The Great Giana Sisters

Now that The Super Mario Bros. Movie is out and the Internet is teeming with fanart, here's my little contribution. But wait, these aren't Mario brothers! 🤔

The Great Giana Sisters (sometimes spelled Gianna) was an obvious knockoff. And the weirdest part of our 80's childhood obsession with this Commodore 64 video game was that we didn't even know there was a game called Super Mario Bros. 🤪 Giana and Maria were our Mario and Luigi, I lived for that game and this obsession spread to my cousins and all over my neighbourhood. The Commodore 64 video games were on cassettes (ordinary audio tapes) and they were easy to copy and share, all you needed was a Commodore Datasette unit.

My dad bought my brother and me a used Commodore 64 with tons of games on cassettes and even floppy discs, so I don't know why there wasn't a Mario Bros. game among them. Giana Sisters was one of the first that caught our attention and remained a synonym for an ultimate video game, so when I finally found out about Mario Bros., I was like, wait a minute... 🤔 And fun fact - I've never played the original Mario game, not even after that. I guess I didn't find it necessary after playing so many hours of Giana Sisters.

Giana sisters' anonymity and problems with production after copyright isuess also meant that there's no definite character design. Before they powered up, they wore big red bows in their hair (Giana was blonde, Maria green) and after powering up they got some kind of punk hairstyle that allowed them to crush rocks in the sky. They wore red shirts and blue skirts. However, the (unsuccessful) sequels changed their looks, so I combined some of the designs, but also tried to stay close to the original I remember and like.

And there's one thing that will undoubtedly put The Great Giana Sisters among the greatest - the music! The phenomenal intro theme by Chris Huelsbeck is still one of the best compositions for video games. Pure nostalgia and goosebumps. 😍

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#digitalart #drawing #fanart #videogame #gianasisters #thegreatgianasisters #supermariobros #commodore64 #grdilicious #grdi