Super Mario: What Is Daisy's Backstory? (2024)

The Super Mario series is one of the most iconic throughout all of gaming, and part of the reason why it is so beloved is the wide cast of characters associated with the popular franchise. While Peach is definitely the most well-known princess in the series, Princess Daisy is also a fan favourite as well, and is slowly growing in relevance and popularity with her more recent appearances.

However, the origins of the Princess are in some of Mario's more obscure and older titles, and many do not know where she came from. So, what is Daisy's backstory, why do people love her personality, and will she ever get her own game?

Daisy's Backstory

While Princess Peach is the leader of the Mushroom Kingdom, Daisy is also a royal, being the leader of Sarasaland, the country that is the setting for Super Mario Land, a Game Boy game where Daisy made her debut. Aside from being the princess of Sarasaland, not too much is known about Daisy aside from her personality.

One notable relationship she does have is that certain instruction guides for some Mario games, in which she is featured, mention that she is the cousin of Princess Peach, who she is shown to have a close relationship with. The information comes from a relatively obscure source, but since it is official, and there are no sources going against this, it is generally accepted.

Personality

Compared to the more gentle and demure Peach, Daisy is consistently represented to be more energetic and outgoing. Her loud catchphrases and exclamations are one of her defining traits and are part of the reason why she is such a beloved character in the series.

She is also paired off with Luigi quite often, making them parallels of Mario and Peach, but unfortunately we do not get to see much of their relationship dynamic.

In spite of how well-liked Daisy is as a Mario character, her appearances have been relatively fleeting in mainline entries, and she is better known for showing up in spin-off titles consistently. So, where have we learned about Daisy's personality so far?

Daisy's Appearances

While a lot of the more obscure Mario characters appear first in spin-off media, Daisy actually showed up for the first time in a mainline game. However, it would be years until she showed up in a mainline game again, instead being a mainstay of the spin-off Mario media. So, what is the timeline of Daisy's mainline and spin-off appearances, and where can we expect to see her next?

Mainline

As mentioned, the first game to feature Daisy was Super Mario Land from 1989. Being one of the first Mario games on a handheld system, the developers wanted it to stand out from the console iterations. Part of this was giving the game a new setting, and with the new setting of Sarasaland, came Daisy, the nation's princess.

Since the graphical capability of the Game Boy was quite limited, the design differences from Peach were not immediately obvious, but in artwork for the game, she immediately stands out with her brown hair and iconic orange dress.

During Super Mario Land, Daisy is kidnapped by a new alien villain called Tatanga, who like Peach and Bowser, wants to marry Daisy.

On top of this, Tatanga brainwashed all of the citizens of Sarasaland, turning them into the villains that Mario has to face on his adventure to save Daisy.

Throughout the game, these enemies will sometimes pose as Daisy pretending to be her when Mario shows up to save her, but it is not until the end of the game that Daisy is saved and peace returns to Sarasaland.

Throughout the entirety of the 90s, Daisy was completely absent from any new Mario games, and it would not be until 2015 that she would show up in a mainline adventure again. Even then, the mainline status of the Super Mario Maker subseries is questionable, since it being a level editor primarily would put it closer to spin-off territory.

However, Mario Maker is the first time Daisy is playable in a Mario platformer, but unfortunately, this is overshadowed by the massive variety of different character options in Mario Maker, since the game supported a wide variety of amiibo figures to unlock them in-game.

While Daisy had her own amiibo figure released, it was not available at the time Mario Maker was launched, so while she is not compatible with her amiibo, she is instead unlocked after playing through an event level called Adventures in Sarasaland.

This course is of course a callback to her country of origin, and is a unique method for unlocking a new character option in Mario Maker, since most are just simple amiibo unlocks. However, Daisy plays just like every other character in Mario Maker, with no one having unique playstyles like Mario 3D Land or Super Mario Bros. 2.

Daisy In Mario Wonder

The true return of Daisy to a mainline Mario game, and her formal introduction as a main playable character, was not until her addition to the main roster in Super Mario Wonder. After decades of New Super Mario Bros. titles, Mario Wonder was aiming to shake up the formula with plenty of new gameplay options, and even more options for playable characters.

