udivision said:

Miyamoto wanted to know if they could make the game only using characters from the established Super Mario universe (this is in refernce Sticker Star). After playing an early build of the Paper Mario 3DS, he said it felt too much like the GameCube game.


Here's the quote from Tanabe:


Some people would say the story and characters help separate Paper Mario and make it unique.

Click to expand...

Phu said:

Of all the abstract, wonky character designs in that game, you pick one of the really nice ones as an example.

Click to expand...

eXistor said:

It should be everyone's least favorite imo. It's still somewhat worth playing I think, but it's a tedious game. Sticker Star and especially Color Splash saved the franchise (I'm serious btw).

Click to expand...

eXistor said:

They did, they turned it into an adventure game. I hope they go even further with it for future games.

Click to expand...

eXistor said:

It should be everyone's least favorite imo. It's still somewhat worth playing I think, but it's a tedious game. Sticker Star and especially Color Splash saved the franchise (I'm serious btw).

Click to expand...

Aeana said:

I love this game. It was so cool to finally get another side-scrolling RPG at the time; it felt like there hadn't been a good one in quite a while at the time. Yes, it would've been nice to get another game like PM1 and 2, but this was a cool side experiment with hilarious writing.

Even if one doesn't like it, though, it boggles my mind how it would be seen as less preferable to Sticker Star or Color Splash. I know those two games have some fans, but I don't get it. Consumable actions and battles that don't give much in the way of rewards except more of those consumable actions or a means to get more of them. Zero sum isn't fun in pretty much any game as far as I'm concerned.

Click to expand...

udivision said:

Miyamoto wanted to know if they could make the game only using characters from the established Super Mario universe (this is in refernce Sticker Star). After playing an early build of the Paper Mario 3DS, he said it felt too much like the GameCube game.

Here's the quote from Tanabe [in 2012]: "Aside from wanting us to change the atmosphere a lot, there were two main things that Miyamoto-san said from the start of the project-"It's fine without a story, so do we really need one?" and "As much as possible, complete it with only characters from the Super Mario world."

Some people would say the story and characters help separate Paper Mario and make it unique.

Click to expand...

Franz Brötchen;227843350 said:

...Miyamoto having precious little regard for stories as major element of a game is known (and on a grander scale I personally agree extremely with that), so the quote is very believable: He apparently thinks that people like the game for the gameplay, and contrary to almost any other Nintendo franchise, this is just not true imo... this dialogue profits enormously from both a story and additional unique characters and those are therefore not a distraction but a crucial building block to the experience of the game. Still, his goal is... the foolish reduction to basics in order to focus on gameplay...

Click to expand...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Super_Mario_RPG
Yoshio Hongo of Nintendo explained the game's origins: "Square's RPGs sold well in Japan but not overseas. There have been calls from all ages, and from young girls, for another character to which they could become attached. Mario was the best, but had not been in an RPG. Nintendo's director, Mr. Miyamoto also wanted to do an RPG using Mario. There happened to be a chance for both companies to talk, which went well." The game was officially unveiled by both Mario creator and producer Shigeru Miyamoto and co-director Chihiro Fujioka at the 1995 V-Jump Festival event in Japan. Miyamoto led teams at Nintendo and Square, who spent over a year developing the graphics. The story takes place in a newly rendered Mushroom Kingdom based on the Super Mario Bros. Series... With guidance from Miyamoto, Square developed the game, combining role-playing aspects of previous Square games like Final Fantasy VI with the platforming elements of Nintendo's games....

Click to expand...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=krnl6LR7paA
”...I've never met someone who's so focused on trying to make things good, and he says both very focused feedback on particular gameplay items, and then at the same time he'll give you 10,000 [foot] overview of what he thinks of the feel and the spirit of the game. He'll be like, ‘I'm not sure if we're going too much in this direction, and I think the spirit of the game needs to go [in this] direction.' So you get both very specific feedback, on certain mechanics, and then at the same time, he would give very general feedback on the spirit of where everything's going. So, it was pretty awesome working with Mr. Miyamoto, and he did contribute [to Eternal Darkness] for sure..."

Click to expand...

Yarbskoo said:

If they went all in and actually managed to make a decent Paper Mario graphic adventure, I might actually be interested in the series again.

Just pick a genre, dammit.

Click to expand...

Click to expand...

eXistor said:

It should be everyone's least favorite imo. It's still somewhat worth playing I think, but it's a tedious game. Sticker Star and especially Color Splash saved the franchise (I'm serious btw).

Click to expand...

Schopenhauerian said:

Miyamoto was apparently involved with the original Super Mario RPG (1996), which obviously had a heavy emphasis on story, as well as a large number of new characters:


Miyamoto also apparently had something of a hands-on role with Eternal Darkness:


Given that Miyamoto has previously been OK with story in games, in at least a few high-profile instances, I am curious if there were developments/events that might have contributed to a change/hardening of his views, on this matter.

Does anyone have any info on this? The reaction to the bad story/characterization in Metroid: Other M was quite strong, for example, so I would imagine that could have played a role.

Click to expand...

