Mario-in-other-games stories remains unconcluded

Tag : Crisp Mushroom

I was in the third grade when I created my first and last videogamefan fiction. It plumbed the hidden motivations of the namelessdriver from Excitebike who, it just so happens, was actually Mario, transported from theMushroom Kingdom into other NES games through a secret warp pipe.The page-long story ended on a dramatic cliffhanger, as the finaljump of the Excitebike course hurls Mario into another secret warp pipe, setting up anentire series of Mario-in-other-games stories that, to this day,remains unconcluded.
It's been said that videogames, like pornography, need some sort ofthin, disbelief-suspending story on which to rest before getting tothe hardcore action. How true this statement is depends on thestory and the game, but there is a class of games it undoubtedlydoes not apply to - those without any story. These pure games mighthave an implied back story ("A bunch of guys get together for amotorcycle race ... ") but by and large, they eschew mythos forpure man vs. other competition, leaving the motivations of thecompetitors purely to the player's imagination.
These story-free games, unsurprisingly, are not the most popularsubjects in the realm of user-created videogame fan fiction (whosestories are often called "fanfics" or "fics"). That title goes toback story-filled epic roleplaying games like Kingdom Hearts , Pok