Look how they massacred my boy…

At first glance, Paper Mario: Sticker Star seemed like an exciting return to form for the skinny, subversive offshoot Mario RPG series. Super Paper Mario’s only significant crime in the eyes of the fervent Paper Mario fan was that the standard 2D platformer direction compromised on the substance that the accessible, yet buoyant RPG brought to invigorate the tired Mario brand. While the more meat and potatoes platformer gameplay in Super Paper Mario was relatively lacking in certain aspects, the straightforward meal being served was surely decorated with some snazzy garnishes and exotic spices to amplify the flavor and presentation to a wild degree. Super Paper Mario was akin to drinking light beer out of a clear, glass top hat that glows in the dark; approaching a beverage that comes by the barrel full in the most unorthodox and quirky manner possible, so it still fits the oddball Paper Mario identity like an oven mitt. With the announcement that Sticker Star was reverting to Paper Mario’s turn-based roots, the devil’s advocacy for Super Paper Mario is almost completely blown back to utter excitement. With the return to RPG gameplay, we can experience another abstract Mario adventure with a concise world map, badges, and proper partner characters with robust personalities and combat abilities. Our son is returning from college, and it's a delight to see him in person after settling for digital communications for a solid three months. However, even with the promise of RPG-facilitated splendor, Paper Mario: Sticker Star is a downright tragedy. Sticker Star is the equivalent of the son from the college analogy dying in a car accident on his way home, and playing it is like watching the medics and coroner peel his bloody body out of the tarnished vehicle. It’s so unpleasant that it's revolting.

For some reason, modern Mario games like to present themselves with a festival of some sort coordinated by Princess Peach. Sticker Star’s event of inane frivolity is gathering around for the annual occurrence of the almighty Sticker Comet that has the power to grant everyone’s wishes. Naturally, Bowser jumps at the opportunity after hearing about this cosmic Macguffin, so he crashes the party with all of his minions and absorbs the divine energy after obtaining the comet for himself. While the festival grounds are in ruin from Bowser’s upset, all hope is not lost. Kersti, a floating silver crown that is the embodiment of the Sticker Comet’s essence, promises to assist Mario in reclaiming the falling star’s power from Bowser before he uses it to dominate the Mushroom Kingdom.

Besides rehashing an overdone plot catalyst from the mainline Mario series, several other concerns arise just from the opening cutscene. For one, has the cat got Bowser’s tongue? Why didn’t he monologue on how awesomely righteous he would be after taking their precious comet, laughing devilishly at everyone is doomed as a result like he normally does? Where is his assistant Kammy Koopa, hovering right behind the Koopa King to humble him with her advisory input? In Sticker Star, the snarling, practically mute Bowser from the mainline series and the immature, comically inclined one we’ve come to adore throughout all of Mario’s RPG spin-offs are now unfortunately interchangeable. Also, every single Goomba and Koopa seen in the introduction is acting as enemies causing a commotion in the quad, which means that these two species of Mario foot fodder are now simply relegated to positions as grunts in Bowser’s army. So much for erasing the stigma with non-partisan Goomba and Koopa citizens of the Mushroom Kingdom. Having other species that roam the Mushroom Kingdom sure would’ve spruced up the heavily homogenized Toad Town hub of “Decalburg” considerably. Not only are Peach’s shroomy denizens the only ones that reside here, but their designs are the commonplace Toad model with little color variation. There are no toads with glasses and mustaches, no elderly toads, no preppy celebrity toads, no toad martial arts masters in uniforms: only the most basic of toad designs scanned thousands of times on a paper copier. Paper Mario’s characters and their dynamics are now indiscernible from the ones found in the mainline Mario series, and this is really Sticker Star’s most fundamental flaw. Mainline Mario can skate by with one-dimensional characters because the player will constantly be focused on the fast-paced platformer action, requiring tighter concentration on every momentary leap. In a slower-paced, character and dialogue-driven genre like a JRPG, the dynamic nature of the eclectic cast and the NPCs, regarding their appearances and personalities, can either make or break the experience. They really couldn’t have formulated a more literal translation of the typical Mario experience in the RPG realm, making what was deemed as more traditional narrative fare in the first Paper Mario seem like an avant-garde depiction of a Mario story by comparison. Because mainline Mario is arguably the least narratively rich franchise in gaming, Sticker Star’s story (or lack thereof) suffers completely.

