Some Thoughts About Mario Odyssey

I recently finished the latest installment in the 3D Mario series, Super Mario Odyssey, and I loved it! But I'd like to share some random thoughts about it. Sometimes, the 'Some Thoughts About' series of articles is structured much like a review, but since this game's been reviewed to death, I just want to touch on a few points that I think are worth discussing: How the game continues the series' recent use of motion controls, how cohesive its world feels and to what degree the game shifts the series back to a nonlinear, exploration-based style.

In Motion

Motion controls became an integral part of the Mario games on the Wii. It was genuinely impossible to beat Super Mario Galaxy and its sequel without shaking the Wii remote and using the pointer controls.

The Nintendo Switch, the Wii's "grandchild" as it were, also has motion controls - but those don't seem to be the focus. As such, you can use motion controls in Odyssey, but it's mostly optional. But though it's mostly a matter of convenience, the game still seems to want to make motion controls more relevant. For this reason, the motion control version of many actions is a better version. For example, you can move faster as a Bullet Bill by holding the button, but you can move even faster if you shake the Joycons. Personally, I would've preferred it if the motion controls were just another alternative and not a "superior" version.

Cohesive World

Super Mario Sunshine is probably the most controversial out of the 3D Marios, with most people ranking it at the top or the bottom of the series - usually not in between. One thing most of us can agree on, though, that it sets up the most cohesive world - that is to say, everything feels connected and like it's part of the same place.

This makes it completely distinct from other 3D Marios, where you enter various disconnected worlds that are connected by a hub - like Peach's Castle or Rosalina's Observatory. In spite of the developers placing Odyssey on Sunshine's side of the fence in the sense that they consider it an 'exploration' type platformer, it's the least cohesive 3D Mario yet. That is neither a positive nor a negative, but it's something to think about. Not only do the game's Kingdoms not really connect logically, they are completely different in terms of artstyle and music. If you were to take Mario out of the picture, you'd scarcely believe that New Donk City, Mt. Volbono, the Ruined Kingdom and Bonneton all exist within the same game and the same world.

It would be unfair to say this applies to the whole game, however. The worlds with more "traditional themes," like the ice-themed Shiveria, beach-themed Bubblaine and desert-themed Tostarena don't seem like an impossible fit in terms of style, though they still don't connect logically.

Exploring

In the time leading up to the release of Super Mario Odyssey, Nintendo made it very clear that they considered it a return to the formula of Super Mario 64 and Super Mario Sunshine. Unlike the Galaxy games and 3D World, this game would go back to having exploration-based levels instead of linear challenges. The strange thing is, this is true in some ways, but not in others.

Mario Odyssey's worlds are indeed large and open to be explored, that much is true, but there's still a very clear intended route to start with. Each world has its own set of story missions that must be played in order (with a rare exception occurring in Shiveria, where you can play 4 missions in any order) and until the story missions are complete, many of the optional Moons are inaccessible. In that sense, it can feel a little bit like Mario 64 or Sunshine; but once you complete a world's story missions, the way it opens up is more akin to Rare collectathons like Banjo-Kazooie. At that point, the worlds are exactly as open and explorable as promised.

But while the worlds eventually open up, the game as a whole does not. A beloved quality of Mario 64 and Super Mario Galaxy was that any Star was as good as another; if you had enough, you could move on to many new worlds at once. This allowed you to skip missions and even worlds you didn't like. In Odyssey, the Moons only ever serve the purpose of getting you to the next world. Sometimes the game allows you to pick which of two possible worlds to do first, but that's the only choice you're getting. You can't even skip over a level if you have enough Moons because the game specifically requires a certain amount of Moons from that particular level before it'll allow you to progress.

So while Odyssey's worlds do offer more room for exploration after you finish their story mission, the game's structure on a larger scale is much more linear than any 3D Mario so far. Even Super Mario 3D World, which is very linear, had more branching paths.

