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Nintendo Games

After Three Decades, Charles Martinet Is 'Stepping Back' From Voicing Mario (gamespot.com) 16

Posted by BeauHD from the end-of-an-era dept.
An anonymous reader quotes a report from GameSpot: For decades, Charles Martinet voiced the iconic video game character Mario in Nintendo's popular series, but those days are now over. Nintendo has announced that Martinet, who rose to a new level of fame with 1996's Super Mario 64, is transitioning into the role of "Mario Ambassador." The company also confirmed with GameSpot that Martinet will not voice the character in the upcoming Super Mario Bros. Wonder. In its initial statement, Nintendo said Martinet will be "stepping back from recording character voices for our games." However, Martinet will "continue to travel the world sharing the joy of Mario and interacting with you all." Notably absent from that statement was any indication about Martinet's involvement with this year's big new Mario game.

When asked about whether Martinet would voice Mario in the upcoming Mario Wonder, Nintendo told GameSpot, "While Charles is not involved in the game, we're excited to honor his legacy and contributions, including looking ahead to what he'll be doing as a Mario Ambassador." This had previously been a topic of some discussion, as the game's reveal led some fans to wonder if Martinet had been replaced, due to subtle changes in the performance. As for who will now voice Mario (or the many others typically voiced by Martinet), Nintendo said, "Character voice actors will be credited in the game credits, so please wait for the game to be released." Nintendo also stated that it will have a "special video message" to share from Mario creator Shigeru Miyamoto and Martinet to come "at a future date." It added, "It has been an honor working with Charles to help bring Mario to life for so many years and we want to thank and celebrate him." In addition to Mario, GameSpot notes that Martinet also voices Wario, Luigi, Waluigi, Baby Mario, and Baby Luigi, among others.
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After Three Decades, Charles Martinet Is 'Stepping Back' From Voicing Mario More

After Three Decades, Charles Martinet Is 'Stepping Back' From Voicing Mario

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  • Nintendo told him he is done voicing Mario.
  • Mario didn't really have a voice in Super Mario brothers 1-3, so to me he will always be the voice of Lou Albano. Rest in peace.
  • There was all that fuss over the Mario movie trailer, where Chris Pratt said one sentence in his Chris Pratt voice and so many people got upset. And I rolled my eyes and said, "You guys are overreacting. I'm sure it'll be fine." And then the movie came out and I was wrong, and those whiners were totally right.

    It wasn't fine at all, and not only that but they went out of their way to mock Mario's real voice right at the beginning of the movie. Just as a "fuck you" to all the people who actually like Mario

  • The dude is retirement age.

    Let him retire.

    Or in this case, be a 'brand ambassador' which is the celeb equivalent of being a store greeter; something to do so you don't get too bored in retirement.

    • Store greeters, and elderly cashiers, usually do it in order to qualify for health insurance. It's not nearly as cushy as "brand ambassador."

  • Ah, spaghetti! Ah, ravioli! Ah, mamma mia!

  • While I can't see Italian Americans getting bent out of shape about Mario's caricatured voice any more than Mexican Americans did Speedy Gonzales, I can't help but wonder if there's some "better safe than sorry" mechanic at play here.

    It wouldn't be the first time... not by a long shot.

    • No, the guy is old and can't be doing it forever - he can go around and do whatever trade shows for pay as an ambassador as much as he likes; the FUN part without the work. The guy loved doing trade shows and was great at it.

      Also, they just replaced him with a prat (coincidentally his name too) for a ton of money just so they could have a jerk who doesn't even play Nintendo (he sucked at Mario Kart, which according to the movie is Kong Kart) go around and use his celebrity to sell the movie... which wasn't

  • The DOOM space marine has decided to demonstrate a much wider vocabulary to prove he is not just a space cadet "What do you think this is, Stormtroopers?""

  • There should be *some* joke here about him working too hard.

  • I can't believe no one mentioned he's also the voice of Paarthurnax, from Skyrim. It's hard to believe the same guy does both voices.

    • This is actually so, I remember this voice, in fact it is the voice of my childhood, too bad that it will no longer dictate anything, in fact I understand that it had to happen once and once, besides I hope that with the development of technologies will appear an app that will be able to take the voice of a man and implement it in another series of the game, I am more and more amazed by the emerging technologies, not long ago I read here about dictation software for mac [setapp.com], this is actually amazing and at the

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