How Old Is Mario And Friends?
So many people have wondered how old Mario is, with many people claiming is is 30 or 40, and was 25 years old in DKA. Is this the case?
So, there is an Nintendo Magazine Online interview with Miyamoto titled Shigeru Miyamoto Long Interview. A message from Mario's Creator. In this interview we get the following answer from Miyamoto about Mario's age. 変に制限をつけなかったのが良かったんだろうと思います。キャラクターが生まれてそれが世間に知れてくるようになると、「好きな色はなんですか？」「好きな食べ物は？」というように、設定が細かく決まってきちゃうんですが、大体24～25歳くらいということ以外はなにも決めていませんでした。それはなぜかと言えば、その後でマリオを使ったゲームを作る時に、ゲームに沿った設定でない場合は活かせなくなってしまう。ゲームを作る上で邪魔になりそうな情報を入れなかったんですね。今後も、それを踏まえた上で自由に作っていきたいと思っています。 "I think it was good that we didn't put any strange restrictions on him. When a character is born and becomes known to the public, the settings are decided in detail, such as "What is your favorite color?" and "What is your favorite food?", but we didn't decide anything other than that he was about 24 to 25 years old. The reason for this is that when we make a game using Mario later, if the setting is not in line with the game, it won't be usable. We didn't include any information that would get in the way of making the game. We would like to continue making freely in the future, keeping that in mind." Basic Google Translation
Now what is interesting about this quote is that the surrounding context that they didn't think about things like when Mario was born. That when they didn't think about anything other than he was about 24-25. Now this is interesting because this age is not a set in stone age, due to the fact language such as was is used, as well as about 24-25 and never said is 24 or 25. This age for Mario not being set in stone is further backed up by Miyamoto bringing up the reason is that when they make more Mario games, he can be used without issue. In other words Miyamoto even seems to be saying this age is flexible.
So Mario and friends like don't have a canon set in stone age, which is likely to keep them from aging too much. This is a similar thing that is done with the Sonic characters. That being said Mario and friends are all about the same age. Mario, Luigi, Peach, Cranky Kong, and Baby Wario all appear to be around the same age, with Baby Bowser being slightly older than them. This also likely applies to other characters like Daisy and Pauline, and the Koopalings as well; because as know they are adults as well.
Meanwhile other characters are indeed older than the main cast, for example Kylie Koopa, Toadsworth, and Kamek. Petey Piranha is another character than is likely older than most of the main cast, and Rosalina who is likely a relative of Peach is hundreds of years old.
Now we do know time passes in the Mario world as evident by the Kongs aging, from Cranky Kong to Donkey Kong Junior. This also makes Donkey Kong III younger than the most of the main cast. We also know time has passed because of things such as Peach's Birthday happening in some games. But also the characters can't age too much, so most of the events of the games likely take place with individual years rather than over the course of many years. This also has to be the case as now that Bowser Junior has been introduced, too much time cannot pass between games because of the fact he hasn't aged.
As for the Olympic Games and other games like it. This is likely the result of the Earth they are visiting, has time pass much faster than it does on Mario's world. Think like how it was done in Sonic X.
Now some people believe the amount of time that passes and Mario's age is determined by release date. This makes no sense for numerous reasons, and try apply this logic to any other piece of media like Gravity Falls and Zelda and it immediately falls apart. Some people have tried to back up this logic by referencing in-game references to things like it being 30 years, a prime example being Huey making mention that Mario has fought Bowser for 30 years. The problem with this is this is a meta joke referencing the fact it's been 30 years since Super Mario Bros. But also, as people have pointed out this joke from Paper Mario: Color Splash is not in the original Japanese version. So meta jokes overall are not useful for finding out how much time has passed between games either, let alone the age of a character.
So what do I think? Well I think around the time of DKA characters like Mario, Luigi, Pauline, and Cranky Kong are all somewhere around 18-19 years old. With all current games they are somewhere in their 20s with no precise age that we will be given. Written by Eris The Lorekeeper
