Mario Card Match

The Mario franchise is the best-selling video game franchise of all time. Over 210 million units of the overall Mario series of games have been sold. Outside of the Super Mario platform series, other Mario genres include the Mario Kart racing series, sports games such as the Mario Tennis and Mario Golf series, role-playing games such as Super Mario RPG and Paper Mario, and educational games such as Mario Is Missing!, Mario's Time Machine and Mario Teaches Typing. The franchise has branched into several mediums, including television shows, film, comics, and licensed merchandise. Since 1990, Mario has been voiced by Charles Martinet.

Nintendo did not initially reveal Mario's full name. In a 1989 interview it was stated not to be "Mario Mario" despite the implication of the Mario Bros. series' title. The first notable use of "Mario Mario" was in the 1993 live-action film adaptation. This was again used in two of Prima's official strategy guides, in 2000 for Mario Party 2 and in 2003 for Mario and Luigi: Superstar Saga. In 2012 after Charles Martinet voiced Mario declaring himself "Mario Mario" at the San Diego Comic-Con the next month Satoru Iwata said he had no last name, which Shigeru Miyamoto agreed with the month after. Two months after Iwata's death in July 2015, Miyamoto changed his stance September 2015 at the Super Mario Bros. 30th Anniversary festival, confirming that his name was indeed Mario Mario.