[DELICIOUS POISON]

I think 1-up-salesman's point was just that it's pointless to be concerned about story in a media that rarely concerns itself with consistency.

It annoys me more when companies do remakes and retcons to make unimportant changes. For example; in Metroid: Zero Mission there is clear and obvious indication that the wrecked ship in Super Metroid is the remains of the Space Pirates' mother ship in ZM. The Super Metroid printed backstory states otherwise repeatedly in various media, and there is no actual reason to change it. One of the biggest flaws in it is how they are attempting to link together two elements that do not need to be linked - the wrecked ship is much more interesting when you know that its origins are 3rd party, IMO.

I agree that the Mario story has been severely mangled, starting with Yoshi's Island. Then again, I haven't seen any evidence that Mario was even supposed to be a plumber from Brooklyn according to Nintendo of Japan. Basically, NoA stepped in and made deals with other companies that came up with a backstory and sold products based on that. Even if Mario was being flown through Dinosaur Land on the way to his first home in the Mushroom Kingdom, he could've easily lived in NY at some point. It's one of those things I've thought over, but we're missing a bunch of pieces to the puzzle.

I don't see the point in caring about the map being slightly off in Zelda II. No one's even said the overworld map in Zelda II was even accurate; I always took it as a simplistic and rough depiction of the landscape. Again, sometimes you have to make a new game, and landscapes change as a result of artistic license. People want a new experience; not repetition.