# Chapter Select, [[S1E2 - Paper Mario - The Origami King]] Transcript This transcription was completed on March 4, 2026 with the application MacWhisper on macOS. This was done automatically, without human input during the transcription process. The transcription used the Parakeet v3 model. My hope is that by offering this transcription – however accurate it may be done by a machine learning/AI – will help you, the listener. I’d love to offer full, proper transcription some day, but that is not feasible at this time. Thank you for listening and reading. I hope you enjoy the show and that this document was helpful. Enjoy. --- Hello everybody and welcome back to Chapter Select Season 1 episode number 2 where we are continuing our dive into Paper Mario. *00:00* My name is Logan Moore, and joining me today, as always, is Max Roberts. *00:07* Hi Max. *00:13* Hey Logan, now you rightfully get to say that phrase. *00:14* Your your phrase, you get to say it now. *00:18* The line that I kind of started by *00:21* habit in all of our other previous podcasting adventures. *00:23* It's like intro comfort food, you know? *00:27* Yeah, it's it's what you lean on when you don't know how to do a podcast intro because you haven't done a podcast intro in so long. *00:30* So *00:36* Um yeah, so as as mentioned, this is uh Chapter Select. *00:37* This is our ongoing series or ongoing podcast series, which is seasonal, which is *00:40* different and is something I'm still getting used to. *00:46* It's weird that we've they're like recording episodes of this and not releasing them and not even even really telling people that we're doing this. *00:49* This is different for me. *00:55* It is a top secret project that will be revealed to all. *00:57* Yeah, so uh if you're not familiar, if you haven't listened to episode one, uh in this show, we bounce back and forth between games in a given video game series, or hey, maybe other pieces of *01:01* media in the future. *01:11* And we talk about the nitty-gritty details of those video games. *01:12* So for example, last episode we talked about *01:17* Paper Mario. *01:20* Uh this first season is obviously all on Paper Mario, so last time around you heard us talk about the original game in the series. *01:21* Uh episode two today. *01:27* We're going to be talking about Paper Mario the Origami King, which is the most recent installment in the series. *01:28* It released last year in 2020. *01:34* It's the same day as *01:37* Ghost of Tsushima. *01:40* Yeah, it's Ghost of Tsushima Paper Mario Day. *01:41* Just like Duman Animal Crossing. *01:45* One of those games was a well, I don't know how I feel about each of those games now that I played both of them. *01:47* Uh uh So today we're gonna be talking about Paper Mario the Origami King. *01:53* Uh as mentioned we go back and forth, so if you are looking at this show in your podcasting feed, you're gonna see that uh we start with the original game and then we go to the most recent and then we go back in time back to the *01:57* One that came out second uh to the original, blah blah blah. *02:07* Meet in the middle. *02:10* Back forth, back and forth. *02:11* Meet in the middle. *02:12* So we're going back and forth so that we can try to see *02:13* how these franchises stack up from their inception to their most recent iterations and then see how they evolved over that span of time. *02:15* Uh with Paper Mario the Origami King *02:23* though. *02:26* As mentioned, this game lost the launched last year on July 17th, 2020. *02:27* It was developed by Intelligent Systems. *02:32* It released on the Nintendo Switch. *02:34* And the game directors were, this is the interesting part of this, uh Masahiko Nagaya. *02:36* Uh the producers were Kinsuke Tanab Tanabe and Atsushi Ikuno, and the music was by Yoshido Sekigawa. *02:41* And then I assume those are additional composers below that. *02:50* Additional composing credits by Sho Murakami, Yoshiaki Kimura, Hiroki Morishida, and Fumihiro Isobe. *02:54* Good job. *03:04* J honestly, Japanese names are how they s they are what they look like. *03:05* So they're usually not too difficult. *03:10* As two Americans who don't speak. *03:12* Really a lick of Span or Spanish. *03:14* A lick of Japanese beyond um Miyamoto and Sakurai and Kojima sounded pretty good to me, Kojima. *03:17* Um Kensuke Tanabe. *03:26* Uh critically, the game uh averaged an 80 out of 100 over on Metacritic. *03:29* So uh *03:37* That would be a uh I don't I don't know what other people's scales are. *03:38* I feel like eight to eight to nine range is usually like great on most people's scales or very good. *03:42* Uh seven range is usually good, eight is usually *03:48* Six is okay, five is fine and down the floor. *03:52* I mean, those are the scales I'm used to working off of in my video game critic career, and I feel like that's typically what it is for many others across the industry. *03:55* Except for I guess *04:04* I I go off a five-point scale now, which is totally different in some regards because like I feel like a 3. *04:05* 5 *04:12* out of five or a three out of five like a three out of five is like uh yeah it's like three out of five that's a pretty good score and then like you look at it blown up on Metacritic it's like six out of ten. *04:13* This guy hated this game. *04:22* It's like well it's not bad. *04:23* Three out of five is good. *04:25* Six out of ten, I don't know. *04:26* Um, so it's it's bizarre working on a smaller scale now. *04:27* Anyway, Paper Mario the Origami King. *04:31* This is an interesting one because um *04:34* I guess just to be upfront with you, the listener, Max and I have been playing this game for the past few weeks now. *04:37* Max beat this game far before I did. *04:42* I actually just beat it yesterday as of the day we're recording this. *04:44* Um, but we have been very, very quiet about our thoughts on this one. *04:48* I there I can't recall a game *04:53* uh that I've wanted to talk to you about more that I've I haven't expressed how I feel. *04:56* And it's very intentional because it's it's for the show. *05:04* But I have I sent you like blocked out pages of how long my notes were. *05:08* It is Ugh *05:14* I have a lot to say. *05:16* I mean we've we've talked a uh we we've thrown out some opinions here and there about some things, but they've been very brief and most more *05:18* Most of our conversations back and forth about this game have just been like, oh hey, I I passed this part or I I finished the third le world. *05:27* I finished the fourth world. *05:34* Okay, I'm done with the game now. *05:35* Like it has just been like *05:36* Uh mile markers telling each other where we're at in the game without any additional commentary. *05:39* I think I threw you an R. *05:44* I. *05:45* P. *05:45* insert character here and there somewhere, and that was about it. *05:46* That was pretty good. *05:49* But yeah, so our discussion on this one is very much going to be us discussing and digging into the origami king. *05:52* In a very raw manner this time around because we have, I assume, many thoughts between the two of us for this. *06:00* I'm curious, the last like Paper Mario game I I tried *06:06* Bus besides the N64 one that we did for episode one here, I th I dabbled in sticker star in high school. *06:11* I borrowed it from a friend and and played a few levels. *06:18* But I haven't touched Paper Mario since. *06:21* Have you? *06:24* Are you the same? *06:25* No, I'm the same way. *06:26* So like when Sticker Star, I remember the hype around Sticker Star. *06:27* So *06:30* Super Paper Mario I played a little bit, but it was like obviously like, oh, this one's way different. *06:31* And then with Sticker Star, that was when they brought it back after it had been I feel like it had been *06:36* what, four or five years maybe between those two. *06:41* Something like that. *06:43* Um and it was the excitement around sticker star of like, oh this one's like a turn based RPG mechanics and stuff like that. *06:44* And people got really hyped that they were returning to that format after Super Paper Mario. *06:50* And so I was excited for that game. *06:54* And then when I heard it wasn't great, I was like, alright, I'm just gonna steer clear then. *06:56* Um same thing with Color Splash. *07:00* When I heard that that one wasn't super amazing, I steered clear once again. *07:02* So Oregon King is the first one I have played in full since I played Thousand Year Door like 15 years ago. *07:05* Um *07:15* And I too. *07:16* Yeah. *07:17* So with that in mind, okay, we're we're gonna get into the very specifics of all this. *07:18* I'm curious just where you are is in a general sense on this game. *07:25* Like top down, how do you feel about it? *07:28* Fine? *07:31* Yeah. *07:31* It has it has I think it actually does have *07:32* A lot of things I I would highly compliment, you know, off top of the dome, the visuals, the music, that sort of stuff. *07:37* But by God, this gameplay it can be a real slog. *07:43* And the n the narrative when you when you come from uh Thousand Year Door and even uh the original *07:49* This plot is like real bad. *07:59* And I'm not looking at Paper Mario Origami King for *08:03* you know, b a fantastic moving plot that is really gonna suck me in here, but I want something a bit more than what they offered. *08:08* And can we just get into can we get into uh well, I don't know if you want into spoilers right now. *08:16* I don't know what kind of thing. *08:22* The whole show's about spoilers. *08:23* The whole show's spoilers. *08:25* Okay. *08:26* Let's uh Yeah, I mean touching on the story specifically, I mean, and this is just off the top of my head now because I finished the game. *08:26* I I finished the game like basically within