Finished Super Mario RPG at 15 hours. It was way shorter than I thought even for SNES RPG standards but also after playing a bunch of complex and deep RPGs lately, something so simple, fun, and lighthearted as Super Mario RPG was such a refreshing change of pace. This was a game I wanted to play for years but I never got around to it, so I'm going into the game as a newcomer.
The overall story is quite simple. it's just Mario with friends embarking on a journey to find the seven stars to restore the Star Road that grants wishes and defeats Smithy who has taken over Boswer's Keep to start an invasion with weapons. While the grand scheme of things is your run-of-the-mill Mario adventure, it's the whole journey to find the seven stars that are the whole highlight of the adventure.
I honestly found the game much more enjoyable than expected because it just doesn't take itself seriously at all. Throughout the game, Super Mario RPG is filled with silly slapstick humor, over-the-top exaggerations, and villains with pretty selfish but goofy motivations. Such as Booster kidnapping and wanting to marry Peach for whatever reason. And he isn't exactly the brightest bulb in the shed, so his shortcomings were entertaining to watch, to say the least.
Super Mario RPG is just a game filled with so much fun, color, and charm, from the various settings and characters featured in the Mario series to the soundtrack composed by Yoko Shimomura to compliment the mood. However, what gives the game its identity is the fusion between the turn-based combat and the platforming, puzzling, and minigames known in Mario during exploration.
Minigames were fairly common in RPGs for its time period but Super Mario RPG uses its strengths from the series' history to create brief challenges for Mario to overcome such as navigating a mine tunnel with controls similar to Mario Kart or hopping over barrels and avoiding enemies that pay homage to its Donkey Kong origins. Personally, I wasn't a fan of the platforming at all, I just find the controls too slippy and it doesn't work as well because of the isometric perspective. But considering the original game serves as the bridge between 2D and 3D Mario, perhaps I could be a bit forgiving.
However, for much of the game, the gameplay lies within the turn-based combat every time you encounter an enemy.
Super Mario RPG takes much of the RPG elements from known Square RPGs from the SNES era such as Final Fantasy IV-VI and Chrono Trigger. Attacks, spells, and item management are all present. But what is unique in Super Mario RPG is the timing-based input for attacks and special abilities. If the input is timed correctly, the potency of the attack or special ability will increase. It's such a kinetic mechanic that it's single-handedly the one thing that prevents the otherwise very easy and simple combat from being stale and boring.
Overall, I don't have many complaints about Super Mario RPG. Besides the iffy platforming and while much of the game's narrative has aged wonderfully compared to its contemporaries thanks to having a simple approach to the story. There are still minor gaps in the story that I have noticed that were unexplained and Geno in particular was oddly silent compared to the other playable characters (I don't know if he is written that way on purpose or not).
Otherwise, it's a game filled with so much color and charm and it does not overstay its welcome at all. Mario is usually at its best when it just wants to show a player a fun and good time without taking a long time to do so and Super Mario RPG does that very well. I understand why this game is very belove
The overall story is quite simple. it's just Mario with friends embarking on a journey to find the seven stars to restore the Star Road that grants wishes and defeats Smithy who has taken over Boswer's Keep to start an invasion with weapons. While the grand scheme of things is your run-of-the-mill Mario adventure, it's the whole journey to find the seven stars that are the whole highlight of the adventure.
I honestly found the game much more enjoyable than expected because it just doesn't take itself seriously at all. Throughout the game, Super Mario RPG is filled with silly slapstick humor, over-the-top exaggerations, and villains with pretty selfish but goofy motivations. Such as Booster kidnapping and wanting to marry Peach for whatever reason. And he isn't exactly the brightest bulb in the shed, so his shortcomings were entertaining to watch, to say the least.
Super Mario RPG is just a game filled with so much fun, color, and charm, from the various settings and characters featured in the Mario series to the soundtrack composed by Yoko Shimomura to compliment the mood. However, what gives the game its identity is the fusion between the turn-based combat and the platforming, puzzling, and minigames known in Mario during exploration.
Minigames were fairly common in RPGs for its time period but Super Mario RPG uses its strengths from the series' history to create brief challenges for Mario to overcome such as navigating a mine tunnel with controls similar to Mario Kart or hopping over barrels and avoiding enemies that pay homage to its Donkey Kong origins. Personally, I wasn't a fan of the platforming at all, I just find the controls too slippy and it doesn't work as well because of the isometric perspective. But considering the original game serves as the bridge between 2D and 3D Mario, perhaps I could be a bit forgiving.
However, for much of the game, the gameplay lies within the turn-based combat every time you encounter an enemy.
Super Mario RPG takes much of the RPG elements from known Square RPGs from the SNES era such as Final Fantasy IV-VI and Chrono Trigger. Attacks, spells, and item management are all present. But what is unique in Super Mario RPG is the timing-based input for attacks and special abilities. If the input is timed correctly, the potency of the attack or special ability will increase. It's such a kinetic mechanic that it's single-handedly the one thing that prevents the otherwise very easy and simple combat from being stale and boring.
Overall, I don't have many complaints about Super Mario RPG. Besides the iffy platforming and while much of the game's narrative has aged wonderfully compared to its contemporaries thanks to having a simple approach to the story. There are still minor gaps in the story that I have noticed that were unexplained and Geno in particular was oddly silent compared to the other playable characters (I don't know if he is written that way on purpose or not).
Otherwise, it's a game filled with so much color and charm and it does not overstay its welcome at all. Mario is usually at its best when it just wants to show a player a fun and good time without taking a long time to do so and Super Mario RPG does that very well. I understand why this game is very belove