Never thought I wanted to play a turn-based Mario game but I actually ended up loving this and it's become one of my favourite in the franchise.
The music is excellent, the story never takes itself too seriously and is witty and pretty funny at times. The characters are charming and new ones like Geno and Mallow feel right at home. Throughout the game I found it funny and pretty sweet to find all the tiny details you never see in the typical games - Mario's house, the town surrounding Peach's castle. This game gave such character to things I never thought I needed or wanted out of a Mario game.
I also loved how typical platforming elements and enemies were used so cleverly. Mario can use a shell as a weapon and the game is full up with action-focused set pieces and one-off minigames that have a focus on fun rather than the typical grind of RPGs. My favourite part of this was probably how short and focused it was. There was no filler.
As for the combat, I loved having to time hits and how that could change the course of a battle, either giving you the leg up or putting you on the backfoot if you've not mastered your weapon yet. This kept the battles interesting to me all the way to the end and some of the boss fights were genuinely creative. Sometimes though I felt it was a little too easy. I rarely had to use items and towards the end of the game I felt almost invincible against regular enemies. The final boss gave me a run for my money though.
Overall it was great fun and I'm annoyed at myself for not getting to it sooner but I think they did a really loving job with the remaster and it was wonderful to see references to Zelda and Metroid. This was just the RPG I needed at the moment.
The music is excellent, the story never takes itself too seriously and is witty and pretty funny at times. The characters are charming and new ones like Geno and Mallow feel right at home. Throughout the game I found it funny and pretty sweet to find all the tiny details you never see in the typical games - Mario's house, the town surrounding Peach's castle. This game gave such character to things I never thought I needed or wanted out of a Mario game.
I also loved how typical platforming elements and enemies were used so cleverly. Mario can use a shell as a weapon and the game is full up with action-focused set pieces and one-off minigames that have a focus on fun rather than the typical grind of RPGs. My favourite part of this was probably how short and focused it was. There was no filler.
As for the combat, I loved having to time hits and how that could change the course of a battle, either giving you the leg up or putting you on the backfoot if you've not mastered your weapon yet. This kept the battles interesting to me all the way to the end and some of the boss fights were genuinely creative. Sometimes though I felt it was a little too easy. I rarely had to use items and towards the end of the game I felt almost invincible against regular enemies. The final boss gave me a run for my money though.
Overall it was great fun and I'm annoyed at myself for not getting to it sooner but I think they did a really loving job with the remaster and it was wonderful to see references to Zelda and Metroid. This was just the RPG I needed at the moment.