The 'Shroom:Issue 200/Palette Swap
Director's Notes
Happy 200, everyone!! Congratulations to The 'Shroom and all our writers!
200 is a huge milestone! We've been kicking this long and I think The 'Shroom has just gotten better and better. With all the creativity of our community plus the WAHOO! of Mario, I think we can easily go another 200 issues. Thank YOU for reading with us all these years and contributing, whether's that's submitting your own original section or voting in a Section of the Month poll, we couldn't do it without our amazing community!
The last wave of DLC for Mario Kart 8 Deluxe dropped this month, and I've truly found joy in my life again playing as Funky Kong. I can forgive (some) of the issues of MK8DX and focus on the fact that I can surf a wave on top of a motorbike with the guy who's having the MOST fun out of anybody. Keep bringing Funky back, Nintendo!!
There are a LOT of good sections down there, so I won't keep you up here too long. The only announcement I have for you is a sad one- issue 200 is Lakituthequick (talk)'s last Site Seeing. We've loved looking at Nintendo's websites with you, LTQ, from games to watches to amusement parks and eerything in between. Best of luck on all your new projects- we'll miss you!
Happy reading!
~FunkyK38
Section of the Month
The last Section of the Month results are in, and this month, the top slot goes to winstein (talk)'s The ? Panel! Following up, we have Shmaluigi, Private Investigator by Waluigi Time (talk), and then our volunteer Random Image of the Month by Shoey (talk). Thanks for voting one last time, everyone, we've been happy to tally everything up and recognize some great sections!
| PALETTE SWAP SECTION OF THE MONTH | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Place | Section | Votes | % | Writer |
| 1st | The ? Panel | 13 | 33.33% | winstein (talk) |
| 2nd | Shmaluigi, Private Investigator | 11 | 28.21% | Waluigi Time (talk) |
| 3rd | Random Image of the Month | 9 | 23.08% | Shoey (talk) |
What's on the Box?
Written by: Waluigi Time (talk)
Hello there, 'Shroom readers, and welcome to a special guest edition of What's on the Box?! No, I'm not surprised, there's just a question mark in the section title. Traditionally, this section has almost always featured boxart from Super Mario games and its related franchises, but I'm doing something a little different from that. Back in Issue 174 when I was first starting out To Infinity and Beyond over in Strategy Wing, I joked that the boxart for Toy Story 2: Buzz Lightyear to the Rescue! would make good material for this section, so... let's do it!
So this game was released on basically every platform that existed at the time, and the boxart was more or less the same for all of them (except the Game Boy Color version, but that was a completely separate game made by different developers anyway). The only difference was the game logo placement and the usual extra logos for the developers and hardware. But hey, it's the same key artwork, and that's all that really matters. It's not like anyone's going into this section expecting discussions about ESRB logos, after all.
Buzz Lightyear himself is front and center, as he should be, since you spend the entire game playing as him! He's in a cool action pose and firing his laser off the edge of the box with a determined look on his face. His arch-nemesis Emperor Zurg looms behind him, partially obscured by what I assume is steam. He's armed with his signature ion blaster and has his hand outstretched in a Darth Vader-esque fashion. While this illustration of Buzz was specifically made for the game as far as I know, Zurg just uses stock promotional artwork for the film here. The setting is the elevator shaft from the film where Buzz and Zurg have their encounter, which is also depicted in one of the game's levels. If I were awarding any sort of points, it would score some here for accurately depicting the game, but I'm not, so I just have to give the artists a kudos here.
The game's logo is just the standard one for the film, in case you forgot what this was promoting. Like I said, this changes placement and size depending on the platform, but it's always here in some form. Underneath it is the subtitle, "Buzz Lightyear to the Rescue!", in a very standard font. It would've been cool if they actually designed a logo for it, and they actually did, but it only appears in-game on the main menu, and that one probably wouldn't have fit well with everything else going on here. The computer versions drop the subtitle entirely, and are in general just worse because Mickey Mouse got his gloves all over it and covered up a lot of the background to put Buzz and Zurg inside of a Mickey head silhouette. Then again, it's also the only version where Zurg isn't partially blocked by the Toy Story 2 logo at all.
