Paper Mario (or Mario Story in Japan) was the last major Mario game for Nintendo 64. The spiritual successor to Super Mario RPG for the Super Nintendo, it was one of the few role playing games produced for the N64. Its title comes from the fact that the game had a unique graphical style in which the characters are flat, 2D-looking paper cut outs inhabiting a three-dimensional world.

The game's story premise involves King Bowser Koopa and his assistant Kammy Koopa stealing the Star Rod and imprisoning the Seven Star Spirits. They then use their castle to steal Princess Peach Toadstool's Castle, with the Princess still in it. Mario and his eight new friends must now save the Star Spirits and Princess Peach. Paper Mario was scored by Yuka Tsujiyoko, the composer for the Fire Emblem series.

These new friends include Goombario (a young Goomba who is a big fan of Mario's), Kooper (a Koopa Troopa who likes adventure), Bombette (a pink Bob-omb who is a former slave of The Koopa Bros.), Parakarry (a Paratroopa who works as a postman), Lady Bow (a princess of Boos), Watt (a little Sparky who lights the way), Sushie (a Cheep-Cheep who can live out of Water), and Lakilester (a Lakitu who used to work for Bowser).

The sequel to Paper Mario, called Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door, was released in late 2004 for the Nintendo GameCube.

Gameplay Elements

Battle System

Much like in Super Mario RPG, the battles in Paper Mario relied on a cross between traditional turn-based RPG gameplay, and timed button presses (or other motions) for increased damage on enemies, or reduced damage taken from enemies. Unlike in Super Mario RPG, the size of a party in battle was reduced from 3 to 2, with Mario and one of the sidekick characters beating on enemies. However, sidekick characters were switchable, and it cost the sidekick their turn, unless equiped with a certain badge. Sidekicks did not take damage like Mario did. Instead they were briefly incapacitated depending on the damage they received (Although very few enemies actually possessed the ability to damage them). If Mario ran out of Hit Points, however, the game was immediately lost (unless a Life Shroom was in your inventory, in which case Mario was immediately revived.) Paper Mario also differed from its predecesor by implimenting a more "common-sense" approach to battles. If you jumped or hammered an enemy in the area you were in, you would begin the battle by launching a pre-emptive strike (although most enemies had the capability to launch a first strike of their own). Also, hammers were ineffective against flying foes, and jumping on a spiked enemy would only result in damaging yourself.

Hit Points, Flower Points, and Badge Points

Unlike many other RPGs, Paper Mario does not feature attacks that do 4,000 points of damage. The most Mario's Hit Points can go up to is normally only 50 (although special badges can raise this total to 65), and enemies' HP tops out at 99. An attack that does 10 damage can be considered extremely lethal. The uniqueness of Paper Mario's battle system lies in both these small numbers and an addition/subtraction system for calculating damage and level-up increases. For instance, Mario using his basic hammer against an enemy with zero defense will do 1 damage, 2 if the Action Command is successfully executed. If the enemy has 1 defense, then the aforementioned attack would do no damage or 1 damage, respectively.

Flower Points, like in Super Mario RPG, are a shared resource between all characters, used for pulling off special techniques and other miscellaneous functions.

Badge Points were a method of limiting the amount of Badges Mario could equip. Different badges use up a different amount of Badge Points, which effectively limits the amount of badges that are able to be equipped and forces strategy to be used in different situations.

Similar to the levelling system in Super Mario RPG, a levelup allows the player to choose between raising HP, FP, and BP. Unlike in SMRPG, however, this was not a bonus to a set increase beforehand; this increase was the only method of raising the maximums. BP and FP could each be raised 9 times, to a maximum of 30 and 50, respectively, and HP only 8, placing Mario's maximum level at 27.

Badges

Badges replace the traditional RPG staple of armor, weapons, and other such things being equipped on Mario. Badges provided a wide range of effects, such as bestowing powerful new abilities like the Ultra Smash or Mega Quake, allowing Mario to jump on enemies that would normally damage him when he did so, increasing attack or defense power, or temporarily increasing the maximum FP/HP. Different badges are effective in different situations, and many badges were hidden in hard to find places, providing a sidequest for completionists who wanted to have all of the badges.

External links

• Dmoz.org - Paper Mario