Conclusion

Super Mario Odyssey wants motion controls to be optional and yet relevant, so it allows greater conveniences and slightly better actions with the motion controls. I think committing to either making the motion controls integral, or completely optional, would have been better.

Super Mario Odyssey is not committed to making a cohesive world. In that regard, it is more like Mario Galaxy than Sunshine; variation over cohesion. It is up to the player to decide whether they prefer this or not.

Super Mario Odyssey's levels allow for exploration, but they are fairly linear until you complete the story missions. The game's actual structure is almost completely linear, even moreso than Galaxy 2 and 3D world and completely unlike Mario 64 and Mario Sunshine.

Those were just some thoughts about the game, but I do have to stress that Mario Odyssey is an amazing Mario game and a must-buy for any Switch owner. If you have any thoughts about the game, good or bad, please feel free to share them in the comments.

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Mario Odyssey footage by: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCtyokkUwxwy0ef1f6TLYFLA
Mario Galaxy footage by: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCSQ1C82NLsVVGmi0ayYnh_w
Mario Sunshine footage by: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCM8XzXipyTsylZ_WsGKmdKQ

#RemasterThousandYearDoor

Recently, fans of the classic GameCube RPG 'Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door' have been part of a hashtag campaign to convince Nintendo to remaster or possibly even remake the game to bring it to a new audience. I want to give you some insight on the movement and explain my own reasons for wanting a remaster of this beloved cult classic.

Puppet with a Plan

On July 27th 2019, Arlo - a family friendly gaming YouTuber - made a video starting the hashtag and an associated petition. Arlo's been making content about the Paper Mario franchise for a long time and like myself, he believes that the Paper Mario franchise has lost much of what made it great - whereas the Thousand-Year Door represents everything that made the series great in the first place. His video is well worth checking out, both for context and because he's a downright entertaining content creator:

Not long after Arlo posted his video officially starting the campaign, the hashtag quickly became populated with thousands of Tweets explaining why the Thousand-Year Door deserves a remaster, as well as mountains of fan art. It's well worth browsing through the hashtag to see just how much the fans care: https://twitter.com/hashtag/RemasterThousandYearDoor

Looks good on paper

So now you're up to speed about what's going on - people want a remaster of Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door. But why? I'm going to divide this segment into three subsections - Content, Context and Improvements.

Content

The most straightforward reason why Thousand-Year Door deserves a remaster is that it is an excellent videogame. It takes the formula of classic JRPGs and distills it down to something more simple, quick and involved thanks to the timed Action Commands. There are no ridiculously high numbers or overly complicated hierarchies of weaknesses and strengths - everything explains itself intuitively. Flying enemies need to be jumped on, spiked enemies need to be hit with the hammer and so on. Battles have many solutions for you to discover and you never have to grind. And instead of a complex system of equipment with many minor statistical differences and percentages, there are just badges that allow you to shape the way you play by adding all new abilities or other game changing additions to your arsenal.

Rock solid gameplay aside, the game's presentation is timeless. The game has a focus on simple, colorful and immediately recognizable characters that stick out from the simple 3D backgrounds. The clear, simple speech bubbles and easily readable font are reminiscent of comic books and make sure you'll never get tired of reading.

The game's soundtrack is also amazing, featuring catchy tunes, emotional pieces and a lot of downright weird stuff as well. One of my favorites will always be the battle theme:

But one of the most unexpected virtues of the Paper Mario series are the games' stories and the way they expand the world that Mario and his friends inhabit. Mario games are famous for being lighthearted and joyful, but the Paper Mario games have moments of deep sadness or even fear that you'd never see in the mainline series. Thousand-Year Door is not afraid to add some darker depths to the world of Mario. I won't go in-depth to prevent spoilers, but let's just talk about how the game starts. Mario walks into Rogueport, and the first thing that happens is a Goomba girl gets attacked by a suspicious figure and no one lifts a finger to help; Mario and the girl escape into town and the first visual that greets you is a gallows with a noose. In a Mario game.