the past twenty-four hours. *08:34* When I got to the very end and Ollie kind of reveals why he is evil and wants to cover the world, he's like *08:37* There's writing on me! *08:44* Somebody wrote on me! *08:45* How dare they? *08:46* And then there his sister's like, oh the writing, it says, I hope you have a good life or something dumb like that. *08:48* He's like, oh it was a nice message. *08:54* It was like *08:57* This guy's trying to kill everybody because he's got scribbles on him. *08:57* He doesn't even know what the scribbles say. *09:01* It's like, uh I wrote I wrote in my notes. *09:03* Ollie wants to erase all toads because he was scribbled on by a toad *09:09* Good gravy. *09:16* That is the evil plot. *09:19* It's not get the star wand and take everyone's wishes. *09:20* They don't even really contextualize that until the very end, too. *09:24* Like that was the thing I found w most was most baffling is like *09:27* You're playing this entire video game and you don't know why this guy is bad outside of the fact that he's just like, oh, I want to fold everybody. *09:31* It was almost better not knowing. *09:40* And just that Ollie was just evil for evil's sake and just wanted to fold all of the paper. *09:42* It was that was actually better than the emotional in quotes moment at the end where he goes. *09:48* I was written on by a toe. *09:57* As he's like crumpled up and he's like, Please fold me in T Thousandth Orgami Crane. *10:01* Yeah, Ollie is uh I mean in my brief notes I wrote down before we started the show, I wrote, uh story isn't great, villains' motivations are dumb. *10:10* Like, and again, yeah, I mean this is Paper Mario. *10:23* We're not expecting some grand storytelling epic on the level of, you know, Last of Us, God of War, whatever. *10:26* Um *10:32* But I will say that original games had a bit more meat on the bones here, and they were a bit more engaging. *10:33* Yes. *10:41* Uh it was very much and I think that's kind of um *10:41* I I we can lead into a discussion on this too because what's weird is the writing in this game conversely is pretty good. *10:46* Like the writing in this game is fun sometime. *10:55* I wanna I wanna *10:58* It's hit and miss. *10:59* It's very hit and miss. *11:00* There are jokes that but they they shoot a lot of material at you very fast. *11:02* There's a lot of riding in this game. *11:06* And it's it's hit what sticks to the wall. *11:07* You know, you're throwing at the wall what sticks *11:10* And it hits and it misses. *11:12* Like uh there's some really good like one-off scenes that just kind of come out of nowhere. *11:15* Like uh *11:20* One yesterday which I didn't really like in the moment because I was trying to finish the game, but in hindsight I was like, okay, that was actually pretty good. *11:21* It's when you're trying to find the rainbow spa and all of a sudden you end up on a shy guy game show and it's like what the heck is going on here? *11:27* That and then the scene with the sniffet who is like, oh, you gotta guess the expression on my face or whatever. *11:35* Yeah, like there's a lot of like really good one off moments in in the game like that. *11:45* But yeah, as as quickly as they arrive, they're almost over, and then it is trying to toss new *11:49* things at you and uh not all of them land so in some senses like I'm not surprised at the overarching story *11:56* is like the narrative thrust and why you're doing this. *12:04* I'm I'm not really shocked that it didn't turn out, I guess, but like for a game that is so writing heavy, I can't believe they couldn't figure out *12:07* Something that was a little bit like better. *12:16* Like it came off to me. *12:20* Um it came off to me like when I used to make movies with my friends back in high school. *12:22* Like we would do *12:28* We would film these movies and they would be pretty funny, honestly, but we didn't have any script for them and we were just like making it all up off the top of our heads. *12:29* And we would w yeah, we were just totally ad-lipping. *12:39* And we were just *12:41* Yeah, flying by the seat of our pants and just whatever came out came out. *12:42* And when we watch it back and we'd splice them together, some of it would be hilarious and we're like, wow, can't believe how well that turned out and then the other some of it would turn out to be terrible. *12:45* And it was it's like they *12:53* somehow did that with a video game? *12:55* Like I'm not really sure how. *12:58* Like the whole thing just feels thrown together like there was no *12:59* uh I don't want to say quality control. *13:03* Like there was no just whatever was written was written and no one else was gonna look it over or give it another idea. *13:05* It's like nope, this is what uh *13:12* This is what uh Johnson over in writing wrote, so we're this is what we're going with. *13:14* Um It was almost like they took the script and and divided it amongst a team. *13:18* And then everyone wrote individually and then they just put it all together. *13:23* I mean there is an overarching, I think, kind of overall tone to the game. *13:27* Um with Olivia's kind of *13:32* ignorance, you know, the cutesy ignorance of just exploring the world and uh certain characters you meet like Bobby or even the professor, like they have a consistent *13:36* tone for each of them. *13:47* And even Luigi. *13:48* Luigi's, you know, little bit in the game was awesome. *13:49* I thought kind of one running gag. *13:53* Yeah. *13:55* Yeah. *13:56* He had better gags than Thousand Year Door. *13:56* It's yeah, I I I think that's a good way to describe it. *13:58* Is that the writing felt very segmented, and I think the reason for that is um is we're talking about how like the different characters have these different vibes to them or whatever, but the *14:01* And I know this is something that we'll talk about more once we play Super Paper Mario and even Thousand Year Door and uh Color Splash and all the others. *14:10* Um *14:20* But the voice of the Paper Mario series is something that I know has very much been evolving from the initial game. *14:20* And when we talked about the initial game *14:28* Um, I remember that we touched on how like the writing was funny and it was witty and there were good moments in it, but it wasn't always like *14:30* It didn't have those like standout hilarious moments that we know some of the other games do in the in the series. *14:39* Um And so I feel like they've got such a beat on what the voice and tone of these games are now that rather than having *14:44* a couple distinctive voice uh people like at the studio work on them. *14:53* Like it very much felt like a some an amalgamation of a lot of people who understand the tone of the Paper Mario series. *14:56* And it's like, okay, you guys know how we write these things. *15:03* Go just r go just write a ton just write a ton of content and we'll and we'll throw it all in there. *15:07* I do I do think that the individual *15:12* environments had a more cohesive nature to them and but they overall didn't necessarily fit together. *15:17* Like they were *15:25* Almost like puzzle pieces that kind of fit together and you if you push it hard enough the it'll look like it's done, but it doesn't quite fit just right because *15:25* uh at the end in the hot springs in the sky. *15:34* Like I really enjoyed the the Bowser Jr. *15:37* camic and camics kind of subplot of no one appreciates me, I'm a I'm an eternal servant. *15:40* Like that was overall good, but where does that fit overall and how does this tie in? *15:46* And it really in the end it doesn't *15:53* really matter. *15:56* Or even Bobby's kind of Bobby almost has two plots where b the first part, the first streamer is *15:56* I have no memory. *16:06* I don't want to do anything. *16:07* I'm just going to do something. *16:08* Oh, I saw fireworks, I remember. *16:09* And then it he goes on to this *16:12* I was in battle. *16:15* Like this like soldier with PTSD and I have to save Olivia. *16:17* And there's like a tonal shift there. *16:22* I actually his sacrifice kinda came out of nowhere in the sense of *16:24* I will blow up. *16:28* I had a feeling that's what was coming, 'cause when he was like when the rock came down and she was stuck under it, uh *16:29* And he was like, I know what I must do, but I d i uh he says something like early on, I was like, is this guy gonna blow himself off or he's like trust me Mario, you have to join me *16:37* Which in it's kind of funny that they put so much emphasis on that considering since we just came from the first game, you literally have a party member that can blow themselves up unlimited times throughout the course of that game with uh *16:46* What's her name? *16:58* Bomb Bed or whatever? *16:59* Yeah, and same thing with uh isn't it Bomb Bombabari? *17:00* Bobbery. *17:04* Yeah, and Thousand Years. *17:05* They just can blow themselves up at will. *17:07* So I don't know if all of these I don't understand how the Paper Mario lore in the world fits together, but uh yeah. *17:09* Uh let's talk about let's get away from story and writing and all that stuff a little bit. *17:16* Um *17:22* Unless you had more to say about the world aspects, I guess. *17:22* I guess we were talking about that a little. *17:25* I mean, narratively, I *17:28* But the I also just didn't feel like there was a lot of extras stuff to dig into. *17:30* These worlds didn't really feel lived in. *17:36* The closest maybe was the temple in Picnic Park where the Koopas would worship this clearly fake *17:38* Cut out of a of a turtle. *17:45* Like that was that built like some level of the world, but the rest was really *17:47* There wasn't life to it was like yeah, and uh all the toads you'd save they'd be like, oh cool, I'm