In college we played Asteroids, in which your space ship shoots asteroids and flying saucers.
Mario Brothers appeared in arcades in 1983, and the Nintendo home game Super Mario Brothers in 1987. Oddly enough, my parents were fans. I have fond memories of summer nights in the 1990s, living in West Hollywood but back in Rock Island for a visit, the screen door open to let in a breeze, hearing the theme music coming from the living room.
There was also a Super Mario Brothers All-Stars in 1993, a Super Mario Brothers Deluxe in 1999, and various games devoted to other characters in the Mario universe, but by that time my parents had lost interest.
They are sometimes accompanied by Yoshi, a sentient dinosaur, and Toad, a sentient mushroom who wears a turban.
However, none of the games involve a fade-out kiss: neither Mario nor Luigi display any heterosexual interest, leaving them open to gay subtexts. Maybe they're a gay couple, not "brothers."
A film version, Super Mario Bros., appeared in 1993. It stars Bob Hoskins and John Leguizamo as Mario and Luigi, plumbers in real-life Brooklyn who are zapped into a parallel Earth run by the descendants of dinosaurs, They rescue Princess Daisy, as expected.
Of course, Hollywood movies must always have a heterosexist plot, so Luigi and Daisy fall in love.
But, on the plus side, John Leguizamo has a shirtless scene (top photo), before he got all craggy and bizarre.
The two big home console manufacturers - Nintendo and Sega - did preview games before they could be sold for their respective video game home system. They were looking for computer bugs, as well as possibly objectionable content. Atari hadn't previwed prospective games and it caused problems... So, from 1985 - to the late 1990s, most LGBT content in games made for a Nintendo or Sega system had to happen under the radar (although games exclusive to Japan were a different story). Games made for the PC or Apple computer were under less pressure to be "family friendly", and had openly LGBT characters.
ReplyDeleteBirdo (the miniboss of Doki Doki Panic, known as Mario 2 in the US) has been a trans icon, though whenever it's mentioned, it's said that "he thinks he's a girl" and implies mental illness. Sometimes Birdo's cis. Koopa has a huge gay following in Japan, though, just because he's so bara.
ReplyDeleteI will say that the only nudity on the NES was male nudity. (River City Ransom, when you go to the health club near the end. Gotta grind those Karma Jolts somehow.) Still a heterosexist "save the girl" plot.
I do remember we used to refer to threeways between two guys and a girl as "Double Dragon style" (two guys having sex with her at the same time) or "Mario style" (two guys taking turns). Nobody at the time even thought of what game would involve interaction between the two guys. Battletoads?
Oh, forgot to mention, the original Doki Doki Panic ALSO had a blackface head instead of turtle shells. (Really, Japan?) Obviously had to change that. And reskinning it as a Mario game added a whole new dimension to level design in Mario games. The second dimension.
DeleteHas nothing to do with Doki Doki Literature Club. (Though they should've had a couple guys for Monika to reprogram and, failing that, delete. Reverse the gay villain tropes.)