Mailbag
03/23/2001

Got something you want us to answer next week? Send it to tmk_mailbag@usa.net.

Hello, it's J.J. again! I've gotten a lot of cruel e-mail ever since I made fun of some of the idiot letters I received in the last mailbag. Well, the joke's on you people! I actually got good letters this time, so it looks like my mocking of ~mArI0HaX0R65784~, or whoever it was, paid off.

PS- We're getting a lot of mailbag questions these days, so try to help us out. tmk_mailbag@usa.net is an address ONLY for mailbag questions, so feel free to have something other than "for the mailbag" in the subject.

I was just wondering what is up with the Mario Advance screenshots. What in the world is a HUGE Shy Guy and turnip doing in that game? I own Super Mario All Stars and SMB 2 and you can't obtain anything like that in them.
-Zombie Mario

J.J.: That's 'cause it's a new thing. Apparently the giant item / enemy gimmick will play a large part in MA, but we have yet to uncover the specifics. SMA will not be an exact clone of SMB2, so expect lots of wacky new stuff.

will there ever be a mario game were there is 2-player cooperative because that would rule, I mean, it would be fun because if you were playing 2-player cooperative and lets just say luigi looses a life because of a goomba and sinse it is 2-player cooperative player 1 can beat that goomba up kind of like avenging his brother. oh and another question is will they ever make a mario kart game for this new GAMECUBE?
-

J.J.: Super Mario Advance will have a 2-player simultanious player mode, but not in the adventure part of the game.
There probably will be a Mario Kart on Gamecube as well, even though there has been no offical comment. Releasing a Mario Kart game on a new system is sort of a Nintendo tradition.

Yes, I have a couple Questions:
1. What do you think about ROMS, and Video Game Piracy in general?
2. What do you think about Conkers Bad fur Day, and the contraversial contetn of the game?
3. Why don't you guys register www.mushroomkingdom.com , or something to that effect? You guys definantly seem like a professional site to me.
4. Have any of you read GAME OVER: The Maturing of Mario by David Sheff, and what do you think of it?
5. All your base are belong to us.
-Spike Murphy

J.J.: 1. I don't think most of us care that much aboot ROMs, one way or another. I mean, if you look around the site, most of our content came directly from ROMs, be it screenshots, sprites, or even info on obscure titles that you could never find a physical copy of in real life. They are website posion, however, so we steer clear of posting any.

2.Conker's Bad Fur day looks like one cool game. None of us here are PC weirdos, so the game doesn't offend us.

3. Surprisingly, almost every good Mario related URL has already been claimed, including mushroomkingdom.com. Deezer is toying with a few other ideas, however.

4. Game Over is an excellent book in my never-to-be-humble opinion, and David Sheff is a brilliant writer. I may disagree with a lot of what he says in his books, but he has a strong passion for what he does, and he really researches his topics thoroughly. If anyone wants to hear the real story on how video games got to where they are today, albeit from a very liberal perspective, I would strongly reccommend this title.

5. Pushing will protect you from the terrible secret of space.

This may be one of my dumbest questions, but how do you "tell Nintendo"? I want to tell them my Game Idea. They probably wont listen, but it's worth trying.
-Super Frog

J.J.: E-mail them or write them a letter. And you better know how to write Japanese, 'cause writing to NOA won't do squat.
PS: Your idea will never be used in a million years, so don't get too excited.

Okay, because of your blatant plagurism in the last mailbag, maybe you can tell me what happened to Nintendorks.com. The site mysteriously vanished a few months ago, and I never found out why. This used to be my favorite site, and if you could offer me an explanation, I would greatly appriciate it.
Thanks!
-Qwil man

J.J.: Nintendorks had no choice but to shut down after financial problems. See, this is why you should ALWAYS click on ad banners! Nintendorks is gone because of you people, and no one else!

My English teacher says that "It's me" isn't proper English. It should be, "It is I," because... well, that's not important. However, he didn't say anything about "It's-a Me!"
-LuigiHann

J.J.: Someone get me Joe Lieberman on the phone! Mario's use of bad English is corrupting our youth!