Charles Martinet, who has voiced the beloved plumber since “Super Mario 64,” will become an “ambassador” for Mario rather than record new audio, Nintendo said.
Do they even need to replace him though? There’s a 25-year back catalog of recorded voice lines to recycle, and most of those consist of “Let’s-a-go” and “Yahoooo!” I think the most complex sentace I’ve ever heard Mario speak in game is “Thank-a-you so much for playing my game”. Combine that with AI voice recreation, and there’s literally no reason to ever hire a replacement. Just cut Martinet a big-ass check for perpetual use of his voice, and they’re golden.
They’d probably prather not pay likeness fees, and there are a LOT of legal considerations Martinet would have to consider as signing the rights away to his own voice brings a lot of considerational challenges.
I feel like I used to have a Mario card game on my 90’s Macintosh? We played go fish in the back of a limo or something… I recall he had pretty complex voice lines in that game.
I’m pretty sure all the edutainment titles predate Charles Martinet as the voice of Mario, and I don’t think Nintendo would ever make a game like that these days.
Do they even need to replace him though? There’s a 25-year back catalog of recorded voice lines to recycle, and most of those consist of “Let’s-a-go” and “Yahoooo!” I think the most complex sentace I’ve ever heard Mario speak in game is “Thank-a-you so much for playing my game”. Combine that with AI voice recreation, and there’s literally no reason to ever hire a replacement. Just cut Martinet a big-ass check for perpetual use of his voice, and they’re golden.
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They’d probably prather not pay likeness fees, and there are a LOT of legal considerations Martinet would have to consider as signing the rights away to his own voice brings a lot of considerational challenges.
Think they already have replaced him, listen to the voice carefully in the wonder trailer
I feel like I used to have a Mario card game on my 90’s Macintosh? We played go fish in the back of a limo or something… I recall he had pretty complex voice lines in that game.
edit: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mario's_Game_Gallery
I’m pretty sure all the edutainment titles predate Charles Martinet as the voice of Mario, and I don’t think Nintendo would ever make a game like that these days.
The wiki page literally says Charles Martinet voiced Mario in that game.
The CNN article says Martinet started with Mario Teaches Typing in 1994.