Don't let Paper Mario's flat look fool you ¿ this is easily the deepest RPG for N64
The Facts
-Challenging quest spanning seven different lands
-RPG style gameplay with enhanced turn-based fighting mechanics
-Party building structure that allows for up to seven group characters
-Classicly styled platformer action
-Unique 2D cartoon look mixes with polygonal 3D backdrops
-Single-player adventure only
-Saves to cartridge
Gameplay
While Paper Mario borrows much from the Square-created Super Mario RPG, its storyline is hardly on par with Square's current role-playing offerings for Sony PlayStation. In fact, it does nothing to advance the traditional plot lines, or lack thereof, found in most of Miyamoto's platformers. The game begins as Mario sets out to ¿ get this ¿ save the Princess from the evil Bowser, who has stolen a magical artifact called the Star Rod and made himself invincible. Jealous of Mario's popularity and wanting desperately to be favored by the Princess, Bowser has kidnapped her against her will and taken her to his floating castle high in the skies above the land. Mario quickly finds that the only way he can beat Bowser and rescue his main girl is to retrieve seven Star Spirits, magical entities that grant wishes, and use them against his evil foe. As is often the case, the Spirits just so happen to be scattered across seven different lands, all of which Mario must travel to if he's to have any chance of restoring order. And so goes the story that is the backbone for Paper Mario. It's not particularly thrilling ¿ or even original, but it's at least familiar to fans of Mario's many adventures, and it's cleverly cute at times too.
The game itself, luckily, is far deeper and more captivating than its standard storyline. Paper Mario is probably best described as an RPG platformer, as there are elements of both genres wrapped together to make up the title. Mario travels through various lands, from desert to rainforest, on land, water and air, platformer style. That is to say, he jumps on objects, breaks blocks, uncovers hidden items, and so forth. But he interacts with characters, enemies, and storyline development RPG style. For example, once Mario comes into contact with an enemy, the game interface immediately switches to accommodate a turn-based RPG battle. The battle system Paper Mario employs is refreshingly interactive, despite being turn-based. Mario and his party of characters take turns fighting off foes via a menu-driven interface, utilizing standard moves such as jumps (on the heads of enemies), as well as magical fire-balls, bomb explosions, lightning bolts, and so on. After an action is performed, as per standard, the enemy has a chance to react and deliver their own deadly blow. The design, however, is slightly enhanced over the traditional turn-based fight because players can execute additional moves within an action to inflict more damage upon enemies ¿ and to protect themselves from oncoming enemy attacks. For example, Mario can, in addition to the standard jump blow, use a special badge to inflict as many damage points as possible. This is done in real-time as an action is executed by pressing the A button as Mario lands on an enemy's head. Mario can continue to jump on the head of his foe until the character is defeated, but the procedure requires calculated timing on the part of the player. Similarly, Mario can successfully block the attack of an enemy if the player presses the A button at exactly the right time. It's a seemingly miniscule addition to an otherwise copied battle system formula, but it goes an incredibly long way to the enjoyment of the experience, and it comes as a welcomed surprise.
At the core of this RPG formula are three different point systems that determine what Mario can and cannot do: Heart Points (HP), Flower Points (FP) and Badge Points (BP). Heart points are Mario's life force; if he runs out of them, he dies. Flower Points are used for magical attacks and special items. And Badge Points determine how many power-enhancing badges Mario can wear. As in any RPG, the more points, the better. Our hero can up the level of each by winning combat battles with enemies, as Star Points are awarded for each successful interaction (the number varies depending on the difficulty of the enemy battle). When Mario acquires 100 Star Points, he has the option of adding five Points to his HP, FP or BP and there's quite a bit of strategy to the whole affair. While one might initially think that upping their Heart Points to the maximum would guarantee success, certain enemy encounters, especially late into the game, can still whip right through Mario's life force without much difficulty. But with special badges and life restoring magical items, gained only by equipping Mario with more FP and BP, the character can still exit each encounter as the victor. The setup, like everything else in the title, is simplified, but still solidly engineered and rewardingly intuitive.
Mario's overall quest requires that he travel through seven different lands in a decidedly linear fashion, and amass a party of seven characters. Along the way our hero will team up with the most unlikely of individuals, including a Bob-Omb, a Koopa, a Ghost, a Fish and more. Each character possesses unique abilities that not only lend themselves to turn-based battles, but also the lands that Mario explores too. For example, there are certain water environments that Mario cannot travel across without the help of the fish. Other areas feature gaps that can only be manipulated without the help of the winged Koopa; stone walls that must be exploded with the Bob-Omb, triggers that must be executed with the land Koopa and so on. In short, it's brilliant design, and really enhances the value of each party member while throwing in a few extra puzzles for the player to figure out.
While there are a few twists and turns here and there, it shouldn't take the experienced RPG player a great deal of time to finish. And don't let that fool you, the title is still wonderfully satisfying to play and irreversibly engrossing while it lasts. Also, considering that every facet of Paper Mario is designed to simplify the RPG experience while remaining true to the formula, it serves as the perfect introductory game to any person hoping to explore the genre.
Graphics
The graphic design of Paper Mario is, for good or bad, unarguably unique. Mario and all of the characters in the game, from townspeople to simple foe and Bowser himself, are created of flat 2D sprites. Interestingly, though, they turn and fold as if they are made of paper, hence the name of the game. When Mario lays down for sleep, for example, he doesn't lift the covers off his bed, but rather floats down underneath them. All of the backgrounds and objects in the game, however, are constructed of 3D polygons. Mario can walk left, right, up and down within the world, as opposed to the isometric view found in Super Mario RPG. You can imagine the clash of styles.
Looking at the colorful, flat 2D sprite characters and blocky 3D backgrounds, one can't help but wonder if developer Intelligent Systems decided to go the route because of its inexperience with fully polygonal games at the time. Probably though it just wanted to remain visually true to the storybook-like worlds Mario explores. Players who never liked the style of the typical Nintendo platformer won't like what Paper Mario has to offer visually (it's not Final Fantasy), but the rest of us won't mind it. In a strange way, in fact, it all works quite nicely. When Mario enters a house and it folds in half like a piece of paper so that we can see the inside, one realizes the amount of detail put into the cart to bring the cartoon world to life.
There are limits to 2D sprites, however, and Intelligent Systems would have been wise to realize them before zooming the camera up close to characters in specific situations, whereupon they transform into a pixelated mass of colors. Still, considering how critical we were of this game's look back when we were previewing it, we're more than happy to walk away from the experience with such a small complaint.
Sound
The sound effects and music in Paper Mario are right out of a Nintendo platformer. Cheery, smile-inducing, and admittedly well composed music that one could easily imagine Miyamoto dancing to, mixed with a never-ending supply of odd character noises including boings, dings, crunches, smashes, and other indecipherable effects exclusive to Nintendo. Most characters have no speech sound effects, let alone actual speech, which is slightly disappointing. Otherwise, though, the listening experience is probably exactly as you might expect: Nintendo-like.
Paper Mario is the best RPG for Nintendo 64, and moreover, a great entry into the genre versus any system. While the cute, simplified look of the game and its similarly colorful mascot characters may turn off those looking for a Final Fantasy killer, it'd be a huge mistake to pass this title up for that reason alone. For underneath its 2D surface, Paper Mario is a fantastically deep, intuitively designed, and wonderfully rewarding experience complete with enhanced takes on old-school turn-based fighting mechanics and a statistic system that would satisfy any RPG fanatic.
A must buy for Mario fans and RPG lovers alike. And if you've never played an RPG before, this is the perfect one to start with.