If the blank characters are any indication, Sticker Star also extends its skin-wearing symmetry with the mainline Mario series with its levels. Mario’s range of level themes is the archetype for all platformer motifs, using base elements to diversify the handful of areas on display. Because Mario established the blueprint of elemental themes that all subsequent Mario games and derivative platformers followed, their prevalence became exhausting. This is why chapters in Paper Mario set in raucous wrestling arenas, poshly-decorated commercial trains, and the fortresses of sweaty, stuttering uber-nerds are highly refreshing deviations from the simple layouts found in the mainline series. Even the first Paper Mario that stayed loyal to the Mushroom Kingdom setting at least used the RPG format to let the tired topography breathe to the extent of livability. Sticker Star and I’m not shitting you, not only features the bare bone essentials of the standard elemental themes with its six worlds but the progression is also conducted via a grid-based map like the one in Super Mario Bros. 3. Progression is but a means of trekking to the end of a level as one would in a standard platformer-centric Mario game, only halted by the turn-based combat at several occurrences along the way. Overall, most of the worlds found in Sticker Star act as less lively versions of the environments from the first game. The desert area does not have an Arabic toad plaza, the Boo mansion isn’t creepy in the slightest, and the tropical jungle does not have a single Yoshi in its wild grasses. The developers couldn’t have approached this facet of the game with a more by-the-books method if they tried.

Mario’s leisurely trajectory through the Mushroom Kingdom will also be detoured often by the game’s main collectible and namesake: the stickers. From the hub of Decalburg to Bowser’s fiery domain in World 6, stickers will be plastered all over the land like a daycare center. Fortunately, Mario does not need a razor blade to procure these collectibles, for they simply tear right off with a moderately forceful pluck. Firstly, I must delve into a tangent with the absurd emphasis Sticker Star puts on paper and paper-related products like stickers. Modeling Mario’s world out of paper was strictly a pleasing and quirky visual aesthetic that compliments the storybook aura of the whimsical Mario RPG. The few special paper “curses'' inflicted onto Mario in The Thousand-Year Door were presented with a tongue-in-cheek sense of irony, a novel idea of actually warping Mario’s thin anatomy into paper objects as a jokey afterthought when the first game forgot to utilize it. The developers here seem to be convinced that paper itself is the selling point of Paper Mario, with the constant crumpling of characters like refuse and weightless floating moments. They think Paper Mario will inspire players to pursue a career at Staples. Eye-rolling paper gags aside, I start to audibly groan when the paper initiative is instilled on the field as a mechanic. Sticker Star heightens the tearing of the small stickers to ripping the foundation of the foreground, leaving behind the molecular substrate of the architectural bearing. It's an interesting mechanic in theory, but leave it to the developers to botch its execution. Filling in the required patch to hurdle over an obstacle is merely a matter of finding a suitably sized construct and placing it over the impediment. This mechanic could have warranted some intriguing puzzles, but even Sticker Star’s new properties are painfully streamlined.

The sticker mechanic is boring and condescendingly easy on the field, but how they are used in combat is bafflingly flawed. There is a reason why most of the stickers are shaped like boots and hammers, Mario’s primary attack options one will recognize from the first two Paper Mario titles. Each sticker equals an allowance to attack, one per sticker collected that is displayed in a sticker album along with the healing items that Mario must peel off the walls. If Mario does not possess any attack stickers in his inventory, the only option he has at his disposal is to scurry away like a yellow-bellied coward. I could understand that the developers implemented this bizarre system to supplement the already bland digression of Paper Mario’s turn-based combat, but this is a horrendously miscalculated decision. The basics of combat should NEVER be relegated to a disposable item, regardless of whether or not it has been watered down to the point of melting. Coaxing the player into meticulously searching for stickers to stand a chance even against the wimpiest of Goombas just enforces long bouts of tedious grinding to pad the game. Or, at least it would if the player doesn’t realize that there is no incentive to fight enemies because Mario cannot gain experience points from battle. All Mario receives is a sum of coins, used to buy more stickers I might add. No, I am not kidding. The sticker system that the developers coordinated as this entry's specific gimmick can be eluded almost entirely.

Upon hearing this revelation, one might ask themselves that if combat can be avoided entirely in Sticker Star, how will Mario fare against the game’s bosses? Well have no fear, fellow gamers, for the developers have thought ahead for this predicament, and what they’ve devised is of course, really fucking stupid. In each world, Mario will stumble upon a “thing,” a notable domestic object of interest whose conspicuous nature is highlighted by its size and sharper, rounder graphical rendering. These series of sore thumbs can be used by Mario once he converts their state of solid matter into stickers and uses them on the field to bypass obstacles (ie. the vacuum in the desert world). Where they come into play with the bosses is that these household apparatuses are exclusively the keys to conquering each boss, their Achilles heel that will bring them to their knees. Naturally, this connotes that all Mario has to do is use the “thing” item during a boss battle without any supplementary damage to it from regular attacks, but it's also the only way to subdue the boss at all. Imagine the cricket sound badge from The Thousand-Year Door as not only Hooktail’s weakness to give the player an advantage but if it was just a pass to automatically win the fight. “Winning” the fight is simply a reward for collecting the badge at the end of the day. Did they overlook this, or were the bosses intentionally this cheap and effortless?