heading back to toad. *17:53* They were all generic regular toads. *17:59* Yeah, and some of them would have good one-liners, you know, when you b when you smash an um smash them or flatten them or whatever the heck or when you find them. *18:02* Um *18:10* But yeah, it was very that was something else I was gonna bring up maybe a little bit later but yeah these all the areas of the game that you go to very empty there's nothing really to do um *18:11* Not that there's typically a ton of side content that I can think of in any of the Paper Mario games. *18:22* Again, we're gonna be playing all of them, so we'll find out soon enough, but *18:29* I mean in the ones I have even played, like Thousand Drawer, there's not a ton to do off the beaten path. *18:33* Well even in 64, I mean there were side quests in the desert and like *18:38* you could do the battle at the dojo and get your dojo mastercard and Yeah. *18:44* For a while we thought finding the magic seeds was a side quest and *18:48* There's a cookbook. *18:52* Like there were other things, optional thing, the pigs, like there were things you could deliver mail, all this other stuff that kind of just fleshed out the world. *18:54* Delivering the mail. *19:02* you could you would learn these characters and their interactions and the and this this uh cheap cheap or this Yoshi on the island knew this toad at the train station and their kids interact like *19:04* It just felt all connected and and origami king feels very segmented in you are in the great sea and that is all you're doing. *19:16* You're in the spa in the sky. *19:25* Um you're out in the mountain, like it the world didn't feel joined together. *19:27* Shingri spa. *19:32* Just like the uncharted locale. *19:33* Um Yeah, I I I agree with you. *19:36* It it's a very *19:39* It it all the avenues are very pretty to look at and but they're all very kind of disjointed from one another and there doesn't feel like this consistent uh *19:42* Yeah, there's just a lack of consistency within the world itself. *19:50* Um, even coming back to Toad Town, like when they mentioned Toad Town early on, I was like, oh, are we gonna go back to like the Toad Town? *19:53* Like from the first Paper Mario game? *20:01* Like that was the first thing that kind of crossed my mind and *20:02* It wasn't, but uh and again like this is like a twenty year old franchise. *20:04* Like they don't need to it doesn't all have to be connected. *20:09* Yeah, it doesn't have to all be the same thing. *20:11* But uh yeah, even tying back to the old games, um, or the Infinite Game. *20:14* Did you have a desire to explore Toad Town at all? *20:19* Because I didn't. *20:21* I once I had freed it from the the paper mache goombas *20:22* I really didn't explore Togetown. *20:27* I poked around a little bit, but not a lot. *20:29* Um like there were a couple areas I knew that like the game was telling me, like, oh hey, you can probably get in over here and *20:32* Just never really tried. *20:40* I I don't know. *20:41* Like again, it was like incentivizing? *20:42* I was gonna say incentivization, but I don't think that's a thing, is it? *20:47* I don't think that's a word *20:50* Incentivise I would they're incentivizing you. *20:51* I don't think the game incentivized me. *20:55* Incentivization? *20:57* What am I oh *20:58* Yeah, there's really no need to ever go off the beaten path in the game, I felt like, other than, oh, you found a toad. *20:59* And then when you found a toad, it's like, oh, you unlock. *21:04* art of the places you've been in the museum or something like that. *21:08* And same thing with the collectibles too. *21:11* Like you unlock this collectible of a thing you already saw in the game. *21:13* It's like *21:17* I mean okay, that's kind of nice, I guess. *21:18* Like I I just didn't understand why Yeah *21:21* Very huge lack of things to do in this game outside of, you know, just see the story through to the end, which is fine. *21:26* Some games are like that, I guess, but I don't know. *21:31* What made it hard made it hard to get through at times, I will say. *21:35* Um let's talk about *21:40* I mean we're kind of talking about I was gonna say let's talk about gameplay, but that's gonna open a whole king of worms. *21:43* It is. *21:48* Let's do visuals because we're already kind of you already kind of touched on this, how the game *21:48* at least looks very pretty. *21:53* Um which it does, yes. *21:54* Um they very much play up that paper art style far more than they did in the uh original game by comparison's sake. *21:57* Yes. *22:06* And that's *22:06* partially because they bring into the fold pun intended with all the origami stuff. *22:07* So then you've got that all coming to play and then you've got *22:13* Some of the different bosses and things like that. *22:17* I I thought they did some interesting thing and fun things with. *22:19* Um So yeah, I I I think the design in the game, the visuals are all very *22:23* Nice for the most part. *22:28* It reminds me more of Kirby and the Rainbow Curse, the Clay Mation Wii U game. *22:31* Than something like Yoshi's Woolly World or Epic Yarn or what that game's called. *22:40* It uses the materials *22:47* Of like you can tell it's paper, but it's it's not real world arts and crafts objects except for the bosses. *22:49* It is it's made of paper, but it's not, here's a paper plate and um the little fuzzy wire, like *22:58* Yoshi is. *23:05* It's more using a material to create an art style in a world. *23:06* And I think that actually is a real benefit to this game, and I think it'll help it. *23:10* It looks good. *23:14* It's a good looking game. *23:15* uh and I think that'll help it over time, but the the bosses, the the pencils, the stapler, the rubber bands, and so on completely pull me out of it *23:16* I'm just like, I am fighting office supplies. *23:27* And I don't want to fight office supplies. *23:30* I want to fight um, you know, tubba bubba. *23:31* I want to fight *23:35* Mario villains and it that just falls so flat for me and it they stick out like a sore thumb and *23:38* I don't like it. *23:46* I like the tape was basically like a Italian mob boss. *23:47* I thought that was He was the boss I th said that you were gonna like *23:52* Uh his writing was talk about good writing. *23:56* I mean it was just dumb. *23:59* Was it the tape or no. *24:01* I think it uh the one I thought you were gonna like was the third boss, the dancing. *24:03* Boogie Nights. *24:09* Oh, the dancing um What was that? *24:10* Hole Puncher. *24:13* Hole Puncher. *24:13* That was pretty good. *24:16* I enjoyed that. *24:17* I enjoyed running around and finding all the toads in that area and making all the faceless toads dance. *24:18* At first I couldn't figure out why they were faceless and I was like, oh wait, it's gonna be the boss, isn't it? *24:23* Um 'cause I was trying to think of what other office supplies they could they could use. *24:27* Yeah, the office supplies thing was um I don't know man, like *24:33* Funny in practicality, but like once it's actually like when it was conveyed when it was conveyed to me that you fight office supplies in this game, like when I was just told that offhand by somebody, I was like, that's hilarious. *24:39* That's a really funny idea. *24:51* But then like when it actually plays out, it's like, I don't know, this is very bizarre um to actually see They just didn't fit *24:53* in the world and you could take the writing and the tone of each of those characters and you could have applied that to a Mario character. *25:02* Why not like get create characters that like wield those tools? *25:10* Like that's the thing I g I I think I'm curious about and don't really understand a wholly original character that wields scissors or that *25:15* is trying to staple you or yeah just things like that like the bosses in I'm thinking I know we haven't played it for the show yet but Thousand Year Door Tabababa uses *25:24* the crystal star to like become the macho grubo wrestler guy. *25:37* Like he uses this evil object to do the thing. *25:42* Like they totally could have made a character that wields just like *25:46* Bowser Jr. *25:50* in Sunshine and uh in Bowser Spear, he wields a paintbrush to do all sorts of stuff. *25:51* Like they easily could have just applied *25:56* the office supply to a villain like a character and have them use it in some way. *25:59* Um I think that would have been much, much better. *26:05* Yeah, I uh I agree. *26:09* I I I think it just came off strange once it actually played out in front of your eyes. *26:12* And again, some of the writing on those I thought was *26:17* Good and it was fun. *26:19* Like, talk about some of the stronger parts of character writing in the game. *26:20* I thought most of the bosses were pretty well written, but like as soon as they arrived, they're gone, and you never hear from them again the rest of the game. *26:23* So uh *26:31* Let's uh let's do the thing I know we've been putting off and let's talk about gameplay because I think this is the thing that we're gonna have a lot of *26:33* Thoughts on and this is a thing that uh this game is 25 to 30 hours and I feel like you spend way too much time stuck in this element of it. *26:41* And um it wears out its welcome in the first couple hours, or heck, after the first couple engagements *26:50* I really was like getting pretty sick of the combat and I was in the first area still. *26:58* And I was like, oh no, I have a lot of this game left and *27:04* I do not like the combat, and there is no point to the combat, and please somebody, why did you implement this combat in the game? *27:10* Uh, I'm gonna guess you don't like it either. *27:18* This oh my gosh, it's so infuriating. *27:21* There's so many times