started playing paper mario for some reason
it’s ok so far (great music), but seems hardly a patch on the unimpeachable SMRPG
which is actually part of why i’ve never played it! was too disappointed that this took over the mario rpg niche from SMRPG
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My job at work involves me usually climbing a lot of ladders to fix shit, and hoo boy wow wow my thighs were killing me after that dang Ring Fit.
Booting it up today, it didn’t so much scold me as express concern that I didn’t do a cooldown session (I didn’t!) and that I may have gone at it too hard the day prior (I did!). It offered to take it down a notch, and the workout for today seemed, uh, a bit more reasonable. Dunno if the game’s health system is designed to detect when your exercise performance is irregular (and so the game pushes you to pace yourself and take a break) or what, but today’s whole thing was a lot shorter than yesterday’s.
It does seem like there’s a lot of smart stuff going on under the hood, though. The little Ring character encourages you to pace yourself, drink water between rep sessions, things like that. There’s also a sort of tool-tip thing going on at the bottom that gives really good layman’s descriptions of how to approach certain exercises.
I gotta invest in a yoga mat or something, because this thin carpet over a tile floor is murder on my feet and legs in general. I also probably need to recalibrate the leg strap Joycon or something, since knee press detection (and just jogging in general) is kinda wonky.
Bought some salmon and asparagus and broccoli that I’m gonna steam up for dinner tonight. That’s not exactly game related, that’s more “ah fuck I’m almost 33 and don’t wanna die” related. I’ll give myself points if I don’t fuck it up and make a good dinner, though.
Oh also uhhh I’m working through a bunch of stuff in Hitman 2. Of course.
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the game doesn’t want you to die because if you die then that makes nintendo look bad.
Hmm that’s fair.
I sure hope Mario would show up to my funeral, maybe give my grieving family and friends some refurbished 2DS systems with Nintendogs or something.
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I love Broccoli and Asparagus.
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I personally prefer Paper Mario over SMRPG because I like the aesthetic so much, and I sort of think SMRPG borders on ugly sometimes.
I am the person who likes the first Paper Mario better than the (universally loved) sequel though so my opinion is always a bit odd on these.
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I think those are both good opinions
Paper Mario also has a much better battle system
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I don’t think Thousand-Year Door versus the original was ever a settled issue on SB and adjacent sites. We never had a Killer 7 line for it, but folks had compelling arguments for both games as the superior installment.
i can definitely say the early-game pacing is way worse in PM than in SMRPG. takes forever to get going
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all of SMRPG / PM / PM2 are great, I think PM2 was impressive in 2004 in part because it was a very endearingly kitschy and fourth-wall-breaking work by nintendo/treehouse standards while still not going overboard into being cloying as they did with everything for a decade after
the script feels very “what we want to see out of jealous stewards of intellectual property” c. 2019 and as such kind of stands alone in 2004, but I don’t think it’s essential or anything
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thousand year door and a bunch of the handheld mario rpgs have horrible final bosses, like theyre 2873747822x harder than the rest of the game in a frustrating way. at least they figured out interesting battle systems
like snes mario rpg was doing A LOT with timed hits at the time (i played it before chrono trigger, and it made me think chrono trigger had timed hits too but no. crits are just random. leave child daphny alone). mario rpg also caps at level 30 which rules. short rpgs rule
i love turn based battles with a gimmick im such a sucker for timed hits or anything that mixes it up
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I really liked the battle system from Thousand Year Door, especially revving up the crowd for goodies. That was a lot of fun.
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OH YEAH THE AUDIENCE IN THAT GAME IS GREAT it really goes all in with games as theatre and it works!
I think SMRPG has by far the best music of the three, and I really like the totally weird license they take with the Mario canon. It really does feel like a hybrid between Mario and Final Fantasy both in worldbuilding and tone. It’s such an odd fusion, and I don’t think it really coheres, but that dissonance works for me in a big way.
I do remember absolutely loving PM2 when it came out though.
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I played Anthem.
And enjoyed it.
b&
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Yeah, I’ll give up the innovation all day to the SNES game, but it’s so much better-implemented in Paper Mario - marrying it with the tiny damage & HP numbers, and getting the shell-kicking and button-mash-fireball and hop minigames together is so key
i spent WAYYY too much time mastering the super jump in mario rpg
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TELL ME MORE
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