User:DatOneWeeb/Mario's Cosmology

Okay, so I am going to try and figure out how many universes actually exist in the Marioverse. Let's begin.

Current Amount

Starting off, we obviously have Mario's own universe.

Next up, we have the Shake Dimension in Wario Land: Shake It, which Wario went to after being offered the Bottomless Coin Sack.

Smithy from Super Mario RPG comes from his own world that is accessed by the gateway, Exor.

In Donkey Kong Country Returns, there is a golden banana in which both DK and Diddy enter another dimension. We know it's a dimension due to Cranky Kong stating: "They say there is a banana out there that not only tastes great, but warps you to an alternate dimension. I say, yes please!"

Super Paper Mario starts with The Void, stating it would destroy all dimensions. The game's worlds are constantly described as dimensions accessed through dimensional doors. There are a total of 9 worlds (The Underwhere and Overthere being separate), with Flipside and Flopside adding 2 more, giving this game 11 universes. However, The Ancients many years ago were stated to create multiple worlds. We know it isn't just the worlds you play through the game, since it's revealed that Bleck and others lived in a different dimension that it isn't able to be found throughout the game. There is no Dimensional Door for it. And it being destroyed wouldn't mean you can't find the door, since the Sammer Kingdom's door can still exist after being destroyed. However, the exact amount created is unknown.

In Mario + Rabbids Kingdom Battle, at the start of the game, we have a person that is shown to be living in a different world from Mario's world.

Now there is something I missed, but we'll get back to that later. For now, let's talk about parallel universe.

Parallel Universes

In Super Mario Bros, you can enter another world that's very similar to the original one, with just different enemies. Being treated as a parallel universe.

In Super Mario Bros. 2, beating the game enough times unlocks a special world, which was stated to be a parallel world.

In Super Mario Land, beating the game lets you go to an enemy infested underworld. In context of the previous games, it's a parallel world, but with more enemies.

In Super Mario Galaxy, Rosalina mentions another world you can travel to, which just happens to be Super Luigi Galaxy. We know in the context this would have to be another universe due to having the same plot, with Bowser targeting the universe.

Paper Mario: Color Splash has a few universes. There's a mini-game you access with a door that lets you play a game called Paint Hunter. The instructions before the game starts state that you've been taken to an alternate dimension. There are a total of 6 different stages in the game. In Vortex Island, there's a pipe that takes you to a parallel world. The amount there are in this game are more than one, since Huey stated that there is another parallel universe, after already being introduced to it. There are 3 pipes in total. One from Vortex Island, Lighthouse Island, and Fortune Island. It should be noted that these worlds were also referred to as a universe. Giving us 9 universes from Color Splash.

However, it doesn't stop there. Every single universe in the Mario series does have a parallel. Once again, in Super Paper Mario, there exists Flopside, which is a parallel to Flipside. Once arriving there, while talking to Nolrem (Merlon's counterpart), he states that everything has a front and a back when asking about Flopside's existence. Which means every universe in Mario would have an opposite world, much like Flipside and Flopside. We will be talking about this later.

Total Part 1

So in total (kinda), there are 15 universes (non-parallel) in Mario. Then there are 13 currently shown parallel universes. Multiplied by 2 from Nolrem's statement.

15 + 13 = 28 x 2 = 56 Universes (Low 2-B)

Not bad, but we're only scratching the surface

Dream Worlds + Size

Okay, so dream worlds are common in the Mario series. Starting from Super Mario Bros 2/BS Super Mario Bros. 2 USA, then in Mario Party 5, and the most recently in Mario & Luigi: Dream Team.

Before we start figuring out how many dreams exist, we need to establish out how big they are individually.

In Super Mario Bros 2, Subcon, a dream world, has been referred to as a world. In the same manual, the people of Subcon refer to Mario's world as the real world, giving us a comparison that these are two separate worlds. It's also been directly called a universe. For supporting evidence, Subcon also appears to have a day and night system, along with stars in the night sky.

In Mario Party 5, the manual, Misstar, and Eldstar refer to Future Dream as a universe, additionally being called infinite in size.

