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Super Paper Mario (Nintendo Wii) Review
Review by 
8.06/10 from 48 user ratings
 
Paper Mario and Paper Mario: The Thousand Year Door are classics. Not only are they filled to the brim with the charm one would come to expect from Mario, but they're also excellent RPGs with awesome dialogue. Contrary to what my Pokemon obsession would imply, I'm not the biggest RPG fan. But I've always enjoyed the Paper Mario games. So, when I heard they were making a third Paper Mario game for the Wii, with less emphasis on RPG elements and more emphasis on platforming, I couldn't have been more excited. Then I got the game. Oh boy. Everybody loves analogies, so the most honest one I can make in this case is, when I was little I was excited to start middle school. Then I started it.



The game looks just as appealing as ever with its paper-looking cartoony graphics. The worlds are colorful and imaginative. The music's alright, nothing really stands out, though. It's pretty to look at, but then you start to play it. Like I said, most of the RPG elements are gone. Instead of dynamic turn-based battles, you get to jump on enemies' heads. Alright, like classic Mario, cool. You can also shake the Wiimote after you've landed the hit to make Mario do a "style move" or whatever and get more EXP. Wait, did I say EXP? That's right, you still level up in this game. You level up by killing enemies as I just established, and when you do you get more health. So, the combat of the game basically boils down to you jumping on top of enemies (sometimes they take more than one hit to die) and waggling your Wiimote after every hit. Sounds fun? Well, guess what, it isn't. It would be much less tiring if there wasn't so much waggling. And I know it's not mandatory to waggle, but the game encourages you to do it. It's hard to resist it. Besides, you want to level up faster, because if you don't have more HP future enemies will kill you faster. It's a trap.

There's also completely unexciting items you can buy or sometimes find in item boxes. Stuff to regain your health, make you invincible, yadda yadda. The only awesome thing is the Star, which turns you into a giant, apocalypse-inducing 8 Bit mario. You can also summon 8 small 8-bit Marios that walk beside you and smash enemies. That's sort of entertaining, I guess. More integral to the gameplay, but in the end pretty similar to these items are the Pixls. You find these guys, and they do cool stuff. Like make you do a ground pound, lay down bombs, cover you in a spiky shield, carry you across electric fences, etc. None of these powers are particularly exciting and it's always obvious when you have to use them.


There are three characters you can play as. The first one you get access to, and the one you'll be using for about 80% of the game is Mario. He's your regular guy, but he has a unique ability which I'll get to in a bit. You can also play as Peach, who is the same as Mario but can hover across pits and duck down under her parasol so enemies bounce off of her. And finally, you'll run into Bowser, who can shoot fire but is slow and big. Cool story, Browser. Mario's unique ability, and the main gimmick of this game, is that he can flip the world from the second dimension into the third. You switch back and forth between 2D and 3D to solve puzzles, find hidden stuff, etc. But the problem is these puzzles are never appealing, and when you're in 3D, not only do you have to move with a d-pad on a 3D space, but the game goes from looking amazing to looking like my toilet after four extra cheese beef tacos. I honestly can't believe how big the difference is. It's embarrassing.


So, Super Paper Mario already ruined the gameplay and the visuals, what more could it ruin? Well, what else is there to ruin in the Paper Mario franchise? They have cool, quirky stories, don't they? Oh yeah. Well Super Paper Mario sort of has this too. Well, it does. But I don't care because there is an insane amount of dialogue. Literally, an insane amount. And there's no cutscenes, only textbox after textbox after textbox and it never, ever stops. I find myself mashing the A button faster than in that LightFoot Strength Test in StarFox Adventures (I wanna review that game sometime). To its credit, the dialogue is fun, I guess. But I don't care. It's too much.

Playing games can give you many feelings. Fun, relaxation, entertainment, a freakin' headache, nostalgia, etcetera. Take a guess in which of those categories Super Paper Mario fits for me. And what's worse, and what makes me dislike this game even more, is that it's a Mario game. A Paper Mario game. And it's ruined. Not only that, but it came out in April 2007, when there was nothing to play on the Wii. I had beaten Twilight Princess a while ago. So I forced myself to stumble through Super Paper Mario and beat it. Every chromosome in my body was telling me to stop, but the bored gamer in me carried on. As I continued playing my hatred for it grew and grew, and that's why I feel qualified to write a review for this awful game. Because I beat it. Fuck this game.

The space shooter levels are embarrassing too.

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 Weak  4.4 / 10
03/09/11, 15:06   Edited:  03/09/11, 21:53
 
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Ouch! I was going to purchase this today too lol.

Posted by 
 on: 03/09/11, 15:15
Ouch... I knew some people didn't like the game too much but you really go out of your way to trash this one. I thought it was an enjoyable game, although a bit too easy for my tastes. May not be that memorable of a game for the most part (I still loved the first boss's joke though ) but I wouldn't place it as low as you did either.

