Another entry for the “curious coincidence… or not?” file today: it turns out that LEGO and Nintendo weren’t the first folks to come up with a LEGO NES that has a sidescrolling Mario feature, because a man named Brandon Jones beat them to the punch by over a year:
This video, uploaded in February 2019, shows a design remarkably similar to the current product being put out by LEGO, right down to the recreation of Super Mario Bros. playing out as the brick NES is attached to the TV. While obviously far less polished than the official version, it is eerily suspicious how similar in design it is…
Then again, given that LEGO is on the record stating that the Super Mario LEGO project took over four years to develop, it seems pretty likely that the company came up with the concept concurrently to Jones, or perhaps even earlier. Rather than suspect foul play, let’s appreciate the ingenuity of a fan who came up with an idea so good that the same thing ended up playing out on a mass market scale. Good work, Brandon!
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Written by Amelia Fruzzetti
A writer and Nintendo fan based in Seattle, Washington. When not working for NinWire, she can be found eating pasta, writing stories, and wondering about when Mother 3 is finally going to get an official localization.
