Beta Connections

Super Mario 64’s personalization AI is known for taking assets from the beta and restoring them in the release version of the game. The way that this works was relatively unknown and even theorists and researchers were unable to quite figure out as to how this event happened.

However, as of recently, a discovery was made to possibly explain this anomaly.

Asset Replacement
Sometimes during a game of Super Mario 64, the AI runs out of assets to use in order to personalize the user’s experience, thus causing a term that is now known as being ‘Asset Replacement’ to occur. The term itself being coined by an anonymous user that went by the name of “Mario’s Soldier”, the way it works is that formerly removed items from the game are not completely forgotten, and so the AI is forced to use the remnants of these items in order to assist in personalization. If the extra code is deemed to be incomplete by the AI, then it will proceed to auto-generate whatever it can possibly, using the context of the code to help with it.

Asset Replacement, as recent as the theory is, was also possibly used in the pre-release versions according to an unverified source. However, no evidence has popped up to prove this, so most theorists shrug this myth off.

Anecdotes
'Note: The following is an anecdote that comes from a somewhat-verified source which, despite it having some form of verification, is not 100% trusted. Take what you see here with a grain of salt.'

The following is an anecdote from a supposed former developer of Nintendo who claims to have worked at both Nintendo and Argonaut. He claims that the two have a link in this department.

''“Upon hearing about the recent news regarding the games’ (Super Mario 64) personalization AI, I recalled about how back when I worked with Nintendo and Argonaut during their little partnership there was a bit of questioning regarding the limitations of the AI, and what would happen if it ran out of things to “personalize” for the player’s enjoyment. The answer was answered by a Nintendo staff, in this secret interview that was made specifically to talk about the AI, upon being asked by an employee Argonaut, and his response was, and I quote, “The computer [AI] will be able to sort of ‘take in’ information from previous editions of the game if it runs out of assets to use in the main game”. Additionally, there were alleged plans and ideals to try and pretty much include extra programming in order to ensure that the AI wouldn’t just…completely malfunction as soon as it ran out of assets in the first place, and one of these planned ‘countermeasures’ were to store at least a little bit of memory from older builds and with it provide some sort of context for the AI to use. Now then, as for the Wario Apparition, honestly, I have no idea whatsoever. I don’t want to talk about this anymore, but I will just say that, for the record, the Wario Apparition's existence is believable, and that is especially when considering how the AI worked and how it was able to trace back so many old things like it did end up doing on the release build of the game.”.''

If what this anonymous user has said appears to be true, then this brings a relatively interesting perspective into the spotlight, with the whole idea of Argonaut having something to do with the AI already being an interesting observation to note down.

However, this paragraph was also questioned by many other anonymous users, with one claiming their own anecdote that seemed to go against some of what this user has said.

''“Argonaut definitely had somewhat of a key role in the AI’s development and that much is true. However, this alleged “extra programming” was never really mentioned during interviews if I recall correctly, and if it was then it more than definitely wasn’t considered. I think that, whilst the idea of ‘Asset Replacement’ is more than likely true, what anon has said here is not 100% correct, because even if this interview had supposedly happened (without me mind you when I was literally a leading figure in the creation of one of the beta builds), I never have seen a transcript of anything like this and I was given a transcript of most interviews that happened at Nintendo and, to some extent, Argonaut. Now whether this might have just simply happened at Argonaut instead or I just never got the transcript for it I will acknowledge as being possibilities, but yet again, I still have my doubts. Also, as for the Wario Apparition, well…uhhh…honestly. I don’t know. I really don’t have any idea nor any clue as to what the status of that thing is but…well…it’s… what I do know is that there’s probably at least some chance of it being a pre-release thingy. Or whatever, I guess. I don’t really know anymore.”.''

Even this was questioned by many users, with some even claiming that Asset Replacement might not even exist, albeit this theory itself was questioned with many stating that Asset Replacement is by far the best explanation that has been thought of in order to explain the anomalous connections between the release and the build, especially including the assets of both.