Every Copy of Super Mario 64 is Personalized: A Deeper Look 

I had a personalized copy myself. When i started the game, everything seemed normal to me, but upon watching RU-vid videos i realize that indeed my copy was nothing like what everyone else bought. That's when i realized i was instead playing Mario Cart, and not Mario 64

Someone should make a fan mod including all of these rumored features and randomizes them all at the beginning of each play through, so every play through is personalized

My dad works at Nintendo and he programmed the AI. That's why my copy of SM64 was just Mario sitting there telling me to bring him a beer

I could never bring myself to get all 120 stars. It's just so hard when every level is completely made of ice; a huge oversight from the developers imo

Every copy of "Every Copy of Super Mario 64 is Personalized" videos are personalized

I just watched an hour long video consisting of lies made up by little kids and what they've told their friends, I like it.

The main thing going through my mind with half of these stories, aside from "These kids are such liars," is "Oh yeah, this would all totally fit on an N64 cartridge."

i was like “there’s no way this is a thing” and then they started talking about how the jumping boxes jumped super high in personalized copies and i literally froze and said, out loud, “do they not do that for everyone?”

Him: Every copy is personalized based on the players desires. Me: So that's why mine is just a copy of Sonic R.

Guy speaking: “The year is 1998.” Me: “Eh, close enough. Continue your creepypasta.”

I love that Oney’s Bowser Room is now an actual part of the SM64 creepypasta stuff

I've thought this over and realized that kids sometimes unintentionally make false memories. I have a distinct memory of having a really cool automated Hot Wheels track but now that I've gone back and looked up their old early 2000s products up, the track never existed. Sometimes kid's brains make up memories and to them they're real.

"Tick Tock clock brings feelings of anger and frustration!" I think anyone could've told you that

Nobody: Every single stage: "This stage is extremely rare, even in heavily personalized copies"

I really wish game developers really did catch on to this trend and started actually implementing insane things. "Bro, I heard if you collect every shine in Mario Sunshine 3 times and then fight Bowser without taking damage, you unlock Peach as a playable character!" "You're such a liar, we all grew past those kinds of things" Developer: *Maniacally laughing*

People: Every copy is personalized is an allegory for each player's life leading to the discovery of SM64. Each one it's own personal journey lending to how the game is interpreted. Look at how each of us have such strong emotional attachment to the time in our lives when we discovered it. It's impact on modern gaming has become a keystone for what 3d platforming should be. Nintendo: We just wanted to make a fun 3d game about a plumber jumping into artwork guys.

I’m really glad you mentioned this! When I was younger, I actually had a personalized copy too! The personalization was that when you put the game in, it was the entirety of shark tale on blue ray.

Ngl, I want a heavily personalized, to the point it's dangerous, copy of Super Mario 64.

Honestly, Wario's giant mug trying to eat you is hilarious.

We definitely have the technology to make games personalized/slightly randomized now, I don't know why more game developers don't add this, it would be so cool.

No, they didn't find me

I feel that if Nintendo really had such "personalization" technology, they wouldn't keep it a secret. They'd market the hell out of it! "Hey, kids! Play the new Mario 64! Now with new Nintendo Personal software! It's not just any Mario game! It's *your* Mario game!" And, it wouldn't just be Mario either. I guarantee you that if Nintendo had such technology, they would slap it on nearly every game franchise they own. Zelda? Personalized. Smash Bros.? Personalized. Pokemon? You guessed it! Personalized! Nintendo is notorious for showing off any new technology (whether it be hardware or software) they develop. Also, there'd be crappy third-party personalized games as well. Oh, and Sega/Sony/etc. would also have their own versions of personalized games...but they wouldn't be as popular for one reason or another.

There's... No way the 64 cartridge holds THAT much memory

This theory is such a cool exploration of how we tend to misremember childhood experiences. It’s really interesting hearing people talk about the different things they remember about the game, how vivid they are and how many people remember the same thing. Obviously the idea that there’s a secret AI in this 90’s game pulling all the strings to make it happen is pretty absurd but I love how it reignites that childhood curiosity about what mysteries could lie in our favourite days before we datamined them and found everything there is to see. It’d be cool if someone made a rom hack collecting all these experiences and randomising them for each player.

