While the idea of a Nintendo-centered theme park once seemed like a pipe dream relegated to the likes of the Wii U's Nintendo Land game, Universal Studios Japan's Super Nintendo World is less than a month away from its official opening. While the theme park was previously shrouded in mystery, the self-proclaimed father of Mario and Luigi, Shigeru Miyamoto, recently gave an in-depth tour in a livestreamed Super Nintendo World Direct just a few weeks ago.
Although the presentation touched on quite a few aspects of the theme park, there have still been a variety of details that fans have had to find on their own, such as recently captured footage of the theme park's Yoshi's Adventure ride. To shed more light on the park's features, a website launched yesterday giving fans sneak peeks at what more the park has to offer, but as it turns out, this new website may actually include unofficial artwork of Mario.
Over on Twitter, artist uJidow posted side-by-side photos of the loading screen on the official Super Nintendo World website and an old render of Mario made by the artist. uJidow pointed out that Nintendo seemingly used their render of Mario on the official website. As an artist who specializes in Mario and Nintendo renders, it is not hard to see how their artwork could be mistaken for something official.
The render which was previously shared on Reddit was reportedly made 3 years ago in the 3D computer graphics software Blender. For the time being, neither Universal Studios Japan nor Nintendo have made an official statement on the situation. Fans quickly took to Reddit to criticize the video game company for striking down countless fan games containing Nintendo properties, yet seemingly using an artist's work on an official website without due credit. As it turns out, there is an official 3D render of Mario that looks incredibly similar to uJidow's render, so it is likely that an unsuspecting employee mistook uJidow's artwork for the official render.
Since quite a bit of new artwork of Nintendo characters, mainly from the Super Mario series, has been used in promotional material for Super Nintendo World, it's not hard to believe that something like this could happen. Provided this was a genuine mistake, it is likely that Nintendo will replace uJidow's render with the official Mario render on the website in due time.
For the time being, as fans continue to find neat easter eggs like hidden Pikmin around the theme park, it's safe to say that Super Nintendo World will be a hit with fans of the massive video game company. It will be interesting to see what else fans can uncover about the theme park when it officially opens next month.
Super Nintendo World is slated to open on February 4, 2021.