The intro segment continues to lay it on thick, showing you two mafioso beating a few people up in the background and having you get robbed moments after. The message is clear: You've left the Mushroom Kingdom - this is a new place in Mario's world, with a good deal more crime and cynicism.

But that's not to say that Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door is an entirely grim game. The game has a fantastically goofy sense of humour and its tone is still optimistic. It's just not afraid to show you the seedy side of Mario's world, a side that we've never really seen again.

There's so much more I want to say about the story and incredible characters, but the purpose of this article is to argue for a rerelease or remake of the game, so I really don't want to spoil any more than I already have.

So, we've got an amazingly fun RPG with beautiful visuals, catchy music and a story that - while charming and humorous - is not afraid to tread dark and scary ground. It's one-of-a-kind, and more people ought to be able to try it for that reason alone.

Context

On a more meta level, a major reason why we need a remaster or remake of Thousand-Year Door is because the game is stuck in a forgotten generation. With the Wii U and Switch leaving GameCube backwards compatability behind, you can only officially play the game with a GameCube and GameCube disc. This means you'll have to either own or buy a GameCube, and then get the game, which might not be cheap depending on where you live.

And even if you did have the financial stability to buy a GameCube with all the bells and whistles, the game is also just fairly unknown. The GameCube was a difficult time for Nintendo, as we all know, and only a handful of games on the system could really be called major successes. A new release wouldn't just make the game more accessible, it'd also just make more people aware of it. With Nintendo's marketing team backing it, the game could enjoy a much greater success on the Switch than it ever did on the GameCube.

Another matter is the current state of the series. The two latest installments, Paper Mario: Sticker Star and Paper Mario: Color Splash did not sell very well and were disliked by critics and fans alike (you can read an article I wrote about it here: https://arjenartdesign.blogspot.com/2017/06/paper-mario-color-splash-critique-1.html), and it's easy to see why: The games aren't bad, but they've completely abandoned what people enjoyed about the series to begin with - namely, the exciting combat and amazing story. Remaking The Thousand-Year Door would be an opportunity for Nintendo to show they understand what the fans want, and would potentially allow them to continue the series in a way that the fans would love. 

In conclusion, remastering the game just makes sense; it makes the game more accessible, it allows Nintendo to market the game as new - which they've been doing quite effectively with Wii U ports on Switch - and thus it'll be seen and played by many new people as well as the fans. It would also be exactly what the fans want after the series changed its focus away from what made fans fall in love with it to begin with.

Improvements

A game doesn't need to be perfect to get a remaster or remake - on the contrary, a rerelease is the perfect opportunity to iron out a few of the problems. Assuming the hypothetical remaster is just that and not a remake, this is a moot point, but if the game gets the full HD treatment like Wind Waker - another GameCube classic - there are things they could do to make the game even better. This segment will feature some very minor gameplay spoilers.

Just like Wind Waker's Triforce chart/piece quest was considered just a bit too tedious, so too does The Thousand-Year Door have its padded segments. Chapter 4 and 5 in particular ask you to run back and forth through the same area more times than is really necessary. Simply adding a pipe that warps you between the two extreme ends of the area would fix this problem. A faster way to switch partners and use items would also be a big plus.

The game also has a few gags that are pretty funny, but drag on for too long - one, for example, involves you having to follow a character through many previously visited areas. This could be fixed by shortening the quest a lot or allowing you to warp from any location once you've opened an area's fast travel pipe. 

These are just a few minor improvements that would make an already great game even more amazing, and a remaster/remake is the perfect opportunity to make it happen.

The Final Page

To summarize, the game deserves a remaster for its exciting combat, great presentation and compelling story. It needs a remaster to reach a new audience and become more accessible for fans and newcomers alike. A remaster would be a great opportunity for Nintendo to score points with the fans and improve upon a beloved classic. All in all, there's nothing to lose and everything to gain. That's why I and so many fans want Nintendo to #RemasterThousandYearDoor.

