In the recently released The Art of Super Mario Odyssey book, the art director, Rikuto Yoshida, and the character art lead, Sho Murata, talked about the process of giving physical materials on Mario a more realistic look.

Check out what they said below:

Art director Rikuto Yoshida

When considering Mario’s design for this game, we decided very early on to give the physical materials a more realistic look than before. In order to welcome players with the aforementioned sense of surprise, we made individual strands of Mario’s mustache and hair visible. We also designed the denim of his clothes to show a fine weave.

The game’s setting and artwork influenced one another, and we were stunned by the impact of this new Mario coming to life before our eyes. Despite significant alterations, we made sure when finishing the design to maintain the visual aspects that people all over the world associate with Mario.

Character art lead Sho Murata

We constructed our Mario with the most detailed quality yet, benefiting the latest 3D Mario game. What would his gloves be made of? Does denim really exist in this color? How are his shoes put together? What about the texture of his hair? There were so many new issues we had to tackle when attempting the updated design. While making sure to not deviate from Mario’s existing image overall, we made his face a bit more “cool” than in previous games to make it seem right when set in motion. You may not be able to tell at a glance, but a lot of attention was put into his eyes. They were made to resemble real eyes with a tangible sense of depth. His expressions are much more vivid, more impressive than before.

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