An rpg that delivers on bringing a humorous and charming world filled with unforgetable characters, new and old
The plot starts off with a legend of a disaster that plagued the land a thousand years ago, and a so called "treasure" that was buried. Princes Peach gets a hold of a map with the location of the treasure and sends Mario to meet her. She gets kidnapped and Mario has to, with the aid of some friends, journey to find Princess Peach while uncovering the mystery of the treasure by finding these items called the crystal stars and the legend of the thousand-year door. As Mario, you get the chance to do battles, gain experience, platform, and have a chance to encounter some really great characters through your main and mini quest.
The gameplay involves a couple of different type of elements. The battles take place in a theatre where executing attacks and magic can excite or bore the audience. The more audience you have, the more beneficial it will be when defeating an enemy because it powers up what they call a star meter, which allows you to perform different special moves. Attacks are performed not necessarily by just merely pressing a button but by performing different types of commands such as pulling back on the analog stick or repeatedly tapping a button to execute an attack, which for the most part makes sense to the animations that happen on screen. At first glance, the actions is great in breaking up the monotony of button pressing that plagues most rpg's, but the may get stale after awhile since it's the same type of actions that must be executed every time the attack or command, and the different commands isn't very difficult. The enemy A.I. is pretty easy. I found that the enemies are easy to defeat apart from the last 2 bosses. Enemies that have no power ups or magic of some sort are pretty easy , while the ones that do will inexplicably power up even though Mario and his companions are in critical health.
The leveling system here is also an underwhelming feature. Mario levels up through battles and one can choose either to increase their hp, fp (magic), or badge slots. The badge slots are used to upgrade variety of things such as attacks, defense or fp, while others are to upgrade attributes like defense and attack power. On the other hand, Mario's companions can only level up by collecting items called shine sprites that are scattered along the world of Paper Mario. This feature may or may not work depending on the player. With my experience with the game, I found this to be a downside as I prefer the leveling up process to be through experience and not item finding.
A real bright spot in the game is its platforming and the various paper forms Mario turns into while trying to get from place to place. The Mario charm and influence of previous Mario games makes its way to this game, and does so quite well. For those who enjoy and follow Mario games since the very first Super Mario game, the platforming really puts the stamp on the game without being frustrating or overly easy. The platforming seamlessly blends perfectly with the tone and theme of the game. Mario can also turn into different Paper forms, such as a paper plane, or a boat. He can turn sideways or roll up into a cylinder where he can roll around and get into different types of areas.
The graphics and sounds for this game is outstanding. The environments look fleshed out and really is beautiful and exudes the type of appeal that only Mario can bring. This was one of the things that caught my attention at the beginning of the game. As an older gamer, seeing the environment really brings back warm feelings I got when I was younger and when Mario games were more prevalent to my gaming tastes. The sound was also a positive. Although there were no dialogues in this game, the music really hit the nail in how music from a Mario game should sound.
The beauty of this game really is its charm and appeal to everyone's inner child. While most rpg's try to immerse gamers in an epic world where evil lurks and tragedy is the main theme, Paper Mario does a great job with refreshing the rpg world with humor and light heartedness. Every character will bring a smile or a smirk to any gamer who is open enough to experience gaming with innocence. And at 30-40 hours of gameplay, anyone playing this game can experience a fantastic Mario rpg adventure that will satisfy and not leave the players hanging.
In the end, though some of the elements of this game under whelms, the charm and humor will make you forget of a tragic even in some other world that only Mario can bring. If you're and rpg fan looking for something refreshing or a big Mario fan, this is a game you definitely want to play.