But I have to wonder, Zurg is behind Buzz, so what's he firing at? Are there Zurgbots just offscreen serving as a distraction while their emperor gets the drop on Buzz? Is there a mirror hanging in the elevator shaft and Buzz is firing at Zurg's reflection, or perhaps trying to reflect his laser shot off of it and back at Zurg? Maybe there's no threat whatsoever and he's just making sure his laser button still works! Neither the game or movie provide any clues, so I doubt we'll ever find out. It probably would've made more sense to have Buzz firing at Zurg, but I can see why they didn't do that. They would've either had to show Buzz from the back, or Zurg would've taken up more space on the boxart than Buzz. This was really the only way to have Buzz shown clearly while keeping him as the most prominent character.
This is a pretty cool boxart that does its job well. It looks good and most importantly, it gets you hyped to play the game! Right away from looking at this boxart, you can see that you get to run around as Buzz Lightyear in an action-packed adventure and even face off against Zurg at some point. Of course, I may be biased since I really like this game.
Site Seeing
Written by: Lakituthequick (talk)
Hello dear readers and welcome to Site Seeing, in which I'll go over some of the websites Nintendo releases to inform the public about their games and series!
A bittersweet edition today, as this is the last Site Seeing I will be writing for the foreseeable future. I've been writing it for just over three years now, and the 200th issue is a high note to end on.
Today, I will look back at the sections I've written, and see if, and how much, sites have changed after I covered it. Let's go!
Super Mario (NOA)
The first site I reviewed, in October 2020, was the North American Super Mario website. Overall, this site didn't change that much. It was updated with games that released in the meantime, such as Super Mario Bros. Wonder, while at the time the focus was the 35th anniversary of the series.
A new item was added to the menu though: a character page, listing the likes of Mario, Luigi, Bowser, a bunch of supporting characters, and Boo for some reason. Each of these has artwork that swaps out when their collapsed box is opened and a blurb is revealed.
Mario + Rabbids Sparks of Hope
The fifth site, in July 2021, was Mario + Rabbids Sparks of Hope's website. The game was only just announced, so it speaks for itself that the contents have expanded afterwards. For one, the character carousel has been completed, from three to nine. There is also more news, which now has its own separate page for a complete archive. And of course, the DLC is now listed.
Mario Kart 8 Deluxe
In January of this year, 2023, I covered site number 13, Mario Kart 8 Deluxe's. A neat site, which has extra longevity because the Booster Course Pass has only recently been released completely. That is the first obvious update: at the start of the year, only three waves had been released, and now it's all six. The second thing I noticed, which is rather a lack of update, is a bug that displays some images stretched all over the page if you happen to refresh while you're scrolled halfway down. Yep, this also happened in January.
SMB Plumbing
A month later, The Super Mario Bros. Movie received a website disguised as one for SMB Plumbing. The site was fairly new at the time, so included just a few teasing elements. After the movie was released, it was updated with more information and more references.
Unfortunately, the site has since been replaced with a simple landing page linking to various streaming services and three behind-the-scenes videos.
Other sites
The sites above are still up, more or less, as well as ten other sites that don't have any relevant changes. There are also two sites that went down, the ones for Paper Mario: The Origami King and the TAG Heuer Connected × Super Mario site. The former redirects to a generic game page, the latter to a general collaboration page where the smartwatch is not listed.
Lastly, the site for Super Mario Party was already down when I reviewed it, though the Wayback Machine.
Conclusion
Well, this is it, Luigi. I greatly enjoyed writing this section for a few years, but as with everything, you have to stop while you still enjoy it. I've seen many a great site, as well as many a so-so site, and I hope I could take you, the reader, along with some facets of web design that you wouldn't otherwise have thought about.
The 'Shroom, essentially, is something of a website too, with its own design, theming, and, as of late, interactivity. Issue 200 is a great testament to that. I hope you enjoy it, and I'm happy to be part of it.
Until next time, have a good one!
Meta's Poem
Written by: Meta Knight (talk)
The following poem you're about to read was created during Roserade's (talk) Poemtober 2022. For those unaware, during the month of October, every day you feel like, you create a poem! Each day had a prompt that was a singular word and you could write about however you interpreted it. This poem was written for the theme Streak. If you wish to know more about the creative process, or anything like that, you're welcome to read my commentary as well.
Artisans
A silent moment disturbed by the spark of artistry,
Neurons firing across the roads of imagination.
A brush swims through hues to fly onto a void canvas,
Painting abstract hypotheticals into the physical plane.
Fingers glide across the strings to grace eardrums with harmony,
Composing a catchy sequence of notes along an embellished melody.