Long-time fans of Daisy celebrated that she was finally returning to a truly mainline Mario adventure.

This is the first game where we get to see Daisy equip different power-ups and go through all the unique Wonder Flower transformations too. This game was also the debut of Daisy's new voice actress, who managed to recreate the character's iconic voice perfectly showing off Daisy's expressive personality.

The initial reveal trailer for Daisy showed her pushing a pipe against a new Shova enemy, which some fans assumed implied that she would be stronger than the other playable characters, which would make sense since her athleticism is shown off in plenty of Mario spin-off games.

However, when the game was launched, it was revealed that all the characters played the same, unlike previous Mario platformers, to keep the platforming consistent.

Spin-Off

While it took 34 years for Daisy to show up in another mainline Mario game and finally be playable between Super Mario Land and Mario Wonder, it did not take as long for Daisy to show up again outside of mainline titles.

There was still an 11 year hiatus until Daisy was seen after Super Mario Land, until the launch of Mario Tennis in 2000. The main reason they brought her back was that the developers wanted more characters with human proportions, and she was one of the relatively few human characters that had shown up in a mainline Mario game.

Her athleticism has been shown off in all her sports game appearances, with her showing up as playable in almost every Mario sports game following Tennis, being in Strikers, Baseball, and Golf, and representing the speed type in every Mario & Sonic Olympic crossover game.

A moment highlighting her relationship dynamic with Luigi is shown when she wins the trophy in Mario Power Tennis, where she speeds up to Luigi holding the trophy on roller skates, making him spin around, and then dashing in and taking the trophy off him in slow motion.

Daisy made her Mario Kart debut in Mario Kart Double Dash where she paired up with Peach. Since then, she has been a mainstay in the popular racing series, and since her introduction has had two courses themed after her.

In Double Dash, the course Daisy Cruiser was introduced, and it was then brought back as a retro course in Mario Kart 7 and the Mario Kart 8 Deluxe Booster Pack.

In Mario Kart Wii, she also has Daisy Circuit, a fan favourite course taking a sunset ride through a beachside resort that features statues of her with Luigi and Baby Luigi dancing with Baby Daisy. This course had not returned until it was announced for the final wave of the Mario Kart 8 Deluxe Booster Pack.

Daisy In Smash

The main spin-off franchise where she felt noticeably absent for years was Smash Bros. The series had plenty of new entries since her reintroduction in Mario Tennis. In spite of this, Peach has been playable since the second game in the series in Smash Bros Melee. Since Peach was added, she has always featured a palette swap that clearly resembled Daisy.

This was the best alternate for fans of the character, but since Peach and Daisy have such distinct personalities, the palette swap always felt a little uncanny since Peach would still retain all of her characteristics and voice lines.

This was finally fixed in Smash Bros. Ultimate in 2018, which introduced the concept of Echo fighters. These characters were designed to be separate fighters, but based closely on fighters that already existed. Other examples of this are Chrom, Dark Pit, and Dark Samus.

Daisy is, of course, the Echo fighter of Peach, but stands out a little from the other Echo fighters for how she doesn't stand out from her counterpart. While the other Echo fighters had some noticeable changes gameplay-wise from their origin, Daisy acts almost completely the same as Peach, with her differences being almost exclusively cosmetic.

This did solve a lot of the issues compared to the Peach palette swap, with Daisy using unique voice lines and having some unique animations to better suit her distinct personality.

Both her running and her standing animations are different from Peach, and for the neutral special where Peach defends herself using a Toad, Daisy instead uses a Blue Toad. Peach's attacks often have a glowing heart motif to match her theming, and for Daisy, this was switched for her orange and yellow petals instead.

It is great to see Daisy finally getting more recognition in the Switch generation, with Smash Bros. and Mario Wonder being particular highlights. In spite of this, Daisy has never been the face of her own title, in spite of being part of the franchise for decades, and part of the popular line of Mario Princesses.

However, with how much attention Peach has been getting with the launch of games like Princess Peach Showtime, and taking a main role in the Mario Movie, hopefully her popularity will prove that other Mario princesses like her, Rosalina, and Pauline should get the same attention.

Next: How Many Times Has Bowser Kidnapped Princess Peach In The Super Mario Games?