I wouldn’t describe myself as a Super Mario expert because there is just so much out there to learn about this series. I know a lot, probably more than the average Nintendo fan and maybe even more than other major Mario fans, but just looking at the main platforming games, there is so much history there that I’m not sure I know enough to call myself an expert in good conscience. And that’s not even counting the many, many spinoffs — and those aren’t even counting the handful of games existing at the fringes of the known Marioverse, where you’re not even sure if they count or not. Should Timber and Pipsy from Diddy Kong Racing count? Should the various weirdos from Rhythm Heaven? These are both conversations that have happened somewhere online, and I’m not sure I know enough to weigh in meaningfully.

All that said, it doesn’t happen often that I come across some bit of arcane Super Mario lore that I’ve never heard before, but that exact thing happened recently on Hamish Steele’s podcast A Super Mario Moment. An episode featuring Josh Covell from the Still Loading podcast focused on Paper Mario, and I was shocked by some history that I’d never heard before.

I would recommend listening to the whole thing, of course, but the part of the conversation this post is referring to begins at the 20:50 mark.

Not long after the release of Super Mario RPG, famously a collaboration between Nintendo and Squaresoft, gaming mags showed off screenshots for what was purported to be a follow-up. These images suggest a preliminary version of what would become Paper Mario, but lacking what would become the series’ trademark paper cut-out style. If anything, they suggest an RPG done in the visual style of Yoshi’s Island, not just thanks to the inclusion of Poochy and Nep-Enut but also because the version of the game seems to translate a handmade art style to pixels, which Yoshi’s Island was the first Super Mario game to do.

To me, it’s easy to see how the version glimpsed here evolved into what got released on the Nintendo 64 in 2000.

Listening to the A Super Mario Moment episode, I learned that there were three pieces of concept art for what amounts to Super Mario RPG 2, none of them looking anything like Paper Mario. The only proof we have of these is sketches — specifically by Kazuyuki Kurashima, who did character designs for Super Mario RPG — and for all we know these drawings are the extent to which any of these ideas were developed. Even if that’s true, however, they’re still fascinating to look at and imagine what might have been.

As it’s noted in a 2000 interview, Paper Mario initially was conceived of as more of a sequel to Super Mario RPG before the team decided to make something fresh. It’s not mentioned in this particular interview, but the choice to discontinue ties to the first Super Mario RPG (and the Squaresoft employees who made it) would seem to be a result of the rift caused when Nintendo announced that the successor to the Super NES would be a cartridge-based console and not a disc-based one. The company’s plans for Final Fantasy VII only made sense on a CD-ROM-based console, and so Square ditched Nintendo for Sony’s new PlayStation system. This chain of events leaves a narrow window of time for people who worked on the Squaresoft side of Super Mario RPG to wonder what a follow-up could look like, and we have the following hints.

Oddly enough, the first one seems like a bridge between Super Mario RPG and Paper Mario in terms of aesthetics, even if it’s meant to be a direct continuation of the first game.

Posted to Kurashima’s Twitter without much context aside from the fact that he was celebrating the release of the Super Mario RPG remake.

It has the cast of the first game popping out of a book, and the the storybook element is a major motif in Paper Mario to the point that the game and the whole series in known in Japan as マリオストーリー or Mario Sutōrī (“Mario Story”). This drawing seems to depict Bowser as having defected to the villain side once again, with the rest of the team from the first game — including Mallow — standing up to oppose him. Geno is missing, presumably because Super Mario RPG ends with Geno (a.k.a. ♡♪!?) returning to the Star Road, but seemingly in his place we have Luigi, who mostly sat out the first game.

There is a second image that is sometimes posted in connection with this one. I’m not sure that it’s meant to be, but for what it’s worth, here it is. We do know that the artist is Kurashima, at the very least.

The text at the bottom identifies this scene as taking place at Mario’s house. Luigi is saying “Hey, Mario! Where have you been?” and to me this might indicate that it’s part of this direct sequel idea, because it’s picking up in the same universe as the first Super Mario RPG. In theory, Luigi could have just kept missing Mario throughout that game, and so he’s asking Mario what he’s been up to as the story leads into the second game. This Supper Mario Broth post, however, posits that it might be depicting a post-credits scene from Super Mario RPG.