In Mario & Luigi: Dream Team, Dreambert refers to Mario's world as the real world, while also constantly using the word "world" whenever talking about dream worlds. Giving us another comparison between two words. When fighting the Zeekeeper, he creates a portal that pulls Dreamy Luigi in. When going inside it, Dreambert states that he's actually crossing dimensions during the battle. This fight takes place within a dream world, so he must have been referring to other dreams. It's also shown that many stars and space exist within dream worlds, along with various constellations.

In conclusion, every dream in the Mario series is an entire universe.

The Amount of Dreams

Now we must figure out exactly how many dreams are there. Spoilers, but it's literally impossible to give both an exact and rough estimate on how many dreams there are. It's impossible. But we can figure out how many universes can contribute to the amount of dreams being made.

The Star Spirits state that dreams arrive in the Dream Depot everyday. And we can see in Dream Team that this happens when people simply fall asleep. It's also stated that there are as many Subcon as there are people dreaming. When it comes to the amount of people and beings that live in the Mario universes, it's a lot. Due to simply how big the universe is, and the fact that there are many aliens and different species that exist all over it. So an exact number of how many people sleep a day is unknown, it's countless. At least for some universes. Let me elaborate.

In Super Paper Mario, inside the world Outer Space (not space in Mario, but rather different dimension), there is an alien you can speak to. He states that space is endless, along with stating within that infinite space is filled with dreams. However, we can't take a random NPC's text at face value. Tippi (someone who's treated as your guide of knowledge) states that the alien in question often drives his thoughts about the endless space. Additionally, Tippi herself refers to Outer Space as infinite, supporting the alien's statement and thus we can take his word. If there's an infinite space in which that space is filled with dreams, this means there are infinite dreams. To further support that infinite beings can contribute to the making of dreams, paint in Paper Mario: Color Splash has shown to be sentient that both sleep and have a mind of its own. If that is the case, paint is also space. Meaning an infinite space has infinite paint. And infinite paint means infinite paint individuals. There also exists an infinite amount of matter due to the Bottomless Coin Sack containing an infinite amount of coins. Which is what paint also covers. Another thing to note is that people can dream within a dream world, which would mean any being sleeping within a dream world causes a chain reaction of more dreams to come.

In addition to this, we need to take into account of Nolrem's parallel statement. This would have to include dream worlds, as in Super Mario Bros 2, you can access Subspace, which is a parallel dream you enter. Thus all dreams have a parallel.

Many Worlds Interpretation

Timelines, in my Mario? Yeah. The Mario multiverse runs on MWI (the theory that each possibility is a timeline), which is shown from the several amounts of time travel within the series.

In Yoshi's Island DS, Bowser travels to the past to defeat past Yoshi and baby Mario. Bowser remains unaffected and suffers nothing from doing this.

In Yoshi's New Island, Bowser (and Mario) travel through time and space to preform yet again the same feat.

In Mario & Luigi Partners in Time, the Shroob Army attack Mario's past, of which none of the present is affected at all. It's also consistent within sports that the baby characters will travel to the future, even ignoring the time paradoxes.

Finally, in both Luigi's Mansion 3DS and 3, time travel is involved. This is the most important and blatant case. E. Gadd during the events of Dark Moon sent out his prototype of Gooigi in the past. However, Gooigi makes his return in Luigi's Mansion 3, in which E. Gadd even mentions he had help from past Luigi. Notice how Luigi knows nothing about Gooigi, despite having an entire adventure in the 3DS remake. Now, I would doubt Luigi could've just forgotten, as normally in the Luigi's Mansion series, he always retains his knowledge from previous games, such as knowing how to use the Poltergust, remembering King Boo, or keep memories of his adventures. Thus, the next conclusion is that this is a different timeline.

As shown consistently, affecting the past in Mario does not affect the future. And anytime you travel through the past, it's actually a separate timeline. Thus meaning that the verse runs on MWI, and any usage of time travel is simply just another timeline. But how many timelines? As mentioned before, infinite space would mean infinite possibilities can happen within that infinite space. Because of this, there would in total be infinite timelines.

Conclusion

So how many universes are there?

There are millions of standard universes existing naturally. Then, there are an infinite amount of timelines, with each timeline having a parallel. Doubling the infinite. Then, there are infinite Dream Depots, existing across every infinite timeline. Each Dream Depot contains an infinite amount of dreams daily, along with having a parallel dream, and having people dream within those infinite dreams just making even more dreams, having an ad-infinite chain within just a single dream.