Dear Master Malstrom,
I’d like to inform you of how Nintendo is pushing that same surprise agenda on its lesser known franchises – in this case, Paper Mario Sticker Star (3DS). Super Paper Mario can be dismissed as a spinoff, but they’re selling this game as a return to the main series – and of course, it retains the art style but none of the gameplay that made it attractive.
– No partners, levels, badges (equipment), no choice of attacks in the usual sense. There is no RPG strategy type gameplay left; minimal as it was in the first three games it was a large reason for playing. – The open world has been replaced by short levels ending in a goal. Presumably same reason as Galaxy: because exploration design is hard and bubble level design is easy. This will kill the feeling of taking on the role of Mario and saving the kingdom. – Huge emphasis on paper gimmick, both visually and in gameplay. The first game was actually a storybook style – Japanese title ‘Mario Story’ – and had nothing to do with paper other than cut-out characters like in a book. The later games emphasized the paper more and more, and now the whole game is about tearing, popping, floating, and as in the title stickers, which have replaced all normal gameplay
Rest assured Nintendo’s direction is not limited to doing a bait-and-switch on the core gameplay of Mario/Zelda/Metroid.
Interesting.
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