Prerelease:Super Mario Sunshine/2001
This is a sub-page of Prerelease:Super Mario Sunshine.
Contents
May
Pre-Reveal
Reports of a "new Super Mario game" dates back to a press event in May 2001, when Shigeru Miyamato announced there would be a new 3D entry in the Super Mario and The Legend of Zelda series at the then-forthcoming Nintendo Spaceworld 2001. He also wanted to get the Super Mario franchise appeal to a "very wide range of ages", and slowly change his design over time, because he thought he it was "little too much to a strictly younger age".
July
Spaceworld 2001
 | To do: Analyse the maps |
| IGN's recording | Gamerweb's recording |
|---|---|
Super Mario Sunshine was officially revealed at the Nintendo Spaceworld event in July 2001, with a release for the summer of next year. There are numerous changes between this reveal trailer and the final release despite it being a year apart. Interestingly, the music that accompanies the trailer remains in the game's data, though lacking the iconic Super Mario Bros. intro.
Differences include:
- Presence of a Hinokuri enemy in a city that is presumably an early Delfino Plaza and a town that is presumably an early Bianco Hills. The enemy's model still exists in the final game's data albeit unused.
- At around 0:33, Hinokuri seems to be shooting goop out of its head (this is easier to see in IGN's recording). This behavior was removed in the final game, with Hinokuri's leftover behavior only allowing it to spawn enemy.
- In close proximity to Hinokuri in various scenes are small, brown creatures that appear to resemble it. Although in most scenes they are too blurry to make out any finer details, in one shot they are shown to have mushroom-shaped bodies and are covered in green spots. What appears to be Strollin' Stus can also be seen in the background of the scene where Mario stands in the shade of a tree; one to the left of Mario's head and another walking down the path in the background. It closely resembles its final design but may have differed in ways that cannot be inferred from the blurriness of the trailer. It may be possible that the Strollin' Stus have striped pants and a brighter body.
- A rather early rainbow goop texture is present. Likely an early version of the normal goop.
- The texture for the water isn't as realistic.
- The trailer uses the unused sky from the Test Level's files.
- The Piantas have extremely crude models with higher-quality textures.
- Water Barrels are shown here to have a more realistic texture.
- There is an unused brunette human girl. Roaming human characters wouldn't be properly implemented until Super Mario Odyssey. In an interview with Yoshiaki Koizumi for Super Mario Odyssey, he said "Indeed, there is a similar discussion before. It was planned to include a human in "Super Mario Sunshine". [...] Even though we nearly attempted during Super Mario Sunshine's development, when we discussed it, we made characters deformed from people, as we came to the conclusion that we'll stop making realistic-body humans".
- This build lacks dynamic shadows.
- The unused ice cream cart and soccer ball can be seen.
- Early HUD, with a counter for Sol Coins on the bottom-left and water counter on the top-right. Sol Coins are referenced in a line of unused dialogue in some copies of the final game. The water counter is in the shape of a sun instead of FLUDD.
- Strangely, at 0:30 FLUDD seems to have no nozzle. This coincides with the fact that Mario lacks water in this scene.
- FLUDD has a slimmer design in this build.
Delfino Plaza
Bianco Hills
Unknown Build (Pre-Spaceworld 2001?)
Although this screenshot is used in-game as part of a texture map for Eely-Mouth's eyes, it is of an early version of Super Mario Sunshine. The patina roofed "Twin Towers" in the background are those of the early Delfino Plaza from the Spaceworld 2001 trailer. This and the lack of a HUD suggest the image is a screenshot from around the time of the Spaceworld 2001 build.
This screenshot provides us with the earliest designs of Ricco Harbor and the Bloopers. Also present is an early version of Delfino Airport, which used to be directly connected to Delfino Plaza. The building with the waiting room has a more modern design, and there is a skywalk that leading to a watch tower.
