Mario Is Missing

Everything About Fiction You Never Wanted to Know.
He's not missing, he's right behind you, Weegee!

"You won't find adobe here in Nairobi..."

Mario is Missing! is a geography-based educational game released for the PC in 1992 and Nintendo Entertainment System consoles in 1993. It was the first game with Luigi as the main character, and the only one until Luigis Mansion came out in 2001. The PC version is notable for giving birth to the "Weegee" internet meme, based on Luigi's creepy sprite. AVGN did a review of the game in summer 2009.

The premise is that Bowser plans to flood Earth, and he sends Koopas to steal famous landmarks to help fund his operation. Mario, Luigi and Yoshi travel to Bowser's castle to stop him. Mario enters all by himself and gets captured, prompting Luigi to go and rescue him.

Luigi progresses in the game by completing levels in Bowser's castle; each floor is guarded by one Koopaling whom you must defeat and contains a number of pipes which transport Luigi to a city containing Koopas. Once in the city, Luigi must collect the stolen artifacts. He must then find and reopen the landmarks by correctly answering three questions about them.

A sequel, Mario's Time Machine, eventually came, which is pretty similar, but WITH TIME TRAVEL!

Tropes used in Mario Is Missing include:
  • Alliteration: The text in the game frequently do this. Most notably, one of the newspapers you read in Kathmandu talks about the 'M' Club, whose members are Mayors of Moscow, Madrid, Marrakech, and Mexico City (they are said to have met the day before in Montana) and want to make Luigi an honorary member for saving their cities. They regret that Luigi's name breaks the whole alliteration thing (So do the mayors' actual names -- respectively, they're Schmutznikov, Smallburg, I. V. Gottserve, and Devotegetter).
  • Adventure Game
  • Anticlimax Boss: After you've completed all of the levels, you have to fight Bowser. Since this game has no life meter and no power-ups, Luigi cannot lose, no matter how many times he gets hit. Oh, and this only applies to the NES version -- in the other versions of the game, the entire confrontation plays out in a cutscene.
    • Of course he can't lose. He's WEEGEE.
  • Celebrity Paradox: One of the missing "artifacts" is King Kong -- the inspiration for Nintendo's very own Donkey Kong, famously inciting a trademark infringement lawsuit from Universal Studios in 1982.
  • Creepy Child: Princess Peach's voice acting.
  • Does This Remind You of Anything?: What Weegee does 1:20 into the Ending. [1]
  • Eiffel Tower Effect: Because of this trope, you rarely need to actually ask people "Where am I?". Which is good, because almost nobody ever gives a straight answer to that question.
  • The End of the World as We Know It: Bowser's grand scheme is to set of a bunch of Hair Driers at the South Pole melting all the polar ice caps and flooding the world.
  • Everything's Better with Penguins: Reading newspapers will bring up news stories about penguins ending up in different parts of the world due to Bowser melting the south pole.
  • Evil Sounds Deep: Larry and Iggy have bizarrely deep voices: Larry sounds less like a trouble-making brat and more like a demon, and Iggy sounds almost exactly like Darth goddamned Vader.
  • Exactly What It Says on the Tin: Mario is missing, after all. It's the only thing that makes sense about this game.
  • Excited Show Title!
  • Exposition Fairy: In the PC version, Mario himself can call Luigi with his videophone to give insight on what Bowser's up to back at the castle.
  • Family-Unfriendly Death: One version of the game has Bowser get cracked in half after being frozen in a block of ice.
  • Fun with Acronyms: The Koopas and Luigi travel across the world using a machine found in Bowser's castle called the "PORTALS", or "Passcode Operated Remote Transport And Larceny System".
  • Getting Crap Past the Radar: One of the short videos you can watch in the PC version prominently features a cable car with a "GET BENT!" slogan plastered on its sides. Not the kind of thing that would raise most people's eyebrows, save for those familiar with crude lingo, in which case it's basically another way of saying "Get Fucked!"
  • Goofy Print Underwear: Bowser, as shown by the ending.
  • Impossible Thief: In addition to stealing Mario, the Koopas go around stealing from national landmarks, which Luigi has to retrieve in order to complete each level. What they've stolen varies. Sometimes they steal something really huge, but other times you'd think they'd be able to get by just fine without. (Just a single brick from the Wall of China and you're closing it down?)
  • Insurmountable Waist-Height Fence: The exits back to Bowser's Castle are blocked off by a Pokey. The player has to figure out where in the world they actually are in order to get Yoshi to come and eat the Pokey so they can leave the stage.
  • Limited Special Collectors' Ultimate Edition: Besides the basic floppy disk based DOS version, there was also a deluxe CD version, which had enhanced audio and full voice acting. TERRIBLE voice acting.
  • Off-Model: For a specific example, in the PC version, at least two castle hallways have shields bearing the faces of Larry, Roy, Iggy, Ludwig, and Lemmy... except Lemmy is blatantly Larry with Lemmy's hair in a glaring example of cutting corners.
  • Only Six Faces: There are specific types of people in each city, who give different types of answers to your questions.
  • Painting the Fourth Wall: In all versions of the game, Mario notices the title of the game, and does a double take as if to say "'Mario is Missing'? But I'm not missing!" And then he goes missing.
  • Rhymes on a Dime: Iggy Koopa. Luigi also indulges in this a bit in some dialogue Dummied Out from the ending.
    • Most of your questions are answered in the form of a rhyme.
  • Shout-Out: When Luigi is asked who painted the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel in the SNES version, the choices are Leonardo, Michelangelo, Donatello, and Splinter. The Irate Gamer admitted this was probably the most amusing thing in the game.
  • Spiritual Successor: Due to the voice acting in the 1993 DOS rerelease, the game could come one for the 2002 Mr. Men video games.
  • Story Breadcrumbs: Certain details and developments of the plot can only be found by reading newspapers or listening to Mario's calls.
  • Stupid Statement Dance Mix: [2]
  • Totally Radical:

With dough through his slimy scales, Bowser hoards hair dryers from the Hafta-Havit Hotline. His plot? Melt Antartica and flood the world! Whoa! Will the brave brothers from Brooklyn permit this abominable snow plan? The boys say "Not!"

"...but they do have some spectacular hotels!"

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