Mario RPG games and Yoshi games

[StraightShooter2]

Color Splash isn't worth trying at all, it's just boring. Origami King is charming and fun, but it's not quite like the other games. Super Paper Mario, the Wii game, is okay but it's more of a platformer and puzzle game than anything.

Most of the feedback I heard was that Color Splash was an improvement over Sticker Star, can you give more details on why it was bad?

 

[0 0]

Most of the feedback I heard was that Color Splash was an improvement over Sticker Star, can you give more details on why it was bad?

Sticker Star is bad because the combat constantly diminishes resources to the tune of your attacks all relying on consumable stickers. With the removal of experience, you have absolutely zero to gain from enemy encounters. Instead, you gain coins, which you will need to use to buy your attacks back except you don't get enough money to recuperate your losses, also ignoring how you need to travel all the way to the shop again anyway. Additionally, the game is rife with aimless wandering as it expects you to backtrack to areas you already have forgotten, all to use some random object you got with zero clues on what you're intended to do next. The boss fights are the most pathetic aspect, and boil down to "use this one item to win, or don't and instantly die" with no strategy. In addition, the puzzles are either one of two extremes: brain-dead easy or moon logic.

For example, there's a boss fight where you get a baseball bat attack, you fight it in a stadium, and it says "play ball." It couldn't be more obvious you need the bat. On the other hand, there's a boss fight with a fish in water, and it uses the water to defend itself. There's a variety of solutions you think would be possible, such as using a battery to electrify the water, a sponge to absorb the water, or a sun to dry it up. None of these work. Instead you need to roam levels you've already explored and stick a door sticker (another draining resource) on specific locations to get the item you need, which is a fishing hook. There are multiple locations which you can access with the door sticker, and they're almost all at the end of levels so you need to replay them entirely again, but only one specific location has the item you need. Even if you've figured out the solution to the boss, if you use your item at the wrong time, you lose it for good, get killed for it, have to find it again, then refight the boss. The example I remember is a squid boss who charges an attack that shoots water, so you use a sponge to block it. It charges the attack for multiple turns, so although I knew how to block the attack, I got hit anyways because I used the sponge too early, then died because I only had one of them.

There are a few games I never got around to beating because I either get distracted by something else or I decide to come back later and forget. Sticker Star is the only game I ever owned where I decided to stop. Color Splash is more Sticker Star, just make the horrible overworld more bearable in exchange for making the combat even worse. Color Splash is all of the above, minus using stickers on the overworld, except now you need to wait around 10 seconds every time you want to attack to fill your cards (the replacement for stickers) with paint, which is a new draining resource. Suddenly, a game series where the primary appeal is its enemy design and combat encounters now actively punishes you for fighting enemies in the least fun way imaginable. The most disgusting part is that Color Splash's bosses are the exact same, where you need to use special items to beat them, but the game also punishes and mocks you for buying the "I win" buttons from a store (which lets you buy previously owned attack cards), and instead forces you to go back to the same areas to grab another one if you didn't save it for the boss fight. You can't even ride on the writing for Sticker Star or Color Splash, something which salvaged Super Paper Mario, because the story is as barren and unimaginative as possible and there are nearly no unique characters. Color Splash improves on Sticker Star by making the exploration just boring instead of painful, but it still makes the exact same mistakes plus a few new ones. If there's anybody willing to defend either game, I'd be convinced they're either lying or aren't human.

 

[MysticMisty]

Paper Mario 64 you can just throw any chapter and people will be like "Aw yeah that chapter was fuckin great" except for MAYBE the Toybox/Flower Fields chapters but those had fetchquests that didn't really waste that much time and told you right away what to do and where to do it since the N64 was being pushed to its limits already

Actually the most complaints I hear are about finding the Yoshi kids in Chapter 5. But it's significantly better than Keelhaul Key because you're not going back and forth between 3 battle maps and shanty town, it's a loop with like 10+ maps. So even though you circle back to Yoshi's Village you travel on a whole bunch of different maps to do so, and that makes the experience a lot more interesting.

