Skip to main content

Details: The Power-Up Mushroom for Your Narrative

Many of you may be aware already, but March 10 is Mario Day! Maybe you’ll break out one of the 200+ games featuring Mario (no doubt Nintendo will have deals on a few), watch the Super Mario Bros. Super Show or read some Super Mario Bros. comics. No matter how you celebrate the day, you’ll be spending time with a character who has a long history and background. Your first experience with our favorite plumber may have been in Donkey Kong, Donkey Kong Jr. (the only game where Mario plays the villain) or the original Mario Bros. My first Mario experience, as is probably the case with many of you, was with Super Mario Bros. on the NES. Mario had already appeared in 21 games by this point, but it wasn’t really until Super Mario Bros. that audiences saw the character we recognize today. To celebrate the character of Mario, in true Never Say Dice fashion, let's talk about the story within that game.

Think about the first time you sat down with that legendary game: Super Mario Bros. Even if this wasn’t your first game with Mario, you’ve likely gone back and played it if you’re a fan. That first time, you might have been at a friend or relative’s house, or sitting in front of the basement rec room TV in your own home. You probably didn’t even read the manual - I know I didn’t! (Did anyone read NES manuals?) I turned the TV on, slid the cartridge into the machine, jabbed the power button with my stubby little finger, and sat with bated breath, controller in hand. Do you remember the plot of the game? You're probably saying to yourself, "sure, go get the Princess and defeat Bowser. Duh." Do you know why you had to do that? Okay, it was a video game and you wanted to beat it, but I mean the story reason. Mario’s reason. I didn’t remember, and likely had never known until I looked it up recently. Page two of that instruction manual I so casually tossed aside. I’ll save you the trouble of looking it up yourself (be aware, Peach was originally called "Toadstool"):

One day, the kingdom of the peaceful mushroom people was invaded by the Koopa, a tribe of turtles famous for their black magic. The quiet, peace-loving Mushroom People were turned into mere stones, bricks and even field horse-hair plants, and the Mushroom Kingdom fell into ruin.

The only one who can undo the magic spell on the Mushroom People and return them to their normal selves is the Princess Toadstool, the daughter of the Mushroom King. Unfortunately, she is presently in the hands of the great Koopa turtle king.

Mario, the hero of the story (maybe) hears about the Mushroom People’s plight and sets out on a quest to free the Mushroom Princess from the evil Koopa and restore the fallen kingdom of the Mushroom People.

You are Mario! It’s up to you to save the Mushroom People from the black magic of the Koopa!

This is an epic TTRP adventure if I’ve ever heard one: Black Magic, a kidnapped royal who's the only one that can stop it, creatures turned to stone, and an evil Turtle King! These details didn’t matter much when I was the kid playing a new Nintendo game. You slid the cartridge in and figured out the controls as you went. "Thank you, but our princess is in another castle" had no greater meaning, it just told us that we hadn’t beat the game yet. Had I known, though, had I just realized...would it have changed my gameplay? Were all those stones I bashed for coins and powers...were they really frozen members of the Mushroom Kingdom? Was I destroying a member of the race I was trying to save with every punch? All so I could earn a few coins and make it one step closer to the Princess? Or maybe we were all somehow temporarily rescuing them from their stony imprisonment, and each coin here or there was a thank you for our trouble.

These are the very kinds of details we need in our TTRPG campaigns. That one page, like a liner note, full of the stuff our own stories are made of. Details that make our characters question their actions and decisions. Details that change our tabletops for the better and make them interesting (if sometimes dark) places. You don’t want the flavor of your story to be just “our princess is in another castle.” As popular and memorable that end-of-level quote is, you want more than that. The trick is reminding your players of the kinds of thoughts and feelings the backstory of Super Mario Bros. invokes without having to repeat a paragraph of text each session. Had those end-level scenes shown saved mushroom people dancing (not just Toad) or the faces of those mushroom people worked into the stony levels... Well, not knowing the story, I wouldn’t have remembered, but perhaps I might have questioned just what I was doing. 


