Game Theory - How Mario BEATS Sonic at The Olympics!

Episode Date: May 14, 2023

Mario and Sonic are classic competitors. When you put them in the Olympic setting, though, it feels pretty obvious who would come out on top right? Wrong! I know, I know. You think a plumber like Mario would automatically lose but that's not true! The Olympics have had some WEIRD events. Events that may just put Mario on top!

Welcome to Game Theory, the show that goes for the gold, but usually winds up with a respectable bronze. Finally getting hyped for a little thing called the Summer Olympics. Now, while the old sports ball isn't usually part of my brand, Mario and Sonic absolutely are. And I feel like I'm long overdue to talk about Mario and Sonic at the Olympic Games. The game series that kind of feels like it should have been a bigger deal than it was. I mean, you've got two of gaming's biggest icons facing off against each other.

Harkin' back to the days when there was a genuine rivalry between the Sega Genesis, and the Super Nintendo. Why has this crossover never been a bigger deal? It seems like the Olympics would provide a perfect opportunity for a theorist like me to pit the two against each other and see who would really come out on top in competitions like the 100 meter dash, the javelin throw in the pole vault, except, uh, do I even need to say it?

The two aren't even remotely close in power level. Mario is an Italian plumber who probably gives, at best, a human performance in any racing event. Well, Sonic could run an entire marathon in a blink of an eye. That's not even hyperbole. If you take Sonic's cannon speed and calculate how long it would take him to run a 26.2 mile marathon, it would literally be less than the tenth of a second that it takes a human to blink. So already, Sonic wins every speed-based event hands down.

Admittedly, Mario's no slouch when it comes to raw strength, but he's still vastly outclassed by Sonic in that area because Sonic's acceleration is off the charts. And as longtime followers of the channel know, with great acceleration, times mass, comes great force. which means that Sonic is also going to win the strength-based contests as well. In short, Mario is a very strong human, but Sonic is a force of nature who runs faster than the speed of light, reaching speed so fast that he actually warps the fabric of spacetime. So, despite the Mario and Sonic at the Olympic Games series existing,

I've kind of willfully ignored the topic for the simple reason that an Olympic face-off didn't seem like it would be an interesting face-off. At least that's what I thought, until I started digging around into the history of the Olympics. Because while we all know the big traditional events like running and swimming and gymnastics, the Olympics actually have a history of forgotten and downright wacky events, like no joke, town planning. Step aside, athletes, it's time for the architects to shine.

There was also dueling. You heard that right, you could gold medal in the sport of shooting a gun at a human-shaped mannequin or other mind-boggling events like solo synchronized swimming. Seriously, solo synchronized swimming. If the point of synchronized swimming is that you have a team of two swimmers who are totally in sync, how do you do synchronized swimming when there's only one person? To which the Olympics response was apparently, uh, the swimmer's movements are synchronized to the music?

Anyway, this was a real-life event that appeared in the Olympics three times, from 1984 to 1992. So, equipped with these and a bunch of other silly Olympic events, I finally decided it's time to pit the two of them against each other in a tribute to the Mario and Sonic at the Olympic Games franchise, the little series that could. to see who's the better athlete, but to see who has the best chance at taking home the gold in the Olympics' most forgotten and most bizarre categories. First off, since I teased it, we gotta go back to that solo synchronized swimming. The idea of Sonic's swimming at all is probably

something that'll get a few eyebrow raises from people, considering his history because Sonic and swimming don't exactly play nice together. Oh sure, he has no problem moving around underwater, which is how we have that iconic anxiety-inducing warning sound to let you know when he's about to run out of oxygen. But in these levels Sonic isn't actually swimming. And these levels, his body just sinks to the bottom, making the underwater levels basically just normal ones with slightly sluggish controls. Sonic, as originally conceived, cannot swim. This came to light in an interview with Eugene Nakoff, famous as the former head of the Sonic team, who shared the following through a translator, quote, he assumed that hedgehogs can't swim, so that's why he made it that Sonic can't swim.