Please let me know what you think in the comments. Did I make a good case, or are you not convinced? Are there other games you think need to be remastered?

Thousand-Year Door screenshots captured from this video. It's a longplay, so it has spoilers- beware: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BKh5LKS6LJ8

Dutch Representation

Overwatch's latest hero, Sigma, was revealed recently - along with the fact that he's Dutch. I was rather delighted by this reveal. I haven't played Overwatch much lately, but the team puts a lot of effort and detail into each character and seeing a Dutch character brought to life like this is a remarkable experience. I look forward to seeing all the references to Dutch culture in his voice lines, sprays and skins. And all of this got me thinking about being 'represented' as a Dutch person.

During my childhood years, I consumed a lot of American (and some British) media and noticed that a lot of European countries would come up depending on the stories and setting. Germany, France and Italy were big names that characters would visit or at least refer to - but never really the Netherlands. And when the Netherlands would come up, the depiction would either be insulting (like Austin Powers' Goldmember) or just plain wrong, having the "Dutch" people speak German (like in the Bond movie Diamonds Are Forever). At the time, this irritated me a lot, but I've come to understand that there are simply many factors working against "proper representation" for the Dutch. For one, our country is tiny, smack dab in between of Great Britain, Germany and France and the English name for our language is Dutch, which sounds an awful lot like the Germans' name for German, 'Deutsch.' No events in recent history can set us as easy heroes or villains, either, and the Dutch accent is hard to pin down and imitate - not iconic at all. So rather than getting annoyed at lacking or incorrect representation, I've just come to appreciate the times when we get acknowledged at all.

And to celebrate this occasion, I wanted to have a look at a few random examples of that:

Windmillville

Mario Party 7 has a 'vacation' theme, so the boards are all based around famous locations. For example, the 'Grand Canal' is based on Venice in Italy. But my favorite board is Windmillville, and it's easy to see why.

Windmillville is an idyllic fantasy representation of some Dutch stereotypes. Meadows and tulips (an important Dutch industry), accompanied by windmills (for which we are famous) which also function as banks you invest in (referring to the Dutch's historical financial savvy). Windmillville gets it right by not trying to be accurate, it's just a glorious exaggeration of some clichés made into a Mario Party board.

Age of Empires III

This example relies more on history than the last, but the Dutch are a faction in Ages of Empires III. While the voice lines for the units are a bit stilted and awkward, the faction itself is interesting and well realized, hinging primarily on the Netherlands' history as a financially forward thinking and trading nation by allowing you to build banks, among other things.

Red

This is a minor example, but in Pokémon Black & White (and its sequel), there are a few members of Team Plasma named after colors in various languages. One of the sages is called 'Rood,' which is the Dutch word for red. This is cool, but it would've been even better if it had been Orange (Oranje) - because that's the name of our royal family, and thus considered our national color. Still a neat detail, though!

Red Alert 3

Red Alert 3 is a goofy and downright entertaining RTS. One of its greatest strengths is its all-star cast crazy factions and charming presentation. This all comes to a head when the Empire of the Rising Sun (one of the factions) led by George Takei leads an assault on final allied base in Amsterdam.

source: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCpXhAuN6DstHgc5fE6ZaEww

It's not a literal copy of Amsterdam, but the canals are there and the architecture of the civilian buildings is noticeably Dutch. I thought it was a really cool location for the finale of the Empire's campaign.

Nintendo in General

This pertains less to the actual content of games and more to their localizations, but starting with the Wii U Nintendo started translating more of their major games to Dutch.  The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild and Mario Odyssey are both the first major games in their respective franchises that were given a Dutch translation. I recently completed Mario Odyssey, and I really appreciated the translation even if I didn't need it. 

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So, that's it! Just a few examples of how Dutch and the Dutch are represented in videogames. There are Dutch developers, of course, but I specifically wanted to look at how non-Dutch parties handle it.

How about you? Are you from a country or culture that you feel is or isn't properly represented? Please share your experiences down below!