A typewriter clicks away stamping furiously through the page,
Inking a manuscript to furnish a crowning narrative.
The fiery passion that rides within the mind of creativity
Brings a blessing of the arts to share throughout a community.
Sometimes it's difficult finding time out of the mundane work schedule to slot in more artistic activities, but I still enjoy it when I can. What's really interesting is that everyone has a different reasoning behind what makes them tick, and for wanting to make stuff. I tried showcasing a variety of creative avenues, so hopefully there's someone that can relate out there.
Random Image of the Month
Hello and welcome to yet another Random Image of the Month, The 'Shroom's most volunteer-based, image-based opinion section. Last month, we looked at one of Mario's spookiest images. This month, we're returning to the classics as we look at an image from one of the greatest games of all time, Super Mario World.
So, before I get into my main point, I have to say that I don't like those fruits. They look gross. Why do they have yellow spots? They don't have yellow spots in the games! The spots make them look rotten and unappealing. My point is that I wouldn't eat them, because they look poisonous. With that little tangent out of the way, I can move on to my main point, that being how unintentionally funny this image is!
Now, you might be thinking, "what do you mean? It's just an image of Mario and Luigi being confused by a Yoshi Egg", and that's true! This is, in fact, an image of Mario and Luigi being confused by a Yoshi Egg. But if you think about it from a lore perspective, them being confused makes no sense! Canonically speaking, Mario and Luigi have spent most of their lives around Yoshis, they've seen dozens of Yoshi Eggs before! Why are they confused about them? IT DOESN'T MAKE ANY SENSE NINTENDO! It kind of has the Pokémon thing going on where it makes a lot less sense that people thought there were only 150 Pokémon when you find out that Johto is like a fifteen-minute Lapras ride away from Kanto. Just like that, in retrospect, this image makes Mario and Luigi look like complete morons. They're here acting shocked over the existence of something they've seen literally dozens of times before!
It's just one of those images that, if it had been made at the time Super Mario World released, would be nothing special. It'd just be some basic art to go along with the game. In retrospect, though, it becomes great unintentional comedy, which made it worth sharing this month.
The ? Panel
"Mexico!" (instead of "Let's-a-go!")
[Mario, in the Sombrero and Poncho while holding a small guitar, has an excited posture]
"I'm attired..." (instead of "I'm-a tired...")
[Mario, in a Black Top Hat and the Black Tuxedo, holds a cane. He has a relaxed expression, maybe tired. Sparkles shine around him]
"Texas on ice! (instead of "That's-a so nice!")
[Mario wears a scarf and earmuffs, while shivering. Cold air comes from his mouth as he said the line]
"Hell odor! (instead of "Hello door!")
[Mario, dressed in a T-shirt, short pants, and sandals, opens the door. He is greeted by Wario lifting his armpit to give Mario a nasty odour surprise. Mario flinched in disgust at the smell of Wario's body odour]
"Just what I kneaded!" (instead of "Just what I needed!")
[Mario, dressed in a Chef Hat and a Chef Suit, kneads dough]
"It's amie!" (instead of "It's-a me!")
[Mario, in his outfit from Mario Party: The Top 100, greets Peach]
Happy 200th 'Shroom Issue!
Written by: Toadettefan
Hey guys! This is Toadettefan, and right here is a special drawing I've created for the Shroom's 200th issue! I bet you're wondering how it felt to create this piece of art. Sit back, relax, and listen to my thoughts!
The first thing I drew were the letters spelling out Happy 200th shroom issue. I colored these in using markers, and after that, I moved on to Poochy. Our shroom mascot is in cake form, indicated by all the circles on him and the crayons. This was my first time drawing him, and I think I did pretty good.
Next, I laid out a table for the cake to be placed on. There is also a plate, though Poochy's body obscures most of it. The first character I drew was Toadette, my favorite Mario character. I started with her arms and hands, and I also added a bowtie to make her look festive. I've drawn Toadette many times, so I'm happy with how she turned out!
Afterwards, I started on Cream the Rabbit, my favorite Sonic character. I drew her a couple times before this, but I think this one tops the others. Her proportions are just right, and her ears are the right size. When I drew her prior to this, she had two circles on her forehead, but now, she has a triangle shape. One thing you will notice is that Cheese isn't beside her, but that's because I could not fit him on without sacrificing the quality.
