'shrooms are so old hat,
the key is exotic fruits
and rave recipes
Additional Comments:
Long before Banjo-Kazooie proved to me that Nintendo's gawky teenager wasn't the heinous atrocity I once thought there existed a game that likely would have reversed my whole perception of the Nintendo 64 far earlier if only I had a chance to play it. Oddly enough, it took the magic of the GameCube to show me this truth. But not with The Legend Of Zelda Collection, despite owning it and enjoying Ocarina of Time, but with another title - a title that blew me away: Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door. I love this game and as a result had a strong urge to play its predecessor. Whatever my grumbles concerning the system or its games, based on my experience with TTYD, I imagined Paper Mario to be free of any N64 related idiocy. Unfortunately, years passed before Paper Mario ever found its way into my collection. Doesn't make for a telling story, but it makes for interesting speculation. Could Paper Mario have been my N64 knight in shining armor? Perhaps, but I'm perfectly comfortable singing the praises of Banjo-Kazooie instead. Alas! Too little, too late....
Nevertheless, Paper Mario would still have its chance to sing its hymns of beauty. That is if I remember that I own the game, which I do, but somehow forgot. While looking through my N64 carts for a game to play, I was rather surprised to find Paper Mario tucked in there. When did I buy this, I thought. Whatever. Obvious choice is obvious - Paper Mario to the console.
It's been a number of years since I played Thousand-Year door, so while the premise of the Paper universe was known, much of the detail had eroded with time. As I said, I loved Thousand-Year door and enjoyed its more adventurous, action-based elements over the more straightforward RPG quirks of the series' founding father, Super Mario RPG. Although from an RPG perspective, Paper Mario is severely lacking. But that's okay, because although the series can be considered SMRPG's spiritual successor, the series is also vastly different. It got rid of a lot of the stuff that bothered me in regards to the Square approach, but maintained just the right amount of innovations originally conceived at the same time.
In many respects, I'd question calling Paper Mario an RPG. Yes, it has turn-based fighting, experience, perks in the form of badges, and a leveling system, but it almost seems as though these elements are used as a compliment to what appears to be an action/adventure game at heart. However, of the various RPG elements being thrown about, turn-based fighting is a hard one to get away from. This is the one mechanic that really throws the game over the tipping point for me since the game falls into the rut of horrendously slow gameplay found in a large number of RPGs. That's not to say it's bad, but I do think it can use some tweaking. Turn-based fighting by default is slow. I use to despise turn-based fighting but over the years grew to...embrace it. I certainly won't endorse it, but I've come to accept it as a necessary evil within RPGs. Of course, games like Chrono Trigger brilliantly improved the turn-based system by adding some real time counters to help speed battles along. I don't find this to be a paramount fix for all RPGs. In fact, games like Final Fantasy, 7th Saga, or Vay are perfectly fine as they are. Even Super Mario RPG works with a true turn-based system. But Paper Mario....
I understand, or at least imagine I understand, why Paper Mario uses a true turn-based system. On the whole, Paper Mario is a relatively simple game. A true turn-based system fits the simplicity without unnecessarily mucking about with any real time counters and allows the player total freedom in setting battle strategies. The downside is that the battles play out ridiculously slow. To help add to the sluggish feeling, there's all sorts of unique actions that can be played out to help add a boost to your delivered damage. Some might argue that this helps break the monotony of turn-based fighting, but I find that it further drags down an already slow mechanic. For the most part, I like the micro-game style action system used to garner bonuses, but some of them are simply tedious or far too time consuming in the grand scheme of things. Yes, it's only an extra two, three, four seconds, but after a couple hundred battles, those few extra seconds become nothing but ceaseless aggravation. Maybe if the game used more of a Chrono Trigger style battle system the time sapping wouldn't be anywhere near as evident. As it stands though, it's layers upon layers of needless mechanics specifically tooled to pad the game out as far as the clock is concerned. As such, the game begins to wear out its welcome. This felt especially true in Shy Guy's Toy Box and Flower Fields.
Shy Guy's Toy Box is likely my least favorite area in the game only because it gave me this nauseating sensation of eternal gameplay. It felt as though very little headway was being made, to the point where boredom began to set in and I had to set the game aside for a couple of weeks. Up until that point, despite minor grievances over the relative slowness of the game, I couldn't imagine Paper Mario would develop enough of an issue causing me to shelve it for a while. Then again, I never did finish Thousand-Year Door and if I recall, it was due to a relatively similar situation. Hmm, worrying signs for the Paper franchise are suddenly making their presence known. As the years passed, I always wondered why I put Thousand-Year Door down despite loving it. Who knew the real answer would show itself year's later?
