My Review of Super Mario RPG

Ah, Super Mario RPG. my first journey into the RPG genre. It was developed by Square (later Square-Enix) and published by Nintendo on the SNES. It was released in 1996 in Japan and the U.S, and was later ported to the Wii in 2008. The experiment from Square and Nintendo was a success, garnering very positive reviews. It layed the groundwork for other Mario RPG franchises to follow such as the Paper Mario and Mario & Luigi series on future Nintendo consoles.


Story

Mario gets catapulted out of the keep at the start of the game, as well as scattering the star pieces across the world, this is where the journey begins...

The game begins when Mario enters Bowser's Castle to rescue Princess Toadstool. During the battle, a giant sword breaks through the Star Road and crashes into Bowser’s castle, sending Mario, Princess Toadstool, and Bowser flying in different directions, as well as scattering seven star fragments across the world. The game picks back up with Mario on the quest to find all the star pieces so that peace can return and wishes may be granted once more.

You met several rather interesting characters along your quest. They all have some simple backstory to them but they all have some personality to them as well.


Graphics

The 3-D minecart section of the game.


An overhead view when in towns and dungeons.

The graphics are very nice, which is not at all suprising considering it came out towards the end of the Super Nintendos lifespan. The environments are rich and vibrant with color, and are always pleasing to the eyes. The dungeons are dark and damp looking as they should be, the towns are lively and all have a theme to go with them. Also has a nice-looking minecart section that is pretty well done.

The spells in battle, as well at the items when used in battle are very detailed and give a great demonstration of just what the SNES could do.


Geno using Geno Beam on an opponent.


Gameplay/Interface

A typical view of a world map in the game.

The gameplay for SMRPG was quite unique for its time. It used an overworld view for each place you were at, then you can traverse the locations in that spot with a simple point and click. Think Final Fantasy XII. Once in an area, you are free to explore in a 2-D plane, with enemies being seen before you battle. Yes, no random battles! oh joy! This gave the player more control with how to proceed through an area. There were also an assortment of puzzles and minigames sprinkled through the game. Ranging from simple switch puzzles to minecart stages to yoshi racing. It had a wide assortment of distractions to suck your time away from the main quest.


A switch puzzle.

The battle system was fantastic. Unlike the ATB systems from the likes of Final Fantasy and Chrono Trigger at the time, they used a turn-based battle system. It cut down on the menu sizes as well and in turn created a much less cluttered screen.


The character screen when in a battle.

Instead of having all the battle options on a single menu, they segmented it, each to a corresponding button. A for attack, B for defence, X for items, and finally Y for a characters special attacks/magic.

Finally, after a battle when you leveled up, you got to chose which stat to improve. This was a landmark for me, I had never been given control on how my characters got to progress in a game. After each level, you can chose to increase a characters HP, Attack power, or Magic power.


An small magazine article I would guess, explaining the level up system.


Music
This game had some of the most memorable music in any game I have played, I would encourage everyone just to skim through an entire playlist, fantastic classical nintendo sound but also some great single pieces, including one of the best boss battle music tracks I have heard in any RPG, as well as the simple but beautiful tune of Forest Maze.
Super Mario RPG Playlist

I don't view many games as one that I think everyone should play but this would have to be one of mine for sure. It's simple and streamlined but so satifying and it's a journey that every gamer should take at least once.