Development:Super Mario Kart/Sprites and Tilemaps
This is a sub-page of Development:Super Mario Kart.
Contents
- 1 Early Sprites
- 1.1 CAR.CGX
- 1.2 MARIO-CAR.CGX.BAK
- 1.3 More Early Drivers
- 1.4 perapera.CGX
- 1.5 TIRE.CGX
- 1.6 DOKAN.CGX
- 1.7 BUBBLE.CGX
- 1.8 pukupuku.CGX
- 1.9 item.CGX
- 1.10 Monty Mole Standing
- 1.11 Coin
- 1.12 ball.CGX
- 1.13 Early Lakitu Graphics
- 1.14 checker.CGX
- 1.15 final-obj-e.cgx
- 1.16 DEMO-MOJI.cgx
- 1.17 SPIN.CGX
- 1.18 HUD
- 1.19 Early Choose
- 1.20 Early Congratulations Text
- 1.21 TITLE-ENG2.SCR
- 1.22 TITLE-ENG2.SCR.BAK
- 2 Early Backgrounds
Early Sprites
CAR.CGX
1 May 1991 03:02, 3 Jul 1991 10:32
Possibly the earliest graphics that were created for Super Mario Kart.
An unnamed guy who mildly resembles Mach Rider in a "car" with a helmet. As mentioned in several interviews, there was originally 8 identical racers sporting a helmet and overalls, and used their own unique color palette to differentiate between each one. The car's design is already very similar to those of Super Mario Kart's. No palette can be found, but it fits pretty well with the driver palettes from the final game (A modified version of Mario/Toad's palette with restored colors used here) unmodified with the exception of some colors. The car itself has much more detail compared to the final game.
He has animations for driving to the horizon and for steering. A sideview of the driver and a rear view with an outline can be found as well.
Directly below these graphics is the same guy sitting in some sort of hovercraft. It has two designs of its sideview.
Then there is this font. It appears to be borrowed from Pilotwings and was possibly used in a very early prototype.
At the very end of this file we can find these very early sprites of the game's main cast sitting in karts. Most likely created as a proof of concept for experimenting with the idea with using the Mario series characters as opposed to a generic racer.
- Mario and Luigi are wearing pants instead of overalls. They are wearing the opposite colors.
- Donkey Kong Jr. is skinner.
- Koopa Troopa's head is much rounder, and his eyes have disappeared behind his head. His shell is way smaller.
- Bowser's hair is orange instead of red. His shell is slightly smaller.
- Peach's hair is longer.
- Toad's head is slightly less round and the red spots are unevenly placed.
- Yoshi's eyeballs are shown. His skin is darker.
MARIO-CAR.CGX.BAK
10 Jul 1991 4:00
A sketch of rear and front views of the drivers. Some look quite similar to their final sprites, while others look pretty different.
- Donkey Kong Jr.'s hands are on the wheel and his mouth is closed.
- Yoshi appears bigger and thicker.
- Toad's mouth is closed and the spots on his head are placed differently.
- Bowser's mouth is less open.
- Some minor adjustments.
Below these graphics are a slightly earlier Mario and an even earlier Koopa sprite with a different face. As a side note, Koopa's shoe fits better with Mario's palette, suggesting that Koopa might have been drawn with Mario's palette in mind.
More Early Drivers
Many sketchpads with lots of early frames of the drivers can be found. While they mostly differs from some small pixel adjustments, they also contain some early designs. It seems that early in development, the drivers had two frames for steering instead of one.
MARIO.CGX
| 17 Jul 1991 8:15 (Left)
18 Oct 1991 9:35 (Right) |
Final |
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For some odd reason, the earliest sketchpad of Mario contains a steering animation for him while further away in the distance but none for the ordinary close-view, possibly a mistake or a hint that the drivers were originally smaller. There is also a slightly later sketchpad which uses the final color for his seat, with his steering sprite differing slightly. Oddly, the Oct. 18 spritsheet doesn't have a defined filename or extension, but can still be previewed in a tile editor.
LUIGI.CGX
| 17 Jul 1991 8:18 | Final |
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| 17 Jul 1991 8:18 | Final |
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YOSSY.CGX, mark.CGX
| 17 Nov 1991 8:08 | 6 May 1992 6:58 | Final (USA) |
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| 17 Nov 1991 8:08 | Final (USA) |
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JR.CGX
| 17 Jul 1991 8:17 | Final |
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His fists were different.
NOKONOKO.CGX
| 17 Nov 1991 8:08 | Final |
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| 17 Nov 1991 8:08 | Final |
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His head received minor tweaks.
perapera.CGX
22 Jul 1992 12:57
| Early | 
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|---|---|
| Final | 
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Early squashed sprites for the drivers.
Top-Down driver sprites, possibly used for a scrapped bird's eye view option, or used as reference to create the squished sprites from the main perspective.
Some neat animation tests for flying away while being squashed. Funnily enough, the placeholder driver mildly resembles Kirby, who was originally designed as a placeholder himself.
TIRE.CGX
17 Jul 1991 8:19
Some stacked tires, possibly a hazard that was later replaced by the pipe. This obstacle would later show up in future Mario Kart installments.
DOKAN.CGX
| Early | Final |
|---|---|
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The iconic pipe hazard received some minor tweaks, mostly in shading.
It can be seen in the game's manual.
