The excellence of a videogame can be measured by how much you can enjoy it in its original format despite the passage of time. And in that sense, Paper Mario and the Thousand Year Door for nintendo switch It is a demonstration that the original is one of the great video games of all time and, in my opinion, the last Paper Mario really good.
And this new delivery created for the console ultra popular Nintendo It touches practically nothing of the original in terms of its gameplay, history and structureand it is actually a graphic update and with some quality of life improvements to justify that this game can be sold again in the 2024.
I want to be very clear on that: If you already have your copy of the original game and one Game Cube and you are one of those who have it connected to a television, this game is not necessary. If you played it back in the day and didn’t like it, it won’t change your opinion about it either.
But for those who have never played it, for those who may have the original game in its box but, frankly, it is easier for them to get their switch to play, and for those like me who once played it but don’t even have Game Cube nor the game to remember it, this version is totally safety pin and a nice addition to your collection.
I’m not going to delve too deeply into the criticism of the game itself because, as I already said, it is the same game released ago. 20 years and there are plenty of analyzes about him. Yes, I am going to do a little review for those who have no idea of the title and then a review of my favorite changes and that make this a version that I consider better than the original.
Paper Mario and the Thousand Year Door it’s a turn-based RPGvisual and gameplay sequel to the Paper Mario of Nintendo 64. The characteristics that make it special are of course its graphic design with flat and very colorful characters, which sometimes simulate worlds made of paper and cardboard, but most of the time they only serve to deploy exploration worlds like a game of 2D platforms.
But if its graphic appearance is unforgettablehis history and combat system They are what make it unique. Both perfect what was seen in Paper Marioand although it is a turn-based combat game, the fights are very dynamic thanks to the actions you have to do so that your attacks do more damage or you manage to defend yourself in a better way.
Each attack has a microgame based on timing, from the simplest of pressing the button at the right time, to moving the stick and releasing it with rhythm. Furthermore, together with Mario We can have a companion, who will have his own skills and powers, with his different attack microgames.
I also like to think that the entire game, although it has an RPG structure, is actually a great puzzle game. The worlds are full of secret rooms which you will have to reach with your wits and unlocking the correct skills and fights especially with bosses They have quite creative elements of deduction and memory. And knowing which enemies to hit with the jump and which with the sledgehammer can be solved only with visual information.
It is also refreshing to remember how Paper Mario and the Thousand Year Door seems to be the last big game where we see a Mushroom Kingdom creative and unleashed. I have always criticized that in the games after this Paper Mariohave chosen to make all Toads be equal, all Goombas be equal, all Koopas be equal, etc. But here we see variations of the classic characters with hairstyles, different ages, different genders and different personalities that I actually feel sorry for not continuing to exploit.
The tone of the adventure is totally crazy and its structure allows you at times to control Peach while she is captured – and develop a twisted romance with a computer– and also to bowser who is overwhelmed by a much larger threat of enemies, and those sections are always laughable. For the rest, it is a classic RPG what to look for seven magical artifacts to open a door that is the key to avoiding the destruction of the world, or in this case, the kingdom.
But then what is different about it? And I am going to go directly with the most notorious and at the same time most controversial: the graphic appearance. As I said before, this is more of a remaster and not a remake, in the sense that the structure of the game is the same, but its appearance is completely renewed. Not only images are now displayed in Full HDbut all textures and the lightning They look much more alive than before. Curiously, they look less flat – even though the whole world is a sheet of paper – and in other places the cardboard effect is exaggerated.
Personally I think that all the graphic changes are for the better and look incredible when playing them on a big screen. Of course, they are not better than what has been seen in the games of the series released for Wii U and the switch. You can see that it is the same graphics engine, but taken to 100 given that the design of environments and characters in this game is much better compared to Color Splash either The Origami King.
And since it is the same graphics engine, it has inherited another feature that not everyone likes: its framerate under 60 to 30 frames per second. I am a defender of 60 framesand I think that if I can do it, I always prefer a game to look more fluent to make it look better, but it will also depend a lot on the type of game. A title of platformsa SPF or one of careerswhere we require precision in movements and quick decisions, 60 frames per second is a must.
But in a title like this, where the combats are in turns, nothing rushes us and for the same reason, we can forgive a refresh rate which is stable, although smaller than the original. And in some cases it even looks better, considering that the 60 of the original did not play very well with the fact of representing a paper world, in my opinion. So, in my opinion, it’s not something that bothers me, although I don’t celebrate it either.
In fact, I completely understand those who may think that if a game is republished and one of its features is removed (in this case, the fluidity of your animations), they would not have to pay full price again to obtain it. Only in my case the opportunity to play it again was better.
There are also small operating changes of the game: now you can collect more coinsif you lose you do not return to the last place where you saved but you start the section (although when you exit the game you do start again from your last save point), there is a new circular menu to change your helpers without having to go to the pause menu, characters to train, and new medals that allow, for example, to return to the original music of the game, although I wouldn’t do it because the reversals are beautiful.
It’s as if it were a patch for the game that only took 20 years to arrive.
Is it worth it then? Again, I reiterate what I said at the beginning: he is a relaunching which is not as impressive as that of the Mario RPGbut Nintendo has also done things like the collection 3D Mario in which they are just slightly updated ROMs. This remaster is above that average and is recommended for those who did not play the original, especially since everything is now in Spanish and they want to know what it was once like. latest Paper Mario really good.