But then recently, he saw a photograph in Germany of a hedgehog swimming, so that isn't quite accurate, end quote. In fact, real hedgehogs are actually great swimmers. According to BBC Earth, a hedgehog can swim as much as two kilometers in a single night, night, not day, because they're also nocturnal creatures. So when it comes to the fundamentals, like being able to float to the surface so as not to drown at the bottom of labyrinth zone, his swimming skills seem to be lacking. Maybe that's why in the Mario and Sonic at the Olympic game series, we see him wearing a life vest for the swimming events. Here he is in the latest game. Zoom in on him poised at the starting position and you can

clearly see that he's wearing a blue life jacket. Apparently, he needs to wear one in order to make himself buoyant enough to stay above the surface. Good job game designers. Great attention to detail. Also, just look at Sonic's atrocious swimming technique. He isn't even swimming so much as treading water forward. Compare that to Mario in the same game who swims like a proper freestyle swimmer. In terms of speed, the two are roughly even for game balance reasons, but when it comes to an event like solo synchronized swimming, where contestants are judge based on form and choreography, something tells me that Sonic's Life Jacket assisted performance isn't going to be impressing any judges. I'm going to have to give this one to Mario. He's no Michael Phelps,

but it's not going to take very much to beat the Hedgehog in a life event. Here's an aquatic Olympic event that Sonic might fare better at. Motorboats, or water motorsports, or powerboating, depending on which 1908 newspaper you're reading. Look, this event only happened once, barely a decade after the invention of radio, and apparently they weren't issuing standardized press releases, so the reported naming of the event isn't consistent. What is consistent from the reporting is that this event was a complete and utter disaster. Apparently, there were three races, all of which involved racing an eight nautical mile course,

And in each race, only a single boat managed to cross the finish line due to strong winds that were disrupting the competition. And I can get wins disrupting, I don't know, a sailing competition, but this was a motorboat event. I guess boat engines that can overcome strong winds are an invention that came later in the 20th century. Unfortunately for the motorboat operators at the 1908 London Olympics. So between Mario and Sonic, I'm going to have to crown the victor here based on who seems like they have more experience with water motorsports. And I think I have to give this one to Sonic. Considering that the only memorable thing about Sonic Rush Adventure for DS was the boating mini-games. The game's opening cinematic clearly shows Sonic confidently piloting a motorized watercraft.

Mario just doesn't seem to have that kind of experience on the water. When we do see him on a boat, it's usually with someone else ferrying him, like the guy in Super Mario Sunshine who charges you 10 coins for a trip to the airstrip. Sure, Mario might have some experience with row boating from all those Mario Party mini-games, but row boating and powerboating are very different. All evidence points to Sonic being the more experienced and advantaged competitor when it comes to motorsports on water. When it comes to motorsports on land, though, it's going to be a different story. Both of these guys have racing games.

Of course, Mario has Mario Kart and Sonic with the All-Stars Racing Transformed and more recent Team Sonic Racing Games. And yes, this is relevant because land motorsports were featured in the Olympics, once in 1900. If you read up on the history of the event, it seems more like an exhibition of each nation's most impressive cars. And remember, this was back in 1900, eight years before Henry Ford introduced the world to the Model T, when simply getting a combustion engine vehicle to move was an impressive feat. Still, I have to imagine that if motorsports were part of the Olympics today, they'd be using more contemporary technology. And that means, you know, probably faster than the cart racing that we see in Mario Kart.

We know from the Mario Kart games that the most skill testing competition that as pals engage with use 200-ccc-incers, and that means they ain't going too fast. A 200-CC4-stroke engine will hit a max speed of around 75 miles per hour, or 121 kilometers an hour. Well, 200-C-2-stroke engines, which have higher power but less fuel efficiency, fare a bit better at around 120 miles an hour, or 193 kilometers an hour. And mind you, this is talking max speed. All of it pales in comparison to most real-world motorsports.

Even NASCAR, which features stock car racing, in other words, cars that at least kind of resemble a typical sedan that you or I might drive, has the drivers hitting average speeds of around 165 miles an hour. That's 265 kilometers an hour. And the top-top drivers are averaging out over 200 MPH, or 322 kilometers an hour. In other words, if Mario's behind the wheel and wants to hit the speeds it would take to win a motorsports competition, he's dealing with much higher speeds than he's used to.

