Ten Reasons Why Super Paper Mario was Not the Masterpiece it Could Have Been

I never was an RPG fan to any extent until I discovered Paper Mario for the Nintendo 64. In spite of being largely simple, it was quite addictive, clever, and lots of fun. The second game, Paper Mario: The Thousand Year Door, was even better, improving on everything that made the first game so wonderful and adding even more excellent features that make it perhaps the best Mario game for the Gamecube. Then there was Super Paper Mario, released for the Nintendo Wii as an attempt to mix RPG elements with classic Mario-style platforming. While an interesting idea on paper, the execution was sadly lacking, and I have picked ten reasons why this was the case. The reasons, in no particular order, are...

Fixed Level-Up System: In previous Paper Mario games, you could choose which attribute you wanted to increase to make your quests as easy or as hard as you wanted them to be. Super Paper Mario, on the other hand, offers a fixed system in that your health or attack power increases when you gain enough experience. The amount of both attributes is also predetermined: five extra hit points and one extra attack point with each upgrade. This ruins the player's ability to power up Mario and his friends to his or her liking, and adds to the game's overall lack of challenge. Having a better variety of attributes, and a choice as to which one to increase, would have given the game more depth.

Easy Bosses: Part of what made the first two games so great were the long, challenging boss battles, especially in the later chapters. In the Wii game, these boss battles are much shorter and easier, even as you approach the final stretch. With the automatically added strength that comes from leveling up, it is not uncommon to take out many of the bosses quickly. About the only really tough bosses are those that are optional, hiding out in the Pits of 100 Trials, but even they can be pushovers if you are strong enough. I was expecting some epic battles, but the results here are less than satisfying.

Getting a Game Over...in a Cut Scene: It is possible that, if you make a bad choice during a cut scene, that your game can end right then and there. This is especially annoying in the opening cut scene, in which if you refuse to accept the first Pure Heart, Merlon assumes that you do not intend to save the world, and the game ends...forcing you to watch the lengthy scene once more. Granted, you can save before dying in some other cut scenes, but you should not have to endure so much, die in a cut scene, and watch it all the way through once again. Dying in-game is acceptable, but death in a cut scene should not plague any game.

Tacked-on Wii Controls: Since Super Paper Mario was intended to be one of Nintendo's final Gamecube games before it moved to the Wii, the motion controls feel rather tacked-on, as if they were late additions (and they probably are). They are used mainly to find secret doors, activate items, and gain extra points after taking out an enemy. More could have been done with them to make them feel like they were better implemented instead of being tossed in at the last moment merely to emphasize that it was a Wii game. Hopefully if there ever is a Paper Mario game intended for the Wii from the start, the motion controls in that game will be much better and add to the overall experience.

Inconsistent Level Design: All too over, the game feels schizophrenic, as if it cannot make up its mind whether it wants to be a platform game or an RPG. Some levels feel like the platform stages from classic Mario games, while others feature a great deal of backtracking that can slow the action down considerably. In one stage, you are forced to earn gems by completing menial tasks, and one of these will take several minutes of consistent moving around in a wheel to gain a certain amount of gems. I would much prefer that Intelligent Systems stick with a single level design, and not have so many ways to slow the action down.

Underutilized Co-Stars: Over the course of the game, you can take control of not only Mario, but also Peach, Luigi, and even Bowser, each with their own special skills. Unfortunately, they are not used often enough, as control quickly switches back to Mario when his ability to switch from 2D to 3D is necessary. As if to further emphasize that Mario is the star, there are times when you lose your fellow companions and must stick to being Mario for a while. I would have preferred to allow the other playable characters to see more action, and maybe even have levels devoted exclusively to them, than to have them take a back seat to the main plumber. Speaking of Mario's 3D powers...

Taking Damage in the 3D Areas: Going into 3D opens up some nice new exploration possibilities. Unfortunately, they are hampered by the fact that if you stay in 3D too long, you take a bit of damage. This makes absolutely no sense at all...I know that Mario games are not exactly known for being entirely logical, but how can one explain how Mario can be punished just for not switching back to 2D fast enough? There is an item that allows you to stay in 3D for as long as you wish without getting hurt (except by enemy attacks, of course), but since you have to switch to 3D many times throughout the adventure, you should not need to be the victim of such a ridiculous idea in the first place.

Retracing Steps in Unfinished Worlds: Escaping from a world when you need to do so is a good idea. However, when the world in question is incomplete, you find yourself having to go through the same areas again just to get back to where you left off. Granted, the levels are not exactly the same as the first time around, as bosses will remain defeated and puzzles do not have to be repeated. However, you can still be forced to cover a lot of ground that you explored before. This is especially frustrating when you escape from a world just before fighting its boss only to have to go through a lot just to reach it again. Normal Mario games do not have you repeating levels just to get back to where you left off, so why did Super Paper Mario have to be any different?

Short Length: Doing everything in the game, including the side quests, can keep you busy for weeks. Completing the main adventure, on the other hand, can be done within a few short days. The other Paper Mario games had a nice, long length, but this one can be finished in a few sittings at best. It does not help that the game is not exactly hard, though there are still some tricky spots at times. Had some parts of the game been more challenging, or had more levels been added, we could have had a nice, long quest to save the world. I was not expecting a 100-hour adventure, but the lack of a long length is still disappointing.

Lack of Co-Star Sections: Not only are the co-stars not utilized much in the main adventure, but they do not experience a lot of action in between chapters. Previous Paper Mario games had some neat sections in between chapters where you took control of Peach and Bowser and found yourself in some awesome situations. Here, only two such sequences occur-one with Peach, the other as Luigi, both trying to escape from Castle Bleck-and they both happen early in the game. More extra sections would have been welcome, since without them, it makes this game feel even less like a Paper Mario game.

I really wanted to love Super Paper Mario, but for reasons such as those listed above, I felt that it was the weakest entry in the series. The features that I have mentioned could have easily been tweaked, even if it meant delaying the game for a while longer, but I guess Nintendo was itching to rush out a Mario game for the Wii for the sake of having their iconic plumber be the star of a game on the then-new console. Better Mario games would be released for the Wii...Super Mario Galaxy and New Super Mario Bros. Wii come to mind, and indeed, I have high hopes that Nintendo and Intelligent Systems will learn from their mistakes and make a Paper Mario game meant for the Wii from the get-go as solid as the first two games, if not even better. In the meantime, I declare that Super Paper Mario should never have been made the way it was, as it ended up being more mediocre than excellent.