“Huh, Weird... My copy is labeled “Half Life 3” On the title screen... Oh well it’s probably not important!” *Proceeds to throw away*

"Bob-Omb Village" is a Nintendo 64 dev kit demo. The sombrero man is a test for joint-based animations common in the early N64 era, and the bomb-ombs are just an interaction demo. That's why there are so many supposed videos of it, because it exists, just not in the way people think it does.

This concept actually reminds me a lot of the thing in Undertale, where every playthrough has a unique seed. Occasional small dialog options and tidbits are in each one. Some really specific ones have references to gaster. It's a cool idea someone should have done back in 96. It would have field the rumors to the moon. Can you imagine if there were a 1/100 chance that blarg would be in your lethal lava land? Or a 1/1000 that you'd swap the red mario skin for green Luigi skin?

I'm pretty sure speedrunners would have found the AI if it were really in the game. Can always rely on them to learn a game inside out.

Meanwhile, former Mario 64 developers are laughing their asses off over us turning our brains into mush over this hahaha

Narrator: “Small chill bullies” Cat: “meow”

I love how my guy is talking like this is a very real thing that happens and not a bunch of kids stories trying to sound cool to their friends

I find that the Skeeters (water strider enemies), the Heave-Hos, and the town are the main things that give me that feeling of a negative aura. Something robotic just shouldn't be in a stage that involves water, and I've always found the Skeeters creepy, especially when they start chasing after you when they go on land, and the thought of the town's inhabitants drowning is very disturbing to me.

“The Mandela effect” roll credits

Me: „Oh i know this is fake“ Him : „pyramid cutscene“ Me: „what is he talking about that is literally in the game“

my copy was so personalized that it only ran on the nintendo ds isnt that crazy?

My copy got crazy personalized. Not only was Luigi there, but so were Wario, DK, Yoshi, and Peach as playable characters. It became 4 player, and the castle turned to a board game. Each player would take a turn on the board until it went into a mini game segment. The 120 stars, are now the objective of the board game. Whoever has the most stars and coins, wins. It was so fun! My negative friends would always tell me things like "That isn't Mario 64!" Which I get it, the personalization was so extreme That it became an entirely different game. One of my friends had the audacity to say "Dude, this is Mario Party, it's a totally different game" Like I'm stupid. "Mario Party" is such a childishly made up name. Whats next? "Mario's Cement Factory"? Like that would ever exist... Clearly he switched the label on my game pak when I wasn't looking, as now that I look at my old childhood copy, it has some obviously fake "Mario Party" Label on it. People will lie about anything...

I've talked about this in my own stuff before but I've always clearly remembered when watching my cousin play this at a super young age, that the painting to LLL was in a basement looking area, however it was a narrow hallway with red carpeting, then you'd take a left turn down the hallways and the painting was on the wall to your right. I still see him jumping into it to this day and it still bothers me that I remember it like that.

LOL at the bowser room that Oney admitted he faked, just to get some cool points at school.

17:17 This one is likely based on the King Boo boss fight in the DS remake. And cold cold crevasse sounds identical to the boss level for Chief Chilly in the remake as well.

"The Chomp Caverns contain smaller Chain Chomps and also Scuttlebugs" Can we make a Scuttlebug Jamboree there? Can we make the Jamboree with 0x A presses?

I love how people still talk about the “Bowser Room” even though Chris O’Neill from oneyplays talked about how he made it when he was little and how dumb he thinks it is, and I’d have to agree lmao

I have a childhood memory that bothers me to this day and I haven't seen it mentioned anywhere yet. So basically I remember that during the final Bowser battle a text box randomly appeared just saying ,,L is real", but as children do, I didn't think much of it. But then, during the ending scene when Peach should appear, Luigi busts through the fucking window instead, starts sucking Mario off,

9:55 I think people misremember other games and put them in Super Mario 64. For example, swimming behind the eel bringing them to a subarea (in your iceberg video, a maze with many eels). That sounds a lot like the Deep Pythons from Majora's Mask, which are giant sea snakes/eels that infest the Great Bay and lurk in the depths of Pinnacle Rock. They will relentlessly attack Link. To defeat them, first you have to lure them out. The end of those twisting caverns look like nasty dark goop. I believe there is a wooden crate there too. There's a lot of that in this video.

I came in here ready to think "interesting but false" knowing that the game wasn't personalized, AI doing these things in 1996 was a hilariously impossible idea, and that none of this was real. Left realizing "oh shit my copy is personalized" when you talked about the vanish cap star.

