Mario (franchise)
Mario[a] is a Japanese multimedia franchise created by Japanese game designer Shigeru Miyamoto for video game company Nintendo, which produces and publishes its installments. Starring the titular Italian plumber Mario, it is primarily a video game franchise but has extended to other forms of media, including television series, comic books, a 1993 feature film, a 2023 animated film, and theme park attractions. The series' first installment was 1983's Mario Bros. even though Mario made his first appearance in 1981's arcade game Donkey Kong and had already been featured in several games of the Donkey Kong and Game & Watch series. The Mario games have been developed by a wide variety of developers, including Nintendo, Hudson Soft, and AlphaDream. Mario games have been released almost exclusively for Nintendo's various video game consoles and handhelds, from the third generation onward.
This article is about the media franchise. For the video game series, see Super Mario.Mario
Donkey Kong (1981)
1981–present
Super Mario Bros.: The Great Mission to Rescue Princess Peach! (1986)
Super Mario Bros. (1993)
The Super Mario Bros. Movie (2023)
Untitled The Super Mario Bros. Movie follow-up (upcoming sequel)
- Super Mario series
- Luigi series
- Yoshi series
- Wario series
- Paper Mario series
- Mario & Luigi series
- Mario Kart series
- Mario Party series
- Mario vs. Donkey Kong series
- Mario sports games
- Mario puzzle games
- Mario role-playing games
- Mario educational games
The flagship Mario subseries is the Super Mario series of platform games starting with 1985's Super Mario Bros., which mostly follows Mario's adventures in the fictional world of the Mushroom Kingdom and typically rely on Mario's jumping ability to allow him to progress through levels. The franchise has spawned over 200 games of various genres and several subseries, including Mario Kart, Mario Party, Mario Tennis, Mario Golf, Mario vs. Donkey Kong, and Paper Mario; several characters introduced in the Mario franchise, such as Donkey Kong, Wario, Yoshi, and Luigi, sparked successful franchises of their own.
The Mario series is one of gaming's most successful and renowned franchises, with many of its games, in particular within the Super Mario subseries, considered some of the greatest video games ever made. It is the best-selling video game franchise of all time, with more than 830 million copies of games sold, including more than 430 million for the Super Mario games alone.[1] Mario is also Nintendo's flagship franchise.
Impact and legacy[edit]
Mario has been featured in 256 games of various genres (including sports, puzzle, party, racing and first-person shooter), and the Mario franchise is the best-selling video game franchise of all time.[69] At least 31 different Mario games have sold more than a million copies each since 1995. This includes the core Super Mario series, which alone has sold over 370 million units worldwide,[70] as well as the Mario Kart series, which has sold 154.26 million units;[71] the Mario Party series, which has sold over 56 million copies;[72] Donkey Kong, which has sold over 125,000 arcade machines[73] and six million Coleco cartridges;[74] and Mario Bros., which has sold 1.72 million Famicom cartridges.[75] By 1999, Mario as a character generated more than $5 billion in sales for Nintendo.[76]By 2002, the Super Mario series had grossed more than $7 billion in software sales.[77][78][79] At its peak, the franchise sold over $200 million in merchandise annually.[80]