Random: Mario's New Voice Actor Says It's "Surreal" To Hear His Voice In Mario Party

...Honestly, I kinda forgot that Charles retired as a VA for the Mario games...xD

Did we ever actually find out why Martinet stepped down a year after claiming he'd like to play Mario for the rest of his life?

@Goat_FromBOTW No, and we probably won't for a while. I feel they should've at least kept him around to mentor the new generation.

By the by, anyone who's played Jamboree, how are Kevin's voices this time around?

@Goat_FromBOTW Could always just have reevaluated or had a sudden change in his health or something, things happen.

@N00BiSH A decent amount of lines are reused from prior games, so his Mario and Luigi are roughly the same as they were in Wonder. His Wario voice is slightly improved from Move It, though, even if it's probably still the roughest. As for Waluigi, Kevin absolutely crushed it imo, he sounds fantastic as the character.

Personally, I actually really like hearing fresh takes on the characters after years of hearing the same voice lines, but so far, I think Luigi and Waluigi are who Kevin is strongest at right now.

Kevin's Mario still needs a little work, but his Luigi is good, his Wario has improved, and wow his Waluigi is perfect.

@StarryCiel That sounds about right, I did find Afghani's Luigi better than his Mario in Wonder. I hope someone uploads the voice clips soon, I wanna compare and contrast.

Mario still doesn’t sound quite right to me but everyone else is pretty good. I honestly don’t have a problem with his Wario, I’m just happy shy guy has new voice lines!

Mario sounds fine but Wario's voice in Jamboree is disappointing.

Gotta hand it to the dude, he's improving the more he does the roles. His Wario is leagues better than that last Wario Ware game. Haven't heard his Luigi here yet but I think Mario sounds better than in Wonder.

I think he's always just going to sound like someone doing Mario impressions to me. But it is what it is. My childhood is already long gone, and for kids starting out now, he might as well have always been Mario.

@Goat_FromBOTW If you listen to Charles' voice lately he sounds much rougher and deeper. I wouldn't be surprised if he just can't reach the same pitch or have the same vocal range he used to.

@Goat_FromBOTW Given that he made that claim years ago, it's most likely that he had a change of heart or decided to step down for health reasons. The man can barely do the Mario voice anymore, to the point where they had to start reusing clips from previous games to help supplement any of the new voice work.

I actually wondered if they were re-using Mario lines cause I thought he sounded spot-on. His Luigi is also really good, but I really think he nailed it with Wario and Waluigi. Charles had big shoes to fill, but Kevin is getting comfortable in them just fine.

I had a feeling he’d probably voice Waluigi as well. I thought his voices in Wonder were pretty spot on. His Mario may have been a bit softer than Charles’? But I honestly think he’s doing a good job, and it’s great they found someone who can emulate the voices rather closely, as opposed to like Rosalina’s huge change over the years, or how other games, anime, or cartoons replace voices with ones that sound nothing like they used to.

Good for him I guess. His Wario in particular is still not good though.

I just heard the Waluigi voice and OOF I'm immediately truly saddened for the fist time since Martinet stepped down.

Honestly I'm really happy with Kevin's performances as these iconic characters. They just feel so much more emotive than they have felt for the past few games although maybe that's the animation aswell. Side note anyone else noticing how every since oddesy nintendo has been showing Mario's hair off a lot more. I just think that a preety neat thing. First oddesy but then the sports games. And now this where Mario's victory animation is taking off his cap.

Me, standing in the corner here, looking at the ground, and thinking "The only true voice of Mario is 'Captain' Lou Albano."

@Goat_FromBOTW In all fairness, 30+ years of voicing a character is a long time; he's been the voice of Mario since before I was born. The guy is also 69 years old, which is well into retirement age here in the U.S. He probably wants to spend his golden years with family or working on personal projects.

@CazSonOfCaz Him, and Bob Hoskins.

Cool but can we talk about how Daisy's new VA crushed it as well? I can barely tell a difference.

@CazSonOfCaz who could forget Mario's catchphrase HEY PAISANOS

i feel like this is obvious, and i dont mean to be cruel to this kid, but they couldve gotten anyone to voice mario, especially any nerd adjacent VA in the X or millennial generations...

This guy isnt particularly good at these voices, and he has almost zero resume at all before voicing Mario in Wonder. Does Kevin Afghani's uncle work at Nintendo or something? 🤔

EDIT - one last thought: despite how much I love Martinet, and he has done a wonderful job defining the characters and shaping their aesthetic especially during the 64/cube days, this was their once a generation chance to change mario back to an Italian-American plumber from Brooklyn, as he should be. ah,well.

It’s very challenging to take over the VA from such an icon as Charles, who did a phenomenal job for many years. But in all honesty, Kevin is doing very well. It was time to for a fresh take on these characters.

@AfroMario YES! I can hear it in my head, clear as day!

@AstroTheGamosian Yep, I remember when Mario 64 first came out and I was appalled at the castrato voice they’d gone for after Mario always having a deep, gruff voice. It didn’t take long for me to get used to the new voice of course and these days it’s just how I naturally expect Mario to sound… and then of course they went back to a deeper voice in the CGI film! 😅

I sincerely doubt that it was a personal choice for Martinet to step down. Most likely, it was a corporate choice: they probably thought keeping Charles onboard was getting expensive and decided to replace him to save a bit more money.

