Email: Miyamoto’s Lost SMB 3 Interview

On your Translating Iwata post you said: Using Miyamoto’s own words from that Nintendo Power interview of when he was developing Super Mario Brothers 3 was that the originalSuper Mario Brothers was, according to Miyamoto at the time, “an introduction to the Mushroom Kingdom” and Super Mario Brothers 3 was to fully “explore the worlds of the Mushroom Kingdom.” I was wondering, what Nintendo Power interview you were referring to? (I haven’t been able to find it myself so far.) The issue # or date of the NP magazine or title of the article would greatly appreciated. Thanks

The first time I ever heard of Miyamoto was in the two page SMB 3 interview found in March of 1990 of Nintendo Power. I’m not sure if the quote I used was from that interview or not. It was one of the things Miyamoto said that has remained distinctly in my mind. After all, there are 8 worlds in the original Super Mario Brothers and 8 worlds in Super Mario Brothers 3. SMB 3 obviously takes place in Mushroom Land so the shoe fits.

It is a fascinating interview. There were scans of it floating on the Internet but I haven’t been able to find them. In the interview, it is where Miyamoto first reveals the Chain Chomp and where it came from (angry dog). Some forgotton information is in there as well such as the Centaur Suit where Mario turns into half man, half horse, but it was dropped.

I like how Super Mario Brothers 4 and Zelda 3 are talked about in the interview. I think those projects were begun while SMB 3 was being made. Best fact of all is that Super Mario Brothers 3 took two years to make and was done by 10 people (!), of which we can assume Miyamoto was one of those 10.

If anyone finds the scans, put them up so we can all see it again.

 

What is this!? What happened to Toad!? Apparently, SMB 3 was originally going to have Koopa Troopa and Hammer Brothers be the hosts of the minigames. There were more minigames than what made it in SMB 3, and they were reused for New Super Mario Brothers. The guess of why they did not make it to the final game is because of memory issues. I wonder if they will appear in NSMB Wii?

Bland but interesting map! Super Mario World was going to have SMB 3 styled Toad houses and Fortresses. And, by the looks of it, it was going to be in the Mushroom Kingdom instead of ‘Dinosaur Land’.

Ahh, imagine a 16-bit 2d Mario game set in the Mushroom Kingdom, as opposed to Dinosaur Land. Who wouldn’t want to be a fly on the wall when these games were being developed?