Although Nintendo's Mario games are full of colorful and iconic characters, most of them aren't very verbal. Even Mario, the titular character of the series, doesn't usually have much to say outside of certain key catchphrases. Yoshi, a trusted sidekick-slash-steed throughout the franchise, is one such example of a mostly nonverbal character... but that isn't always the case. Is Yoshi secretly able to talk?
Since his 1990 debut in Super Mario World, Yoshi has become something of a staple in the Mario franchise. He's appeared in several mainline games and spin-offs, and even has a few games in which he's the star, such as Yoshi's Story and Yoshi's Woolly World. In early appearances, Yoshi's vocals consisted of little more than noises like record scratching and whistling. This eventually evolved into a simplistic vocabulary, one that allowed Yoshi to say his own name and not much else. This is arguably the most common portrayal of Yoshi's vocal abilities, and series like Super Smash Bros. and Mario Tennis tend to use this direction when it comes to Yoshi's voice.
However, Yoshi's species is portrayed in some Mario games as being able to speak the same language as other characters. In others, the use of parenthesis around their text implies that they have their own unique language that must be translated. The ability for other characters within the series to understand Yoshi is equally inconsistent, and sometimes the series even implies that Yoshi's language just consists of saying their own name repeatedly. This has left many fans confused as to whether or not Yoshi is actually able to talk, as well as whether anyone else in the Mario series is capable of understanding him.
Is Yoshi One Of The Few Speaking Mario Characters?
The short answer is... it depends. Like most Mario characters, Yoshi's vocabulary largely varies from game to game. Sometimes he just makes incomprehensible noises, and other times he speaks in full-on sentences, which can be jarring when coming from a character who normally isn't that articulate. He isn't the only Mario character to experience this phenomenon. Bowser, who typically only grunts or roars, is given complete sentences to speak in certain games like Mario Golf: Toadstool Tour. Other characters, like Princess Daisy or even Luigi, tend to be more chatty on a usual basis. When they're given proper voice lines, it isn't quite as surprising to long-time fans of the series. Hearing Yoshi speak, on the other hand, tends to be seen as unusual - which is why it's strange that there are so many examples of it happening in the Mario franchise.
Yoshi is given a speaking role in the Paper Mario series, but that isn't exactly an oddity given that the rest of his species can also speak within the Paper Mario games. The species is also shown speaking in Super Mario RPG: Legend of the Seven Stars. It's worth noting that both this game and the Paper Mario games are largely text-based when it comes to dialogue, far more so than many other entries in the Mario series. However, Mario Kart Wii also features a squeaky-voiced Yoshi, as do games such as Mario Strikers Charged and Mario Smash Football. Yoshi is even shown talking in other mediums on occasion, like the Super Mario World cartoon. Generally speaking, though, Yoshi isn't shown to say much of anything other than his own name - but there are many exceptions to be found across the Mario series.