10 Video Game Characters Better Than EVERYONE Expected

There sure wasn't much fanfare for Waluigi when he was first introduced in Mario Tennis, given the understandable perception from many that he was nothing more than an unimaginative Wario sidekick - the Luigi to his Mario, naturally.

Given that he was blatantly shoved into Mario Tennis to pad out the roster, there wasn't much expectation among the fandom that Waluigi would be sticking around, and yet, less than a quarter-century later he's appeared in more than 50 Mario games.

While Waluigi's character development is thin at best, he has become something of a cult icon for the Mario brand due to his tendency for self-loathing, his unforgettable screams of "Wahhhh!," and the meme-worthy decision to let him do the D-Generation-X crotch chop in Mario Strikers.

There's a passionate quarter of the fanbase that even believes him to have surpassed Wario in appeal at this point, perhaps best evidenced by the vocal outrage when he was excluded from Super Smash Bros. Ultimate.

For a character we'd surely dismiss as "AI created" were he introduced nowadays, it's impressive that Walugi has actually had serious staying power in the cultural consciousness, even if Nintendo seemingly refuses to give him his own solo game.