We have all known Mario and his rescue efforts since childhood. Despite its deep-rooted admiration and fame, it is reasonable that an average person may not likely associate with the eponymous gaming icon from the classic Mario franchise of platform games, though it’s very unlikely that no one would even recognize this iconic mascot even if they aren’t gaming. There are distinctive features to its figure which cannot be missed like the red t-shirt, the blue overalls with yellow buttons, an unmistakable moustache, and to (literally) top it up, the most recognized signature symbol…yup, I’m talking about his red cap with the ‘M’ logo. He’s playful, joyful with a cute pretence for an actual plumber, Super Mario was a significant part of my growing up era and being popular with my generation, he instantly became synonymous with the activity of gaming itself. Glad to experience those moments once again on my Nintendo Classic but that apart, I was able to discover a small piece of history behind the culmination of its name and it was mind-boggling!
In the early 80s, Nintendo had rented warehouses in New York for establishing its US headquarters and the owner of the business park was visiting the warehouse to collect overdue rent when he started berating Minoru Arakawa, President of Nintendo of America in front of employees. At the time, Nintendo was developing the famous arcade platform game Donkey Kong which had a character called ‘Jumpman’ who must dodge and jump over obstacles to rescue a damsel in distress called Pauline. After this rather discourteous display of temper, Arakawa and the developers decided to rename ‘Jumpman’ after the landlord who was called Mario Segale, also because the character itself resembled the suspenders-wearing Italian-American. If there was an instance of killing someone with kindness this one takes the trophy!