Kamek

Kamek appeared in 1995 video game called Super Mario World 2: Yoshi's Island. Kamek (referred to as Magikoopa on occasion) is an old, yet powerful Magikoopa and apparent adviser to Bowser (or at least a high-ranking member in the Koopa Troop), and the arch-enemy of Yoshi. He serves as one of the secondary antagonists in the Mario franchise, alongside Bowser Jr., and is one of the two main villains of the Yoshi franchise, alongside Baby Bowser. He is also Baby Bowser's primary caretaker, and continues to look after Bowser, even in the present day. Kamek's name comes from the name for the Magikoopa species in Japanese: Kamekku (カメック), which is derived from kame, the Japanese word for "turtle."

Various unnamed Magikoopas appearing in the Mario franchise are presumed to be Kamek, often due to the parallels between their relationship with Bowser or their position in the Koopa Troop. This relates to confusion with the Japanese games where the character is only given a unique name in Super Mario RPG: Legend of the Seven Stars. Many appearances of individual Magikoopas, however, specifically call back to Kamek's behavior in Super Mario World 2: Yoshi's Island in having him power up bosses, likely making these the same individual.

n his most recent appearances, Kamek is depicted as being entirely identical to the generic Magikoopas. This means that in most of his appearances, he wears a pair of round spectacles and a set of blue robes, complete with a blue wizard's hat. Both the brim of his hat and the edges of his sleeves are white, though in earlier appearances the former was also blue. He is always seen with his scepter, a golden stick with a red jewel at the end; he is also usually seen with his broom, which is a stereotypical straw-colored broom with no particular quirks about its appearance. He is shown to have legs in Super Mario Galaxy, a feature not seen in any other game.

Kamek's skin, like all Magikoopas and most other Koopa species, is yellow. Despite being very old, he shows no physical signs of his age, looking very similar in the present as he did in the past. However he appeared somewhat smaller in his past appearance in Mario & Luigi: Partners in Time. In the Super Smash Bros. series, Kamek's appearance is mostly unaltered, compared to other Mario characters. However, Super Smash Bros. Ultimate gives Kamek a slightly subdued color scheme, while his clothing and broom receive simple detailing.

From Mario Party DS, it would seem that Kamek is academic, as the board that he owns is a library. This is reinforced by the fact that Kamek can build complicated machines. In Super Mario Party, Kamek is shown to be quite knowledgeable, since he gives articulate advice to the player about modes such as Partner Party. In that game, Kamek is shown to be quite polite, though he takes clear enjoyment in either conjuring Bad Luck Spaces or scorceling them into Extra Bad Luck Spaces.

It is hinted that Kamek likes to act feminine. This is notable in Mario & Luigi: Dream Team when he starts talking about how cute the dress based on Princess Peach's is while calling the Magikoopa robes drab. Furthermore, in the Japanese version, Kamek uses the feminine pronoun 「あたし」 atashi to refer to himself. However, in the Japanese version of Paper Mario: Sticker Star, Kamek instead uses the standard pronoun 「私」 watashi.

His personality is expanded upon in Bowser Jr.'s Journey, where he is shown to have acted as a mentor to Bowser Jr., and is very loyal to the Koopa Troop, even making Bowser Jr. swear to aid the minions beyond the sake of personal glory. He is also shown to be very concerned when the Koopalings begin slowly dwindling in numbers. He is also shown to have some foresight, as evidenced by how he developed a freezer to store the Ever Ice, despite knowing it will not ever melt, due to anticipating Bowser Jr. would ultimately need it, and also deciding to act as Bowser Jr.'s first captain due to anticipating that even Morton may ultimately leave Bowser Jr.'s command before long. He also admits that, despite his faithful service to Bowser and his son, he does have a few regrets. He is also shown at times to be sarcastic, such as in Mario & Luigi: Paper Jam, where he sarcastically goes along with a Papercraft Yoshi due to thinking it is a hallucination until his paper counterpart tells him he is indeed seeing a Papercraft Yoshi, and also in Bowser Jr.'s Journey, he "gladly" accepted Bowser Jr.'s ignoring the Ever Ice despite Kamek spending 36 hours trying to find it. In addition to sarcasm, he also has the tendency to be quite condescending, often taunting the Yoshis with pet names such as "baby" and "cutie" in Super Mario World 2: Yoshi's Island, Yoshi's New Island, and Yoshi's Woolly World.

Powers and Abilities
Kamek displays powers commonly associated with Magikoopas, including teleportation, creating beings from inanimate objects, pyrokinesis, firing magical blasts from his scepter, summoning enemies and the ability to create multiple copies of himself. These are assumed to be much more powerful than those of a regular Magikoopa, because of his top rank. The evidence of this is in Mario and Luigi: Dream Team where Kamek created an army of Dry Bones surrounding Mario, creates different colored clones of himself with unique properties, and being able to fire a gigantic magic blast with other Magikoopas at a Giant Dreamy Luigi during the battle against Giant Bowser, despite being fatigued from previous battles with Mario and Dreamy Luigi. Kamek is also capable of flying on a broomstick, being the first ever Magikoopa to display such an ability.

Aside from the aforementioned powers inherent to all Magikoopas, Kamek is portrayed as having powers unique to himself, the most prominent of which is his ability to shrink and grow other creatures (including himself) to extreme proportions. Kamek is also capable of psychic powers, such as divination, brainwashing, foreseeing events in the future, and manipulating objects with his mind. These he does without using his scepter, although he does utilize a crystal ball for precognition and divination. He also has the ability to Paperize.

Kamek also displays some expertise at mechanics, supposedly building the apparent time travel device he and Bowser utilize in Yoshi's Island DS; Kamek's ingenuity at mechanics remains in the Club Nintendo comics, with one story even having him create a vacuum cleaner-like device which can absorb color and emotions. Kamek is also a master at various types of games, pertaining such skills at them that he has been given the coveted title of Game Mage.

Although not usually shown in his appearances, Kamek has been shown to have superhuman strength. This is revealed in Yoshi's New Island, as for many times throughout the game, Kamek has been able to lift and use a giant magical hammer many times his size to power the game's bosses with little to no effort. He also has been shown to have significant levels of durability and is capable of enduring lethal situations as he survived being knocked into lava by Giant Bowser in New Super Mario Bros Wii and Mario and Luigi: Dream Team, even after being weakened in the latter game, and appearing in the ending of Paper Mario: Sticker Star after being dissolved into ashes.