Summary of Super Mario Summary of Super Mario Reviews for Super Mario An Excerpt from Super Mario

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The first princess Mario saved was Nintendo itself.   In 1981, Nintendo of America was a one-year-old business already on the brink of failure. Its president, Mino Arakawa, was stuck with two thousand unsold arcade cabinets for a dud of a game (Radar Scope). So he hatched a plan.   Back in Japan, a boyish, shaggy-haired staff artist named Shigeru Miyamoto designed a new game for the unsold cabinets featur­ing an angry gorilla and a small jumping man. Donkey Kong brought in $180 million in its first year alone and launched the career of a short, chubby plumber named Mario.   Since then, Mario has starred in over two hundred games, gen­erating profits in the billions. He is more recognizable than Mickey Mouse, yet he’s little more than a mustache in bib overalls. How did a mere smear of pixels gain such huge popularity? Super Mario tells the story behind the Nintendo games millions of us grew up with, explaining how a Japanese trading card company rose to dominate the fiercely competitive video-game industry.  “Jeff Ryan bashes his head against the story of Nintendo and finds all manner of coins and power-ups. He also manages to tell the wider story of how video games have sewn themselves so completely into the fabric of global entertainment. This is a wonderful history.” — Tom Bissell, author of Extra Lives: Why Video Games Matter  “Super Mario is the rightful heir to David Sheff’s Game Over, a tremendous achievement combining a solid retelling of the known story of Nintendo with new information." — Steven Kent, video game journalist and author of The Clone Republic  “A thorough history of Nintendo’s victories, written by an enthusiastic and knowledgeable fan.”  — Publishers Weekly