Once she was finished, I began working on Nitros Oxide, my second favorite Crash character. This was also my third attempt at drawing him, and I did pretty good. The eyebrows are curvy in shape to indicate his mood with ease. It was hard getting a smiling mouth to work on him, I wanted it to not look too scary, but also not make him look weird. He's also to scale with everyone else here, as making him taller could have been off-putting.
Once all characters were colored in, the background was taken care of. I used a black marker, making sure none of the details got lost. Once that was done, I spent some time polishing the letters. After that, the drawing was complete. I was proud to create this piece and share it with the community. Happy 200 issues, and to everyone in the community, thank you for making this newspaper the best one on the internet!
Mario's Boombox
Written by: Hooded Pitohui (talk)
If you've been around the community for a spell, or just following some of the music I've covered in this section and, say, the Music on a Staff staff-written collaboration, there's a fair chance you know that I like both nerdy videogame-inspired songs and songs with a bitter streak. I'm fond of music that has overtones of anger, songs that are unafraid to get acerbic in their lyrics and sound. Today, for this milestone issue, I have a song for all of you that combines those two things, mashing together an appreciation for a game's world and characters with more than a fair bit of resentment. Check your nails at the door, settle into your seats, and get ready to raise a glass in a toast... "To The King".
"To The King", to cover the basics first, is a Hollow Knight-inspired fan-song written by TyKim, performed by Brittany Hadley, and accompanied by thumbnail art by @_NotaMato. Now, it looks like TyKim makes videogame-inspired music on occasion, with a couple of Omori-inspired songs listed (though, as of the time of this writing, it appears many of their works are unlisted), but it's not their exclusive focus. Their channel lists a few original songs, too, which overall seem to combine peppy, upbeat instrumentals with heavier lyrics. "To The King" stands out in a few ways, though. First, it's far and away the most popular video on the channel, with well over one million views, and, second, well, as aforementioned, a vocalist performed it, while it appears many of TyKim's songs are performed by Vocaloid software.
Getting into the song itself, what we have here is far from the glowing ode to a monarch that one might expect from the title. No, the song is a condemnation of a monarch, a strong rebuke of the long-gone Pale King, founder and once-ruler of the "eternal" kingdom of Hallownest, the being that uplifted the insects of Hallownest and gave them intelligence. With accusatory questions such as "do you remember your graveyard?" and "with corpses beneath you, do you sleep at night?", the narrators of this song really don't hold back in critiquing The Pale King. In fact, the song is such a repudiation of what The Pale King did, and his philosophy of "no cost too great," that it even leans into being a promise-and-a-threat. You have the narrators warning The Pale King that "someday you'll have to / pay up your debt" and promising a return, culminating with the declaration that "our voices will cry out again".
Just who are these narrators behind the song, though, and why are they so bitter towards The Pale King? Well, it seems like the narrators are The Pale King's children, the many vessels created from the union of The Pale King and the White Lady as part of a plan to seal away an infection ravaging Hallownest that were ultimately dumped into an abyss to be filled with Void and, save for one, sealed away there after just one of them was selected for the plan. I mean, personally, I think that's a fair reason for the many vessels to resent The Pale King; that's not exactly A+ parenting there. Lending even more weight to the vessels' contempt for The Pale King, there are a fairly large number of Hallownest denizens who ended up suffering on account of The Pale King's actions, too, reflected in the song when the vessels command The Pale King to "think of your children" and to "think of your men", along with them mentioning all of the sacrifice needed by The Pale King to "seal [his] damned demons away".
Honestly, the song works really well as one long resentful string of barbs towards The Pale King, drips with venom the whole way through, and it doesn't pull punches, either. The vessels go right for targeted strikes throughout the piece, inquiring about the true relationship between The Pale King and his singular selected vessel, the Hollow Knight, made to suffer thanks to the king's actions. This "chosen, pure knight" turned out to be not-so-pure, seemingly gaining hopes and desires of its own, contrary to the plan, through forming an attachment to The Pale King, seeing him as a father figure. Yet the king sent it to fulfill its duty anyway, all but ensuring its torment as it kept itself silent and raised no objection. The vessels call their father out on this, asking "for you, for your heart, for their love, did they lie?" as if to hammer home that The Pale King cast aside - failed - even a child so devoted to him that it would willingly sacrifice itself for him.
