This article is meant to be a short follow-up to my previous article, Every Copy is Personalized, which relates to the more despair-inducing elements Super Mario 64. If you haven't read it, well, I wouldn't blame you because I am horrible and pathetic and nothing I write is worth reading. Now read this!
L is real, 2401. The fabled existence of Luigi as a secret character in Super Mario 64, hinted at by the castle's courtyard plaque supposedly declaring "L is real 2401".
If you somehow haven't heard the good word, the holy scripture, then I'd be happy to inform you. For many, many years, people have squinted at the mess of pixels on this one texture, and made out with the phrase "L is real 2401", taking that to mean "Luigi is real 2401." This has been interpreted as meaning you can unlock Luigi by collecting 2401 coins in the game (impossible, we're pretty sure) or even that it was foreshadowing the date of Paper Mario being released. Some people read it as "Eternal star", which ostensibly means... something. People noticed that the exact same texture was reused seeming randomly in The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time, and still tried to connect the dots.
Long story short, "L is real 2401" just a generic texture that means nothing, and Luigi is not in Super Mario 64 and never was. Or at least, this was the story up until a couple weeks ago...
I'll try to be brief, because this all really seems too good to be true, even though it is. It really is. On July 24, 2020, there was what people are calling a "gigaleak" of source code relating to past Nintendo games. Through this source code, nerds (yeah, that's right, NERDS) began finding little bits and pieces relating to possible textures and models of Luigi in Super Mario 64. Yeah, dude. After taking some effort to string everything together, they found that, yes, Luigi exists in full within the code of the final game.
Now, is this really that big of a deal? We knew he was intended on being in the beta of the game but was removed early on. It's kind of a big deal, and it's kind of a giant fucking deal. Big deal because, to everyone's knowledge, there were no actual existing assets relating to Luigi in the final version of the game. Giant fucking deal (G.F.D.) because all of this was discovered, again, on July 24th, 2020.
Super Mario 64 was initially released in Japan on June 23rd, 1996. Which would mean that these discoveries were made, literally, one day off the mark, twenty-four years and one month after the game's release. 2401. Luigi was discovered to be in Super Mario 64, 24 years and 01 month after the game came out. L is real 2401. L IS REAL 2401. I don't normally get this weird and freaked out about stuff but, dude, this can't be real. Especially at a time like this, with the oddities and mysticism surrounding Super Mario 64 being at the forefront of everyone's consciousness. What can be said?
Well, obviously, this could just be a combination of selective reaching by skeptics, and a really, really, really strange coincidence. Confirmation bias is a very common thing, especially when it comes to ideas relating to urban myths. And with a platform like the internet connecting people from these circles, stuff like confirmation bias, misinformation, and lack of context can run rampant.
And remember, this is the world wide web. A dark, dark place. We are talking about some people who need, not want, but need these conspiracies to come true. There are lunatics out there who, in their heart of hearts, in the darkest and most unexplored parts of their splintered minds, could not comprehend a reality where their ideas and theories were completely and definitely put to rest as false. In a world as scorched and mistaken as this one, in a world forgotten by God, the most determined and empowered are those who are fueled, not by any kind of altruism or desire for betterment, but by a scorn for the world around them. A fury ignited by some rotten, stinking tumor in their brains that needs to feel above the filth around them. The kind of fury that burns the brightest and hottest.
A withered man, crumbling at his computer, like vines, entangled and sunken around a little chair and desk, a desperate thing, abandoned by the sovereignty that he may have once answered to. A man like this can only kid himself, bitterly, sadly, that he knows what others don't. That he sees with a third eye, that he understands the meanings of things other, lower creatures could never fathom. As he stumbles, head to the ground, in and out of different realities, this type of creature doesn't truly even have a reason. He just is. A presence without presence. Repeating the same lies, over and over, scribbling them like incoherent ramblings on the walls of the damned. In the halls of the dead. A lie. That's all it ever was. And, in the end, when the ultimate, forever darkness comes for us all, that is the only reality that will ever remain. A lie. Scribbled on the walls of the damned, in the halls of the dead.
L is real 2401
L is real 2401
L is real 2401
L is real 2401
L is real 2401
L is real 2401
L is real 2401
Or maybe it's true. Maybe. keep scribbling and find out