Mario from Mario & Luigi: Brothership Could Have Looked “Edgier”

But then the devs received feedback from Nintendo, which said that they should “aim to make the art direction identifiable by fans as belonging to the Mario & Luigi series.” After that, they narrowed down their focus to combine two things: the appeal of illustrations, which could feature, for example, solid outlines and bold, black eyes, along with the “charm of pixel animations,” showing the characters ‘ comical chaotic movements. According to Furuta, that’s when the creators finally started to develop an art style unique to the game.

Nintendo Producer Akira Otani also explained that the early designs of a “rugged” Mario “gave the impression of something different that just resembled Mario,” and a meeting was called to reassess the artistic direction. According to Furuta, at the meeting, Nintendo showed the creators a document describing the core features of Mario and Luigi in the series. With that direction from the company, the creator realized that they should stick to the original character’s design, which was known and loved by players. 

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