SolVanderlyn said:

I thought it was right up there with PM and TTYD. The change in gameplay didn't even bother me.

Sticker Star and Color Splash don't know what they want to be. SPM is a platformer RPG, and I feel comfortable putting it under the RPG umbrella. SS and CS are... something else, like they're stuck in a limbo that isn't anything. Turn based battles with no numbers? Either be an RPG or don't. Color Splash brought back good writing, but they need to do something about the gameplay in this series.

Click to expand...

Miyamoto was apparently involved with the original Super Mario RPG (1996), which obviously had a heavy emphasis on story, as well as a large number of new characters:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Super_Mario_RPG
"Yoshio Hongo of Nintendo explained the game's origins: 'Square's RPGs sold well in Japan but not overseas. There have been calls from all ages, and from young girls, for another character to which they could become attached. Mario was the best, but had not been in an RPG. Nintendo's director, Mr. Miyamoto also wanted to do an RPG using Mario. There happened to be a chance for both companies to talk, which went well.' The game was officially unveiled by both Mario creator and producer Shigeru Miyamoto and co-director Chihiro Fujioka at the 1995 V-Jump Festival event in Japan. Miyamoto led teams at Nintendo and Square, who spent over a year developing the graphics. The story takes place in a newly rendered Mushroom Kingdom based on the Super Mario Bros. Series... With guidance from Miyamoto, Square developed the game, combining role-playing aspects of previous Square games like Final Fantasy VI with the platforming elements of Nintendo's games..."

Click to expand...

Miyamoto also apparently had something of a hands-on role with Eternal Darkness:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=krnl6LR7paA
”...I've never met someone who's so focused on trying to make things good, and he says both very focused feedback on particular gameplay items, and then at the same time he'll give you 10,000 [foot] overview of what he thinks of the feel and the spirit of the game. He'll be like, ‘I'm not sure if we're going too much in this direction, and I think the spirit of the game needs to go [in this] direction.' So you get both very specific feedback, on certain mechanics, and then at the same time, he would give very general feedback on the spirit of where everything's going. So, it was pretty awesome working with Mr. Miyamoto, and he did contribute [to Eternal Darkness] for sure..."

Given that Miyamoto has previously been OK with story in games, in at least a few high-profile instances, I am curious if there were developments/events that might have contributed to a change/hardening of his views, on this matter. Does anyone have any info on this? The reaction to the bad story/characterization in Metroid: Other M was quite strong, for example, so I would imagine that could have played a role.

Click to expand...

A Link to the Past said:

Eternal Darkness is Eternal Darkness though, Mario is Mario. Super Mario RPG works as an exception since it is a third-party-developed title (and from a developer that makes a lot of important games for the platform). Another example was Super Mario Galaxy 2 - the developers had to sneak story into the first game in the form of Rosalina's story time. Miyamoto specifically sought to prevent a repeat of this in the sequel. If you've ever heard the phrase "upended the tea table," it came from a Galaxy 2 interview with Miyamoto.

Click to expand...

https://www.wired.com/2009/06/super-mario-galaxy-2/
--”I'd like to go with as little story as possible," [Miyamoto] said. ”I've always felt that the Mario games themselves aren't particularly suited to having a very heavy story."

--”I just feel that the Mario games are something that should be a much more bright and active experience," [Miyamoto] said. ”With the Mario games, you don't need to have such a complicated setting where you have these particular characters with complicated backstories that can weigh down the bright and fun feel of the game."

--”I feel that even if all that you have is that the villain is just simply a villain and you fight them, and you throw them down, and you find out, well, that wasn't such a bad villain after all, that's enough story for ultimately what is just about a very fun experience," [Miyamoto] added.

--”Mr. Koizumi is the type of person who, whenever we're working on a new Mario game, he always wants to bring more story elements into it, as he did with Super Mario Galaxy. But in talking with him this time, he agrees and feels that with Galaxy 2, there won't be a need for as deep of a story," Miyamoto said.

--But does he really agree with his boss, or has Koizumi just been overruled? In an interview with Wired.com in 2007, Koizumi said that he's been trying to sneak bits of story into Mario and Zelda games for his entire career at Nintendo, even as Miyamoto has been trying to keep them out. I told Miyamoto about what Koizumi had said, and he looked slightly taken aback...

Click to expand...

NeoGC said:

I really enjoyed SPM's efforts to strip down the more in-depth RPG mechanics of PM and TTYD, and still incorporate them into what is basically a sidescrolling platformer.

The script in SPM is really some of the best writing the series has had, in my opinion -- and definitely had some memorable moments. (Like Francis' castle -- with that line everyone always refers to.)

Of course, I think Thousand Year Door really is the pinnacle of the Paper Mario games.

It seems to me that, when the Mario and Luigi games began getting sequels, the Paper Mario series began experimenting and moving away from it's RPG roots. Now we have Mario and Luigi as the pretty constant "RPG Mario" series, and Paper Mario as the more exploratory series.

I haven't played the 3DS games, but it seems that the Mario and Luigi series hasn't changed all *that* much over installments; at least, not in the same way Paper Mario has.

Click to expand...