Super Mario Bros 3 Remake

One of my favourite illustrators is Yōichi Kotabe.  Not only is he responsible for one of my favourite anime’s, “Heidi, Girl of the Alps”; but was also the primary artist on early Super Mario video games.  His work is simply gorgeous, colourful and groundbreaking.  When it comes to Nintendo, his most recognizable artwork is the cover and manuals of Super Mario Bros on the Famicom (Japanese edition), Super Mario Land on the Game Boy, and of course Super Mario Bros 3.  I have been mesmerized by Kotabe’s version of Mario ever since I saw the cover of Super Mario Bro 3.  His illustrations breathed life into Mario at a time when technology simply did not match Shigeru Miyamoto’s vision.  I would think to myself, why couldn’t Kotabe’s illustrations be the version used in the game? 

Thankfully we now live in a time when technology allows creators to put their visions into video games the way they dreamed of.  Even though video games with cartoon graphics have existed for years, (such as Dragon's Lair, Wario Land: Shake It! and Ducktales Remastered) this art style didn’t become popular until the release of Cuphead.  This game popularized the animated cartoon video game genre, and influenced other video game developers to modernize old classics into modern cartoon video games (Monster Boy and the Cursed Kingdom).  So my hope now is for Nintendo to do the same and re-master Super Mario Bro 3 in an animated cartoon version using the original designs created by Kotabe.

Yōichi Kotabe Wiki: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Y%C5%8Dichi_Kotabe