Why do you want to kill me, Mario? Why?
I wish I could have sat in on the pitch meeting 25 years ago when Nintendo was developing Super Mario Bros. I want to know who when posed the question “What is this plumber going to fight?”, answered “Turtles”. I imagine the room going quiet before he says it, everyone’s mind racing, running through all of the possible villains, but knowing that none of them were quite right. And then:
Turtles.
They all look at one another and nod wisely. Of course. Turtles. What else could possibly serve so well?
I wonder why he chose turtles. Maybe he has some deep-seated fear stemming from a traumatic terrapinian past occurrence known to his family as “The Turtle Incident”, that may or may not have involved a fat mustachioed man jumping on one’s back.
I guess some questions are best left for the philosophers.
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Anytime I wonder about a video game like that I just think, “Japan, they’re weird”