A Game Review, by Nick Maker
I finally played the new paper Mario game and I have to say it was a whole different paper experience. This begs the question, “Nick, did you like this game and should I buy it?” Well, in my honest opinion, it wasn’t the best paper Mario game ever. In all the paper Mario series this one hasn’t got my wow face, but still I like it. I have a few likes and a few dislikes; here are the good ones.
1. The Paper Mechanics: They really turned the whole Mario world into an actual paper world. Just like in Paper Mario the Thousand Year’s Door, except this one was better on the paper mechanic. Everything you interact and the people (or toads) will either bend, fold or cut into pieces.
3. The Music: A good setting mood whenever you visit the worlds. You will love all the music, except when you’re in W3 of the poison theme, because that’s where things get bummed down and creepy.
Spoil Alert!
This will reveal some stuff from the game and if you haven’t played the game don’t look at it.
THE BAD SIDE
1. The Plot: It’s just the plot isn’t pretty WOWZA. It sure is good, but compared to Paper Mario and the Thousand Year’s Door, Super Paper Mario, or even the original Paper Mario, which all have very good plots, this game is sort of the same old thing. Bowser crashes the festival party just to touch the comet, he captures peach, and we all know what that means. Though I have to admit it’s a good start to the story, is the main villain Bowser again? I thought it would be an all new villain from whom you have to save the world, or maybe an evil comet spirit who possesses Bowser. That would be sort of good (just saying).
2. The Bosses: I know that the bosses were hard, but they are pretty easy to deafeat once you get the right sticker. Also the design of the bosses was nothing new to me and is pretty predictable. You can tell which boss will be coming next (well ,except W4 — that I did not expect).
3. The sticker settings: Don’t get me wrong; I’m not saying that stickers aren’t a macho thing, and I like the concept of putting stickers in the game, but this game doesn’t use them the right way. I despise the setting when your attacks are limited like Kingdom Hearts Chain of Memory. Not only that, but when you’re not prepared for, say, Bowser Jr. and Kammek (especially Kammek — he really made me mad when he turned my stickers into flip-flops), you will have a whole lot of trouble winning. Also you don’t have defense mode. Sometimes when you don’t have the right sticker, or the enemy has wings and you need a shoe to stop it, well, too bad. You have to either waste a sticker like a hammer even if it will not work, or just run away.
Kammek really gave me a hard time fighting him since he is always in flying mode, and I can’t defend myself if all my stickers are flip-flops — and you know those things can’t jump. I just wish I had Mario’s old moves and that the stickers would be like items to use just like in the other paper Mario games. And even if the game developers want that concept, that doesn’t give them an excuse for putting no defense mode. They could have added an option to not use any stickers.
4. What’s the point in fighting? You think this is an RPG and you think that if you fight you will gain experience points and get stronger. Well, you’re wrong! No experience points means no heart upgrades or strength power. It is just the heart upgrade that you have to collect (which I don’t mind) and getting more power is all in the stickers you collect in your journey. Now here is my point: there is none! What is the point in fighting if you’re not going to get experience except getting more stickers, coins and hearts to recover? But most of the time I just collect the stickers and avoid all enemies in sight, except when I have a mini boss to fight. Without experience there is no point in fighting those enemies.
Now whether you should buy this game is all up to you. If you disagreed with my opinions, that’s okay — by all means buy it. If you are still a Mario fan like I am, buy the game. To me it wasn’t the best paper Mario game ever, but I still had fun playing it and that gives some credit to it. I give it a 3/5 stars. It needs improvements and some features should be returned, but all in all, a good game.