The second Super Mario RPG 2 concept is even wilder, and the sketch depicts a sort of Smash Bros. crossover years before that game actually saw release.

Posted to Kurashima’s Instagram with the caption まぼろしのMR2, “The Legendary MR2,” with that last part presumably meaning “Mario RPG 2.”

Apparently a mock-up of a battle sequence that recalls Final Fantasy Tactics in the way it spreads opposing parties across varied terrain, this drawing seems to show Mario fighting alongside Link and Samus (both of whom made cameos in the first game) as well as a much deeper cut: Donbe from Shin Onigashima, released on in Japan on the Famicom Disk System. If you’ll note, there’s a hand-shaped cursor above Mario’s head, presumably hinting at what a menu system for this kind of game could have looked like. Obviously, nothing like this has ever been released, but I have to admit that I would be down to see a Nintendo crossover strategy RPG, if only for building different party combinations to see who you liked fighting together best. In theory, Donbe being tossed into the mix would open the door for all sorts of rando Nintendo characters to also be in such a game.

The text at the bottom indicates that this was associated with Love-de-Lic, a short-lived company founded by Kenichi Nishi, who’d previously worked as a field designer on Chrono Trigger and Super Mario RPG. One of the titles this company developed was the 1997 Playstation RPG Moon, and one of the characters featured in this game is named Noge. Not only is he styled somewhat like Geno, but his name is also an anagram of Geno’s — in English and in Japanese, where he’s ノージ or Nōji.

Thirdly, we have the weirdest of the bunch: a game in which Mario would be kidnapped and Princess Peach would apparently Nick Fury together a team of alternate versions of Mario from around the world.

Posted to Kurashima’s Instagram with the caption ボツMプロジェクト, which I’m guessing is something like “Bots M Project,” though I’m not sure what that means. Peach’s letter reads something like, “Mario of the Mushroom Kingdom is in trouble. Marios of the world, please help me!”

I’m not even fully sure what this means or how this would work, but the concept art includes a Robin Hood-style version, a music conductor, a martial artist, a robot, a creepy shadow and an igloo-dwelling native of the north. Most interesting to me, an avowed Super Mario Bros. 2 fan, is the magic carpet-riding version, which suggests a fusion of Mario and the guy from Doki Doki Panic that he replaced, Imajin. I suppose if we’re allowed to entertain the idea that Dr. Mario might be a separate entity from the regular, non-medical degree-having Mario, then this isn’t the most reality-shattering game concept ever, but I guess I’m glad we got the Paper Mario we got instead of this, though I wouldn’t mind something along these lines existing as well.

It’s posited on Rawest Forest that this proposal, as “an omnibus game,” could have had a chapter focused on one alternate Mario at a time. I’d say that checks out, because it sounds a lot like Live a Live, on which Kurashima also worked.

As near as I can tell, we have Kazuyuki Kurashima to thank for the fact that we get to see any of these. For whatever reason, he’s just a lot freer about his old concept work than a lot of Japanese video game types are. Somehow, I missed these entirely, even though they are posted on the Super Mario Wiki and Super Mario Broth posted the third one late last year. Because I care a lot about both Super Mario RPG and Paper Mario, these sketches are very much up my alley and very much the kind of thing I’d imagine I would have seen before now. But I hadn’t, and I’m just happy A Super Mario Moment took the time to show them to me.

This is why I’d hesitate to say I’m an expert. There’s always so much new to learn.

On this Christmas Eve, instead of thoughts of sugar plums, consider pondering all these “lost” versions of Super Mario RPG 2.

Miscellaneous Notes

In poking around for this post, I found a few random bits that were also new to me. Among them was some indication that there might have been a scrapped “Ninji boy” partner that was at one point planned for Paper Mario. His special powers would have included the ability to “lower the block,” whatever that means. Also, at one point Flavio from Thousand-Year door was planned to be a Toad instead of… whatever the hell he’s supposed to be.

And finally, I demand that Poochy be a playable partner in a future installment of Paper Mario. He deserves it.