But would Sonic fare any better behind the wheel? I'm gonna go out on a limb here and say, yeah. Unlike Mario, he's not just cart racing. Sonic is actually driving larger vehicles that resemble the form and shape of the stock cars that you'd see in competitions like NASCAR. Bigger vehicle means bigger engine, and bigger engine means higher speed. So automatically, it seems like Sonic has more experience racing with faster cars. Mario is by no means a bad driver, but again, I'm going to have to give the advantage here to Sonic.

Putting the blue blur ahead at 2 to 1. But enough about motorsports, be they land or on water, it's time to get back to what the Olympics are really about, physical performance. While still sticking to our prompt about choosing the weirdest ones. Friends, may I introduce you to the sport of, club swinging. Nope, that's not an activity for Friday nights when you feel like hit in the town. It's exactly what it sounds like. An event that involves swinging a club around your body. And then what, you might ask? Throwing the club for distance, slamming the club down with as much force as possible.

Nope, the entire point is the swinging. The competitors are judged largely based on the style they exhibit while swinging the clubs. Can we please start a petition to bring back club swinging into the modern Olympics? In the internet age, club swinging would be like the top tier sports. it would rank up there with ping pong. Hashtag justice for club swingers. Club swinging apparently was a form of exercise with origins in India, but it wasn't until the Indian club made its way to Europe that it got turned into a competition. Anyway, what I want to know is who would make the better club swinger, Mario or Sonic. Well, we already know that Sonic has what it takes to swing a baseball bat hard and accurately enough to hit a home run,

including one in the recent movie that he threw himself from the pitcher's mound, so he's definitely got what it takes to swing a club athletically. But when I watch videos of people swinging clubs around their body, sometimes weighing up to 108 pounds, there's one iconic boss fight that constantly comes to mind. And that is Mario's encounter with Bowser in Super Mario 64. First, he has to pick up Bowser by the tail, an impressive feat on its own,

considering that King Cupa probably weighs thousands of pounds. Then he has to swing him around by said tail, and then throw him with such accuracy and finesse that Bowser's big behind lands on one of the bombs scattered across the arena. Could Sonic do the same thing if he had to? Probably, but he's not going to be in as much practice as Mario when it comes to contests of picking up a really heavy thing and swinging it around your body in a precise and specific manner.

So I'm going to have to give this one to the plumber, bringing us back up to two to two. For our final event today and our ultimate tiebreaker, I'm going to go with potentially the most fatal of all Olympic events, pistol dueling. Yep, the same sport, whose lethality I'm reminded of every time I look at a $10 bill and see Alexander Hamilton's face. Though usually when I do that,

I'm thinking something more like, wow, this guy doesn't look like Lin-Manuel Miranda at all. Anyway, at the 1906 Olympics, competitors dressed in frock coats, counted to 10 and attempted to shoot a human-shaped dummy better than their opponents. Is it just me or is there something really weird about making this a competitive sport? Like, they didn't even try to abstract it by shooting at a bullseye or anything. They actually dressed the dummies up with frock coats to look more like a real person. Knowing what this Olympic sport is based on really amps up the stakes for winning the goal, doesn't it? Anyway, this is one area where I feel like both Mario and Sonic aren't gonna have that much experience.

For reasons that might be obvious, Nintendo and Sega have both been reluctant over the years to have their family-friendly mascot characters wield guns. You might know one of my favorite places to turn to for a unconventional Sonic lore, the Archie Comics. Where it should come is no surprise that we see Sonic actually using real firearms. And while they're certainly not his preferred method of problem solving, when we do see him use them, he seems to be perfectly accurate. One shot always seems to be enough to do the job. Mario, in contrast, has zero firearms experience. Even though in the original Super Mario brothers, Mario actually did have a gun in early prototypes.

In an interview with Femitsu magazine, translated by One Up, Shigero Miyamoto revealed that, quote, during much of development, the controls were A for shoot bullets, B to dash, and up on the control pad to jump. Obviously, Mario's gun didn't survive the development process and was eventually replaced with the fireballs that we now know and love. Anyway, all of this means that Sonic has way more firearm practice than poor Mario, who's never had the chance to use a gun.

At least, that's what I would be saying if it weren't for the fever dream that was 2017's Mario plus Rabbids Kingdom Battle, an X-com-inspired tactical combat game made by Ubisoft getting its sequel next year. I had to look this thing up just to remind myself that it's a real game that does in fact exist. I still have trouble believing on some level that Nintendo signed off on it because in it, yeah, Mario has himself a gun for an art. So does this mean that Mario could actually go toe to toe with Sonic in a shooting competition? I'm gonna say absolutely yes.

