Super Mario Bros. Wonder Devs Reveal Cut Inflation Power

The developers of Super Mario Bros. Wonder have revealed that the game once featured an inflation-themed power-up, but it was cut during development. This would have been tied to Super Mario Bros. Wonder’s new elephant transformation, which makes characters bigger and stronger and lets them fire water from their trunk.

The Super Mario Bros. series is no stranger to cut content, a lot of which has been revealed in interviews outside of the games, such as the concept of Mario riding a dinosaur being around since the early days of the series, but the limitations of the NES prevented it from happening until Super Mario World. Nowadays, hardware limitations aren’t as much of an issue, so the developers at Nintendo can go hog wild with new Super Mario Bros. ideas.

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Super Mario Bros. Wonder Almost Let Elephants Inflate Koopa Shells

It initially seemed as if Nintendo was leaning into weird stuff with Super Mario Bros. Wonder, but their depravity has some limits. A new interview with the developers of Super Mario Bros. Wonder on the official Nintendo website has revealed a bizarre power-up that was partially produced for the game but was cut before it could be implemented.

According to Koichi Hayashida (Entertainment Planning & Development Production at Production Group 10), Super Mario Bros. Wonder initially let characters using the elephant power-up grab discarded Koopa shells and inflate them, increasing their size and strength. A short animation of this ability in action was included in the interview.

The inflation power-up was cut because the developers couldn’t think of anything interesting to do with it. There is a holdover from this stage of development in the final version of Super Mario Bros. Wonder, as the elephant power-up lets players carry big objects, as this was the intended goal for inflating shells.

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It’s a shame that the inflation power-up was cut from Super Mario Bros. Wonder, but if it stumped the developers that much, then it must have been for a good reason. The dream of reliving the amazing giant world from Super Mario Bros. 3 might be dead, or not, depending on how far the game goes with the elephant concept.