I was yelling on my television. *27:25* Um *27:29* I have in bowl or like all caps, I have um these types of words. *27:30* Livid needs better communication. *27:36* Apparently not, uh, in the context of oh, the hammer stuff. *27:40* We'll talk about that later. *27:47* Uh it's I'm just I was so mad. *27:49* These there's these bosses and these uh how do you pronounce it? *27:51* Velumentral? *27:55* I don't think it's velumentals or velamentals or something. *27:57* I don't know, man. *28:00* The elemental guardians. *28:01* They were those fights were not fun. *28:04* They were frustrating. *28:07* The game does a very poor job of telling you what you need to do and how to do it. *28:08* Um, but don't worry, you can just spend thousands of coins and have it do it for you. *28:13* Wait, really? *28:19* Even in the bosses? *28:20* You c well the toads can help him point you in the right direction and you can get it's unnecessarily complicated at times and but it's also *28:22* incredibly simple on the other end. *28:34* There's no middle ground. *28:36* I never felt like I was necessarily getting better. *28:39* I just felt like I was getting more frustrated. *28:42* And that's not what I want for my game's combat, especially when you do it so much. *28:45* That was the thing that started to dawn on me, uh, about a little ways into that first area that I was talking about and the reason I started to get *28:50* uh pretty tired of it quickly was because the game does not have a whole lot of situations to throw at you. *28:58* Not that it has like five predetermined, you know, orders or whatever. *29:07* Um *29:11* of uh how they line up the characters and then you move around from there. *29:12* There's a lot of permutations, but it just all boils down to the exact same thing. *29:15* Line them up or group 'em into a group of four so that you can hit 'em. *29:21* Um *29:25* Which like in practice, I'll say this for the combat. *29:26* Like the system as a whole is an interesting one and it's a *29:30* Fun one that I could see being enjoyable if it wasn't used as the primary means of gameplay and combat throughout the entire game. *29:35* I think if this was something that they threw in specifically maybe *29:44* For boss fights or something like that, like it could have been interesting on its own. *29:47* But you just get so tired *29:52* of lining them up and you're like, okay, I've seen them in this order before, what's the solution for it? *29:54* And sometimes like the later into the game it got, it was just like, I don't know the permutate I don't know how to solve this necessarily. *29:58* I'm not even gonna waste my time trying to solve it. *30:05* I'm just gonna do as best as I can. *30:07* I'm just gonna stomp on him with uh my best uh item that I have, or hit him with my best hammer and hope that it kills him because *30:09* Uh the boots and the hammers only have limited uses, but I don't know about you, but I went back to Toad Town pretty often, or maybe not a ton, but I would go *30:16* back like in between chapters and just load up on flashy hammers and flashy iron boots and then go back out and basically just so I could spam those all the time so that I could potentially end combat engagements a little bit more quickly. *30:24* I never felt like I was running low on *30:36* special weapons or types of weapons. *30:39* Like it th what I found in the world kept me well stocked. *30:42* Yeah. *30:46* The worst thing *30:47* Of all though with the combat. *30:49* Forget the fact that it wears out its welcome quickly and there's not a lot of depth to it and that it just *30:51* largely gets old to do, the biggest sin the combat commits is that there's literally no point to it. *30:57* Outside of the sections where you are at a boss or at a scripted moment where you have to finish the fight to move on. *31:03* There is no reason to do this because what you're getting at the end of the day is just coins. *31:10* And what are the coins for? *31:16* You can buy some items, you can buy some like *31:17* moderately helpful accessory upgrades for your character that'll help out in some instances. *31:21* And you can buy the assistance of toads. *31:26* Like *31:30* I got like four hours into the game and I realized how many coins I was getting and I was like, okay, when is something going to come along that shows me what I'm supposed to do with these 10,000 coins I have in my pocket here? *31:30* And really? *31:42* There was never anything. *31:43* You can buy more time. *31:44* You can pay the toads to help you that are in the crowd. *31:46* Yep. *31:49* You can go to some stores. *31:49* But again, yeah, same with me. *31:51* Like I was well stocked on *31:53* Mostly everything other than the items I would go back to town uh Toad Town to buy. *31:56* Uh I would just buy new weapons and then I don't know, like like the *32:01* Like I felt like this was the perfect example of how useless money is in this game. *32:06* And when you get to the spa, there is a *32:11* storefront person there that you can find. *32:14* You know exactly what I'm gonna say. *32:16* They're selling one of the collectibles that you can find in the game. *32:19* And I'm like, okay, there's one of the collectibles. *32:22* I bet this is worth like a thousand coins or something. *32:24* No, it's worth twenty thousand coins. *32:26* Which is a lot of money in this game. *32:29* In the fact that it's one collectible. *32:31* Yeah, I didn't sweat spending that either f uh myself. *32:36* But the fact that *32:40* Like you the game knows you have so much money and it's so pointless and it knows you have a ton of it that it's willing to just be like, oh hey, are you willing to spend a fourth of the money on you currently to just buy this one-off collectible? *32:42* That was when it became apparent to me that yeah, this game it has no which yeah, if all you're getting from the fights is coins and the coins in practice are pretty useless in the grand scheme of things, there's no point to fight. *32:55* I I j I tried to avoid as many fights as I could in the back half of the game. *33:10* Like as much as I could. *33:14* And you're talking about frustration? *33:16* My frustration stemmed from the fact when I kept getting stuck in fights I didn't want to partake in, and then for some reason I couldn't flee. *33:18* I don't know what the flea sits situation is in this game. *33:26* Like, Mario tripped a lot for me. *33:29* Do you have to like time it and let go at a certain point? *33:32* I just have to do that. *33:34* I didn't run from a single fight. *33:35* I tried to run from so many fights in this game and it would never let me. *33:37* And if I tried to flee and I failed, this is what would happen. *33:41* Now I'm just raining about things I dislike specifically. *33:45* But if you try to flee and you fail, that counts as your turn, so then it switches to the enemies, and you get all their long an attack animations, which are *33:48* Upwards of 15 seconds, 30 seconds long sometimes of them attacking you. *33:57* And so then they do all their attacks and they attack you, blah blah blah blah blah. *34:01* And then it gets cuts back to you. *34:04* And it's like, okay, well *34:06* I guess I'll try to flee again. *34:07* And I try to flee and then it fails again. *34:09* And then it switches to the enemy and you gotta sit and you gotta watch the attack animation play out. *34:11* There's no way to skip through it or *34:15* Make it move a little faster or anything like that which I understand because there is an active time element to the combat and the blocking and all that stuff, so like I get why you can't really speed it up, but yeah *34:17* Very annoying. *34:30* I the part I was most frustrated with was the boss fights in the sense that they never *34:33* So in a boss fight, uh or I should say in a regular fight, your goal is to line up the enemies either in squares of two by two or in rows, you know, straight back, just four in a row. *34:41* And then you can jump on them or hit them with your hammer. *34:53* But a boss fight, um, you are moving four rings um around to create a path for Mario to walk on to get close to *34:55* uh the boss to hit them. *35:04* So instead of being in the middle of the circle, you're on the outside. *35:06* And so these boss fights, you have to create this path, you have to move and shift and slide pieces all around. *35:09* And the boss will will do something to the board or have some sort of status effect, like the the fire bird thing. *35:17* Birds on fire. *35:25* You've got to *35:26* um remove its feathers and then hit it while it's it's out of feathers, which apparently give it its firepower. *35:28* The game *35:36* Never expressed to me that I didn't have to like *35:38* hit the there was a w I could use the water volumetral thing to douse the feathers. *35:46* Oh. *35:52* Um it never explained that to me and this 'cause I thought I had to save the water guy for the bird. *35:53* No, you don't save it for the bird. *36:00* Um so I get to all of the feathers are off of the bird and it powers up and it looks like it's on fire. *36:02* And I'm like, all right, here we go. *36:10* Time to use my water guy *36:12* Use the water guy and all the feathers go out, but nothing happens. *36:14* The bird s hit hits me with its attack, sucks all the feathers up and have to start the whole fight over again. *36:20* It didn't *36:25* The only way it communicates to you in very vague, poorly written hints, is if you open a treasure chest. *36:27* Well, to open a treasure chest, you have to make your path go to the *36:34* to set chest, which is wasting a tur the chest, you'll open the chest and it'll say, Well, you've got to use this certain um button pad like on the board to do something. *36:37* Well