Quote Originally Posted by VertigoProcess View Post
Mario is a franchise... and it branches out away from mario as well, just like halo branches out away from master chief...
But the orientation is different. Master Chief could be in every single one, but it's still not Master Chief who's the mascot, it's the Halo name. Likewise with Call of Duty/Modern Warfare. I almost think that Zelda is the same thing as well. Meanwhile, very, very few Mario games exclude Mario.