BUBBLE.CGX
25 Mar 1992 1:22
The fire bubble, used in the Bowser Castle tracks in the Nov'91 and Feb'92 prototypes before being scrapped in favor of the Thwomps.
pukupuku.CGX
25 Jun 1992 8:21
Various sketches for the Cheep-Cheep, including 2 test spheres and 4 unique top-down sprites.
item.CGX
13 May 1992 9:34
| Early | Final |
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The fireball thrown by Bowser originally had eyes, more resembling the Sparkies from Super Mario World.
| Early | Final |
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Some early drawings of Chain Chomp (the ball enemy from Match Race) with many different faces.
Monty Mole Standing
Maybe they originally waited on the ground for some driver to jump on. Or it was for an animation where it moved its paws.
Coin
While the coin is used in the final game, it does not have graphics for different distances. This could mean that the coins were originally supposed to be standing on the track rather than laying flat.
It can be seen in the Nov'91 prototype.
ball.CGX
16 May 1992 13:57
Many early drawings of the balloon from Battle Mode. There is also a strange futuristic core object of some sorts which was directly ported from early Pilotwings source files.
Early Lakitu Graphics
Early flags and every number for the lap counter. There is also an extra graphic of a scrapped flag that is diagonally divided black-and-white (which means "driving unsportsmanlike" in real races). The scrapped flag got overwritten with the animated coin graphics, while the needless numbers were replaced with the small numbers for the lives counter in the final.
| Early | Final |
|---|---|
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The yellow reverse flag was missing the X and some pixels were moved.
| Early | Final |
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The edge of the flag was changed slightly.
checker.CGX
3 Feb 1992 4:00
| Early | Final |
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Early version of the goal flag seen in the results screen. It was later given an outline.
In real races a white flag signals a driver that there is a slow vehicle on the route. It might also be just a shading template to draw the checkerboard pattern on it.
A sad Mario in a front view can be found towards the bottom of the sheet, which partially overwritten an early spritesheet for Mario. Most likely was meant for post Battle or Match Race when the player loses.
final-obj-e.cgx
| Early | Final |
|---|---|
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Early graphics for the award sequence shows a different type of award. In the place of the champagne bottle was originally an early trophy which palette was modified so that the outline color doesn't fit anymore. The final bottle palette fits however.
DEMO-MOJI.cgx
| Early | Final |
|---|---|
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An early Mario trophy can be found in the graphics for the cup selection.
SPIN.CGX
A unique swirl effect, presumably used for when the player spins out.
HUD
Early Item Icons
Sketches with different designs for the item storage and items. Interestingly, one item is the Pegasus Boots from The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past.
1UP and 2UP
Found within the final HUD graphics is this extra graphic of 1UP and 2UP. In the final version, it is possible to collect multiple 1 Ups, but only one at a time.
SROT-DRAM.SCR
A tilemap showing some items listed. Maybe you could see which and how many items you got/used after a race or a battle?
MARK.CGX
From the CAR folder
17 Oct 1991 3:14
Early graphics for the small icons which are displayed after a race. They didn't have two frames for the winning animation. Some even originally cried in their loser icon.
MARK.CGX
From the obj/others folder
6 May 1992 6:58
| Early | Final |
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Peach's face was a bit narrower.
Early Numbers
Various sketches for the time counter graphics.
Early English Fonts
| Early | Final |
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Several early versions of the English font sheet.
OBJ-MOJI-CGX.BAK
An early Japanese font sheet without an outline and less characters.
Early sketches for the Japanese "Game Over" sign, including a blocky version.
Early sketches for the "Won" and "Lost" signs from Match Race and Battle Mode.
Early sketches for the "Retire" sign. including a bubble version.
Early Choose
| Early | Final |
|---|---|
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Early Congratulations Text
Sketchpads of the Japanese and the English "Congratulations" text from the award sequence.
| Early | Final |
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TITLE-ENG2.SCR
| Early | Final |
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An early version of the international title screen logo, with a slightly bigger "O" and similar letter spacing to the Japanese version. Additionally, Mario's mouth is closed and the border surrounding the logo is thinner in width by a single tile. This version was last modified Jun 17, 1992.
TITLE-ENG2.SCR.BAK
| Early | Final |
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Another early version of the international title screen logo, also modified Jun 17, 1992. It looks closer to the Japanese logo than the final English logo, with the only exceptions being that the "O" is bigger, and Mario's mouth is closed.
Early Backgrounds
Mario Circuit Trees
| Early | Final |
|---|---|
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The trees were more round.
Donut Plains Background
| Early | 
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| Final | 
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The clouds were originally part of the foreground layer. Some mountains used a lost fourth color palette which got overritten with the cloud color.
Note that the color palette used by the foreground cloud still exist in the final, albeit unused.
Interestingly, the Donut Plains 1 remake from the Mario Kart DS Kiosk beta features a recreation of the background with a new mountain color, which may be the lost color from the development file.
Choco Island Background
| Early | 
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|---|---|
| Final | 
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The choco mountains looked pretty different. One of the unused darker brown colors are used here.
Bowser's Castle Background
| Early | 
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| Final | 
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The mountains had some different shapes. The tile for the 45% angle slope for the mountains is still left in the final tileset, unused.
Hitodama
| Early | Final |
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Found in Ghost Valley and Rainbow Road's background graphics are some hitodama which loosely resemble Fireballs from Donkey Kong and Freezies from Mario Bros. They have the same placement as the Boo graphics and were most likely used in their place before being scrapped in favor of something that would fit the Mario universe better.
Early Boo
| Early | Final |
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An early backup of Ghost Valley's background graphic contains, besides the flame shown above, an earlier boo graphic. It was a bit larger and brighter, more closely resembling the boos from Super Mario World.
