#Mario is the coolest and scariest and most powerful guy ever. That's my conclusion.

[decamarks]

Here is a question if you feel like answering.: How do you feel about the "every copy of Sm64 is personalized/old Mario games are liminal" sort of thing that started getting popular in 2020

Oh, this is a wonderful question to answer... I think it kinda rules! It is an appealing sort of idea to me; I obviously really love the idea of creepypasta, and it's always interesting to see the way that it branches out, especially nowadays. Super Mario 64 is a game that is quite good at instilling those specific, surreal sort of feelings, so the works that revolve around it definitely feel like a natural evolution of creepypasta as a genre—an evolution that follows the advancements of technology in general.

The more time put between now and the game's release, the more alien it seems. Even if it wasn't that long ago, N64 graphics are so far removed from modern 3D; it's ancient in Gamer Years, but in the general passage of time, 27 years isn't that much! It feels distant, but really not that far off. Modern, but... not. It certainly occupies a perfect liminality in that regard.

Like, SM64 presents such a zany, colorful, strange world—a type of world that had basically never existed before. Which is insane! It obviously has its oddities, being basically the progenitor of all 3D platformers. It's weird as hell! Seeing people expand upon those aspects is sort of cathartic, in a sense. The game itself doesn't acknowledge its own strangeness; it kind of couldn't. The game was an innovation first and foremost, working with what little it had to go off of. At the time, it'd be unfamiliar enough that it wouldn't really register as strange—at least not the same strangeness it has today.

Amplifying or building additional horror around those oddities is just a really fun way to express the strange feelings it can invoke: a sense of nostalgia, alienation, the uncanny—returning to something you loved and seeing that it's not the same. Really, I just think weird early 3D graphics are beautiful and I'm glad to see their properties explored in any art, including silly creepypasta stuff. Also Mario-based horror is kind of great to me in general.

Coincidentally, I was kind of talking about this just yesterday? But only kind of. I was encouraged to share it though so please enjoy this discussion about Scary Mario and Scary Sonic: