What is Paper Mario: The Thousand Year Door?
Paper Mario: The Thousand Year Door (Paper Mario for the remainder of this review) is a modern remake of the 2004 game of the same name. It is a turn-based RPG that follows Mario as he tries to find the crystal stars that hold back the danger inside the Thousand Year Door. It has a paper-based art style where the characters and environment are made out of paper. It was released on the Nintendo Switch on May 23, 2024 and costs $59.99. It takes around 30 hours to finish the main story according to HowLongToBeat.com.
Game Review:
The Nintendo Gamecube is a console that holds a lot of nostalgia in my life. It was the first console I had and the one I used in my formative childhood years. It holds a special place in my heart, but I also missed a ton of the gems from that console because I was a kid who couldn’t afford to buy the best games and I also just didn’t necessarily know what those games were. Paper Mario: The Thousand Year Door is one of those gems I missed that I was excited to see get a Switch remake and see what all the hubbub is about.
Paper Mario is a timeless game. RPGs tend to age really well because it’s never about groundbreaking technological advances that make those games so good. It’s engaging battle mechanics and fantastic story-telling and characters that really push that genre of games. Paper Mario follows suit and cements itself as one of my favorite RPGs I’ve ever played. Its simple-yet-deep battle mechanics are a joy to play and never feel stale. Its humor is still funny today, and funny for adults too, not just kids. It has one of the best cast of characters in any Mario game I’ve ever played. It’s been such a joy to play.
The battle mechanics in Paper Mario play similarly to battles in Sea of Stars. It is turn-based but uses active button prompts to add a level of success or failure to a move that depends on your own timing and skill. Paper Mario doesn’t get quite as complex as Sea of Stars as this game was intended for kids, and the damage output and calculations are generally low numbers (ranging usually between 1-5 per hit). But the simplification doesn’t mean it isn’t well-designed or fun. I have a blast trying to come up with creative solutions to defeat the enemies that act like puzzles, in front of me. Between basic moves like jumping, items, power-ups, and partner abilities you have a ton of tools to tackle any enemy put in front of you. And it does all this while not being too difficult, maintaining its approachability by its target audience.
The paper art style in a 3D world leads to some really cool puzzle and level design concepts, especially around the idea of perspective. The hub world is layered and unfolds the further you progress in the game. And each dungeon/level is designed around an ability that you earn just prior while also implementing the previous abilities so each dungeon gets progressively more complex. Everything is still fairly simple in keeping with its target audience, but there were still a few spots where I got stuck for a few minutes before discovering what I was supposed to do to progress.
Each world and level is designed around a theme, and not just from a mechanical standpoint. Aesthetically each level has its own identity. I really enjoyed most of the designs, one of the standouts was a level based on a wrestling ring. There were a few levels that I didn’t love, however. The one that jumps to mind first is a level designed around ghosts and graveyards with a dracula-esque castle. The main reason I didn’t enjoy it was that the lighting was really bad. It was nearly impossible to see anything I was doing because it leaned a little too hard into its theme of dark and gloomy.
The story is actually pretty interesting, even for an adult. It’s geared towards kids so there’s some lack of depth in certain areas and some slapstick comedy, which actually generally lands well. But even with the bent towards children, there is still some nuance and storylines that have deeper tones if you really think about it. The characters are all goofy but in charmingly funny ways and some of their problems are very real and relatable. The story surprised me at how engaging it actually was.
Overall Paper Mario holds up better than I could’ve imagined for a game that came out in 2004. It’s a great RPG that uses a lot of character and charm in place of pushing the limits of the technology. It’s art that is aware of what it wants to do and doesn’t try to do more than it needs to, all while finding creative ways to achieve it.
Family Friendliness:
Paper Mario is very family friendly. It uses cartoon violence and characters don’t really ever die, they just get squished or flattened or the like. It is text heavy so for a kid to understand what’s happening they would need to be able to read. But I actually play this exclusively with my toddler son; I save it to play with him so I haven’t actually fully beaten it but we are probably 75% of the way through.
Features for Parents:
Paper Mario was made at a time where modern accessibility options weren’t standard practice. It uses save points rather than an option to save wherever so you do have to be able to reach a point (though they are fairly generous in their placement). The Nintendo Switch however does have a great sleep mode function that lets you put it down and it’ll hold your place in the game as long as it has battery life. So it’s not a terribly inconvenient game but it’s a game of its time.
Final Verdict:
Paper Mario: The Thousand Year Door is a masterpiece of RPG game design. It’s one of my favorite RPGs I’ve ever played and it does it in family-friendly whimsical ways. It is genuinely funny and maintains an engaging narrative. It has simplified but skill-involved battle mechanics that make battling feel fun. And it has one of the best cast of characters in any Mario game to date. It is a must play if you love Nintendo.
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