I have a bit of a hard time understanding the amount of fuss over Mario, especially considering there's far worse depictions of women that people turn a blind eye to. I guess it's just a difference of view, though, since these types seem to claim that the more popular something with sexism is the worse the sexism is and that the actual degree of sexism doesn't count so much as the popularity of something that has any sexism at all, whereas I. . .don't exactly see it that way. It almost feels more like piggybacking for attention rather than trying to deal with the real problems and as though it belittles dealing with any form of sexism by not dealing with the things everyone would agree are sexist first but are never brought to attention and then working their way down once society actually sees there's a major issue and worse things have been dealt with, but different people have different ways of seeing things.
But then, I don't play Mario games unless he's crossing over with something I like anyway. Granted, most of the games I like would probably be called sexist too, but there's often some kind of complication that makes it a whole other kettle of (typically unaddressed) tropes. And then there's Splatoon, which actually does have women bailing out men and depending on your player character can be nothing BUT women bailing out men.
I'm of the mind that trying to hide away anything and everything sexist isn't going to help, because then stupid people are going to forget sexism exists and even dumber people will continue being sexist without ever being called out. Political correctness gone mad is political correctness that's going to backfire horribly by enabling sexism through it's misguided attempt to stop it. I'd rather people drag the more serious stuff out into the open than hide the more minor stuff in a tiny corner and hope the elephant in the room leaves if they pretend it doesn't exist.
As for characters, I'd prefer it if people wrote their female characters the exact same way they wrote their male characters, possibly minus the offhand perversion some male characters have. Female characters tend to be BORING. Where's the female Large Hams and Hot Blooded Shonen types and slapstick idiots? And when they are there, when are they ever written with half as much passion as the men or without this huge "And she's a GIRL" sticker stuck to them? I don't see needing more female characters or more powerful ones as the issue I have, we have plenty of both already. I'd like more female characters that are actually CHARACTERS instead of woman-shaped things for people to project themselves onto. But any example of having an actual personality would almost certainly be treated as sexist by certain types. . .