There are a handful of segments throughout the song that seem to be from The Pale King's perspective, with The Pale King affirming he'll do anything to keep his kingdom, that he sees no cost as too great, and pleading for just one day more to solve the problems plaguing his domain. It's an interesting little addition that makes me want to imagine the song in duet form or something similar, with The Pale King interjecting in defense of his actions, defiant and clinging to his philosophy even after the end of his "eternal" kingdom. It's not impossible to read these segments as still being the vessels, though, mocking the king's work and decisions, especially with lines like "cause pain and death, it's fine / as long as this kingdom's mine," which does sound more like something you would say to mock a person rather than something a person would admit to and boast about.
I could go into more detail about exactly how the song intersects with the story of Hollow Knight, pick out more lines that highlight this song as a forceful, somewhat melancholic, mostly bitter rebuke that fits well among the ruined kingdom of Hollow Knight, but, honestly, as always, I can't convey to you in thirty-three paragraphs what listening to the song a couple times through can. The vocalist here does a great job of conveying the song's anger, nailing a festering sense of resentment by mixing softer, melancholic lines with loud, admonishing commands to The Pale King to remember the past and face the consequences of what he wrought. She even does solid work selling the pleading of The Pale King during his short segments. The instrumentation does just as great work of bringing out the bitterness of those left behind and abandoned in a ruined kingdom, and I'll give the song props, as well, for working in a well-placed reference to The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas.
Overall, it's a great song, one highly worth a listen, especially for Hollow Knight fans, but one that I think gets its bitterness through even if you aren't familiar with the game's story. In fact, I was only vaguely familiar with the game, knowing it mostly through word-of-mouth praise, when I stumbled upon the song. It was hearing this that convinced me to spend a weekend reading up on Hollow Knight and to eventually buy the game. I, ah, still haven't played it... Though, hey, I'll play it before issue 300 for sure... right? Enough about my gaming habits, though. Go check out the song!
From the Composer of...
I'm a video game fan but I'm also a big fan of video game music. I like listening to it, playing it on different instruments, and buying official soundtracks, and whenever I play a game or even watch a movie, I try to pay attention to the music and, if I liked it, look up the composer(s) afterwards to see what else they've done. Although you'll frequently see people praising music in games, it's not often that the composer themselves gets recognised, especially if they're not a household name like Koji Kondo or Yoko Shimomura. For this section, I wanted to shine a brief spotlight on some Nintendo and non-Nintendo composers - both well known and lesser known - that have worked on Mario music, and show some other themes outside of the series that they have also worked on, which may be similar to compare the composer's musical style between the two themes, or even completely different to show the composer's versatility. They may be obscure tunes, or tunes you probably didn't know were by that composer. I'm definitely not the most music theory-savvy person, so this won't be a section where I go into technical detail; it's mostly just a showcase of songs that share the same composers with some occasional comments, which hopefully some of you may find interesting and may even encourage you to listen to more of their music! (Credits sourced from the game itself and respective game soundtracks on VGMdb.)
Koji Kondo
Who better to start with than Koji Kondo? A legendary composer who can be considered the John Williams of video games, he's written some of the most memorable themes in video game history and is still composing today, even having composed some songs for Super Mario Bros. Wonder, which just came out last month, and, before that, Super Mario Odyssey, including the fan-favourite Steam Gardens theme. But today I wanted to bring attention to a couple of lesser known themes that he's done...
| Composed... | Also composed... | |
|---|---|---|
|
|
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| "Ground Theme" from Super Mario Bros. (1985) | "Title BGM" from Shin Onigashima (1987) | "Bowser" from Super Mario World 2: Yoshi's Island (1995) |
Two years after Super Mario Bros., Kondo composed for Shin Onigashima, a Japan-only game. This is a nice, comforting tune and a cool showcase of the Famicom's distinct sound. You may be familiar with this theme from Super Smash Bros. Brawl, where it got a sick electric guitar arrangement.
While many of you probably know Kondo did Yoshi's Island, I wanted to highlight this theme because of how completely out-of-left-field it is from the rest of the game's tone and music, and even Kondo's previous works. It's not just fast-paced electric guitar and organ, it's fast-paced electric guitar and organ on the SNES, and even sounds pretty realistic for the system (the organ's not in this sample, but you can listen to it here).
