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Super Mario
- How Nintendo Conquered America
- Narrated by: Ray Porter
- Length: 8 hrs and 20 mins
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Super Mario
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Publisher's Summary
The story of Nintendo’s rise and the beloved icon who made it possible
Nintendo has continually set the standard for video game innovation in America, starting in 1981 with a plucky hero who jumped over barrels to save a girl from an ape.
The saga of Mario, the portly plumber who became the most successful franchise in the history of gaming, has plot twists worthy of a video game. Jeff Ryan shares the story of how this quintessentially Japanese company found success in the American market. Lawsuits, Hollywood, die-hard fans, and face-offs with Sony and Microsoft are all part of the drama. Find out about: Mario’s eccentric yet brilliant creator, Shigeru Miyamoto, who was tapped for the job because he was considered expendable; Minoru Arakawa, the son-in-law of Nintendo’s imperious president, who bumbled his way to success; and the unexpected approach that allowed Nintendo to reinvent itself as the gaming system for the nongamer, especially now with the Wii.
Even those who can’t tell a Koopa from a Goomba will find this a fascinating story of striving, comeuppance, and redemption.
What the critics say
“One of America’s favorite pastimes is covered in exhaustive, enthusiastic detail.” (Publishers Weekly)
What listeners say about Super Mario
Average Customer RatingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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Overall3 out of 5 stars
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Performance5 out of 5 stars
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Story4 out of 5 stars
- Dexter
- 2021-12-21
A competent retelling of Nintendo's history
This book is very much a product of several others that came before it, namely David Sheff's Game Over, a seminal book on Nintendo's rise and Steven L. Kent's the Ultimate History of Video Games.
As a result, the first half is jam packed with a very nice flow and interesting tidbits gleamed from those previous works. The narrative starts to fall apart post SNES and in the transition to the N64. Not surprisingly this is around where Sheff's Game Over leaves the scene.
As has been pointed out in some other reviews, there are many factual inaccuracies ranging from small to large. Though they mostly don't detract from the overall cohesion, telling Nintendo's story post 1995, where the narrative isn't a simple rise or fall, is difficult, and Jeff Ryan makes a good attempt at it.
With the book's publication date in 2011, it landed squarely in the last half of the Wii / DS boom years for Nintendo, and does feel quite dated in 2021 (the date of this review). Most of the book's predictions about the future fall flat, and in the intervening years, we've seen the rise and fall of facebook darlings like Zynga that the author hyped up as a potential Nintendo competitor.
With all that said, covering Nintendo up to the Wii and DS affords Ryan the opportunity to construct a redemption arc after the lucklustre GameCube and he does a competent job at it, though he tends to fall for too much of the internet chatter and armchair histories from what he calls the 'video game intellgentsia' of the period.
If you want a high level view of Nintendo, this isn't a bad start, just be prepared to accept some facts relayed are either wrong, garbled or based on urban myths and the book skips over large chunks of interesting histories of Nintendo at its height, notably the fight with Mirrorsoft and Atari to gain the home rights to Tetris, or most of the console wars shenanigans of the 90s. For those, further reading such as the aforementioned Game Over or Blake J. Harris' aptly titled Console Wars will be required..
Lastly, the audio book's narration by Ray Porter is increadible. The narrator really engages with the material.
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Overall5 out of 5 stars
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Performance5 out of 5 stars
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Story5 out of 5 stars
- John
- 2024-07-30
Excellent narration
Love Mario
lol there is a 15 word minimum for this review
I love this narrator though
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Overall3 out of 5 stars
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Performance4 out of 5 stars
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Story3 out of 5 stars
- Joe
- 2022-01-23
Biased
Not terrible. The author does lean heavily towards Nintendo. Nintendo's expensive peripheral flops like the power glove and the super scope 6 are not discussed at all. The N64 controller was the most awkward and cumbersome controller ever. The Wii remote was spotty at best and didn't work at all with larger displays. The author obviously never picked up either controller. The best part of this book is the laughable prediction that Nintendo will make some sort of comeback. Two consoles later we have another machine that has next to no software. I used to love Nintendo as much as the next fan. Sadly the truth is Nintendo is the only publisher worth buying on their consoles and there aren't enough games to justify the purchase.
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1 person found this helpful
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Overall5 out of 5 stars
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Performance5 out of 5 stars
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Story5 out of 5 stars
- Bruce Novakowski
- 2023-04-11
Loved it!
Fascinating deep dive into the history of Super Mario by looking at Nintendo and the video gaming industry as a whole. Really found it interesting. Narrator does a great job too, captivating voice. Was pleasantly surprised by this one, didn’t have high expectations.
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Overall5 out of 5 stars
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Performance5 out of 5 stars
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Story5 out of 5 stars
- Anonymous User
- 2023-02-06
GOOD
I was just going through my emotions when I was listening to this book u got to read it
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Overall5 out of 5 stars
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Performance5 out of 5 stars
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Story5 out of 5 stars
- Amazon Customer
- 2021-11-19
great read for the history buff or the gamer geek
What a great book. I narrator was highly expressive the jokes were funny and well placed and the content was on point. This book saved peach and bounced to a win.
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Overall5 out of 5 stars
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Performance5 out of 5 stars
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Story5 out of 5 stars
- Al
- 2023-02-20
Very enjoyable
Well paced story about Mario and Nintendo. I had no idea about donkey Kong and that’s a fun bit of trivia to bring up.
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Overall5 out of 5 stars
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Performance5 out of 5 stars
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Story5 out of 5 stars
- Chris
- 2021-12-10
Fantastic and deep history of greatness in gaming
Awesome stuff. I loved the narrator Ray Porter and the information on not just Mario but the history of all video games and the great Nintendo and it's creative geniuses.
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Overall3 out of 5 stars
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Performance4 out of 5 stars
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Story2 out of 5 stars
- Duane Morgan
- 2022-02-11
used it as a sleep aid
was fine. few tidbits I remembered before falling asleep. porter is easy to listen to.
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Overall5 out of 5 stars
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Performance5 out of 5 stars
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Story5 out of 5 stars
- Andrew Tougas
- 2022-03-25
Great Book - give it a listen
second time listening to this book. great research and interesting perspective on the gaming industry on a whole.
highly recommended.
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