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Rob
Hello. This is 6 Minute English from BBC Learning English. I’m Rob.

Georgina
And I’m Georgina.

Rob
Now, Georgina, you recently mentioned in one 6 Minute English programme about NFTs and that you had a collection of Pokemon cards when you were younger.?

Georgina
Yes – I did, and I still can’t find them. Why did you bring that up??

Rob
Well, Pokemon started out as a video game series that turned into anime movies and trading cards among other things – and in this programme we’re talking about a video game character that is?iconic?– a word which means widely known and recognised. That character’s name is Super Mario.

Georgina
Ahhh I spent many hours of my childhood playing with Nintendo’s Super Mario or his rival, Sega’s Sonic the Hedgehog.

Rob
Now, these days, video games are everywhere, and people of all ages enjoy playing them. There’s also competitive e-sports events where gamers compete for what are often considerable amounts of money.

Georgina
Yes, and there are also streamers that appear on platforms like Twitch and YouTube who have become celebrities in their own right.

Rob
Talking about celebrities, I have a question about the famous character we’re talking about in this programme. Many people remember Super Mario Bros. as being the first time we saw Mario, but he first appeared in another game – which was it? Was it:
a) The Legend of Zelda
b) Donkey Kong; or
c) Pokemon

Georgina
I’m not sure about that – I can’t remember him being in Pokemon, so I’ll go for a) The Legend of Zelda.?

Rob
OK, Georgina, we’ll find out if you’re right at the end of the programme. So, we established at the start of the programme that these days the video games industry is thriving.

Georgina
True – but it wasn’t always that way. It’s hard to imagine now, but in the 1980s the console market was struggling, particularly in the US.

Rob
Keza MacDonalds, video games editor for the Guardian newspaper,?explains what was happening in the early 1980s. Here she is on BBC World Service programme You and Yours, speaking with?Peter White.

Keza MacDonald
Well, back then, especially in America, there had been?a flood of?games that were just not very high quality. One of the games that’s often?cited?as a factor in the collapse was this game called ET on the Atari, which was so bad they ended up burying thousands of copies of it in the desert, because nobody liked it.

And, so we’d had that, especially in America, this didn't happen so much in Europe, but in America just been lots and lots of software. None of it was all that great. There hadn't been anything really revolutionary in some years, so the video game?boom?was really falling off a cliff and Nintendo is what rescued in the US especially.

Georgina
Keza MacDonald used the term?a flood of?– meaning a large number in a short period of time – to describe the number of games that were coming out.

Rob
She used?cited, which means referenced or noted, when talking about the game ET being a reference for a factor in the collapse of the console market.

Georgina
And she said?boom?– a sudden period of growth. So as ET was mentioned as a factor in the collapse, many people say that Super Mario Bros. was the reason that video games really took off, especially in the US.

Rob
It’s interesting to consider what might have been if his creator, Shigeru Miyamoto, had never created that character. The question is, why is that game so popular, what made it so fun to play?

Georgina
Here is?Keza Macdonald speaking again with Peter White,?on BBC World Service programme, You and Yours,?explaining why Mario is just so popular and what makes the original game so satisfying to play.

Keza MacDonald
It’s just such a joy to play. It's running and jumping, and it's the joy of?movement. When, when you play, even the original Super Mario Bros, you just feel this sense of joy in your movement, and it's one of the greatest games ever made. And a lot of games from 35 years ago are basically?unplayable?now. They might have been a step to something greater, but Mario was one of those few that really?holds up?today as it did then.

Rob
Keza Macdonald said that some games from 35 years ago are?unplayable?– so, not possible to play them.

Georgina
But she said that Mario?holds up –?a term?used to say that something’s standards or quality has not lessened.

Rob
It certainly does hold up – in fact, I played it the other day and I had lots of fun with it – it reminded me of my childhood, and it’s still as good now as it was then.

Georgina
Which reminds me of your quiz question, Rob.

Rob
Yes, in my quiz question I asked Georgina which game had the first appearance of that famous plumber, Mario.

Georgina
I went for a) The Legend of Zelda.

Rob
Which is wrong, I’m afraid! Mario’s first appearance was in Donkey Kong, and his creator, Shigeru Miyamoto, never thought he would be that popular.

Georgina
Well, I guess we’ve all really learnt something today. Let’s recap the vocabulary from today’s programme about Super Mario, starting with?iconic?– famously associated with something and instantly recognisable.?

Rob
Then we had?a flood of?which means a large amount of something in a short space of time.

Georgina
Cited?means reference as or noted.

Rob
Boom?relates to explosion and means a short period of sudden growth.?

Georgina
Unplayable?describes something that can’t be played or a game that is very difficult to enjoy.

Rob
And finally,?holds up?means that the quality or standards of something hasn’t changed and still looks good or plays well.

Georgina
That’s all for this programme.

Rob
Bye for now!

Georgina
Bye!