I swear this had little to do with the upcoming remake. I played paper mario 64 2 years ago and then procrastinated with the sequel. ANYWAYS. About as good as the first, but for fairly different reasons?
Ttyd has a much stronger world and cast than the first game. Rogueport, the X-Nauts, the new partners, the pianta mafia, the linebeck ass dude, all have such distinct personality and flare that carries the whole experience. Ttyd is also much, much longer than the first game, which at first scared me, but then made me appreciate the journey a lot more, so that's neat.
To counterbalance all that goodwill, however, thousand year door brings a couple of stinks that weren't present in 64. The shitty backtracking is certainly one of them, but also, like, a really sloppy difficulty curve. Chapter 7 was a breeze, almost chapter 1 level difficult, and then chapter 8 woops my ass, whereas 64 was a nice, even, linear graph. Besides I just have to dock points for the 10 minute unskippable cutscene WITH DIALOGUE PROMPTS in the final boss.
But other than that, ykno, it's a perfectly fun rpg. The combat is good, the presentation is tight, and that's that. I still prefer Mario & Luigi over Paper Mario, but I guess it's easier to adopt the stance of "Both, both is good"

This game came out during an era where it seemed every single player Nintendo game was padded for length. TTYD is no exception. Even if we assume the designers had no desire to artificially pad the runtime, the game just doesn't feel like it used its space well. Twilight town and the train are two particularly bad examples. What's most frustrating about these are that they have really interesting setups, but most of the gameplay was walking from one place to another.

I do think that the designers had a playtime in mind they were shooting for and designed the limited content they had in a way to achieve that goal. Most of this comes down to level design and I think this game would be significantly improved if they reworked some of the levels to quicken the pace overall. Maybe this will be done in the switch remake, but I am not holding my breath.

It is baffling to me that Nintendo had found the absolute perfect balance for their Paper Mario games in character variety, fun combat, an engaging and investing story, and really unique levels and gimmicks, and they just never bothered to ever do something similar again.

There is a reason why this title is loved. It has everything you could possibly want in an RPG. It has a great sense of humor and it is fun and unique from start to finish.

I played it over 10 years ago and it is still fresh in my mind to this day. Amazing game.

What are the odds that the best game Mario has ever been in is not developed by Nintendo? It is the perfect Mario RPG, perfectly demonstrating how E/E10+ games should be written. It tells a fantastic story with a stellar cast of characters, despite being a Mario game. It has one of the best OSTs ever for a video game, with some of the most fun turn based combat ever. The badge system allows for a nearly endless amount of options in battle without ever making it too overwhelming to the player. Each chapter is like a story within itself, with each of them being interesting with distinct and imaginative settings. The best being chapter 3, where Mario finds himself in a wrestling league and uncovers the secrets behind the league. The game provides the perfect amount of challenge for an entry level JRPG. Paper Mario TTYD is formerly my favorite game of all time, and was the best game in existence upon its release.