Another problem is that almost every area is too much of a copy of it's counterpart in the first game. The only really unique places were Glitzville and the Moon, and the Moon is mainly because of the X-Naut base. The first game was a very "direct" indirect sequel to SMRPG, but at the same time it stood out. Forever Forest could've been almost a direct copy of Forest Maze, but instead of a large forest with a short maze puzzle at the end, Forever Forest was shorter but was entirely a maze with "spooky" elements to lead Mario down the correct path. That led to a decrepit mansion, that was near an old windmill, and an old castle that sat atop a hill nearby. Which was all unique and new to the game.

If there's anybody willing to defend either game, I'd be convinced they're either lying or aren't human.

She likes it. She also only got it solely because of the Koopalings, and also has extremely low expectations if she thinks it's one of the best looking Wii U games.

 

[StraightShooter2]

Sticker Star is bad because the combat constantly diminishes resources to the tune of your attacks all relying on consumable stickers. With the removal of experience, you have absolutely zero to gain from enemy encounters. Instead, you gain coins, which you will need to use to buy your attacks back except you don't get enough money to recuperate your losses, also ignoring how you need to travel all the way to the shop again anyway. Additionally, the game is rife with aimless wandering as it expects you to backtrack to areas you already have forgotten, all to use some random object you got with zero clues on what you're intended to do next. The boss fights are the most pathetic aspect, and boil down to "use this one item to win, or don't and instantly die" with no strategy. In addition, the puzzles are either one of two extremes: brain-dead easy or moon logic.

For example, there's a boss fight where you get a baseball bat attack, you fight it in a stadium, and it says "play ball." It couldn't be more obvious you need the bat. On the other hand, there's a boss fight with a fish in water, and it uses the water to defend itself. There's a variety of solutions you think would be possible, such as using a battery to electrify the water, a sponge to absorb the water, or a sun to dry it up. None of these work. Instead you need to roam levels you've already explored and stick a door sticker (another draining resource) on specific locations to get the item you need, which is a fishing hook. There are multiple locations which you can access with the door sticker, and they're almost all at the end of levels so you need to replay them entirely again, but only one specific location has the item you need. Even if you've figured out the solution to the boss, if you use your item at the wrong time, you lose it for good, get killed for it, have to find it again, then refight the boss. The example I remember is a squid boss who charges an attack that shoots water, so you use a sponge to block it. It charges the attack for multiple turns, so although I knew how to block the attack, I got hit anyways because I used the sponge too early, then died because I only had one of them.

There are a few games I never got around to beating because I either get distracted by something else or I decide to come back later and forget. Sticker Star is the only game I ever owned where I decided to stop. Color Splash is more Sticker Star, just make the horrible overworld more bearable in exchange for making the combat even worse. Color Splash is all of the above, minus using stickers on the overworld, except now you need to wait around 10 seconds every time you want to attack to fill your cards (the replacement for stickers) with paint, which is a new draining resource. Suddenly, a game series where the primary appeal is its enemy design and combat encounters now actively punishes you for fighting enemies in the least fun way imaginable. The most disgusting part is that Color Splash's bosses are the exact same, where you need to use special items to beat them, but the game also punishes and mocks you for buying the "I win" buttons from a store (which lets you buy previously owned attack cards), and instead forces you to go back to the same areas to grab another one if you didn't save it for the boss fight. You can't even ride on the writing for Sticker Star or Color Splash, something which salvaged Super Paper Mario, because the story is as barren and unimaginative as possible and there are nearly no unique characters. Color Splash improves on Sticker Star by making the exploration just boring instead of painful, but it still makes the exact same mistakes plus a few new ones. If there's anybody willing to defend either game, I'd be convinced they're either lying or aren't human.

Thanks, what's your opinion of Origami King?

 

[0 0]

Thanks, what's your opinion of Origami King?

It looks decent, but it's definitely not what I'm looking for in a Paper Mario game, so I haven't tried it, but it's certainly charming. I don't know much about it other than that, though.

 

[ducktales4gameboy]

Origami King is bogged down by a really bad combat system and pacing issues. If it interests you at all look up a Let's Play and background it while doing other things, you can get the entire good part of the experience just by watching someone else run through it.

None of them can compare to the original SMRPG. All of them just feel like children's games full of cutesy garbage and stupid gimmicks. SMRPG has withstood the test of time and has much wider appeal as far as style and personality.

