Wikipedia:Main Page history/2021 March 9

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Kensuke Tanabe

Paper Mario: The Origami King is a cross-genre video game, developed by Intelligent Systems and published by Nintendo; it was released exclusively for the Nintendo Switch console in July 2020. The story follows Mario teaming up with his new ally Olivia to prevent the Mushroom Kingdom from being folded entirely into origami. The game is designed to look entirely like paper, with multiple open-world areas allowing for exploration and puzzle-solving. Turn-based combat is organized into circular rings, which can be rotated to line up enemies to deal more damage. The producer, Kensuke Tanabe (pictured), anticipating that he could not satisfy every fan, opted for entirely new gameplay and concepts compared to previous games in the series. The game received generally positive reviews, being praised for its graphics, writing and characters, and critiqued for the lack of other elements of role-playing games, such as experience points. Reception on gameplay, mainly the puzzle-style combat, was mixed. (Full article...)

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New York Stock Exchange Building

... that the New York Stock Exchange opposed making its building (pictured) a New York City landmark?
... that historian Gary Kates turned down recruiters seeking to help make him a college president so that he could teach undergraduate history?
... that after Turkey's environment ministry granted a one-year temporary licence to reopen the coal-fired Çatalağzı power station, the Right to Clean Air Platform complained that it was still emitting thick smoke?
... that Elliot Mazer's only taste of Neil Young's music before meeting him was his girlfriend incessantly playing "After the Gold Rush"?
... that the Jaffna Stallions took home the trophy for the inaugural season of the Lanka Premier League in 2020, besting the Galle Gladiators, the Dambulla Viiking, and the Kandy Tuskers, despite failing to record a win against the Colombo Kings?
... that Arthur Walworth took a decade to write his biography on Woodrow Wilson and twenty-five years to write another book on him?
... that Primrose Hill Tunnel was the first railway tunnel to be built in London?
... that the English classicist Neil Hopkinson hosted events at which only dessert was served?

In the news

Naomi Osaka and Novak Djokovic

In Zamfara, Nigeria, 279 girls who had been kidnapped from a secondary school by armed bandits are released.
In tennis, Naomi Osaka wins the women's singles and Novak Djokovic wins the men's singles at the Australian Open (both winners pictured).
Porfirije is enthroned as the 46th Patriarch of the Serbian Orthodox Church.
NASA's Perseverance rover, carrying the Ingenuity helicopter, successfully lands on Mars.

On this day

March 9

Svetlana Alliluyeva

1776 – Scottish political economist Adam Smith's book The Wealth of Nations, the first modern work in the field of economics, was first published.
1842 – Awaking from a nap under a tree at Rancho San Francisco, Francisco López made the first popularly documented discovery of gold in California.
1946 – Thirty-three people were killed in a human crush at Burnden Park, a football stadium in Bolton, England.
1967 – Svetlana Alliluyeva (pictured), the daughter of former Soviet leader Joseph Stalin, defected to the United States.
1978 – The Jagorawi Toll Road, the first toll highway in Indonesia, was inaugurated by President Suharto.

Mary Anning (d. 1847)
Qayyum Chowdhury (b. 1932)
George Singh (d. 1999)

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Today's featured picture

Philippe Chaperon (1823–1906) was a French painter and scenic designer, known particularly for his work at the Paris Opera. This is Chaperon's set design for the third act of Giuseppe Verdi's Rigoletto for an 1885 production of the opera at the Palais Garnier in Paris.

Set design credit: Philippe Chaperon; restored by Adam Cuerden

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