| M1. Best Sound Design |
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| The game that overall sounds the best. A significant deciding factor is the game's soundtrack, but it also includes skillful and appropriate use of sound effects, ambience, and (if present) quality of voice acting. |
| M2. Favorite Kart Game |
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| The best game of the Mario Kart series. |
| M3. Favorite Mario Platformer |
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| The best game featuring the core 2D or 3D Mario gameplay without too many significant deviations. The selection encompasses games which focus on the use of skillful jumping to traverse obstacle courses and/or sandboxes to reach the objective, often while collecting coins and helpful powerups along the way. |
| M4. Favorite Mario Kart Course |
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| The best race course featured in one or more Mario Kart games. This does not include battle courses. |
| M5. Favorite Donkey Kong Character |
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| The best character of the Donkey Kong spin-off series. |
| M6. Favorite Wario Character |
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| The best character of the Wario spin-off series. |
| M7. Favorite Yoshi Character |
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| The best character of the Yoshi spin-off series. |
| M8. Favorite Art Style |
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| The best visual style used in Mario media. This features prominently used, distinct, and recognizable art styles, but does not include one-off styles. A focus is placed on overall aesthetics over deviations due to hardware limitations (for example: SM64 looks different from SMG, but this seems to be a product of hardware limitations rather than artistic choice. Promotional renderings of the game show Mario in the familiar main series style. Therefore, we do not recognize SM64 as its own art style). |
| M9. Favorite Add-on Content |
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| The best Mario-relevant software package that adds new content to a game. To qualify, the content must be non-essential for the core game and add one or more distinct, recognizable elements to it. This does not include minor patches, code updates, or bug fixes. |
| M10. Favorite Lyrical Song |
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| The best music track from a Mario or Mario spin-off game featuring intelligible lyrics. |
| M11. Favorite Major Character |
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| The best recurring Mario series character prominently featured in a main role. |
| M12. Favorite Supporting Character |
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| The best Mario series or Mario spin-off series character who is part of the supporting cast. This includes recurring minor characters, as well as major characters that only appeared in one game, or exclusively appear in spin-offs. |
| M13. Favorite Level Theme |
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| The best overall environmental theme of a level. |
| M14. Favorite Species |
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| The best species that characters in the Mario series can belong to. To qualify, there must be more than one representative of said species present throughout the series. |
| M15. Favorite Instrumental Track |
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| The best music track from a Mario or Mario spin-off game featuring solely instrumentals and sounds. |
| M16. Favorite Item |
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| The most interesting, useful, or otherwise superior item or power-up available in the Mario series. |
| M17. Favorite Mario RPG |
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| The best Mario role-playing-game. |
| M18. Favorite Mario Party Game |
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| The best game of the Mario Party series. |
| M19. Favorite Villain |
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| The best Mario series or Mario spin-off series villain or nefarious group, major or minor. This award takes into account their role in the story, their actions, boss battles, and overall characterization. |
| M20. Favorite Sports Game |
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| The best sports-themed Mario spin-off game. Mario Kart titles have been excluded from this award because they already possess a dedicated award to themselves. |
| M21. Favorite Puzzle Game |
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| The best Mario spin-off game which primarily focuses on on the completion of puzzles and places emphasis on the use of logic over pure dexterity. This includes puzzle-platformers. |
| M22. Favorite Battle Course |
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| The best dedicated battle course featured in one or more Mario Kart games. |
| M23. Favorite Capture |
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| The best controllable creature that can be captured with Cappy in Super Mario Odyssey. Deciding factors include their moveset, breadth of options, how well the game used them, as well as how enjoyable they are to control overall. |
| M24. Favorite Costume |
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| The best complete outfit set in Super Mario Odyssey that Mario can wear, as purchased from Crazy Cap or otherwise. |
| M25. Favorite 2D Mario Level |
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| The best level found in a Mario sidescroller. This only includes nominees from the main Mario games. Levels from the Donkey Kong, Wario, and Yoshi spin-off series have been excluded. |
| M26. Favorite 3D Mario Level |
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| The best level found in a 3D Mario game. This only includes nominees from the main Mario games. Levels from the Donkey Kong, Wario, and Yoshi spin-off series have been excluded. |
| M27. Favorite Boss Battle |
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| The best boss battle found in a Mario or Mario spin-off game. |
| M28. Favorite Game Setting |
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| The game with the best setting overall. Focus is placed on the entirety of the setting as a whole, rather than just individual areas. |
| M29. Favorite Classic Game (GCN/GBA and older) |
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| The best game among every Mario title released for the Nintendo Gamecube and older (for console games), and the Gameboy Advance and older (for handheld games). |
| M30. Favorite Modern Game (Wii/DS and newer) |
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| The best game among every Mario title released for the Nintendo Wii and newer (for console games), and the Nintendo DS and newer (for handheld games). |
| F1. Worst Character |
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| The least favorite Mario series or Mario spin-off series character. This includes both major and minor characters regardless of number of appearances. |
| F2. Worst 2D Level |
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| The worst level found in a sidescroller. This includes nominees from the main Mario games, as well as the Donkey Kong, Wario, and Yoshi spin-off series. |
| F3. Worst 3D Level |
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| The worst level found in a 3D game. This includes nominees from the main Mario games, as well as the Donkey Kong, Wario, and Yoshi spin-off series. |
| F4. Worst RPG Area |
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| The worst map or level found in a role-playing game. This includes nominees from the Mario series, as well as any other relevant spin-off. |
| F5. Worst Level Concept |
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| The least favorite type of overarching stage or level theme. |
| F6. Worst Spin-off |
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| The least favorite game not part of the main Mario series. This includes sports, party games, and alternative storylines, to name a few options. |
| F7. Worst Enemy |
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| The least favorite non-boss villain, baddie, or grunt. |
| F8. Worst Mario Kart Course |
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| The least favorite track in a Mario Kart game. |
| F9. Worst Direction of Series |
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| This award focuses on the downward turn of a game franchise or spin-off, with lower quality coming with further installments. |
| F10. Worst Game Mechanic |
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| The worst feature of a game's functions. |
| F11. Biggest Missed Opportunity |
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| Recognition of the most lost potential or missed chance, aimed at any level of the Mario series, from treatment of characters and stories, up to company management and business decisions that, if handled better, would have a more welcome outcome. |
| F12. Worst Game Objective |
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| The worst goal, challenge, objective, or quest in a game. |
| F13. Worst Remake |
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| The worst new version or remake of a game. |
| F14. Worst Setting |
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| The worst overall location and backdrop of a game. |
| F15. Most Disappointing Game |
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| May not necessarily be the worst game Mario has to offer, but is the game that was most poorly received and squandered its greater potential. |
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