th I need to know that before I make the path. *36:50* And that you've already made the path and you walk around and you've wasted your turn. *36:53* Yeah, you've now *36:57* You'll spend entire turns trying to get the note just to find out what you're supposed to do, and then the note's like, oh, you gotta get the the chest, and then in the chest there's an on button. *36:59* It's like okay, so *37:07* Next turnaround you you make a path to the chest and you get the chest and then it shoots out the on button. *37:08* You're like great But the on button's behind you already and you gotta reroute another path *37:13* So then you gotta Yeah, then you gotta wait till your next turn. *37:18* Then you turn on the on button. *37:20* And if you're lucky, you can do the on button and get the valuental sign in the same time. *37:21* And then it's like *37:25* So like I texted one of the things I did text you about this game yesterday, I was I I was like, oh hey, the scissors fight, it's actually not that bad. *37:27* And you're like, I don't know about that. *37:34* I didn't like it and I'm like, well, all you really had to do was jump to dodge it and hit it with a hammer. *37:35* And I like that. *37:41* Like that was the one nice fight like *37:42* I died the first time on him, I will say, but then when I realized there is a split second where you can jump and avoid him altogether, I was like, okay, so if I just keep dodging and I hit him with a hammer, this will end. *37:45* And so I just dodged enough time. *37:57* So I died two times. *37:59* And I agree, once you learn that you can jump over his magic one hit kill scissor cut *38:01* The fight is fairly simple. *38:08* You just hit him and you jump. *38:09* But it doesn't tell you that. *38:11* All the fight tells you is better not hit the scissor guard. *38:14* And so you walk up to it and you do your bet you do the attack you think's not gonna hit it, and you end up hitting it anyway. *38:17* And he so the whole point they force you into removing the guard, so that you have to do these dodges, which makes the fight very *38:24* Very cool or or whatever, but they don't communicate it to you and it's so frustrating. *38:31* And I I've been dying to ask you this question, and I I feel like you did not have this problem. *38:38* 'Cause you you're usually better about this than I am. *38:44* But I would say fs based off my notes *38:48* Sometime between the hole puncher uh which is toward the end, right? *38:55* The hole puncher was one of the final bots. *39:01* It's third. *39:03* It's third world. *39:04* Yeah. *39:05* Alright. *39:05* So between three and four. *39:06* World. *39:09* I learned that there were three hammer slots to equip. *39:09* Like special items too. *39:16* Yeah. *39:18* When you look in the menu *39:19* What you see is is three boots and two hammers and there is no indicator that you can go down *39:21* to add a third item. *39:30* And I was so frustrated because I was like, I can't equip these two types of hammers. *39:32* The one where you can throw it in a room. *39:38* You're gonna feel even stupider in about five seconds. *39:40* You can equip what you want within the combat itself. *39:43* I did I did see that button. *39:49* I did know that. *39:52* But I didn't know that there was a third hammer option *39:53* So for more than half the game, I wasn't using the hammers as much. *39:55* Yeah. *40:01* It is just *40:03* And the problem is is like Olivia is so chatty. *40:06* I wrote I wrote down in my partner's notes. *40:10* I was like, is Olivia the new Fi? *40:13* From Skyward Sword. *40:15* Like this is ridiculous. *40:17* There's more talking in this game than Persona 5, I feel like. *40:18* Like there is a lot of talking in this game. *40:22* You go you try to do something and she goes, uh-uh-uh, we gotta go over here and do this. *40:24* Uh-uh-uh, do it like this. *40:29* So that's an even that's an even bigger uh go ahead and finish this thought with her first. *40:30* It's just they they tell you how to do *40:35* stuff all the time, but when it comes to critical moments, they're suddenly hands off and I figure it out *40:39* Yeah, the thing that so you kind of talked about there with her constantly pointing you in a new direction the game orgami King does this so much where it says okay hey we need to go *40:48* To this w you we put this point on your map. *41:01* You need to go here. *41:05* This is where the streamer is. *41:06* Go up there, we'll get there. *41:07* Yada yada yada. *41:08* Okay. *41:09* And so you go there. *41:10* And then either while you're on your way there or once you get there or whatever, it's like, oh crap, we can't actually do this. *41:11* Now we have to do XYZ or like or now we have to do this other thing instead. *41:17* So you start going somewhere else and it's like while you're going there, then it shoots you off and offshoot on that, and then it shoots you off and offshoot on that. *41:21* It's like you get the valumentals are a great example of this. *41:27* It's where it's like, hey, we had the streamers up there. *41:30* Uh let's go get the streamer. *41:33* It's like, okay, cool. *41:35* So you start going up the streamer, you get up to the top of the hill in the first area. *41:36* Boom, streamer. *41:39* Oh, well, we can't get in here. *41:40* We got uh *41:42* uh find some sacred power thing. *41:43* And it's like, okay, so like if first it makes sense and I'm fine with it and it's like, okay, this is this is understandable. *41:45* They're trying to, you know, flesh out this area a little bit more. *41:52* They gotta extend this game a little bit *41:55* But once you get into like the third or fourth stage or the streamer of the game and they keep sending you off on these offshoots or the C's a good example of that where it's like well the C's I guess is a little different type of an area. *41:56* But um *42:09* Yeah, it's just it it is constantly you never go from point A to point B in that game. *42:11* You always go from you always have to go from point A to point B, and then in the middle of those points it will shoot you in A1, A2, A3, A4, A5, A6, A7, A8. *42:16* Like there is no direct path to anything I feel like in this game. *42:25* And I know that's a very video gamey thing, uh, and I'm not complaining about the fact that it it it diverts you occasionally, but I swear, even the simplest things in this game *42:30* There is always the good the best example I can think of this was uh like towards the very end of the game when you finally get on Bowser's airship and he's like we're going to the castle *42:40* You can't just go to the castle. *42:49* It's gotta be like, oh, there's planes attacking us. *42:50* Play this bad shooting mini-game for l like eight minutes or something. *42:53* So you gotta do that for Oh okay now we're flying. *42:57* Oh but but we're gonna crash. *43:00* We're not gonna get to the actual castle. *43:02* Oh now we're in lava. *43:05* It's like uh can you just *43:07* Just get me to the front door of the castle. *43:08* And then even when you get to the front door of the castle, Luigi's like, oh, I don't have the key. *43:11* And it's like, oh, I gotta go walk over here. *43:14* I gotta pull the key out. *43:16* It's like, if there's never *43:17* It's just all these small little steps in between everything. *43:19* And some of them aren't long, like the Luigi Key thing I mentioned. *43:23* That takes 10 seconds. *43:26* I get it. *43:26* But like, there's never just *43:27* Of simple like, oh okay, we're here. *43:30* And like the things that they are I guess the problem, the thing I'm trying to express, the things they are throwing in between that are constantly diverting you are not great. *43:33* All those things I just mentioned, between getting on Bowser's airship and finally getting into the front door of the freaking castle, none of that is good. *43:40* And all of it is like diverts you for a good twenty minutes. *43:47* Um and the game is filled with stuff like that where it just throws you off the trail that you're on and makes you do something else and typically it's not great. *43:52* There are some *43:59* enjoyable parts with it. *44:01* Like I mentioned the Shy Guy thing earlier. *44:02* Like that was one example of it where it's like, okay, I I can kind of get down with this. *44:04* Or even the uh the sniffet example as well. *44:07* But uh the game is filled with those moments. *44:11* It and it's not the fun c kind of like get in your way. *44:14* 'Cause typically a game typically you you play a game and *44:20* there is an obstacle that you have to overcome to get to your destination. *44:24* Like you that is m m in a Mario game you were going from left to right to get to the flag and there are things in the way. *44:27* And you can go above and below and things like that. *44:33* Or you look at Uncharted and *44:36* um Uncharted 2 and you're in the the the city and your goal is to get to the temple. *44:38* Well there's a helicopter in the way and you have to but that's fun because it's surprising and engaging on that level. *44:44* In this game it's *44:52* Well I guess we better go explore this place. *44:53* Now I can lift the earth. *44:56* Or even um *44:58* Bobby with the fuse. *45:02* It's like, all right, we need to get to this boat. *45:03* Now we're on this boat. *45:05* Yeah, there's a sea monster. *45:06* So now we've got to like go sneak around and save people and find this fuse and then fight a sea monster and then come back *45:09* and blow up, but don't worry, we have to stop Olivia from crying before we can move on. *45:15* It just keeps getting in the way of itself and it really *45:21* Is frustrating. *45:25* And it this is extended into the combat as well. *45:26* The combat gets in the way of what I want