On the contrary, I didn't enjoy the more traditional TTYD and had more fun with Super Paper Mario. I sure am a weird one

Posted by 
 on: 03/09/11, 15:16
Nah, I think I'm the weird one in this case. Lot of folks love this game. I just ... well, I don't. lol. It's not broken or anything, it's just awfully mediocre and boring. That's why I scored it above a 4.

Posted by 
 on: 03/09/11, 15:18   Edited:  03/09/11, 15:19
WTF

Posted by 
 on: 03/09/11, 16:11
Holy shit, dude! That's low, so to speak.

I'll give my standard spiel about the game. It's admirably punk and very uneven, but quite imaginative and amusing in places. I wish the whole game had combat on the level of the Pit of 100 Trials. As it is, the combat is just too easy to make you explore the battle system.

Posted by 
 on: 03/09/11, 17:27
I've never played the Paper Mario games before getting Super Paper Mario, so I had no expectations whatsoever going into it. Or rather I should probably say that my expectations were entirely shaped by non-Paper Mario, Mario games. I'm about a third of the way through the game, and don't feel I'm far enough along to really give an opinion yet, other than to say that despite how wordy it is - and it is EXTREMELY wordy in some parts - I have enjoyed the game thus far.

I like the 2-D - 3-D transition. I think the less vibrant 3-D world is intentional, as your pretty little 2-D character takes constant damage while running through the 3-D landscape. You're not supposed to like the 3-D world. The 2-D world is where your paper character is comfortable. Now, whether the decision to make a dull 3-D landscape was a good one...

Those getting the game looking for an rpg are going to be disappointed though. It's nowhere near the rpg that the Mario & Luigi DS games are, for example. It's more of platformer-puzzler.

Posted by 
 on: 03/09/11, 17:42
It felt like an Adventure game to me, since the main emphasis was on exploration and puzzles.

Posted by 
 on: 03/09/11, 17:58
For a Paper Mario game, it was probably a 4, you're right.

Compared to most games out there? Still better than 95% of them.

Posted by 
 on: 03/09/11, 18:06
@-JKR- I'll admit if it was any other game I would've probably rated it higher (unintentionally), but I still think the game is not worth playing regardless.

Posted by 
 on: 03/09/11, 18:14
At least it's still better than Yoshi's Story. *whew*

Posted by 
 on: 03/09/11, 21:18
Is this a joke?

Posted by 
 on: 03/09/11, 21:21
For a second there, I thought I was on Destructoid....*rimshot*

@ GameDadGrant

Hey Yoshi's Story isn't too bad!

Posted by 
 on: 03/09/11, 21:32
Yoshi's Story is fun, you heathens!!

Posted by 
 on: 03/09/11, 21:38
I pretty much totally disagree. It had some flaws but also had a lot of neat ideas and awesome characters and dialogue and was a joy to play through.

It's a strange score too, because when I think 4 I think like... stuff like Space Chimps and Wing Island.

But to each their own!

Posted by 
 on: 03/09/11, 21:39
I'd give this game a 6.5

It's not a great game by any means, but I had some fun with it. I did expect a lot more from it though, so it was a disappointment in a lot of ways.

Posted by 
 on: 03/09/11, 21:41   Edited:  03/09/11, 21:41
@Marsh No, but I'm surprised it took this long for someone to post it.

And Yoshi's Story is like a 2.5/10

Posted by 
 on: 03/09/11, 21:48
SPM had a lot of hopes hanging on it in the post-launch drought. It's no wonder it didn't live up to expectations. Even so, by any standards, the game was average at best.

Posted by 
 on: 03/10/11, 01:37
*ahem*

I disagree.

I do like TTYD better, but Super Paper Mario was still enjoyable. At least a 7 comparing it with the others in the series, and at least an 8 standing on it's own.

But what do I know, I don't even give games scores. :P (well, I do here)

Posted by 
 on: 03/10/11, 01:46
I loved this game.

8.5 in my opinion. The challenge wasn't there (except towards the end), but the gameplay sure was IMO.

Maybe my perception is off, though. It was I believe only the second Wii game I bought. I also never played the other Paper Mario games.

However, maybe people need to see it as a "separate" game from the "actual" Paper Mario games. I have a feeling people don't like SPM because it has "Paper Mario" in the game, thus raising their expectations.

If the game was just called something else I have a feeling people would like it more. Critics liked it, but I guess it has mixed feelings among Wii owners.

Posted by 
 on: 03/10/11, 01:56
I loved Super Paper Mario for the first couple chapters, but after beating Chapter 3 I lost interest in it. I think I had just beaten Chapter 5 when I played it last, and that was years ago. I've had the game since it came out and I still haven't beaten it. That's really bad. It totally doesn't live up to the first two games at all as far as I'm concerned.

@-JKR- Nah, I'd say 95% of games out there are better than Super Paper Mario.

@GameDadGrant Yoshi's Story kicks ass! >:O

Posted by 
 on: 03/10/11, 03:32
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