Kazumi Totaka
You also know him as the voice Yoshi. While the Wii Sports and Mii Channel themes are probably Kazumi Totaka's most popular, my personal favourites of his are from the Animal Crossing series, where he's done a majority of its music, including K.K. Slider's songs and the Roost's theme. Among his more recent compositions is the main theme (and its arrangements) in Woolly World, which was his only contribution to the game.
| Composed... | Also composed... |
|---|---|
|
|
| "Yarn Yoshi Takes Shape!" from Yoshi's Woolly World (2015) | The title theme from X-Scape (2010) |
While doing some last-minute shopping on the 3DS/Wii U eShops before their shutdown, I decided to pick up this DSi game (of course, it was given the more boring title 3D Space Tank in Europe and Australia), and the title theme was enough to draw me in. This eerie tune sounds like something you'd hear in a futuristic sci-fi movie like Blade Runner, and it's unlike any of Totaka's other works.
Kenta Nagata
Kenta Nagata is best known for his work in the Mario Kart series, including Mario Kart 8, where he's done a few arrangements like this amazing rendition of F-Zero's Big Blue theme. This time, I want to show two highly popular Nintendo themes that you might not know were done by the same composer. Here's probably the most well known theme in the Mario Kart series with probably the most memorable theme from Wind Waker.
| Composed... | Also composed... |
|---|---|
|
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| "Rainbow Road" from Mario Kart 64 (1996) | "Dragon Roost Island" from The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker (2002) |
Shinobu Nagata
| Composed... | Also composed... |
|---|---|
|
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| "Waluigi Pinball" from Mario Kart DS (2005) | "K.K. Bashment Instrumental" from Animal Crossing: New Horizons (2021) |
One of my favourite songs from the 2.0 update for New Horizons. Shinobu Nagata's name doesn't appear as a "music" credit often nowadays, so seeing her in this game's credits was a surprise.
Asuka Hayazaki
| Composed... | Also composed... |
|---|---|
|
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| "Mega Mario" from New Super Mario Bros. (2006) | "Entropical" from Splatoon 2 (2018) |
Asuka Hayazaki composing two Splatoon songs (this and SashiMori's other song "Chopscrewey") was also a surprise, considering a lot of her past works were relatively more relaxed soundtracks like Super Mario Maker and Pikmin 3. As expected from Splatoon, it sounds weird and awesome.
Ryo Nagamatsu
Ryo Nagamatsu was probably my favourite composer at Nintendo, and I say "was" because he left Nintendo earlier this year to go freelance, which sadly means we likely won't be getting any more Nintendo music from him in the future. But the number of soundtracks he's contributed to during his tenure - A Link Between Worlds, Mario Kart 8, Splatoon 2 - has been impressive to say the least, and I'm currently looking forward to what he'll be working on next. Of course, his best Mario theme for me is still the theme for Puzzle Plank Galaxy.
| Composed... | Also composed... |
|---|---|
|
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| "Puzzle Plank Galaxy" from Super Mario Galaxy 2 (2010) | "Nasty Majesty" from Splatoon 2 (2018) |
Remember that song from the Octo Expansion? Yep, among several others from the DLC, this was one of Nagamatsu's themes. Before that, he also handled all of the music for Salmon Run.
Shiho Fujii
| Composed... | Also composed... |
|---|---|
|
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| "Castle Theme" from New Super Mario Bros. Wii (2009) | "Wave Goodbye" from Splatoon 3 (2022) |
Outside of the several Mario games Shiho Fujii has worked on, she's also known for her work on the Splatoon series, particularly music for the Squid Sisters. This theme from the ending of Splatoon 3's story mode is a fitting finale to the duo's music (...even though they made another song after that).
Minako Hamano
| Composed... | Also composed... |
|---|---|
|
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| "Bowser Castle Course" from Mario Kart: Super Circuit (2001) | "Big Boss Confrontation BGM" from Super Metroid (1994) |
More popularly known as "Vs. Ridley" or the "Ridley theme", this theme never gets old for me no matter how many times it's brought back. Like Kenji Yamamoto (another prominent Metroid composer and also one of my favourites), Minako Hamano is a master of atmospheric music (just listen to her solo work on Metroid Fusion), but she's also able to deliver some catchy tunes, like this Mario Kart theme and a large portion of the Link's Awakening soundtrack, for example.