to do. *45:29* When I go into a fight, I want to I wanna hit Goombas. *45:34* I want to get experience, not that this game offers that, so I want to get coins. *45:37* Like I just want to hit them. *45:41* I wanna I wanna execute my real-time, you know, button presses and strategy and that stuff. *45:43* But first, I've gotta rearrange reins, I've gotta solve a visual puzzle, and sometimes I can't, so then I've gotta spend money on toads or more time. *45:49* It just it's a constant obstacle. *45:57* And it encourages me to avoid it. *46:01* And a good game should not encourage you to avoid its core mechanic. *46:04* It should in incentivize you to do so. *46:10* So *46:13* Uh there's some other things at play here that we'll talk about with the game itself, but I wanted to talk about how I'm viewing the series as a whole moving forward. *46:14* I think this is an interesting *46:22* Way to maybe present where we're heading. *46:23* After Origami King? *46:26* Yeah, yeah. *46:27* Like the rest of our podcast series here. *46:27* Rest of season one, because obviously we've not played the others as we are playing these in the order that the episodes are posting. *46:31* So um *46:37* So yeah, I I think the thing that was the biggest eye-opener to me is uh going off of literally everything you just said is yeah, there's so much fat in this game that could be trimmed that could make this just a tighter *46:38* experience in almost all aspects, whether it be gameplay or story or just all of it. *46:50* It could be a tighter experience. *46:56* The fact that this game is 25 to 30 hours is baffling to me *46:58* Um and when I look at the other games, I know some of them are that long too. *47:02* And Thousand Your Doors is obviously different because you and I have played that one. *47:07* And so we have thoughts on that one. *47:12* Like I feel like that game's pretty respectful of your time. *47:14* But the others I know are pretty long as well. *47:17* Like I know Color Splash is pretty equivalent time length to this one. *47:19* I know Stiger Star is pretty equivalent as well. *47:22* And like *47:25* Not that I again I don't think this game is even bad, but it is just like the I feel this sense of like dread over me, like uh, I really do not want *47:26* the other games in this series that we still have to play to be like this. *47:37* Like it has turned into uh and I'm making this sound way more negative and dour, and I'm making this this probably something *47:41* I I don't know. *47:50* I'm just talking about how I feel. *47:51* And so maybe it's not a b enjoyable listening experience for a listener to be like this guy hates the games he's playing. *47:52* I don't hate them, but I just want them to be, yeah, more respectful of your time. *47:58* And so looking down the road of where we're heading in this series, I'm very much hoping the other ones aren't like this in that respect. *48:03* I also think it's partially because we know like Paper Mario is d could be said definitively divided into two different eras or types of games. *48:11* There are the first three and there are the most the three most recent games. *48:24* Like they're there's clear two different leagues of Paper Mario. *48:27* And we know what the begin like we have a really solid idea of the first three games. *48:31* We've played one. *48:37* Previously, we've played Thousand Year Doors. *48:39* So like we have previous memories and context for that. *48:41* And we've both dabbled in Super Paper Mario in the past. *48:43* Like we know where this series can go or where it came from. *48:46* And now we've seen where what it's become. *48:50* And I'm not r I'm not stoked in the sense of like *48:55* I love Paper Mario characters, the world, all that stuff. *49:00* And I'm not looking forward to exploring what that world has turned into since 2012. *49:05* That's a good that's a good way of putting it. *49:11* Like I guess to make it to make it not sound like I'm trapped in a podcast series I don't want. *49:12* I'm excited to talk about those games with you *49:18* But I am not excited about the trajectory that the series has taken. *49:21* Because yeah, like I my familiarity with Paper Mario post-Super Paper Mario, like you, is it's *49:25* I never really checked anything out from sticker start onwards. *49:31* So Origami King in some senses is very much our first litmus test of what that second half of this series. *49:34* is probably like and so the fact that Origami King has not resonated with us on any sort of level comparatively like we both came in I think on a gameplay level *49:41* uh uh the most. *49:52* Yeah, the the visuals and the the narrative How do you feel about the original Paper Mario uh after playing this? *49:54* I I appreciate it a lot more. *50:02* Yeah, same here. *50:04* Because I know we came in the last time around, we're like, ah, this game's pretty good, you know, like *50:05* Really? *50:10* It's like twenty years old. *50:10* It holds up alright, I guess. *50:11* And then it's like I played this with the origami king. *50:13* I'm like, wow, that first game was a lot better than I gave it credit for in our last episode. *50:15* And really, remember, we were talking about *50:20* the uh the seed quest where you it it was like oh get the magic seeds it's a side quest ha ha ha no you actually need to get it and man that would suck if you had to backtrack and and get all the seeds *50:23* Or a Gami King would have absolutely made you go back and get the seed. *50:34* They would never would have told you the seeds existed, and then suddenly you have to go back to three different worlds. *50:38* But that would actually imply that the world is connected in a in a cohesive way. *50:43* So really the seeds are just gonna be in four previous places you've been that are really far apart. *50:47* Maybe like the Great Sea would have been a good *50:51* um a good spot to do that where you've got to go to the four corners or something. *50:54* The only time the world felt really connected to me, speaking of the Great Seat, was when you found the streamer in the valley. *50:59* And then the rock fell on Olivia, and then you left and you went to this scene, you saw the other streamer. *51:05* It's like, oh, okay. *51:10* So and then I like made a mental note. *51:12* I was like, remember to come back here after this. *51:13* Don't worry, the game forced you to go back there. *51:16* The game never really does that otherwise. *51:18* Like there's no there's no uh like interconnectivity. *51:20* Like it is constantly like you are just on the main path. *51:24* And it is forcing you down that path. *51:27* And anytime you don't know where to go next, the game is like, oh well don't worry. *51:29* Like after I beat the the fourth *51:32* Streamer? *51:35* I was like, well, okay, where's the fifth? *51:36* And it was like, oh well, there's the green streamer. *51:37* It's going showing up it goes up into the sky. *51:40* I was like, what? *51:43* Okay, like I'm glad I don't have to go hunt down for it now, but yeah, it very much uh like in the original paper Mario there would be sections where it's like, okay, I finished *51:45* The ghost town, I I wonder where I'm supposed to go next. *51:55* And you would go you know you you know you'd have to go back to Toadown. *51:59* You'd kind of talk to some people and they'd be like, hey, I hear there's weird stuff going on over at this house. *52:02* And you're like *52:06* Okay, house, I guess, and you start poking around and then you find some shy guy things and then you're in a toy box. *52:07* It's like, okay, so like it kind of forces you to, you know, poke around a little bit. *52:13* It's not just constantly *52:18* Hey, uh the large thing in the sky, we should follow that and head that way, and oh hey, it just happens to be at the end of this path we're on right now. *52:20* And look at um *52:30* I this is sort of I f I feel almost guilty bringing Thousand Your Drawer into this, but think of the glitz pit. *52:32* How do you get there? *52:38* Well, the game presents it to you on the map. *52:40* It's in the sky. *52:42* You're like, well, how do I get in the sky? *52:43* Oh look, there's a blimp. *52:44* Oh, I need a ticket. *52:46* Where do I get a ticket? *52:47* The mob boss. *52:49* And there's like this subplot with the mob boss that ties into a later world. *52:50* And like they build this world, and that's an example of the game getting in your way, kind of putting that A1, A2, A B, A3. *52:53* But it's an engaging way and it feels rewarding and then you're even rewarded later on for it. *53:02* Yeah. *53:07* And it's you feel smart for solving the puzzle. *53:08* But really the only puzzle you're solving in origami kingdom is the combat and it's not a good puzzle to solve and there's always a solve it for me button and it'll only cost you 2,000 coins. *53:11* Typically there is. *53:23* Yeah. *53:24* I I think um there's a couple other things I know we haven't discussed. *53:24* Um let's talk about the music um because I do feel like this is actually one of the stronger parts of the game. *53:28* The music is looking pretty good. *53:34* I think it's the strongest part of the game. *53:36* Music's pretty good. *53:38* Um those uh five composer credits on it. *53:39* Those guys all did some work. *53:42* Um They did stuff *53:44* I didn't think Paper Mario could do. *53:46* There were parts that frankly reminded me of Doom in the sense of just like Definitely some heavy metal in this thing. *53:49* Um yeah, how awesome. *53:58* There's a lot of diversity in the score. *54:01* There's a lot of um *54:04* What's a good word I'm looking for here? *54:07* Yeah, there's just I I don't know. *54:10* There's a lot of diversity and there's a lot of different styles, I will