.

"Her ability to evolve and grow with the times, while staying true to her spirit is central to why Barbie is the number one fashion doll in the world."

A new range of Ken dolls were also released this year featuring different body types and hairstyles.

Here’s probably more than most of you will ever want to know about the Nintendo character “Mario”...

Shigeru Miyamoto created Mario while developing Donkey Kong in an attempt to produce a best-selling video game for Nintendo; previous titles like Sheriff had not achieved the same success as titles like Pac-Man. Originally, Miyamoto wanted to create a video game that used the characters Popeye, Bluto, and Olive Oyl.[3]

At the time, however, Miyamoto was unable to acquire a license to use the characters (and would not until 1982 with Popeye), so he ended up making an unnamed player character, Donkey Kong, and Lady (later known as Pauline).[3] In the early stages of Donkey Kong, Mario was unable to jump, and the focus was to escape a maze. However, Miyamoto enabled Mario to jump, saying “If you had a barrel rolling towards you, what would you do?”[4][5]

While the protagonist was unnamed in the Japanese release, he would be named Jumpman in the game’s English instructions and Mario in the sales brochure.[6] Miyamoto originally named the character “Mr. Video”, and he was to be used in every video game Miyamoto developed.[7]

According to a widely circulated story, during localization of Donkey Kong for American audiences, Nintendo of America’s warehouse landlord Mario Segale confronted then-president Minoru Arakawa, demanding back rent. Following a heated argument in which the Nintendo employees eventually convinced Segale he would be paid, they opted to name the character in the game Mario after him.[8][9]

Miyamoto commented that if he had named Mario “Mr. Video”, Mario likely would have “disappeared off the face of the Earth”.[5] 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.[10]

Mario’s character design, particularly his large nose, draws on western influences; once he became a plumber, Miyamoto decided to “put him in New York” and make him Italian,[10] lightheartedly attributing Mario’s nationality to his mustache.[11]

Other sources have Mario’s profession chosen to be carpenter in an effort to depict the character as an ordinary hard worker, and make it easier for players to identify with him.[12] After a colleague suggested that Mario more closely resembled a plumber, Miyamoto changed Mario’s profession accordingly and developed Mario Bros.,[3] featuring the character in the sewers of New York City.[13]

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.[3][10]

To make him appear human onscreen despite his small size, Mario was given distinct features, prominently a large nose and a mustache, which avoided the need to draw a mouth and facial expressions on the small onscreen character.[14]

Miyamoto developed Mario with the idea of using him as a “go to” character that could be put into any title as needed, albeit in cameo appearances, as at the time Miyamoto was not expecting Mario to become popular.[7] To this end, he originally called the character “Mr. Video”, comparing his intent to have Mario appear in later games to the cameos done by Alfred Hitchcock within Hitchcock’s films.[15]

Over time, Mario’s appearance has become more defined; blue eyes, white gloves, brown shoes, a red “M” in a white circle on the front of his hat and gold buttons on his overalls have been added. The colors of his shirt and overalls were also reversed from a blue shirt with red overalls to a red shirt with blue overalls. Miyamoto attributed this process to the different development teams and artists for each game as well as advances in technology as time has gone on.[12]
Surname

Nintendo did not initially reveal Mario’s full name. In a 1989 interview it was stated not to be “Mario Mario” despite the implication of the Mario Bros. series’ title.[16]

The first notable use of “Mario Mario” was in the 1993 live-action film adaptation. This was again used in two of Prima’s official strategy guides, in 2000[17] for Mario Party 2 and in 2003[18] for Mario and Luigi: Superstar Saga. In 2012 after Charles Martinet voiced Mario declaring himself “Mario Mario” at the San Diego Comic-Con[19] the next month Satoru Iwata said he had no last name,[20] which Shigeru Miyamoto agreed with the month after.[21]

Two months after Iwata’s death in July 2015, Miyamoto changed his stance September 2015 at the Super Mario Bros. 30th Anniversary festival, confirming that his name was indeed Mario Mario.[22][23]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mario#Concept_and_creation

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