SMRPG is really something that stands on its own, Mario's behavior and pantomimes are a very direct Charlie Chaplin homage and none of the others really go to the extreme lengths SMRPG does to make it work.

 

[MooseGump]

I 100% Origami King and I wouldn't really say the pacing was that bad, not TTYD bad for sure, but the battle system is a step in the right direction that was held back by the fact it's a battle system for EVERY fight

If I HAD to keep the battle system then I would rather get rid of it for normal battles but keep it for the boss fights since that's where it's better, the dungeons were fine to me since they were like zelda dungeons and have the whole dungeon give you clues to the boss's puzzle

I also really liked the music for it so that kept me going

 

[Fucktwat The Clown]

Super Mario RPG is one of if not the best Mario RPG, and one of the best RPGs in general.

This right here.
I remember having tons of fun playing and trying to 100% that game as a kid. Definitely worth checking out.

 

[StraightShooter2]

Does Color Splash work on PC emulators? - I was thinking of trying it, however the WII U emulator I looked at (CEMU) indicated it had major bugs which may prevent it from being finished.

 

[Kulee Baba]

None of them can compare to the original SMRPG. All of them just feel like children's games full of cutesy garbage and stupid gimmicks. SMRPG has withstood the test of time and has much wider appeal as far as style and personality.

Eh, Paper Mario, Paper Mario TTYD, Mario & Luigi, and Bowser's Inside Story hold merits. They're well polished games with enjoyable gameplay and some funny dialogue.

With that said what definitely made Super Mario RPG so legendary was that it was an epic of an adventure set in what felt like the main Mario universe, visually its pseudo 3D sprites were more detailed than what Super Mario 64 had when it came out months later on new shiny & expensive hardware. And there's no denying it Super Mario RPG told a fun giant story which in comparison made 64 look barebones by contrast. Don't get me wrong 64 is a classic but for utterly different reasons.

It really seems like Square's little game quite honestly intimidated Nintendo, understandably Nintendo wants the mainline Mario games to be the biggest games in the franchise. So they forced the Mario RPG subseries to be on a significantly smaller scale. Paper Mario literally takes place in a storybook while Mario & Luigi is set in an even more cartoon like setting than the mainline games.

One can only hope that with the runaway success of Undertale Nintendo wakes up and decides to produce another lighter hearted somewhat psychedelic RPG like SMRPG was. It's not like we'd ever get even a remake of Earthbound now that Itoi is retired from game development.

 

[gaystoner]

I really enjoy the 3DS remakes of Bowsers Inside Story and Superstar Saga. The side tacked on games are meh but decently fun. Origami King was more fun than TTYD for me but I liked the combat in TTYD more. The problem with Origami King is it gets little old doing the early shifty puzzle part to the fight every. fight.

Dream Team is worse than the remakes but its ok.

 

[Jonah Hill poster]

As far as Mario RPGs/Yoshi RPGs are concerned, here‘s how I would play them (number rankings not meaning good to bad or best to worst):

1. Super Mario RPG
2. Paper Mario
3. Super Paper Mario
4. Paper Mario and The Thousand Year Door
5. Paper Mario and The Origami King
6. Mario & Luigi: Superstar Saga
7. Mario & Luigi: Dream Team
8. Mario & Luigi: Bowser’s Inside Story

As far as Yoshi RPGs are concerned, here’s how I’d play them (same as list above):

1. Yoshi’s Story
2. Yoshi’s Woolly World
3. Yoshi’s Island (Super Mario Advance 3)
4. Poochi and Yoshi’s Woolly World
5. Yoshi’s Crafted World

Spoiler

I’d like to point out that Yoshi’s Woolly games are pretty underrated to me in my opinion. Compared to Yoshi’s Story, I do wish Nintendo could do more stories regarding Mario and Yoshi collaborating again for old time‘s sake, and not just use Yoshi as a background character just to get to another level.

 

[Massively Strong Greed]

Dream Team is decent enough. Color Splash and Origami King are pretty bland IMO, but they’re passable, Origami King moreso. Yoshi’s Woolly World is good, Crafted World is okay, and I don’t hate Island DS or New Island, but they’re not very well liked. New Island and Crafted World are infamous for bad music, and please don’t try to 100% Island DS or Crafted World, you will go insane.