Toad/Characteristics
Toad basically has the look of the rest of his species. He normally wears a blue vest, large brown shoes and a large diaper-like piece of clothing for pants. His appearance often depicts him to looking like a small human child with his miniature size and recognizable human like features. In the games starting from Super Mario Sunshine, Toad's vest is given an added gold lining. He has a red-spotted mushroom cap, indicating slight cowardice and heavy obedience. A small controversy arose with Super Mario Bros. 2, because Toad is given a blue mushroom cap instead of a red one. However, Toad's blue mushroom cap is actually due to the graphical incapability of the NES rather than a continuity thread. In remakes of Super Mario Bros. 2, such as Super Mario All-Stars, Toad is given a red mushroom cap. While the question as to whether or not Toad's mushroom cap is in fact a hat or not has yet to be answered in the games, the cartoon series The Adventures of Super Mario Bros. 3 has Toad removing his cap on occasion.
Like most of the characters in the series, Toad has changed very little appearance wise throughout the years since his debut in Super Mario Bros.. The only recognizable differences in his current look consists of his physical appearance which included some defining factors in the recent years (such as redesigned eyes and a gold outline that was recently added to his traditional vest), and the corrected number of spots on his mushroom cap (the number of spots on his cap was inconsistent in the older Mario games). The addition of the red polka dot on the top of his head is first seen in the game Luigi's Mansion where even Luigi acknowledges the top spot and called it lovely if he is to take a picture of Toad with the Game Boy Horror. In other aspects, Toad is very small in size (a trait shared within his spcies).
In relation to his body size, he also has small, thin arms and no legs (with just his feet). He also has a large head that is mostly dominated by the red spotted mushroom cap on his head. Overall, Toad's head appears to have a strong resemblance to various mushrooms (most notably the Super Mushroom). While having the look of a child in his current appearance (as like most of the members of his species do), it can be arguable that his earlier appearances (especially in his game appearances during the Nintendo 64 era) portray him as looking much more childish in design with his very large head and miniature body (more so than his current appearance). Surprisingly, a piece of artwork of Toad for the game Mario Party has Toad's legs showing. Toads have never been portrayed with their legs showing in games or game artwork before or after Mario Party.