It's also a shame to see people downplaying Charles' performances as of late. The last major titles he did new voicework for - Luigi's Mansion 3 and the previous two WarioWare games - showed that he's still got it when it comes to bringing these characters to life.

Of course, Martinet isn't going to voice these characters forever - he knows it just as much as we do - but I believe Nintendo should've at least kept him around to guide the next VA in making sure they understand the nuances that go into giving those characters... character. Disney did it with Donald Duck and the like after all.

Right now, Kevin Afghani is the voice of Mario and all those characters, but it's not the same as saying Charles Martinet IS Mario, y'know?

@BulkSlash : Are you sure the "castrato" effect wasn't just due to PAL speedup?

Hope he isn't always going to make it about him...

@SillyG If only! 😂 Sadly when it came to PAL games we got slowdown instead of speed up, so Mario probably sounded more like Lou Albano than Martinet in that version. 🤣

I love SMBW, and I never felt the voices were too far off (I have never played a WarioWare game, so I can't speak to his Wario voice). I can't wait to hear his Waluigi, apparently most people love it! So glad he is able to emulate Martinet's tone, when I first heard there was going to be a change, I was terrified because one of my favorite audio series replaced a character with someone who sounded nothing the same, and I really did not want that to happen with Mario!

Actually, Chris Pratt is the best mario VA lol.

@N00BiSH

I believe Nintendo should've at least kept him around to guide the next VA in making sure they understand the nuances that go into giving those characters... character.

I want to think he does that, but probably behind the scenes. I'm sure Afghani will nail his Mario voices the same way as Martinet did.

At least Charles Martinet didn't act like Hellena Taylor when she was replaced by Jennifer Hale on the role of Bayonetta.

He should've just been the voice for Waluigi. They didn't need one guy to do all four again.

@HammerGalladeBro that's what I hope too but I do wish there was some official acknowledgement from either Nintendo or the actors themselves. Would help ease the transition.

And yeah, it's nice that Charles is being professional about all this. I think Nintendo's aware of how much value people put in his performances(especially after the Mario movie's cast reveal), which is probably why they made him a brand ambassador. Again though, I just wish he or Kevin would acknowledge each other's performances.

@Goat_FromBOTW Wouldn't be surprised if there's a NDA between Nintendo and Charles.
Several years ago, Nintendo had to remind Marcus Lindblim, I believe his name was, they (their lawyers) wouldn't like it if he talked about the EarthBound localization process even decades later.

@Mario_Master I don't think whoever did the DiC cartoon voices was heard from again, were they?
I don't think most of the cast of those cartoons became very famous. Well, Tara Strong I think, but not for that show. (as "Hip Koopa", I forget which one, it was Lemmy or Larry in the official canon)

@Goat_FromBOTW When he said that, he also mentioned that if the time came when he felt he couldn't voice Mario anymore, he would pass on the role and it seems like that time has come. I don't think there's a deeper reason than just he wanted to step down from the role.

"In a question and answer session at a Canadian gaming and comics expo two years ago, Martinet told the audience "I want to voice Mario until I drop dead" in response to a fan's question, according to gaming blog The Game Crater. But he added "if someday I think I am no longer capable of doing it, I will tell Nintendo to look into finding someone else."

Source: https://www.npr.org/2023/08/22/1195166089/voice-super-mario-stepping-down#:~:text=While%20he%20did%20not%20voice,gaming%20blog%20The%20Game%20Crater.

@Goat_FromBOTW
Definitely a question I'd like an answer to, even with the added context

Also, his Mario has improved in the new Mario Party imo. I kinda miss Martinet, but will admit that as he is mortal, he will eventually need to step down..
Now to find a way to imagine Mario's "It's A Me" without a sneer forming on the face of the person saying it..

New voice actor? Un-*******-acceptable. I expect them to use Martinet recordings until the end of time.

I guess he'll be voicing Baby Mario and Baby Luigi for Mario Kart 9 lol.

Tbh I would have thought they'd have used Charles stepping down as an opportunity to spread the roles across multiple people.

It's obviously going to be harder to be sound alike for multiple characters from one person because Charles could just do whatever voices he feel he could do comfortably. Kevin has to try and match every voice Charles could do.

@N00BiSH I'll be honest. It's so strange to see so many people talking about how he still need to nail the voice properly, because I honestly can't tell the difference.

@-wc-

"this was their once a generation chance to change mario back to an Italian-American plumber from Brooklyn, as he should be. ah,well."

Agreed. Always wondered why Mario had that overly cutesy faux-Italian accent when I grew up reading that he was a plumber from Brooklyn! Not saying that he had to sound like Bob Hoskins in the games but he would've had a bit more personality if his voice had skewed more toward that direction.

@GoldenSunRM you're not alone in that regard, but there are plenty of people who can recognize the nuances in a VA's performance, especially if they're playing the roles of legacy characters.

@-wc- @DeciderVT so I take it you enjoyed the movie's interpretation?

@batmanbud2 I can't talk about that as I didn't saw the film in english.

@batmanbud2

Let's just say Pratt was way off the mark in a whole other direction. ✌️ I'll never understand the casting.

@DeciderVT

I really miss the Mario of my youth! 🫠

New wario voice is bloody awful.