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Super Mario RPG 2 delivers a cute, charming cast of characters, variety of gameplay, and a battle system that surpasses Chrono Trigger.
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1) Cute, loveable characters likely to be widely embraced by children everywhere. The cute characters also make this game hand itself nicely to a female audience.
2) The game play is an absolute masterpiece. It seamlessly combines action and strategy elements giving the game a lot of fun, variety, and challenge on many different levels. Except for the screen transitions, it's better than Chrono Trigger! There are also several different things you can do: get the first strike, play the normal strategy game, collect the koopa shells from the fuzzies, solve puzzles to get items, etc. It is all the more evidence to demonstrate Nintendo's ability to consistantly deliver high quality products.
3) The paper concept presents the player with a new kind of game play feel not available in any other game.
4) Quirky sense of humor in almost every cinematic. There is also a lot of situation comedy in the game. The way that the situation comedy was done is a huge plus in my opinion.
5) A fairly good basic plot: the evil guy (Bowser) gets a strong powerful magic wand, and kidnaps the princess. Mario then has to embark on a quest to twart the evil koopa king and save the girl. Mario is the chosen one who will bring balance to the mushroom kingdom. Although, the game isn't really that epic - it's more of an epic turned into a cute, quirky little adventure.
6) It never explains why Mario is so famous, but who needs explaining? It's Mario! Of course he's famous!
7) It's an excellent children's game, for a children's console. Nintendo is making games for the right market: their market.
8) Playing both as Mario and Princess Toadpeach in the two different scenarios was a great technique for adding variety to the story. Normally the princess is just some girl locked up in a castle, but this time you get to hear about what's happening on her side of the story.
9) When you're playing as Peachstool you have to avoid the guards by sneaking by. It's Metal Gear Solid, Peach style, and it's a lot of fun.
10) The status affect spells actually work on the bosses. This means they can actually be used for strategy. I have always dreamt of the day when I would be able to strategically cast status affect spells on bosses, and now that day has come.
11) You can collect everything in the game. There is never a point you reach when you cannot go back to collect a treasure.
12) The level up experience system was well designed. The pacing of the game was also very well balanced.
13) Talking to the fortune teller and Goombario for help was the best help system I have ever seen in any game. It is very helpful in telling you what you need to do next if you ever get stuck. It is also much more user-friendly than going to gamefaqs.com and downloading a walkthrough.
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1) The content is a little too cheesed out. There's too much happy music, and too much la la la. But I suppose that isn't too bad considering the original intent of Mario RPG: to get more people interested in RPG's. Mario RPG was originally intended for Mario fans in hopes to expand their gaming interests into the RPG genre, and given that purpose this game does do a good job of achieving that. It also does a good job of doing the opposite: getting RPG players interested in Mario. But it's still too cheesed out. Many RPG players probably won't play this because it's Mario, and vice versa.
2) RPG players expect to see really cool-looking spell castings, and this game fails to deliver that too.
3) The game requires a tutorial, which means the game isn't intuitive enough.
4) The paper concept is new, but it's not as good as full blown 3D. The lacking of full blown 3-D is really a major drawback for this game. If you look at this game from across the room, it will not catch your eye nearly as much as a game like Ocarina of Time or Black & White.
5) You go back too far, and loose too much when you die. Usually when I die I suddenly get a strong urge to turn off the machine and do something else because I went back too far.
6) As in all RPGs, this game continues the tradition of having cinematics inserted into the game, making this a movie/game. Even though it isn't nearly as bad as games like Final Fantasy VII or The Longest Cutscene... I mean, Journey, it still employs too much movie and not enough game play. In my opinion, cinematics should never be any longer than a few short seconds, and only used when absolutely neccessary.
7) Text boxes instead of voice acting.
8) The pressing A repeatedly games are more tedious than fun. They just makes my arm stiff. I don't like it.