Another element that really slows the pace of the game to a crawl is the various side quests, be it collecting Star Pieces or Badges, taking the reins of the Pony...er, Koopa Express, or playing errand boy to Tayce T.'s fantabulous recipes, or so she claims. For being a so-called master chef, she sure doled out a number of embarrassing mistakes. Also, how does Tayce T. manage to make a cake with a single ingredient, yet Peach needs a proper list of ingredients? No wonder she's cooking up so many critical failures. She's attempting to shortcut everything. Peach, on the other hand, even for the gluttonous Gourmet Guy who's working for the other team, managed to bake her cake with a touch of princessey love. But I digress. Slowness is the topic and there's so much additional garbage really hampering Mario's progress.
Is it right to harp on optional side quests though? Forget that they're optional, side quests, especially those revolving around collectibles, have become the norm in video games - not just in RPG's but in all games. So how can I warrant crying over what's essentially become a gaming institution? Under the right circumstances, I enjoy needless deviations from the main quest. Anything to stretch out the game, as long as there's an inherent value to it, I'm all in. However, most games insert optional diversions along the route of progression. Paper Mario throws caution to the wind and insists on improperly padding the game by having Mario traipse all around the diorama-like Mushroom Kingdom in search for bullshit.
There's no real need to collect the Star Pieces unless your looking to obtain all the badges on offer from Merlow, most of which are useless thus making the whole cross-country treasure hunt counterproductive. Badge hunting, well, there is purpose to the badges. However, only a fraction of them possess any real merit. Just find what you need and move on. Only, for those gamers like me, it's easier said than done because that looming 100% gratification is constantly slapping the back of our heads saying, "Hey, jackass! You missed a cleverly hidden Star Piece in Flower Fields." And so it is, prepare for heavy backtracking and consistent criss-crossing of the world. Oh! Did I forget to mention that coins are somehow at a premium in this game? What's that about? A Mario game where coins are not exactly easy to come by? When it came time to collecting the last few badges from Rowf, I had to make a two hour detour under Mario's new guise, Panhandlin' Pete.
But the true culprit of tedium is Tayce T. and her stupid recipe scavenger hunt. It's not so much the recipes, the lack of knowledge when it comes to acceptable ingredient mixtures, or the constant globetrotting for ingredients...oh wait. It's totally about the constant globetrotting. Why? Because Paper Mario, much like its predecessor, Super Mario RPG, insists on using one of the dumbest features of all: an incredibly limited inventory. For completion's sake, I decided to knock out all the recipes after completing Shiver Mountain. Surprise, surprise, I had to jump on GameFAQs as there was no way I was going to blindly guess 50 recipes. With guide in hand and off to the market to dump my inventory I spent nearly four hours straight doing nothing but recipe questing. That's fucking stupid! I'm sorry, but that's completely ridiculous. The amount of time spent jumping into Shy Guy's Toy Box just to collect a hearty helping of cake mix was enough to make me want to blow my brains out.
If there was more incentive to perform some of these optional tasks or the game made a attempt to have some of the side quests properly parallel the main quest so that everything can progress at a relatively steady rate, I wouldn't mind. Yes, the Star Pieces and Badges sort of manage that, but I still felt like I was performing a lot of needless backtracking.
Despite such egregious mechanics and fully expecting the player to enjoy the view within Toad Town's sewer system for the umpteenth time, Paper Mario is a great game, It kept my attention full stop, except for the slight Toy Box debacle mentioned earlier, and I relished it to the very end. Sure there's other nitpicky bits here and there but most everything else can be overlooked for the greater good. Granted, I don't find the game to be on par with Thousand-Year Door, even with an uncanny amount of similarities between the two, but I can chalk that up to Alex Kidd syndrome all over again.
As a Paper Mario game, there's a certain beauty and charm lacking in other Mario titles. Be it Peach's hyperbolic daintiness, Bowser's likeness to Moose's brawn-but-no-brains archetype, or Luigi playing the role of the self-pitied runt...wait, I don't care for Luigi's newly found idiosyncrasies whatsoever. Sure, Luigi's played second fiddle to his brother since he was first introduced, but he's been stomping Goombas and aiding Mario on his numerous quests ever since, and now, suddenly, he's too weak and incapable? Understand, my gripe has nothing to do with "wanting a two-player mode" as that would be completely absurd, but his character direction in this game is disparaging to say the least. Thankfully, they sent him on a "quest" in Thousand-Year Door, though I can only imagine out of guilt for how they disrespected him here.
