4.1. The Nintendo Stance Nintendo maintains a historically strict policy regarding the protection of its Intellectual Property. While the company occasionally tolerates small, non-commercial projects, it almost invariably issues DMCA (Digital Millennium Copyright Act) takedown notices against projects that use their assets or characters, particularly those that gain high visibility.
4.2. The Cease and Desist In 2020, Nintendo's legal team issued a DMCA takedown notice to Christopher. The specific targets were the project's download pages and associated videos hosted on YouTube.
To help visualize the sprawling nature of the franchise, here is a breakdown of the major dimensional planes and their primary titles.
| Dimension Name | Primary Titles | Key Rule | Threat Level | | :--- | :--- | :--- | :--- | | The Primary Plane | Super Mario Sunshine, 64, Wonder | Standard physics; Respawning enemies. | Moderate (Bowser) | | The Paper Realm | Paper Mario: TTYD, Origami King | 2D narrative logic; Audience affects reality. | High (Demons, Erasure) | | The Cosmic Cycle | Super Mario Galaxy 1 & 2 | Spherical gravity; Universal death/rebirth. | Cosmic (Universal Reset) | | The Dream Depot | Mario & Luigi: Dream Team | Dreams become physical; Pi'illos shape reality. | Variable | | The Glitch Zone (Minus World) | SMB1 (Glitch), ROM Hacks | Broken code; Infinite loops; Water physics. | Psychological | super mario multiverse
For decades, fans have debated a simple question: Is Super Mario Bros. 2 just a dream? Is Super Mario Sunshine a vacation gone wrong, or a glimpse into a parallel dimension? As Nintendo continues to push the boundaries of its flagship franchise, one concept has moved from fan theory to functional reality: The Super Mario Multiverse.
Unlike the gritty, existential multiverses of Rick and Morty or the MCU, Mario’s multiverse is filled with pasta power-ups, talking hats, and paint-based physics. Yet, it is arguably one of the most complex and narratively rich multiverses in gaming. From the shifting geometry of Super Mario 64 to the dimensional rifts of Super Mario Odyssey, let’s dive deep into the endless realities of everyone’s favorite plumber.
At its core, a Mario multiverse is more than a collection of themed worlds. It’s a design philosophy that treats each world as a unique set of rules, aesthetics, and mechanics—while keeping Mario’s core identity intact. Imagine: To help visualize the sprawling nature of the
These variations let designers experiment without breaking the recognizable joy of running, jumping, and stomping.
No article on the Mario Multiverse is complete without addressing the fandom’s most persistent meta-theory: Luigi is the constant.
The theory posits that while Mario represents order and stability (always saving Peach in each universe), Luigi represents variance. In the Primary Plane, he is a nervous coward. In the Luigi's Mansion universe, he is a reluctant hero facing supernatural horror. In the Paper universe, he is a bumbling sidekick writing a poorly-selling book about his adventures. and Luigi has no reflection
Furthermore, Waluigi (a character with no canonical origin) is often cited as a "multiverse ghost"—a being that only exists because of the reflection between realities. If Mario has Wario (his dark reflection), and Luigi has no reflection, the multiverse created Waluigi as a balancing error.
In strict terms, the Super Mario Multiverse refers to the collection of parallel dimensions, dream worlds, pocket realities, and altered timelines that co-exist alongside the primary Mushroom Kingdom. This is not a single timeline (like The Legend of Zelda), nor is it strictly a multiverse of alternate characters (though we have those, too—looking at you, Cosmic Clone).
Instead, the Mario Multiverse operates on a "World Soup" model. Different games introduce different cosmological rules: