Things, Places, and People to See

There are several kinds of currencies, collectibles, and pick-ups to watch out for, along with items of interest, landmarks, hazards, and helping hands to be found throughout the globe.

Hearts

Mario’s normal max health is three hearts, or health points. Taking a hit depletes one heart, and losing all hearts will K.O. Mario, while knocking some change out of his pockets where he gave up the ghost. Don’t worry, he’ll reappear from a nearby checkpoint or entrance, ten coins lighter. (If certain things were accomplished, like Power Moons or keys revealed, but not yet acquired, they’ll have to be uncovered again.)

Mario can survive terrifying falls no problem, if he lands on solid ground. He won’t even lose any hearts, but watch Mario shiver absorbing the impact! Fall into a deep pit, though, and he’ll be instantly K.O.’d, permanently losing 10 coins.

What happens when Mario falls into hot or bubbling liquid depends on the liquid. Some vats of boiling liquid are merely extremely hot, and falling into them sends Mario scrambling for higher ground, his behind smoking. You can throw Cappy to extinguish Mario, otherwise, you can’t stop him running while he cools down, you can only steer his direction, so keep him away from further contact with the hot stuff while Mario cools down. If there’s no safe footing nearby to flee to, it’s possible to get stuck bouncing repeatedly in smoking hot soup, losing heart after heart until poor Mario succumbs to the heat. In 2-player mode, the second player can also force Mario to cap jump, extinguishing the flames. It’s worth noting that in Assist Mode, Mario doesn’t bounce off the lava on fire, but instead will bubble back to land.

Some especially noxious liquids are simply lethal on contact, though, and touching them instantly depletes all of Mario’s hearts, leaving a ring of coins behind where he fell. Where lots of toxic sludge abounds, you may find some creature, like a Jaxi for example, that you can ride who can pass unscathed over (or even through) the poison brew.

Coins

Gold coins are plentiful across the world. They’re left behind by busted blocks and defeated wildlife. They’re found hovering in line formations or lying in big piles. Ground-pounding a curious molehill or crack in the floor often reveals a ring of coins around Mario, easily collected all at once with a spin throw. Clobbering a boss also usually reveals a similar ring of gold coins as a reward. The point is, there are a lot of gold coins about. Collect as many as you can, because you’ll want lots of coins to spend on Crazy Cap’s item stock, on Hint Toad’s Power Moon clues, and on the nickel-and-diming you’ll inevitably experience through occasional clumsiness, since Mario drops 10 coins when he falls into a pit or runs out of health!

Single coins go directly into Mario’s pocket. Multi-coin blocks can cough up to ten coins. Coin rolls also grant ten coins. Passing through a coin ring is worth three coins. The outlines of Regional Coins you’ve already retrieved are worth two coins; the outlines of retrieved Power Moons are worth five. With full health, picking up hearts grants five coins too. With coin piles, well, it all depends on the size of the pile!

Regional Coins

A fixed number of purple coins are hidden throughout each kingdom. Smaller kingdoms usually have 50 purple coins to find, while the biggest kingdoms have 100. These special coins are the local currency, legal tender toward unique local items at Crazy Cap’s, the souvenir shop.

Like Power Moons, picking up Regional Coins replaces them with an outline where they once floated. Sending Mario or Cappy through the outline awards two gold coins.

Power Moons

Mario’s goal is to track down Bowser, and he needs Power Moons to do it. Beating the stuffing out of the Koopa king and getting Peach back are the goals, but most of the work toward those goals involves digging up Power Moons. Power Moons are mysterious sources

of energy that can be used to power up Mario and Cappy’s sweet ride, the Odyssey. The more Moons you funnel into the Odyssey, the more places it can go.

During the first visit to each new kingdom, some Power Moons need to be collected from that region for the Odyssey to refuel and repair for the journey forward. Depending on the condition of the Odyssey and the progression of the story, you may or may not be able to travel to previous kingdoms while collecting prerequisite Power Moons in a newly-discovered kingdom. The number of required Power Moons to progress is indicated by dotted outlines found just under your coin and health tallies in the top-left corner of the display. In addition to collecting Power Moons, you usually have a local objective to complete before you can move on.

Cat Mario and Cat Peach

Apparently fossils lasting all the way since the 2D, 8-bit era, these strange hieroglyph-like symbols can occasionally be found plastered on out-of-the-way patches of wall. Striking Cat Mario with Cappy grants 10 coins. Striking Cat Peach awards a Heart.

Brick Blocks

It wouldn’t be a Mario game without some bricks to bust apart! Jump up from underneath or ground pound from above to test the integrity of blocks.

Most brick blocks shatter, clearing the space. Cleared blocks can open the way to platforms above or pathways below. In rare cases, you won’t want to bust a block because you need it as a platform. In these cases, usually some baddie like a Bullet Bill is looking to break them for you, so watch out!

Steel Blocks

Some specially-treated bricks snap into steel instead of breaking apart. They’re safe to use as platforms to stand on, cling from, or wall jump off. But nothing removes these blocks once they’ve hardened.

? Blocks

? blocks won’t break apart when struck, but you won’t know what you’re going to get until you hit them either. ? blocks usually become steel blocks while spitting out a coin, but sometimes spit out a Heart, Life-Up Heart, or roll of coins, too.

Multi-coin Blocks

Some brick blocks and ? blocks won’t shatter or become steel blocks immediately when struck—you can hit these over and over within a brief period to pull out lots of coins before they harden. From underneath, jump up as fast as you can until all the coins are withdrawn. From the side, you can throw Cappy into the ? block and then hold him in place. His spinning quickly knocks all the coins out of the block! You can extrude a max of 10 coins from multi-coin blocks before they snap into steel.

Pipe

Mario’s squat form is just the right size and roundness to slip down pipes and see what’s on the other side. To enter a pipe, either run into it from the side or climb atop it and crouch. You may also find pipes sprouting from the ceiling, which can be entered by jumping in from below.

8-bit Pipe

Conspicuously blocky pipes spirit Mario away into a land from the past, flat retroscapes where Mario appears and controls just like in Super Mario Bros.!

Run left or right with the stick, hold down to crouch (or just press the Crouch button), dash old-school-style by holding down a Cap Throw button, and jump as usual.

Environments are full of hazards from the NES era, but with Super Mario Odyssey twists!

Explore 8-bit pipes while wearing various outfits from Crazy Cap’s shop to see the 8-bit spin put on each costume! To see 8-bit costumes, make sure to match your suit and hat before entering an 8-bit pipe. Mismatched costume sets result in the classic, standard overall-sporting 2D Mario.

Checkpoint Flag

Checkpoint flags are located throughout each kingdom. They’re under Bowser’s control initially, but can be replaced with Mario flags simply by visiting and touching them. Once a checkpoint flag is under Mario’s control, it’s a potential recovery point when defeated nearby, and instant travel to the checkpoint is possible by selecting it on the Travel Map.

Rocket Flowers

Throw Cappy at a Rocket Flower to pick it up and latch it to Mario’s back on the return, instantly infusing Mario’s step with fire. This puts the hotfoot effect after falling into hot liquid to shame, as Mario hurtles across the landscape, arms out for high-speed balance. Direct away from any walls or obstacles while zipping along on Rocket Flower fuel, and throw Cappy at any other Rocket Flowers along the way to keep the effect going longer.

P-Switches and Scarecrows

These devices trigger various temporary effects while they’re engaged. P-Switches may cause magical vine pathways to grow over thin air, forming living, moving pathways wherever they stretch. P-Switches also may sometimes reveal hidden blocks for a limited time, among other possible effects. Scarecrows usually herald a timed platforming puzzle involving platforms that only appear while the challenge is active. On top of that, the scarecrow has to wear Cappy during the challenge, so Mario must succeed without all the tricks he gets while wearing the magical Bonneter.

Cap Clouds

These ephemeral structures aren’t really anything until struck by Cappy. Then they’ll spring into bright and fluffy, yet firm, cloud platforms. After a few seconds, they dissolve back into gossamer hat form. When using cap clouds as platforms, plan ahead and don’t dillydally.

Hat Launcher

These strange objects are primed to catch Cappy and launch him forward, picking up coins and striking objects along the way. Some walls have hat launchers set up in dizzying arrays that propel Cappy along surprising or revealing paths.

Hat Trampoline

While these strange flowers initially clam up, they spread apart and become incredibly buoyant when struck with Cappy, or with a ground pound from above. A blooming hat trampoline can launch Mario much higher than he can ever jump under his own power, spinning gracefully along the way. Since Mario launches upward in a spin jump, his descent is slower than normal, allowing more time to drift toward desired landing sites.

There’s a mild difference between a hat trampoline spin and Mario’s own spinning jump in that cap tosses won’t automatically be spin throws when using hat trampolines.

Slingshot

What you see is what you get—engage a slingshot with a cap throw to get Mario scooped up and launched a great distance.

Pulse Beam

Initially, these objects are inert, but if something hits them they’ll emit a ring of dangerous energy. This ring expands, demolishing blocks and damaging creatures in the way.

The devious thing about the pulse beam is that there’s almost never just one. Expect pulse beams floating close to each other, so that a strike against any single pulse beam causes a perpetual loop. A pulse beam’s energy expands, striking other pulse beams near it, which emit their own reactions to a hit, which re-trigger the first pulse beam, and so on. The resulting wave patterns of rings expanding are tricky to dodge and jump over, and they’re usually found hovering near moving or narrow platforms of some kind, to boot. No one said chasing down Bowser was going to be easy!

Mysterious Cube

What are these things? No one is sure. The answer will probably have to wait until after Mario and Cappy rescue Peach and Tiara!

Moon Pipe

Hmm, this is strange. Where did this come from?

Locals

Each kingdom has its own set of regional inhabitants, who come in all shapes and sizes. These locals usually cluster mainly around a main settlement in the area. Wherever locals live and work, you’re sure to find a Crazy Cap’s souvenir shop, and plenty of people (or robots, or dogs, or fork-like creatures, or friendly skeletons, and so on!) who could use Mario’s help.

Talkatoo

This yapping feathered friend can be found somewhere in each kingdom, perched and ready to dispense indirect Power Moon clues in the form of their names. Frequently, just the name of a Power Moon is enough to point you in the right direction, so this can be a big help. Talkatoo gives you up to three names of undiscovered Power Moons at a time.

Hint Toad

When things are calm in each kingdom, you find Hint Toad hanging around near Uncle amiibo. This pathfinding entrepreneur is willing to share Power Moon location hints… for a price. Hint Toad’s Travel Map markings cost 50 coins each. There are some Power Moons he can’t map, but he knows most of them. Hint Toad and Talkatoo work hand-in-beak to give you a little guidance looking for more moon power.

Uncle amiibo

In each kingdom, whenever it’s safe enough for Hint Toad to begin scouting, Uncle amiibo tags along. This bot can communicate with your amiibo, engaging a special function that allows Uncle amiibo to use amiibo power to locate a missing Power Moon. In effect, this means any amiibo becomes like a free Hint Toad tip! Begin a conversation with Uncle amiibo for prompts to use amiibo. This function can only be used every few minutes.

Certain other amiibo can also be engaged anywhere in the game world, even away from Uncle amiibo, by holding right on the D-pad, then scanning the amiibo. Special amiibo that grant extra features are listed here:

Super Mario Odyssey-series amiibo

New Super Mario Odyssey-themed amiibo of Mario, Peach, and Bowser in full wedding regalia are now available! These figures unlock special costumes and have special exclusive in-game bonuses that will be useful the whole time you enjoy the game!