Naoto Kubo
| Composed... | Also arranged... |
|---|---|
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| "Break Free (Lead the Way)" from Super Mario Odyssey (2017) | "Napalm Man Stage" from Super Smash Bros. Ultimate (2018) |
One of the cool things about Sakurai assembling a staff team for a Smash game is that the composers get to tackle themes from series they would not have been able to be involved in otherwise. Take this, for example, which is a Mega Man 5 theme arranged by the main composer of Odyssey. You can even slightly hear the opening guitar slide from "Break Free" in it.
Yasuaki Iwata
| Composed... | Also arranged... |
|---|---|
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| "Mario Kart Stadium" from Mario Kart 8 (2014) | "Battle! (Island Kahuna)" from Super Smash Bros. Ultimate (2018) |
Here's another example of a composer from the Mario series taking on a non-Mario theme in Smash. This arrangement of a Pokémon Sun and Moon theme wouldn't sound out of place in a new Mario Kart game. Yasuaki Iwata has also gone on to be involved in a number of other big Nintendo titles, a notable one being Breath of the Wild, a game he did a lot of the music for, including Kass's Theme and the four Champions' individual themes.
David Wise
| Composed... | Also composed... |
|---|---|
|
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| "Seashore War" from Donkey Kong Country: Tropical Freeze (2014) | "Crimson Leaves" from Tengami (2014) |
David Wise is my all-time favourite composer, and his work on Tropical Freeze pretty much cemented that, so of course I had to include him. A game he's worked on that hasn't gotten much attention and I wanted to highlight is this indie game from Nyamyam (a studio formed by ex-Rare developers), which blends Wise's signature atmospheric style with Japanese-styled music.
Grant Kirkhope
| Composed... | Also composed... |
|---|---|
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| "Paean to Palette Prime" from Mario + Rabbids Sparks of Hope (2022) | "Yaiba" from Yaiba: Ninja Gaiden Z (2014) |
Originally, I wanted to include the DK Rap as a funny juxtaposition, but I just had to highlight this theme from Sparks of Hope, which I think is Kirkhope's best piece in recent years. But who knew the composer of Donkey Kong 64 and Banjo-Kazooie would also compose for a Ninja Gaiden game?
Motoi Sakuraba
| Composed... | Also composed... |
|---|---|
|
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| The title theme from Mario Power Tennis (2004) | "Lightning Battle" from Kid Icarus: Uprising (2012) |
Fans of the Mario sports games will recognise Motoi Sakuraba's music, but he's arguably more well known for his non-Mario works like the Dark Souls and Tales series. Here is one from what I think is an underrated soundtrack, which he did multiple tracks for alongside several other composers, including Dark Pit's Theme. If you've played Uprising, this theme syncs with what's going on in the game especially well.
Masafumi Takada
To end this section, I wanted to show a few composers well known for their work outside of the Mario series that have arranged Mario themes for Smash.
| Arranged... | Also composed... |
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| "Mike's Song" from Super Smash Bros. Brawl (2008) | "N.M.H." from No More Heroes (2007) |
While I haven't played many of Masafumi Takada's games (God Hand, No More Heroes, etc. - still need to play Danganronpa), the variety of tracks he's contributed to Smash is incredibly diverse. He can go from doing the cute ending theme of Yoshi's Story to the fast-paced, heavy-metal Shin Onigashima medley I mentioned earlier. Here's two more examples showing his range as a composer.
Noriyuki Iwadare
| Arranged... | Also composed... |
|---|---|
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| "Gear Getaway" from Super Smash Bros. for Nintendo 3DS (2014) | "Furio Tigre - Swingin' Tiger" from Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney – Trials and Tribulations (2004) |
The composer behind the beloved Ace Attorney series, though some of you may know him as the composer behind the Grandia series. Noriyuki Iwadare's music for Trials and Tribulations in particular was part of what made the game so memorable for me, but besides the usual dramatic and occasionally unconventional themes, there are also a few themes with some jazz influence, which even extends to his Smash arrangements.
Keiichi Okabe
| Arranged... | Also composed... |
|---|---|
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| "Ashley's Song (JP)" from Super Smash Bros. for Wii U (2014) | "Song of the Ancients (Atonement)" from Nier: Automata (2017) |
Keiichi Okabe made a name for himself through the Tekken and Drakengard/Nier series (two drastically different styles of music), but I only found out about him through the two songs he did for Smash 3DS/Wii U, one of which was this one not featured in the English version. It wasn't until Nier: Automata when I realised how big of a composer he is; in fact, part of the reason I picked the game up in the first place was the music. Definitely check the soundtrack out, and the game if you're into action-adventures!