You see, usually in ex-com-style games, which is all about tactically maneuvering characters around the battlefield to execute attacks, the designers work in accuracy stats and the chance to miss shots. Mario plus Rabbids though, ignored that. Mario will never miss the shots he takes with his arm cannon. Anytime he has direct line of sight to the enemy and there isn't anything blocking the shot, which are the conditions that you'd expect from the Olympic event, of dueling, he's right on target. And that's in actual combat when he's surrounded by enemies.

His accuracy would only get better when he's just standing there as part of an Olympic event looking straight on at a non-moving target. So yeah, against all odds, Sonic and Mario, despite both being characters that you'd expect to have zero aptitude for guns, actually seem to have incredible aptitude for hitting targets with guns when they need to.

Maybe the fact that Sonic has more experienced with pistols that resemble what would be used in an actual duel puts them at an advantage, but I don't think there's an easy way to settle this. I know this might sound like the ultimate cop-out, but I really can't call it, which means that we need to go into extra rounds. Let's start off with one that I teased about last episode. One of the weirdest events that I came across while I was researching, town planning.

Part of the architectural design category of Olympic events. Yeah, apparently they decided it was worth creating an entire event category for architectural design. Hey, Medina High School. Where was the varsity architecture team, huh? Go Team T-square. Making this event even stranger, though, is the fact that the town planning, event actually had a history of rigged judging. Yeah, in an event where you could basically design anything you wanted, every gold medalist won the town planning architecture category by submitting a

design for a sports facility. Because of course they did. The jocks had to take over what little hope teenage Matt Pat had for a varsity letter jacket. It's not my fault that show choir was never deemed to be an athletic event. I'll have you know that our choreography was very aggressive, thank you. So, uh, yeah, maybe the town planning event should have been renamed the athletic stadium design event, but a questionable judging bias aside which of our two competitors would fare better in this category? Well, need I remind you friends that Mario is a plumber by profession, meaning that he knows a thing or two about building design, at least when it comes to waste removal. But he wasn't just content to fix your house, no, he became a builder in his own right

thanks to Super Mario Maker 2's story mode, where Mario helps a bunch of hapless toads build Princess Peach's castle, with Mario doing most of the work as usual. That being said, while Nintendo's level creator is certainly better known, you might be surprised to learn that actually released an official Sonic the Hedgehog level creator. And it was way back in 2009, years before Mario Maker hit the scene. Yeah, this one came as a big surprise to me. It was actually released on the Play Sega website, an online service where you could play emulated Sega games.

And if you happen to be a paying VIP member of the website, you could have access to various level designers, including one for Sonic games. There wasn't anything too earth-shattering about it. You are given basic tiles, the ability to add rings, springs, enemies, you know, basically Mario Maker, but with Sonic stuff. In a cool feature, though, every time someone played your level,

you would actually get rewarded with rings, which was the currency of the website. And likewise, if he played someone else's level, same thing. You'd get rings based on how well you did. So there was a real incentive for you to create and explore around the site. Sadly, not enough incentive, because the whole thing was shut down two years later. More to our purposes, though,

the Sonic the Hedgehog level creator, while a cool forgotten piece of history isn't exactly a demonstration of Sonic's architectural prowess. It's not like Sonic was the one physically creating the levels, unlike the story mode from Mario Maker 2. Now, construction work and architecture work aren't exactly the same thing, but I'm still going to have to give the town planning award to Mario.

For our next event, let's turn our attention to a category that involves jumping. Not that type of jump. That type of jump. Equestrian high jump. Because you know that when I see a large, four-hoved mammal, I'm thinking, that thing has got some mad-ups. You see, no equestrian events were held at the first modern Olympics in 1896. Five were featured in 1900.

including this one as well as horse long jump. Neither one went particularly well or got a second chance. Anyway, my first impulse was that Mario would come out on top. After all, a human has got to be better at horseback riding than a prickly hedgehog, right? I mean, in all of my research, Sonic has never ridden a horse in any of his games. Not even in Sonic in the Black Knight where people are on horseback everywhere. Seems kind of like a missed opportunity there, Sega. Clearly, this is the only reason the game got such poor reviews.