I like that you don't just go through it going "but obviously all this is fake and made up" and you roll with it.

The 999 coin thing should have been called out right at the start, since no coins spawn at all during the Fire Sea Bowser fight

Broke: Kids were lying to each other, seeing hacks & Machinimas, all leading to people developing false memories of the game. Woke: THE GAME HAS A SUPER ADVANCED AI THAT PERSONALIZES THE GAME ACCORDING TO ITS PLAYER

I LOVE water and as a kid I always wanted to go behind the glass and swim with the fish near the Jolly Roger Bay painting. Eventually I found the secret aquarium level but I died inside because I was little and didn't understand how to get oxygen there. When I came out, I was glitched inside the fishtank wall like I always wanted. Had to reset the game though because I couldn't get out. I spent so much time trying to recreate that when I was a kid because no one believed me lol It was probably just a positioning glitch with spawning back into the overworld, but it made me really happy back then and I thought it was magic.

I want someone to mod some of these additions into the game. They sound like great add-ons, like the Prince Bomb-omb and the star sky level

"This Stage is rare, so not much is known"="i can't think of anything that would be in this fake level"

28:54 "meow" Rare cameo by NEScRETRO's cat

I'm not sure if anyone pointed it out but I believe that most of the personalization theories come from people dreaming about SM64 when they were younger and having a vivid dream about something and waking up to thinking it is real (this happened to me once and I believed something that didn't exist existed in a game).

I wonder if the AI takes requests. How much would I be tempting fate if I asked my cartridge to “make it spooky”?

This do be the exact video I’ve been waiting for after literally watching the iceberg yesterday...

Around the 28 minute mark while you're talking about chill bulls you can hear a cat meowing. Maybe a minute later, little dude doesn't sound happy. Pet that cat

One classmate in elementary claimed, mario 64 contains "collect every coin existing in the level" stars

Wait wait wait so basically this is a comprehensive look at M64 that collects and categorizes every bull $*it lie we heard as children? This is the video I never realized I wanted.

on one hand, i think "this is all stupid there's no way this is possible and all of this is just your average rumors that don't take the tech at the time and the developers' view of the game seriously", but on the other hand, it's so fun and comfy to listen to this shit and think that some people actually have memories like this. it's especially comfy due to how you talk about all this and the background music, great video.

Just like someone in school found the Mew under the truck and evolved it into a mewthree. Must be true, kids don't lie.

The Audio Artifacts, The specifically worded scripting, and the musical choices add up to a truly ethereal and Spooky yet fun experience.

My personalized copy had two screens and no analog stick. It also had Luigi and Wario for some reason... Weird...

If only DS had been personalized. Then maybe I could've experienced some wierd shit.

Dude threw a baby penguin off a cliff and killed the only witness

29:22 the cat makes a really good point here that I haven't heard being said anywhere else, life changing

I love how you brought back the "More on that latter" thing from the previous video where people pointed it out, and i really liked it, its some nice attention to detail in a way, and just embracing the "meme" it became in the comment section Aside from that, i absolutely am in love on how long this video is Maybe it's just me, but personally i LOVE long videos, specially on this topic, its just so interesting hearing someone speak about this interesting topic to this length,it's so nice, specially on this great quality you have!! Amazing job, cant wait to see pther content of yours, you get better with each video!

This whole video reminds me of the schoolyard rumors my friends and I would tell each other. My friend INSISTED on several secret unlockable characters in SSB Melee; including Sonic, Tails, Birdo, Toad, and what was described as an 'Evil Fruit Loop.' Keep in mind I was a dumb little kid, but I wrote all of them down and tried to unlock everyone when I got home. Good video, man.

NGL I have watched this video and the Companion Iceberg like 20-30 Times each and will continue to do so.

"The year is 1998. You're a baby with no concept of video games. A super advanced AI has taken a hold of Super Mario 64 but cannot produce baby formula. You scoff at the game and go back to your bottle."

28:53 "Small Chill Bullies." *mrow*

I like how the video is narrated as if all this is true, as it makes it much more uneasy Once again a great video, my only complaint is a few of the pauses are slightly too long, but besides that its a well made and informative video also James did nothing wrong, justice for James Goomba

Kids went from having an hour a day to play games, to not even having an hour left out of the day where they're not playing some kind of game.