If you do celebrate Mario this year, and I hope that you do, make sure to take some time and think about the story. Think about Mario’s history, and why he fights so hard through those levels. It isn’t just to save the Princess, it's to save a whole kingdom of the mushroom people. Most importantly, think about how you can add those precious details to your own games to keep the story from being nothing but end-level quips. You can include that paragraph of text at the beginning of your table-top sessions, but be sure to support that story with details in your game. They might just grow your plot from a Mario to a Super Mario. Don’t grab too many of those fire-flowers though - they’ll give you heartburn. Until next week friends, enjoy your tables - get out there and break some dice!

- A

Popular posts from this blog

Be a Grinch! (in a Tabletop RPG)

The Holidays may be almost over (for a while), and we hope you’ve all enjoyed your seasonal music and movies/specials. We here at Never Say Dice have covered the infamous Star Wars Holiday Special and the new LEGO edition a few posts ago. A common thing many of us into tabletop RPGS like to do is incorporate media into our games. After all, many of us have grown up with the blending of media and the holidays as a given. It provides us a framework to build on and a common touchpoint to the people at our tables, virtual or otherwise. One classic character featured in holiday specials and commemorated in his own song is the Grinch, the avocado-green villain with strange cardiac growth problems apparently linked to his personality. The Grinch, villain though he may be, has a slew of characteristics that would make the character an excellent one at the gaming table. Those of you not familiar with Suess-lore may really only know the Grinch from the How the Grinch Stole Christmas animated

An Introduction to Risus

While roaming the internet in the late nineties/early noughties, I came across a TTRPG that was rules-lite and called itself “the anything RPG.” Want to play a high school cheerleader/samurai-in-training part-time goth enthusiast fast food cashier? The hot pink stick figure art glared back at me. Nah, not interested. But I was wrong. The stick figures were actually purple, and Risus is a surprisingly versatile, handy and down right fun TTRPG. I wouldn’t figure that out though till I discovered it again several years later. Even though it was written as a comedy system (and somewhat lighthearted response to GURPS) you really can use it for just about anything: space opera, high fantasy, pulp, vampires,western, any movie setting you could think of...seriously anything. You can read a far more detailed and interesting history in a number of other places should it strike your fancy. It is time for your Risus indoctrination introduction. Risus really is versatile and fairly easy to learn

Devouring "Roll for Sandwich"

Good timezone to Never Say Dice fans, adventures in Aardia, TikTok and beyond. No, I’m not the Roll for Sandwich guy (neither of us is), but if you haven’t heard of him already (or especially if you have), this week I wanted to talk about the TikTok/YouTube show Roll for Sandwich hosted by Jacob Pauwels. The premise is exactly what it sounds like: every episode, the host rolls dice to determine the various items that comprise a sandwich (except when the episode is about s’mores). He assembles the sandwich, then actually eats and critiques his random creation. If it sounds pretty niche to you... it is. You should  probably be both a bit of a foodie and a TTRPG fan in order to truly appreciate both the strange layered creations and the roleplaying references. My eldest son has been so interested in the web series that he decided he wanted to try doing it for himself. So, for the last week of summer this year, we took stock of our cupboards, made our own charts, and proceeded to consume

Willy Wonka - Cartoonish Supervillian or Time Lord?

Every spring, in at least some of the religions practiced in the States, brings yet another holiday full of varied confections: Easter. For some reason, perhaps it’s the candy content or the garish colors associated with the holiday here, Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory seems to be the movie that most often comes to my mind. While there are other pieces of media that are more “classically Easter” entries, Willy Wonka just seems to belong here. Perhaps there’s something to those giant eggs, as well. Whatever the reason, it’s in our common consciousness around this time of year, and that has had me thinking about a couple of common internet theories. One common thought is that the titular character Willy Wonka is an incarnation of Doctor Who ’s (only semi-titular) protagonist, the Doctor. The other would have you believe that Willy Wonka is a cartoonish supervillian originating in the DC universe, most likely one of Batman’s adversaries. For this post, let’s go over the arg