But even though horses don't play a role in the games, they do show up in the comics. Let me call your attention to issue 41 of the Sonic Archie Comics from 1993, where Sonic, after defeating King Acorn, takes over riding the horse before portling back to the real world. Though, not really sure how much horse riding skills needed when the horse is just able to fly through the air like that. What about issue 140 of Sonic the comic published back in 1998? Where on page two, you'll notice, a Hey Boomers reference. They're old and they're proud, and apparently they're reading Sonic comic books. But after being greeted, we see an old story where, shockingly, hedgehogs are riding horses like professional cowboys.

Granted, it's Amy doing it, but I think the general lesson applies. Plus, on the next page, courtesy of Kaylee Sipple from Lane Den Essex, we see the blue blur on a horse, so it must be canon. By the way, congrats on that digital watch win, Kaylee. So what about horses in Mario? Well, there's not many. Believe it or not, they were originally planned to be in Super Mario 64, but that was scrapped, and the horse got moved over to Ocarina Time.

And from there, horses just never really showed up. they're in Mario Sports Superstars, but dipping into the sports-based games is kind of what we're trying to avoid here. So, eliminating that, the only time that we could find Mario on a horse was in a single mini-game from the recent Super Mario party. It's just a glorified rhythm game, but hey, he's there, riding a very small horse in a very straight line. Don't ask about the logistics of the Gumba riding next to him. You know what? I just got to call this one. Sonic and Friends are seen riding much more confidently. They're also much lower weight than the pasta swirling Mario, which in a horse jumping competition is going to matter

A lot. I think we chalk this one up for the hedgehog, tying things back up to three to three. If you'll recall, last episode we put Mario and Sonic against each other in both water motorsports and land motor sports. So, I think it only makes sense to complete the trifecta. Time to get airborne. Yep, airborne vehicles did make an Olympics appearance, but we're not talking about airplanes or helicopters. Oh, no, friends. This Olympic event took place years before the Wright brothers. Back in 1900, the Summer Olympics included a ballooning event. But not hot air balloons like we understand them today. No, my friends, these were gas balloons, but not helium. They were filled with hydrogen and coal gas,

which allowed them to fly higher and further than normal hot air balloons, but at the expense of being highly combustible floating bombs. Kind of makes you wonder if a gold medal is really worth it at that point. Anyway, they would phase off in a range of challenges, including how far they could travel, how long they could fly, how high they could go, how close they could fly to a target, things like that. Now, Mario is no stranger to balloons of all shapes and sizes. He controls them, he takes romantic rides with peach in him,

and the Mario Party series is full of games where Mario attaches balloons to his body so he can hover in the air, skydive out of literal planes, even use them to send his loved ones into deadly freefalls. Look at how happy is after doing this. Dude has got something wrong with him. And when it comes to precision flying, we have mini games like this where Mario pilots a balloon-based vehicle to avoid oncoming cannon fire from his friends.

When it comes to balloons, Mario is tough to beat. Sonic, though, is also a balloon expert. Probably the most notable appearances in Sonic Lost World, a game that, much like the Wii U platform it was released on, is mostly forgotten at this point. This game was... It was good. Basically, Sonic's version of Mario Galaxy.

The most notable thing about it was that it had some of the coolest crossover levels ever as Sonic ran through both Yoshi's Island and Legend of Zelda-themed levels. Yeah, that is Sonic homing attacking Estalfos and collecting rupees instead of rings. Super cool stuff there. Anyway, in the game, there are these remote-controlled vehicles that are created by Tails. In order to make them, you had to collect materials from the Nintendo 3DS version of Sonic Lost World, then build them, then transfer your creation to the Wii U version of the game. It was a dumb system. But it allowed the player to craft remote-controlled balloon vehicles that could then fly around the levels.

Vehicles that also had to be very precise in their controls in order to fly around the various obstacles. Looking at both competitors' experience here, I think we have to give the win to Mario. He's better with a wider variety of balloons. He knows enough about him to leap out of a plane using a balloon as a parachute, and, unlike Sonic, his balloons don't seem to be remote controlled by an off-screen player, too, which seems like something that might be disqualified by the judges. Just be careful of those fireballs, Mario. Those balloons are combustible. Anyway, that brings our running score to four to three in favor of the plumber.

