After 24 years, Luigi has been discovered in Super Mario 64

Another massive Nintendo leak has finally shown proof of Luigi’s existence in Mario 64’s earlier versions.

July 25, 2020

A number of huge discoveries about Nintendo games have leaked as of late, including plans for a scrapped Pokemon MMO (on the Game Boy Advance, no less!) and a prototype of Yoshi’s Island. Today, though, the holy grail of Mario may have been discovered: Luigi was originally planned for Super Mario 64.

Word of a multiplayer mode being planned for the game has been known for years (and Luigi truthers have existed for just as long — “L Is Real 2401” may as well be the Mario 64 equivalent of QAnon), but proof has never existed until today, when a source code leak showed textures and code references to everyone’s (second) favorite plumber.

From the latest N64 games leak:

Luigi, at one point, was planned to be included in Super Mario 64. pic.twitter.com/2cUgcsOKYb

— OatmealDome (@OatmealDome) July 25, 2020

https://twitter.com/GlitchyPSI/status/1287148799740317699?s=20

LUIGIS CAP ICON pic.twitter.com/TIxfeeVTdO

— danielh05 (@TheDanielh05) July 25, 2020

AAAAAAAA pic.twitter.com/9BuZ3QYexn

— pablothinghouse (@pablothinghouse) July 25, 2020

THEY FOUND MORE OF THE GREEN MAN'S BODY pic.twitter.com/DSxtZeEWhb

— StarKirb ⭐️ (@StarKirb94) July 25, 2020

This is a pretty crazy discovery, as while it’s been speculated forever that Luigi was probably at least up for inclusion in the Mario franchise’s 3D debut, proof has not been found. Thanks to these massive Nintendo source code dumps, however, we can finally see what could have been.

While Luigi did not appear in the release version of Super Mario 64, he made his first appearance in the 3D era in Mario Kart 64.