say. *54:11* Um yeah, you'll go from heavy metal in one in one second to like more *54:15* ancient Japanese musical stylings in in another. *54:20* Um there there's a lot to digest here and it's all largely pretty good. *54:24* Um I can't think of a single track off the top of my head outside of maybe the battle music, even though I just heard that a thousand times over. *54:29* But even then the battle music's it's I was humming the battle music. *54:36* Yeah, the battle music is really good in this game, I think. *54:40* Um *54:43* So yeah, music, I I I don't feel like it's a step to say, oh hey, Nintendo put out a pretty good video game soundtrack in one of their games. *54:43* Um but compared to everything else where I have *54:52* For everything I have to praise about the game in some aspect there's a uh something to take it down a peg as well. *54:56* The music is the one thing that I can just kind of say, oh yeah, it's flatly good. *55:02* Uh and I don't have anything on the other side to say bad about it. *55:06* There was I'll this tweet will be in the show notes. *55:11* Um I saw this the other night and it it simply says, Why am I headbanding to a song that plays when you fight a stapler? *55:15* And I feel like that really kind of includes the soundtrack. *55:23* This soundtrack goes above and beyond what anyone *55:26* what I certainly expected from Paper Mario, uh especially in modern times, like the previous uh you know, N64, it's good N64 music and Thousand Your Door, it's it's fun, good gamekeep music. *55:31* But this is *55:44* This is a soundtrack I would listen to in my free time. *55:45* And it goes places and it's so diverse. *55:49* There was a video *55:51* I saw the other day that I want to listen to. *55:53* It was I wanna say a hundred and thirty-five different musicians came together to do different music in this game. *55:55* There's so much musical meat to like dig into and chew here, and I really *56:00* It blew me away. *56:07* The Toad Town music is really good. *56:09* I like how it I like how it uh when you go in the museum, it shifts to like an all piano version of it as well. *56:10* That was a nice little touch that I don't know if that's anything you picked up on by chance *56:17* Um I did not specifically. *56:21* Even those small tweaks like that, it reminded me of soundtracks I really like. *56:23* Like Banjoe is a great example, like oh, the song's playing and you go underwater and becomes a submerged slower version of the song or whatever. *56:27* Um *56:34* Same thing here, like it would keep up it didn't do that all the time, but there there are aspects of that at play which I really enjoyed in the soundtrack. *56:35* Last kind of talking point that I wanted to touch on with this game, and then maybe we can talk a little bit more big picture about the series before we wrap up. *56:44* Um I don't know if this is anything I can *56:52* Properly convey- The game has like a B-movie quality to it, I found. *56:58* Um, where this is Nintendo and this is Mario, but it very much *57:04* Doesn't feel like a Nintendo product in some respects either, and maybe that's just because I'm used to like uh like it was very bizarre for me within the past days, so now I'm playing uh *57:11* Bowser's Fury, which uh now that I wrap this up, I had been putting that on the back burner to finish Origami King before I started playing that. *57:22* And it's like going from one to the other *57:29* They're both Mario and I get that they're different genres and different types of games and things like that. *57:31* There's a lot of differences at play. *57:36* But *57:38* One feels distinctly Nintendo to me, and the other feels kinda like off for some reason, and I can't really put my finger on what it is. *57:39* Maybe it's just an amalgamation of all the things we were talking about before where it's like *57:48* the writing is hit and miss and the in the world i uh structure kind of he doesn't feel it doesn't have that sort of charm that I expect from a Nintendo game that uh *57:52* Nintendo is really good at eliciting from me, whether it be with Zelda or Mario or any of their other franchises. *58:04* I never really got any of those feelings at any point playing this. *58:10* And I thought that that was a little strange to me. *58:15* Um what's even more strange is that I did have those feelings with Paper Mario previously, the original game, in some respects. *58:18* I was I was just gonna bring this up. *58:25* And Intelligent Systems is the same developer. *58:26* Obviously it's been twenty years, but uh kinda odd. *58:28* It I think it stems, frankly, from *58:33* It being so self-aware. *58:38* Yeah. *58:41* They refer to the paper constantly, which is fine and cute. *58:42* And there are some paper references even in um the N64 game. *58:46* But in I feel like it's safe to say the first three games, they are *58:51* They are games that are set in the world and they explore that space and that's what it's about. *58:59* It's super paperwork gets a little off the wall. *59:06* Okay. *59:09* That's where I feel like the writing gets a little bit more like, whoa, what's going on here? *59:10* And they can they spend their time developing these characters in these places and the events of the game. *59:15* And I feel like an origami king, it's all very surface level. *59:22* In the sense that it is we are made of paper, we are origami. *59:26* I mean, we talked about it at the top of this episode. *59:30* Ollie's motivation is he was scribbled on. *59:33* Not only is that just shallow in the sense that let's let's change that to he was bullied. *59:37* Like it's just shallow there. *59:43* But it's also referring to the fact that he is paper and origami and they are celebrating paper and folding. *59:46* Like there's no richness and depth to explore. *59:52* And when you switch to *59:55* Bowser's Fury, it's very clear and tight. *59:58* You are you are in this space in this world. *01:00:01* Bowser is in some black ink, and Bowser Jr. *01:00:04* needs your help to save his dad. *01:00:07* And granted, you're not going to Bowser's Fury for the story or Super Mario Odyssey or anything like that. *01:00:09* But the that world is defined by its islands and spaces, and Paper Mario, the origami king, is. *01:00:15* We are paper. *01:00:22* Yeah. *01:00:24* And then it it feels like that B tier. *01:00:24* I think because of that *01:00:28* It's a game that very it's a g a game that leans heavily on its writing, which is why I think we started off this episode kind of talking about that the most. *01:00:30* Like I said, there's as much writing in this game as you would find in some other JRPGs. *01:00:38* Uh so it really commits to its writing and its characters and its *01:00:43* uh story and for I I guess for that to be the main thrust of the game and the main thing that you are reading and doing almost constantly is just a reading what the characters are saying. *01:00:48* For it to be so hit and miss, like we talked about previously, I guess that would lead to it being like that. *01:00:59* I don't know. *01:01:05* Yeah *01:01:06* I think we've kind of done this naturally over the course of the episode. *01:01:07* Um so I don't think there's a lot to talk about as far as how it evolves from the first game. *01:01:11* Um a lot of this has been seen and we've already tied it back a lot in some ways to *01:01:15* the original paper Mario. *01:01:21* Um but was there anything else you wanted to say specifically about the dichotomy here between the first game and Origami King now that we've kind of played them both and we've done our first bounce back and forth between them *01:01:22* I f specifically for Arigami King wanted to call out partners briefly because when this game was initially revealed *01:01:35* Everyone was like, our partner's back. *01:01:44* It kind of was implied. *01:01:46* And you do briefly get some different characters. *01:01:47* You get a Professor Toad. *01:01:50* Um *01:01:52* Bobby or Babam, as he keeps trying to correct, and Kamic, arguably the most iconic. *01:01:53* But they don't do anything in battle. *01:02:00* They don't give you any ability. *01:02:02* They try. *01:02:04* Bobby tripped a lot for me *01:02:05* He did trip a lot. *01:02:06* Um they don't do a lot in battle. *01:02:08* You have no control over them in battle. *01:02:10* Let's put it this way. *01:02:12* It is all chance. *01:02:13* Yeah. *01:02:14* Apparently just like trying to flee the the combat. *01:02:14* There's that. *01:02:18* They don't really add anything outside of the world. *01:02:19* Really, the only abilities you get are the thousand arm fold and the velumental powers. *01:02:22* And both of those are just keys to unlock *01:02:28* doors. *01:02:31* There's no puzzle solving with them in any way, shape, or form. *01:02:31* And uh th I feel like they heard *01:02:35* the cries for partners because I think a lot of fans latch on to that in those early games. *01:02:39* Yeah. *01:02:45* And they're like, this is what makes Paper Mario great. *01:02:46* And it can, it it definitely is an an additive element if done correctly. *01:02:48* And this feels like the most shallow attempt possible to bring that kind of connection and magic back. *01:02:52* And I was very disappointed. *01:03:00* But I not that I was expecting a lot from it, but I just kind of was hoping for more here. *01:03:03* What sucks is the partners themselves are some of the better written characters in the game. *01:03:09* I like Bobby a fair amount. *01:03:13* Uh Professor Toad maybe not as much, but Kamek and Bowser Jr. *01:03:15* I liked a whole lot. *01:03:18* I thought that their section of the game was uh a standout for me. *01:03:19* So like the addition of partners specifically when it comes to the writing was