Now, we could go back and forth like this all day and have another dozen episodes on this darn series, so I think it's time that we just make it into a speed round. Forgotten Olympic sports, let's go! Fishing from 1900. Mario fishes a lot in the Mario Party series, whereas Sonic, yeah, Sonic Fishing was in fact a thing, but we never actually see Sonic fishing in it. The whole thing feels like Sonic deciding to try fishing, buying a $200 fishing rod, and then getting bored after 15 seconds.

Leave the fishing to Big the Cat there, Sonic. This one goes to Mario. Bowling from the 1988 games. Sonic can be seen bowling and Sonic bowling while Mario does bowling in various Mario party titles. Technically, Mario has more complicated bowling games, but he also uses a ball that he can apparently remote control from the sideline, so I don't know. Gotta call this one a draw. Cricket from the 1900 Olympic Games.

This one is solidly in favor of the blue blur. Sonic Cricket actually exists. It's a game that was exclusive to India for Sonic's 20th anniversary. Mario has played almost every sport, but cricket is one that he missed. Probably couldn't figure out the rules. Point Sonic. Firefighting. Yep, this was actually part of the Olympics back in 1900.

And though I'm sure Sonic would do a bang-up job dashing around to put out the fires with pure speed, but if they were forced to use traditional methods like humans are, thanks to Super Mario's Sunshine, Mario takes this one hands down. Gaelic football, which is kind of like a combination of American football and soccer. Now, I know that both Mario and Sonic play soccer in the Mario and Sonic Olympic series, but I'm trying to look for their experiences outside of that specific franchise of games. For instance, Mario has his own set of soccer games,

Super Mario Strikers and Mario Strikers charged, along with their actually being a football game that was in development at one point for him. So this guy's familiar with both halves of the equation. Sonic, meanwhile, has no American football experience, and, surprisingly doesn't even have a game where he's played soccer. Even Mega Man had a soccer game. Anyway, Sonic and Friends do play soccer in one episode of the Sonic Boom series. Give my soul to score another goal.

And they're not very good. Nearly getting beaten by their evil robot doppelgangers. The only way they're able to win is by... Oh, Sonic, what have they done to you? Anyway, based on that, I have to give the Gaelic football win to Mario. As well as any other football-related events that have been canceled from the past like American football and Australian football. Sonic and Mario both have tennis games with Sega Superstars tennis and the Mario tennis series, so an old event like

Judea Pome from 1908, which was a precursor to modern-day tennis, would likely end in a draw. Corf ball, meanwhile, a Dutch ball game similar to basketball, would likely go to Mario thanks to his game Mario Hoops 3 on 3, and thanks to Sonic's complete lack of any basketball-related experiences. And last, but certainly not least, there have been a number of hand-to-hand combat demonstration events over the years, like Savat, Glimma, and Budo, which I believe would actually go to Sonic. Sure, both characters take part in Super Smash Brothers, but Sonic actually has two additional fighting games under his belt. Sonic Battle and Sonic the Fighters. Thus, three points over to him. And there you have it. The grand conclusion, Mario comes out on top with the most gold medal wins. Now, I know what you're thinking. You're thinking that I'm probably biased, that I went into this trying to prove that Mario was better than Sonic, that I chose events that would purposefully make Sonic look bad. But the truth is, Sonic was always destitute. into lose. Looking at the results, Sonic may indeed be the fastest thing alive, but Mario is just a

more well-rounded character. His franchises spawns so many sport-related spinoff titles, and the Mario Party series can literally throw anything at him at any moment. So it's no wonder that when it comes to these old, weird, off-the-wall Olympic games, where you're trying to do everything from flying balloons to solo synchronized swimming, he's the one who's going to come out on top. Sonic would be great at the real Olympic games, you know, the ones that require actual speed and endurance. But for The games that have been lost to time largely because they lack all of that stuff, yeah, Mario is gonna take the pasta. And as far as the actual Olympics go, hey, as your ratings continue to suffer year after year, maybe consider making club swinging and pistol dueling a thing again. The internet would love to see some memes sports thrown in there.

Get them to care about watching you again. But hey, that's just a theory. A game theory. Thanks for watching.