10 Video Game Characters Who MASSIVELY Changed Before Release

There is a lot going on with Mario. Despite being the face of video games, he is a face that takes a considerable amount of patience and effort to explain to someone.

He is an Italian plumber who lives in a fantasy kingdom, fights armies of turtles and mushrooms, has a ghost-busting brother, and his main nemesis is a spiky dragon who flies around on a giant airship with the sole intention of kidnapping princesses.

Now imagine how much more confusing this Mario equation would be if you were to add guns to it!

Well, you might be surprised to hear that this was actually Shigeru Miyamoto's idea for the character! During the 25th Mario anniversary, the legendary Nintendo director revealed that in his original vision for the first Mario Bros. game, the Italian plumber was meant to wield an actual gun!

Mario would pull out his weapon whenever you pressed the A button, and instead of having to jump on his enemies heads, he would be able to safely dispose of them from a distance.

This concept was later reworked into the flower powerup, but the bizarre visual of Mario running around with the Mushroom Kingdom's equivalent of a 9mm Glock was scrapped.

Probably for the better.