I've always been intrigued by those invisible paths that Mario entered, like the sewers and those caves in Noki Bay. So I decided to do some research on them while playing.

In Noki Bay, there's one of those ledges with several different paths and openings (the one with one of the paths leading to the Golden Bird at the top). One of the paths is the invisble one, and before I entered, I used some camera work to get the camera in front of Mario (so it would show what was behind Mario; not ahead of him).

I took a VERY small step into the entrance, and the invisible path appeared ahead of me. It was a grayish color, and appeared to be see-through. Just like I had guessed, the paths were non-existent, just some sort of thing triggered by the game.

What was odd was that if you had the camera in front of Mario normally and you did this, the path would still appear, but the grey outline would appear to be covering Mario, as if it were on a different layer (or whatever it's called) than him.

Next up, two other things. One observation and something possibly beta.

*I noticed that on normal signs and the sign on the Surf Cabana at Gelato Beach, there's some sort of weird language made of swirl-like symbols, despite the fact that Piantas, Nokis, and Tanookis all speak English, and some signs like the sign for Hotel Delfino are in English as well. Unless they all speak two different languages, is it possible there could be a fourth, unseen species of Isle Delfino?

*Also, there appears to be a beta toad that can only be found through Action Replay. Here's the video showing it:



What he says makes no sense, meaning he is most likely a beta leftover.