Share to Facebook Share to Twitter Share to Linkedin Paper Mario: The Thousand Year Door Even though I knew people with N64s back in the ‘90s, and admittedly spent a good deal of time wielding that divisive, three-pronged analog controller (monstrosity?), I never personally owned Nintendo’s blurry fog machine—er, I mean, 64-bit console . Thus, I never had the opportunity to play the original Paper Mario, a classic by most retro gamer standards, or so I’ve observed. I did, however, end up snagging a silver lunchbox GameCube at some point and thoroughly enjoyed the pop-up sequel, Paper Mario: The Thousand Year Door .
I particularly appreciated the hilarious writing, which had no business being that sharp and witty in a game about everyone’s favorite plumber flattening out to PaRappa the Rapper proportions. I also loved the fast-paced turn-based battles. A brand new remake for the Nintendo Switch releases tomorrow, May 23 2024, which promises a host of visual, audio and quality-of-life improvements.
According to reviews that have started publishing, the game retains everything that made it great back in 2004, the year it first released, although it does retain some dated elements, especially in terms of design. Pros include additions of features that make travel more convenient, a new hint system for lost adventurers, some excellent graphical and sound updates, and a (mostly) consistent 30fps framerate. Cons mostly refer to the notorious back-tracking that is still pre.