"Paper Mario: The Origami King": Reveal Trailer Thoughts

"Paper Mario: The Origami King": Thoughts Upon The Reveal Trailer

5/14/20

I’ve played Paper Mario games before, but I have yet to own one. The only Nintendo system I’ve owned before my Switch was my 3DS, and when I was still buying games for that, I just bought whatever box art looked coolest. Honestly, I’d never even heard of Sticker Star back then. Now, upon getting older and realizing a few things about the Paper Mario series, I’ve been getting more and more excited for a new game. Especially because of the March rumor about most of the old 3d mainstream Mario games coming to Switch, either in remasters, remakes, ports, or just HD upscaling. Along with this initial rumor, though, came word of a new Paper Mario game. This really spiked hype for this rumor, of course. Many people thought that there wouldn’t be a new Paper Mario game along with these new Mario remakes, so hype for this game kind of fell of the rails leading up to now. Though here we are, and hot damn this game looks different (in a good way).

The past two Paper Mario games were, or so I hear, steaming piles of shit on not only fans, but the series' legacy. I guess the main thing that made these games so bad were their lack of life. The obvious lack of creativity and passion that’s easy to see, yet kind of hard to pinpoint. Another main problem with those games was the battling, and we still don’t know if that’s resolved or not. The battling in the last two games seems to me like it was slow-paced, dull, tedious, and became something to avoid throughout the course of the old games. The second I clicked on this new trailer at 10am today, I really yearned to see the battle mechanics, but alas, the only gameplay shown was some running, riding, and talking with enemies. Overall, though, the gameplay looks good. I don’t think we’ve gotten enough footage to really see if that passion and liveliness from a game like Thousand Year Door is back in whatever quantity, but I’m still generally excited. This game is obviously gonna be priced at or around 60 dollars, so I probably won’t be buying it for a while. Though, I’m still excited for all of the die hard fans I know and have heard of.

My hopes are that they will bring back all of the funny and light-hearted RPG elements from the first two games in the series. This was what made the first two games in particular so much better and added so much life. Also that they will fix the battle elements, and make it more fast paced and fun. Overall, my one hope is that Nintendo will just go back to the old style. My expectations are high as well, and my reasoning; this is the Switch.

Over the course of the past three years, we’ve seen Switch installments of older series improved so drastically from their predecessors. Take, for instance, one of Nintendo’s first ever and most popular series; Mario. I don’t think I’m the only one who thinks the 2d Mario games are pretty much just uncreative garbage fires (I don't hate them that much, but I'm still angry). I feel like Super Mario 3d Land and World are the older 3d Mario games we’ve come to love so dearly but they were clearly meshing in with 2d Mario’s more boring and linear format (especially 3d Land). Then, in January of 2017, the sequel to these games was revealed; Super Mario Odyssey. This game is an enormous and exciting open-world adventure, and this was clear as crystal from the first teaser trailer. Looking back at my experiences with 3d World and what I’ve seen and heard about 3d Land, Mario Odyssey is definitely a better game on many levels. Despite me not thinking Odyssey is a 10 out of 10 game, it’s still beautiful, polished, creative, different, and most importantly; fun. I’m not saying that 3d World and 3d Land aren’t fun, I’m just saying that Mario Odyssey is more fun than even 3d World, and far more fun than 3d Land. My point here is that the Nintendo Switch can change series, only using Mario as an example because it’s one of the more drastic improvements in a series entry. While the Switch may have a few mediocre first party games, (see Kirby Star Allies, Mario Tennis Aces, Sword and Shield, etc.), it’s still overall made so many great sequels. These great games not only avoid hurting the series’ high-standard legacy, but rather improve upon it even more. 

With the power that the Switch has given Nintendo to suddenly make amazing games, I feel like there’s hope for Paper Mario yet. Not only that, but this game, to me at least, looks amazing from the reveal trailer. And because this game has already skyrocketed up to the top of the featured eShop games, I feel like the Nintendo fan population is just as excited about this game as I am. Last but not least; the plot. In an attempt to keep things brief, the plot comes off absolutely amazing. It feels unique and interesting without being too complicated, and frankly, that’s precisely what a Nintendo game plot should be (at least in my opinion). In conclusion, this game looks amazing. It may be stupid to build up such high hopes, let alone such high expectations, for a game we really don’t know much about yet. But alas, that’s exactly what I’ve found myself doing.


Image sources (in order):
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ifTn-zG2UF0
https://www.nintendoenthusiast.com/paper-mario-the-thousand-year-door-remembering-it-15-years-later/
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bhNlxIBMtzM
http://gamingtubes.com/watch/review/NEW-Paper-Mario-Origami-King-Coming-July-2020-Gameplay-Trailer-Reaction-Switch-News-Update-96125