SZ's Paper Mario: Sticker Star Review

Introduction

Do you remember the old days of Paper Mario? You know, where you used to sit down at your N64 or GameCube and play all day? I do. Over the years all that fun was taken away from me as the series moved on. Super Paper Mario came, which was a great game but did not have 'Paper Mario feel' to it. Then, rumours started going around about a Paper Mario for 3DS, I though "Wow! A 2D game in 3D!" That feeling was taken away from me since released. The game started out nicely and the graphics were great.

But the thing that got me, is the world. No longer was there a big, open world to explore, but another linear map like NSMB. Nintendo has taken that Paper Mario feel again, and tossed it.

Graphics

The graphics are amazing, especially in 3D, it's generally awesome. Watching paper and 2D stuff in mind-boggling 3D before your very eyes is just fan-freaking-tastic! The 3DS graphics chip bears a resemblance to GCN graphics, hence the game's graphics looking like The Thousand Year Door's graphics.

Storyline

There's not much of a storyline here, just Bowser steals the Sticker Comet and Mario and Kersti (Stiker, geddit?) have to collect 6 royal stickers, one from each world boss, and then travel to Bowser's Castle in the sky. How original. The other Paper Mario Games had partners and they had backstories. Come on Nintendo, this isn't your best work.

Gameplay

This is my least favourite thing about the game, other than the story. My favourite thing about the other games was the game engine, but that has now turned to my least favourite aspect of it. The over-world is horrible, putting a world map in just sucks. The battle system is okay, similar to the first 2 games but still a little messed up. It works differently so you can't be as strategic as you could before. And World 3 is horrific, it's all based on poison and finding Wiggler's body parts, and it had 12 levels! IT SUCKS.

Final Score & Summary

7.3

The game is okay, I'd recommend it if you LOVE Paper Mario, but if your just an average fan, don't bother picking it up.

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Hope you enjoyed my first review, rate comment subscr- Oh wait this isn't Youtube.

It's an awesome review, seriously, you're good at writing these.

And I have yet to play the game myself, so I don't know if I agree with you on what you said.

Zero Revolution wrote:It's an awesome review, seriously, you're good at writing these.

Thanks so much! =D

It's odd becuase I suck at english lol.

...those must of been some pretty impressive graphics if it boosted the score right up to a 7.3...

Interesting review, I didn't really explain Paper Mario to me, which is an issue as I didn't fully understand what was wrong about it, plus you clearly must of missed out some good aspects of the game to rate it so highly after complaining about it so much!


So, How does the battles work, what didn't you like about them?

What is it that old Paper Mario Fans will like about the game?

What was it about the map you didn't like? How did it relate to the one in NSMB?

Oh gawd, I just realised a typo. -___- The score is 6.3. No way I'd rate it a 7.

The battle problem is the stickers.

Old PM fans will probably like it since it's got some aspects of those games in there.

And the map is too NSMB, wen RPGs should have a big, open world to explore.

I see, so what exactly are stickers, what's the actual mechanics of them.

Basically, they're one use attacks. You find them scattered all across the world. But nice there's no level ups, then there's no point in battling.

Ah, I see it a bit clear now... that's what you should of put in your review!

Well, my review was aimed at people who like PM and have played the other games.

SuperZweilous wrote:Basically, they're one use attacks. You find them scattered all across the world. But nice there's no level ups, then there's no point in battling.

Yeah, I really hate that about this game, the battles are kinda boring in this one anyway, but I like to battle in Paper Mario.

Actually you can level up by finding all of the heart's that are scattered through out the title thus Mario's HP goes up. As for his attack going up; depending on the shininess of the sticker is how much damage it will do compared to just a plain ordinary sticker.

I have played all of the Paper Mario titles & honestly I liked the new idea's that Sticker Star brought to the title. I was kind of glad that some of the characters you'd team up with were gone since they all were getting to the point that it was almost predictable with the kinds of characters & abilities they'd have when you'd get them on your team.

I can understand not liking to have to go on a fetch quest to get your attacks but personally that's what I liked about the game; is that it MADE you go out & go fetching for your attacks that way it was more customizable. I'm sure that not every one has the same attacks in their sticker book if you were to check every person who had this title. It's custom made to where every person who owns this game can have what ever attacks they want with out the crap tons of lvls it would use up in order for you to allocate points & all of that other bull crap. I for one was glad to see a game like Sticker Star released & hope to see something along it's lines release down the line for the 3DS again; perhaps as a Princess Peach Sticker Star title; which I for one would support 100% if it were to release.

Personally; I loved having to be made to do stuff in my game where as otherwise everything is given to you on a silver platter & then some. <.< I for one was glad to see that this was one title that didn't do that; thus why I enjoy this title so much.. Because not every thing is handed to you; you know like how it is in real life.

I think the flaw with Sticker Star was the fact that it's apart of the same Paper Mario series that was heavily based upon traditional RPGs along with a deep story. On its own, SS was a unique game that heavily relied on the use of arts and crafts much like the namesake of the series is based upon. Now why did it gather so much hate amongst the fanbase? Well...truly, it was a completely different game from the predecessors. 

The development team truly took a different approach to the series by emphasizing the artstyle of the game and even made it more connected to the view of the Super Mario platforming series as opposed to an RPG. Yes, SS is still an RPG game, but it was done in a much simplistic way than the previous Paper Mario games.

The fans have been wanting a game similar to TTYD, but were disappointed by SPM. Wanting to see partners, the EXP leveling RPG battle system and a deep, but lovable series - of course the Paper Mario fans were disappointed when SS failed to deliver all that. Sadly, the Paper Mario fanbase were wanting a TTYD 2, but Nintendo instead delivered what seemed to be a NSMB themed Paper Mario game with unique art effects. 

For the series to go in a completely different pathway, I think that's what truly hurt the Paper Mario fanbase. I don't hate the game; however, I too was hoping for a game similar to the TTYD and the original Paper Mario as these games provided a chance for the Mario characters and settings to truly develop in a story. 

If SS was its own thing, perhaps it wouldn't have received this much hate (though then again, the game was lackluster at some points admittedly). However, being connected to the Paper Mario series was what caused all the commotion to break loose.