Super Paper Mario is looking pretty good right now, isn’t it? Paper Mario’s former less-than-favorable effort on the Wii was an odd duck that took some wild liberties with the gameplay and pissed off some series veterans like myself at the time, but it is a goddamn masterpiece compared to Intelligent Systems follow-up to Super Paper Mario when they decided to appease fans with another game revolving around turn-based combat. Sure, it technically returned, but at what cost? At least Super Paper Mario was funny, creative, irreverent, and offered something outside the capabilities of typical Mario procedures. Paper Mario: Sticker Star is not a return to form: it’s an aggressive deviation in every shape and form. It’s generic, bland, pointless, broken, tedious, and mind-numbingly boring, all negative characteristics that do not match its Paper Mario brethren. It offends me in every way imaginable. Perhaps the biggest offense is that the process of sizzling all of the taste out of Paper Mario was a calculated effort on the part of the developers thanks to Shigeru Miyamoto’s “guidance.” If this isn’t just a grapevine rumor, it's time to put Nintendo’s patriarch in a rest home.

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Attribution: https://erockreviews.blogspot.com

Maybe half a star is too harsh considering the undeniable production values, but this was such a massive step down from the previous three Paper Marios. It's bland, generic, safe, predictable, all words I had previously never associated with the series.

And maybe I could stomach the watered-down story and level themes if the gameplay was good. After all, Paper Mario 64 is a relatively straightforward Mario vs. Bowser story. But Sticker Star's gameplay is just not very fun, and the world is nowhere near as charming as 64's. Combat is shallow and easy despite consumable attacks on paper being an interesting idea, bosses all require specific "things" to beat, there's only nameless toads to talk to, Bowser has next to no personality when he used to be the star of the show in the previous games (and in Bowser's Inside Story), the list goes on and on. Forgettable, yet unforgettably disappointing.

Something I respect about Nintendo is that even at their worst, it's usually a polished experience. Besides running smooth as silk, the visuals in this game are fantastic: the Pikmin-esque models of real life objects and paper-craft level design are nothing short of eye candy. The sense of humor is on-fleek as per usual for the Paper Mario franchise, pretty much all the jokes are charming and land well. I shouldn't even mention the soundtrack being good because everybody knows that, so yeah. It's good. But don't let it deceive you; every aspect of the game design packed in here is atrocious. The uninteresting combat is one thing, but the absolute insanity that is the "puzzles" in this game are another thing entirely. Playing this game with a guide open at all times was the optimal way to go, because every level had some random bullshit like "place a specific item sticker in the background" or "knock over this bush in the middle of nowhere" or "the item you need to progress is in a toad's asscrack in a random level". It's like jesus christ man, it might be the most obtuse Nintendo game ever crafted. But it's fairly fun if you play with a guide! So do that if you wanna experience this infamous beast

Wow, the average score on this game is low. I realize that I’m going to be a bit controversial with some of the things I say here, but I do believe that this game in general takes an unfairly harsh criticism from the community for simply being the first to majorly screw up the paper Mario formula; I think it’s a genuinely better game than color splash, which tends to see at least slightly less scathing reviews.

For one, I think the sticker mechanic is far more fun and engaging than the color card mechanic from that game. Peeling unique attack stickers from the overworld is just such a satisfying thing! And I think the graphics look good on the smaller screen, whereas I find color splash to be far more bland visually. Obviously, this game is entirely lacking story. It’s simply a ‘collect all the pieces’ game without nearly anything else going in. Even so, there are some interesting set piece moments to enjoy even if they’re kind of moot without a story, such as losing Kersti (stupid name) and your hammer to the poison big forest and wiggler’s antics that ensue, or climbing an ancient desert tower, or the haunted mansion. I also think that the ‘Things’ have the best implementation in this game compared to any other paper Mario game that has used them. A lot of the game is lacking though, in intrigue and variance compared to paper Mario games past. The bosses are generally uninspired, typically being a regular Mario enemy enhanced with the power of one of the sticker crowns.

Though, I think if you can get past how much of a step back it is from the other predecessor games, you can actually find a decently fun time in this game! Don’t let all those hate reviews bring your perception down; and that’s coming from a diehard Super Paper Mario fan.

going into this game, i thought "nah it can't be that bad, right?" and at first, i thought i was right. the game is visually nice, the soundtrack is good, and it's polished. i was so young, so naive

sticker star is one of the worst games i've ever played and for so many more reasons than what i had expected them to be. people talk about how derivative and boring this game is, but they dont really talk about how the game is designed. some truly baffling design decisions went into this game. the two cacti mission, the wiggler segments goose chase that goes on for WAY too long, the final boss (dear god), and tons more. the enigmasion is a highlight in this sea of utter filth and contempt, it actually felt like a video game for once in its pitiful, meaningless existence. unfortunately, it doesn't take long for the swill to return, and we are back into contempt land. i used a guide for probably half of this game and it's absolutely necessary. the amount of ass-pullery this game does is insane. frustrating is the only word that could really and truly describe what we have here

i love mario, and i can defend a lot of mario stuff. i can defend the 1993 live action movie AND the animated movie from 2023. i can defend hotel mario. this? this is shit.