Sheesh... It's difficult to sing my praises when everything somehow relates to some sort of faux pas in the game. Surprised I haven't brought up the uselessness of the Li'l Oinks, the stupid luck-based Jump Attack found within The Playroom, or Koopa Koot's fetch quests of everlasting sadness. But thankfully, they're even more tangential to the main story than some of the previously mentioned optional garbage, so...whatever.
To get back on point, and it may not sound like it, Paper Mario's a fantastic game. Just ignore the optional bullshit and it's easy to see why the game is heralded as one of the Nintendo 64's finest. As far as RPG's go, it's not the best, but it's unique, fun, and introduces a variety of interesting concepts not often seen elsewhere - for instance, the action commands. True, Super Mario RPG had an action bonus as well, but Paper Mario enhances the concept through its use of micro-game like creativity. Still think they hamper the overall speed of battle, but like I said earlier, I really like the idea. Additionally, the areas are interesting and well varied - yes, even Shy Guy's Toy Box. Honestly, I love the idea behind that area; it's just a shame how it played out for me. Same can be said for Flower Fields - in fact, that may be my favorite area from a conceptual standpoint. Another element concerning the world is that it's nicely populated giving it a well-deserved, lived-in feeling which really helps with story depth and overall bringing the paper thin world to life. This is something a lot of RPG's fall short on, in my opinion, and I think Paper Mario definitely set the bar regarding believable populations.
And finally, music. There's a wealth of great music, so much so that it's tough to decide on just a few notable tunes. There were a couple standout pieces, although I have a feeling my first two picks are likely too ambient for the common man: Shooting Star Summit and Over Shiver Mountain. But my absolute favorite piece in the game has got to be Angry Bowser. There's just something about that twangy sitar that makes me smile.
Nano-Rant(s):
It can't be. It just can't be. Despite claiming my adoration for the game, there's still more that pisses me off.
1. Chuck Quizmo. Fuck this guy and his never ending quiz show. I'd complain that 64 questions is a bit over the top, but that's not really the issue. The issue is that in the scope of natural play, only having the chance to answer one question at a time is bullshit. By the time I completed Shiver Mountain, I had answered a whopping ten questions. Ten questions...out of sixty-four. And it's not like I kept ignoring Chuck Quizmo. On the contrary, I hit him up every time I saw him, and no, I wasn't incorrectly answering any of his questions. That's fucking pathetic. Needless to say, in my hunt to tie up all my loose ends before moving on to Bowser's Castle, I spent a good two hours hopping back and forth between Koopa Village and Dry Dry Outpost seeking his one act quiz show. Why does it seem like there's a pattern of irritating monotony emerging? I'm sorry, but this game completely failed at making side quests even meagerly enjoyable.
2. I outright despise the experience system in this game, or more precisely, the lack of Star Points gained from certain enemies once you reach a certain level. I understand it's designed to prevent the player from grinding endless levels of experience, but I think there's a better way they could have gone about it. I'm of the opinion that every enemy should dole out at least a single Star Point no matter the case. Otherwise, there's zero incentive to go into battle with lesser creatures. I know what you're thinking: don't battle lesser creatures. Case closed. Except when you have to constantly trek across the same patch of real estate to grab some cake mix or settle in for a long bout of coin-spawning fisticuffs it becomes an issue. Thankfully, in the off chance where you're avidly trying to avoid battle, there's a few different badges that can help the cause. Of course, every once in a while things just don't work out at which point you have two options. You can either run - not the preferred scenario since coins are already at a premium - or you can slog your way through a meaningless battle with little to no reward. Maybe I'm over thinking lesser grade battles versus reward and rather missed the point the developers were trying to make. However, I found it to be yet another element further slowing down an already atrociously slow game.
So yea, Paper Mario for the motherfuckin' win.... Amirite?
Ugh. The more I dissect the game, the more I wonder why I have any love for it.
Rating: 3 giant tuna out of 5*
*I wanted to give it a 3.5, but with all its flaws, I just couldn't do it in good faith.
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