For those who might not be aware, E3 is the biggest gaming convention in the world. It goes down at the same time every year in LA where all the biggest game creators come together to announce big things and demo new games.
It goes without saying that most, if not all the gaming big wigs attend the event each year.
At a media pre-briefing for Nintendo, I sat about 3 meters away from Mario creator and Nintendo genius, Shigeru Miyamoto. 3 meters from the architect of my favourite childhood games. Needless to say, I nearly shit in my pants.
But unbelievably, that experience would be topped when I today attended a tour of Nintendo’s corporate booth. As well as trying out a bunch of their new games (all of which are fantastic, by the way), I got to meet the voice of Mario in the goddamn flesh, Charles Martinet.
I damn near froze. What the hell do you say to one of your childhood heroes? We made some small talk once we were introduce and it turns out he is the nicest person I have ever met. That’s not an exaggeration, he could not be more pleased to see how happy I was to meet him.
He asked if I wanted a photo, to which I obviously accepted, and then I asked if maybe he wouldn’t mind doing a little shout out for us.
And he bloody did it, folks.
I thanked him profusely as he departed to go and talk to people out in the crowd. He was not obliged to do so, that’s just the awesome kinda dude he is.
Charles is 61-years-old and has been voicing Mario since 1995. He also voices other notable Nintendo characters Baby Mario, Luigi, Baby Luigi, Wario, Waluigi and Toadsworth.
He’s also done some acting and can speak fluent French and Spanish.
Photo: PEDESTRIAN.TV / Matt Hopkins.
