Update: There's another rare pair out there somewhere
Update: It turns out the shoes were in fact made! While they are pretty rare, there was a sales listing for them in the last year or so. Thanks, bluesun for sharing that with us!
Gako Miyao also spoke about these shoes back in 2017, referring to "two types". We've seen one, of course, but we wonder what's on the second pair?
Here's a rough translation via Google translate of the Tweet:
Therefore, somewhere in the world, there are children's shoes of "Miyao version cute Princess Peach".
I should have made two types.
If you find it, it's super rare.
If you've seen the second pair that Miyao designed, share it with us! And we'll be on the lookout too, of course.
Original story: The moustachioed Mario has long had an iconic look of overalls, a cap, brown shoes, and white gloves. And, of course, that signature facial hair. While there have been some slight variations, like swapping colours around, the Italian plumber has basically stayed the same since his introduction to the world as Jumpman in Donkey Kong.
Princess Peach didn't come about until 1985's Super Mario Bros., but even though we got a pixelated look at the Mushroom Kingdom ruler, Nintendo did not have a finalised look for her. So when the game sold like hotcakes, Nintendo was scrambling for merch to push sales even further.
It enlisted the help of mangaka Gaku Miyao, who shared some photos of some lost Mario merch that never saw the light of day — a pair of kids' shoes! Think of all the littluns who didn't get to wear these on their feet back in 1986.
As you can see, Peach has much-straighter hair than her now-iconic wavy locks. Admittedly, we think this old design is really cute, and reminiscent of old-style manga princesses. There's a lot of red, including on the skirt, and she's wearing a pink overcoat-like piece. But there are similarities to her current design, too, such as her blue eyes, the three point-crown, and hair colour.
We have a translation of the short thread, thanks to Twitter user GSK:
"I worked on this girls' merch, before Nintendo had established a standardised design for Princess Peach; the Peach everyone's familiar with was born later. a certain someone shed a few tears over their legit work being treated as fake.
A lil more info: at the time, pics #1 & #2 were the only 'official reference materials' for Peach—they weren't sufficient for girls' merch, so I faxed my rough sketches to Nintendo & got the OK; if that design took root, Peach might look like #3 right now"
It's fascinating to see just how Peach's pixels were translated to paper and merch back in the day, and Miyao also shared an image as to what the Princess may have actually looked like had Nintendo gone ahead with the shoes.
Now this is lovely. There's something extremely elegant about this look, and it looks even slightly more like the Peach we know and love today, with bigger hair. It's also even more anime-esque than the first one! Nonetheless, we never got the shoes, so Miyao's design never made it past the drawing board.
What do you think of these older Peach designs? Let us know in the comments!
That Toad has a nose!! And they have belly buttons!!! Somehow I find that fact much more interesting and unsettling than the discarded Peach design, lol
This also isn't exactly how she looks today. Even if she went with that design back in the day, she could still have looked largely the same as she does today because she has been redesigned before.
In fact, her classic design didn't have parts of that discarded design that have actually returned in her modern design. Particularly on the skirt part of her dress.
Nintendo should bring this back as Peach's long lost sister Apple.
This peach is actually awesome! Definitely not as iconic.That bottom/modern illustration is friggin' sweet!
This design isn't bad! It's cute. But it's also a very of-the-era cartoon princess look. So while it's not bad, it's not as timeless as the Peach look we have today.
Lol this is funny was just watching this fan made mario movie
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=ChnDdvqXalg
(translating his actions like this lol) After watching this video i feel kinda sorry for stomping on goombas lol.
That's actually pretty cute, maybe even cuter than the Peach we have now. Definitely reminiscent of that old manga art style, which I love so much.
But let's not forget what she looked like in The Super Mario Bros. Super Show! She DEFINITELY doesn't look like how she looked then! Heck, in that cartoon, she wasn't even blonde, but brunette!
Is it wrong that I like this version of her a little more? Because I love it a lot.
Also, So long grey bowser!
Peach's final look was actually seen for the first time on the Japanese flyer for Super Mario Bros. 2 (Lost Levels). The artwork for that game actually also solidified the design of Bowser and many of his minions, who all look bizarre on the original SMB's Famicom artwork. Ironically though, due to palette limitations, Peach still wouldn't look like she does now in-game until the SNES era.
@inenai It's unsettling because it implies those mushroom people are in fact mammals.
Out of sheer honesty, I like that version of Peach a lot better! She looks way cuter in that design!
Nintendo don’t do enough with peach. I’ve a young daughter who adores the Nintendo princesses and would love a new game dedicated to the princes! It’s also so hard to find peach figures and toys. Come on Nintendo take a leaf out of Disney’s book and push the princesses! Peach, Daisy, Rosalina.
That first one creeps me out (what happened to her EYES) but the second one is beautiful, very Sailor Moon esque. I understand why they changed it since it doesn't really fit the general Mario aesthetic, even for the time, but I would love to see it revived maybe for a more stylistically bold entry (perhaps a manga themed Paper Mario game?).
That first picture? Yeah no that’s freaky. The picture at the very bottom though I vibe with. It gives off that cute 90’s anime aesthetic that’s so popular these days.
I really like the second pic, she looks floaty which fits really well with her ability to float in some games like Smash Bros.
I'll take that princess Toadstool over the Ditz Peach she has become anyday.
Second Peach looks like a teenager. The last one.
The flat face is the only thing i don't like as much as the final design.
You're right, it does look a lot like old anime style artwork. I wish we'd gotten 3D redhead toadstool/peach with the white and red dress at some point.
@AlanaHagues The shoes do seem to have been made. There's even a sales listing for a sold pair from 2020, which seems to have sparked up the conversation at the time.
Apparently, there were two kinds of shoes.
Looks great, but this is just what some anime/manga looked like at the time. Not much more than that going on here.
@bluesun Thanks for this! I've updated the story with the listing and the old Tweet!
"That's actually pretty cute, maybe even cuter than the Peach we have now. Definitely reminiscent of that old manga art style, which I love so much.
But let's not forget what she looked like in The Super Mario Bros. Super Show! She DEFINITELY doesn't look like how she looked then! Heck, in that cartoon, she wasn't even blonde, but brunette!"
(*https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0096707 (World Wide Web address))
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