Super Mario's current voice actor Kevin Afghani has set the record straight and debunked an odd online myth – no, he isn't and has seemingly never been the enthusiastic voice behind Nintendo Directs. Ever since he stepped into the boots of the evergreen plumber in Super Mario Bros. Wonder, taking over from the iconic Charles Martinet after more than three decades, there's been recurring fan chatter that says Afghani was also secretly the guy who would exuberantly narrate Nintendo Directs (the publisher's marketing-stuffed showcases). The online speculation became so pervasive, even Microsoft Bing falsely corroborated the rumor while I was researching this story. (Don't trust the AI that automatically spams you answers whenever you search things up online, kids.) Mario's new voice actor has "unbelievable respect" for 32-year icon Charles Martinet Nintendo icon Shigeru Miyamoto says while he's not as involved with making Mario games anymore, he always plays about 30 minutes during development to make sure they feel right Metroid Prime 4 recasts Samus as a Hades 2 and Dispatch actor replaces Mass Effect's Jennifer Hale, continuing the Nintendo Switch 2 era's trend of introducing new talent Either way, Afghani finally put the rumors to bed in a new interview with USA Today. "I'll give you one," he says when asked if there's anything – anything – he'd like to talk about. "I was never in Nintendo Direct. There's this weird narrative online I was in Nintendo Directs, I narrated Nintendo Directs. I never worked for Nintendo before being Mario." Elsewhere, the actor shared that he has "unbelievable respect" for Super Mario's OG voice Charles Martinet and, even though Afghani's usually a cheery lad, he "can't help but get teary-eyed" while talking about his love for the joyous platformer series. Nintendo president reportedly teases new games for popular series are in development, which I hope means we're getting a 3D Mario title for Switch 2 sooner rather than later