In this sense, Paper Mario was always about marrying the platformer with more traditional RPG mechanics. He raced in Kart, battled in Smash, partied in Party, and played just about every sport under the sun. Honestly, The Origami King has expanded what I thought a Mario game could be, which in itself is an extremely Mario thing to do. In a way, she’s the anti-Navi from Ocarina of Time. She never intrudes on your adventure and instead only adds to it. Her inability to remember your Bob-omb partner’s name, which leads to her calling him pretty much every imaginable name that begins with the letter B, is particularly fantastic. Her mix of sweet naivete and infectious wonderment over everything and everyone you come across provides countless amazing observations and interactions. First and foremost is Olivia, Mario’s new sidekick for this adventure. There are a few factors that help bolster this consistency. Literally every single interaction you have in the game is just brimming with charm, creativity, and humor. But even with all of this, I genuinely believe that Paper Mario: The Origami King is the pinnacle of Nintendo’s humor. And of course there’s EarthBound, which has one of my absolute favorite scripts in video game history. The WarioWare series was built on creative non-sequiturs, strange characters, and an abundance of charm. The writing in the Paper Mario games has always shined, going all the way back to the pre- Paper days of Super Mario RPG on the SNES. Nintendo has been known for memorable characters, solid writing, and particularly great localization over the past few decades. And luckily for us, what we have in 2020 is Paper Mario: The Origami King, which, despite some of its mechanical shortcomings, manages to deliver an incredible experience for one simple reason - it’s the funniest game in Nintendo history. But until then, we have to settle for what we’ve got. Or a true sequel to The Thousand Year Door that revives those nostalgic memories of the GameCube’s short-lived heyday. I understand that we all pine for a Mario RPG that channels the energy of Legend of the Seven Stars and brings back puffy Mallow, Pinocchio-esque Geno, and that pervert Booster. Aside from The Origami King’s short gestation period, it seems like the main discussion leading up to launch wasn’t about what the game was, but rather what it wasn’t. This kind of tiny runway is rare in video games, but certainly appreciated in an era where it’s common to wait the better part of a decade for anticipated games like Cyberpunk 2077. However, Nintendo saved its biggest surprise of the year for May, when it revealed that not only did Paper Mario: The Origami King exist, but that it would be releasing in just two months from its announcement. But besides these two, it’s been a relatively quiet year for Nintendo, with only rumors, brief glimpses, and nebulous dates on what we might see on Switch this fall and beyond into 2021. Alongside this, we saw the first Pokémon Sword and Shield DLC expansion drop late last month. Its main tentpole has been Animal Crossing: New Horizons, which is currently the best-selling game of the year in Japan to date and continues to see a constant stream of free and much-appreciated updates. Nintendo has had an understandably strange 2020.
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