Finally somebody who takes this seriously and isn't just "oh boy floating wario head spooky"

Everyone talks about mario 64 personalized copies but no one talks about wario land 4 personalized copies

*But the real question is, which personalized copy of the game features the typical white bottom bar of emulator gameplay?*

Once my cousin told me a code to unlock something in Mario64 - I don't remember what was unlocked, but I remember the code involved pressing various buttons in a set order, including both Z buttons. I think this is an instance where the personalization extends to the hardware itself, so amazing!

Oh cool an answer finally! Oooh, this is an hour long

This is funny because I'm being dead serious, but me and all my siblings played mario 64 and during the battle with the Whomp King you had to ground pound the bandage on his back. But the difference is that the bandage is on different spots on his back after every hit. We got the game again about 7 years later and were super confused when we played and the bandage didn't move. We looked it up on RU-vid and couldn't find it. We played a bunch of different versions of the game to no avail. So for this weird theory thingy to be an actual phenomenon is funny to me.

Your cat meowing in the background was easily the highlight of the video.

beautiful video. I love the narration, the topics, the music and the overall vibe. I've watched it a few times already and i never want it to end. Good job

Where was this deep dive a year ago when I really needed it? The RU-vid algorithm definitely is special

28:53 small chill bullies “mreow!”

I remember as a kid that Dory ate me, I was terrified of her for years. I was very confused when other kids said that she can't eat you. Now I play the game on an emulator, I tried to get her to eat me, but she hasn't yet.

source: "trust me bro"

This is basically showing how kids remember tons of things wrong. If you really believe you remember it. You remember it! That's what happened with the Bloody Mary stuff where you go to a mirror and say "bloody Mary" three times in a row. Some kids remember seeing a creepy face in the mirror because they remembered it wrong and thought it really happened

Man this stuff is just so fascinating to me. Taking something as simple as old, reconstructed memories, and turning it into a whole theory with genuinely fascinating lore. It kinda reminds me of SCP or even Godzilla NES. I really hope more of these “recollections” get added to the wiki and stuff!

When you get the perfect take but your cat is screaming in the background

I REMEMBER THE GIANT GOOMBA! It took place in the dark world, where the second triple-goomba configuration was. however, the goomba died in one hit when i ground-pounded it. it didn't act any differently from a goomba when i fought it, but the walk animations were slowed to compensate for the bigger steps the goomba took

Rumors like this are really funny because it just proves that people are more readily willing to believe in delusions than to admit their memories are wrong and scratch their ego. The whole berenstain/berenstein bears thing is another really funny example, where some people would rather invent a whole alternate universe to explain their feelings than to just be like "oh, my mistake, I spelled it wrong I guess haha."

We need a mod that actually add this.

Is this a good place to document my experience with my cartridge, well in my copy, Mario did a dance and and turned his skin textures to tan. And he would say “you lookin good today”.

As a kid I remember not being able to play Mario 64 at night because it gave me the creeps, and I think I know why. If you look into the concept of "liminal space" the entire game is the perfect example of it, people have noticed this phenomena in source games as well

Listening to this really captures how vast and mysterious SM64 was to us as kids

“The year was 1998” Ah yes, some of the best years of my life... were I wasn’t alive..

28:52 So small chill bullies sound like cats

Nerd: I found Luigi in SM64 Everyone: *Rock eyebrow raising SFX*

I'll hand it to you, you've got alot more dedication dedication to the bit than most people, making an hour long video about stuff made up by 10 year olds on the creepypasta wiki. I salute you sir

I literally require this to be satire for my mental health

"The year is 1998, your in elementary school" Mf i don't even exist yet

I think it's kinda fun how our minds create all these scenarios ultimately. I have always been pretty imaginative and have issues with maladaptive daydreaming, so I always have a "trust but verify" approach to anything I remember. For instance, I was 5(?) when my parents got the game. I remember my mom playing it, hell I even tried. But I always remembered her finding Luigi at the top and not Yoshi for whatever reason. I also remembered her using the cannon and shooting past the barrier and dying (the one that gets you to Yoshi). I know this isn't true, because I played through the whole game to prove it happened. Of course, it didn't. That doesn't make diving into these fun theories (however false they are) any less intriguing! Thanks for making these videos and kind of compiling all of these theories together!

If there’s one thing I can say about my copy of the game it’s that I remember the “L is Real” being way way clearer then most of the images I see now from others