uh *01:03:23* a strong area I felt like for me. *01:03:29* But yeah, the comment stuff. *01:03:31* Not much. *01:03:33* Did you uh uh remember that uh collectible you could buy for twenty thousand coins? *01:03:34* Yeah. *01:03:38* Did you say no to it at first? *01:03:39* I did actually *01:03:41* And then Bowser Jr. *01:03:42* 's like, oh wow, wow, you're so cheap. *01:03:43* And then you go back and buy it and he'll say like three bags over here. *01:03:45* He'll ask you how much money you have and CamX says it's like not polite to ask or something like that. *01:03:50* Um it's awesome. *01:03:55* So there are like good moments in the game l like that, um, which I enjoyed. *01:03:57* But uh Yeah, I I think for me the big *01:04:03* Uh the big shift between the two games is the the thing I just mentioned. *01:04:07* Like the original Paper Mario felt still distinctly Nintendo in so many aspects. *01:04:11* This still has this is still Mario and Nintendo, obviously, but it just feels I I don't know, it feels like this is their B team making these games nowadays, and they just don't give it that sort of *01:04:16* Same love. *01:04:30* Um, and it's also weird to me that uh maybe this is something we can talk about a little bit more big picture once we actually end this series. *01:04:32* Um or in this season of the show. *01:04:41* But it's weird to me that they have made yet another like where we're at right now, and this is the most recent installment. *01:04:44* Like there are so many things that people have been begging for from this series for so long. *01:04:52* Partners is one thing you brought up that you just mentioned. *01:04:57* Um like there are core pillars of this series that people have been asking to see come back. *01:04:59* Pry basically since the original and Thousand Year Door came out and for them to be like, oh yeah, uh okay. *01:05:05* We've heard your cries *01:05:11* Here's a uh combat system where you rotate platforms and uh then you can jump on like it's so just *01:05:13* N I don't know who's asking for this, and I get that it's boring to make the same game fifty times over, even though like I said before *01:05:21* Intelligence System have been making this series forever, but they've surely not that that team surely is turned over a little bit. *01:05:28* So I guess it's just confusing to me that *01:05:35* I f Paper Mario more than any other franchises over the past few years. *01:05:38* I feel like the fans are very much in concert with one another of what they want to see. *01:05:42* Make it an RPG again. *01:05:48* Add experience. *01:05:49* Make *01:05:51* uh bring partners back. *01:05:51* Br like all these very simple XYZ things that they want to see from the series and for intelligent systems to just continue to be like, hmm, how about this idea instead? *01:05:53* It's so *01:06:04* baffling to me in some senses. *01:06:06* Um I I think for the longest time it was Paper Mario is the became the place to experiment. *01:06:08* and not adhere to JRPG tropes and that shifted over to Mario Luigi. *01:06:17* Because they had these two funky Mario RPG things where uh at least Partners in Time, Bowser's Inside Story, and Superstar Saga *01:06:26* Those games have unique elements of the Mushroom Kingdom and cool new characters and things to explore and all the same sort of things that I on paper love in Paper Mario. *01:06:35* And I think m Mario Luigi probably went on to be the RPG Mario game and Paper Mario became what it is now. *01:06:46* But now that Alpha Dream is gone. *01:06:58* Oh yeah, I forgot about that. *01:07:02* There's like a hole in *01:07:04* Mario RPG realm because Origami King was in development before Alpha Dream closed. *01:07:07* Yeah. *01:07:14* So maybe that vision can be re-ignited because I do understand not having two different series kind of step on each other's toes. *01:07:15* Yeah. *01:07:24* But so maybe there's a chance for Paper Mario to kind of come back into the JRPG fold and embrace it fully, but I I do think that that's part of where *01:07:25* that energy and differentiation went. *01:07:36* It was just uh Mario and Luigi was the RPG series. *01:07:38* It be that's what it became. *01:07:42* d uh in the DS and handheld era and that series never made it to home consoles and and Paper Mario was was predominantly a home console *01:07:44* game until sticker star and origami king. *01:07:53* And I think this will become a little bit more clear as we continue on and we revisit all these games. *01:07:56* Um *01:08:01* But yeah, I I guess in a general sense I'm just curious what Nintendo's view of this franchise is moving forward and what they want to do with it and what they do see it as because I you're right, like it totally started out as just *01:08:03* an experimental, weird, off the wall idea. *01:08:17* And obviously they had done m Mario RPGs in the past, um Super Mario RPG, but uh this was this franchise and its inception was very much something different for Nintendo. *01:08:19* Uh so for them to continue with it. *01:08:31* So I mean twenty years after its inception it has just become this weird thing that I don't even know what I would pin the Paper Mario for like I don't know what its core tenant is anymore other than *01:08:34* I guess. *01:08:45* It's lost its identity. *01:08:46* Yeah. *01:08:47* It's a game where everything's paper and it very much leans into that now, whereas it used to not really do that as much. *01:08:50* And it leans on its writing, which is hit and miss in times. *01:08:56* So uh Paper Mario the Origami King *01:09:00* Okay, video game. *01:09:05* Okay video game. *01:09:07* Again, I I feel like we really beat it up. *01:09:08* I don't hate the game by any means. *01:09:10* It is just very much a like if I was gonna rate this, it is a strong *01:09:12* six to seven out of ten range for me somewhere in there. *01:09:18* I think it's a good it's almost like a good baby's first Paper Mario. *01:09:22* Yeah, it definitely holds your hand. *01:09:26* It walks you through things. *01:09:28* It has really it does have strong moments, but it has a lot of stumbling blocks and a lot of things that get in your way of *01:09:30* enjoying and playing the game, and I think that's its biggest fault, is it it almost doesn't want you to have too much fun. *01:09:38* Yeah. *01:09:45* So yeah. *01:09:46* That's this episode of Chapter Select. *01:09:46* Again, we are going to continue on throughout the remainder of the games. *01:09:49* Uh if you are not already looking down at your podcast feed and you can see what ne comes next. *01:09:53* Episode three will be on Paper Mario The Thousand Year Door, so we will be diving into that game next time around. *01:09:58* I think our impressions of it. *01:10:05* It will be interesting though because this is the one we have played, and this is the one we *01:10:06* Like a lot and this is the one we scream for them to remaster because it's stranded on the GameCube and I gotta go over to my parents' house and I gotta dig out my Wii from my *01:10:11* Old the childhood bedroom storage space and I gotta find a GameCube memory card somewhere like *01:10:20* Uh there's a lot I gotta get a Wii uh a remote uh sensor because I will have to turn it on with sensor bar. *01:10:28* Dear Lord. *01:10:37* Um there's a lot of steps to this I didn't think about until now. *01:10:38* Anyway. *01:10:42* This is the one that we do like though. *01:10:44* So I'm I'm curious though to see what it'll be like with fifteen years of *01:10:46* a gap, at least for myself. *01:10:51* I don't know when the last time you played this one was. *01:10:52* So a few years ago. *01:10:55* It's been a few it's been a few years. *01:10:56* So that'll be episode three. *01:10:59* Um not committing to anything. *01:11:01* And again, you'll know by this point, but we might have a guest on the next one. *01:11:03* So *01:11:07* If you want to find out the answer to that question, you can look down at what the episode says because I'm sure it'll it'll tell you if there's an extra special guest on that uh episode. *01:11:08* And then from there, uh to give you *01:11:17* More insight into where we'll be going from there. *01:11:20* Episode 4 will be on Color Splash. *01:11:22* Episode 5 will be Super Paper Mario. *01:11:23* And episode 6 will be Sticker Star. *01:11:25* And that'll wrap up season 1 of the show. *01:11:27* Uh if you are listening to this though, we have also got out a season zero of chapter select that you can check out right now. *01:11:30* That is just a brief *01:11:37* sort of test course that we did for the show, uh all about the last of us. *01:11:38* So if you would like to listen to us talk about the last of us, the original and the last of us part two. *01:11:42* You can go check that out as well. *01:11:47* Other than that, if you would like to find Max and myself, you can find me. *01:11:49* I'm on Twitter at Moreman12. *01:11:53* You can also find Max. *01:11:56* He's at Max Roberts143. *01:11:57* Bingo. *01:12:00* Okay, good. *01:12:01* That's a that's a very new thing for me to say on a podcast, everybody. *01:12:02* Old Twitter handles if uh *01:12:06* I'm very used to seeing that old Twitter handle. *01:12:08* Um and then yeah, you can also find uh chapter select on all podcast feeds. *01:12:11* If you could subscribe to us in any of those locales or give us a review, that would greatly help the show. *01:12:16* And would hopefully get us in more people's ears and more Paper Mario fans who are looking to digest this series or maybe digest a single game in the series. *01:12:22* Um *01:12:31* So yeah, that's it for episode two. *01:12:31* We will see you back here next time with our thoughts on the thousand year door. *01:12:33* And until then, so long everybody. *01:12:36* Adios *01:12:38*