The COMPLETE Mario & Luigi Retrospective | The Bros' Wackiest Adventures Yet

[Music] all right everybody i have a never-before-seen concept for you you know those two mario rpgs that we got what if we add luigi the year is 2003 and the game boy advances well into its life cycle and shockingly enough there is no original mario game in sight yeah we got a couple of quality ports here or there but nothing in terms of a brand new adventure starring the portly plumber despite that nintendo insisted on constantly giving us the same version of mario bros across multiple games why did you do this i don't understand and that is where newcomers alpha dream come in developing an rpg featuring not only mario but his lesser known brother green mario you gotta remember here at this point luigi getting a headline roll was kind of a big deal luigi's mansion was the first time he was more than the typecast player too we don't count mario as missing in this house so the idea of not only playing as luigi but both brothers at the same time in a brand new adventure well boy howdy sign me up it's also the game that added striped socks to luigi's canon so that's good to know classic alpha dream is of course known for this series but at the time these devs didn't really have much under their belt they made hamtaro rainbow rescue for gba that's cool not the first and probably not the last time i'll bring up these hamtaro games on this channel i swear but more interesting tomato adventure i don't really know much about it but it looks very similar to what they would go on to work on soon after and that's good enough for me it's an rpg that never left japan will probably never get any recognition from nintendo ever again and will be quite a while before a fan translation is completed so i can understand why tomatoes are the main aesthetic here not gonna lie i'm very confused as of late 2019 alpha dream shut their doors after filing for bankruptcy now this doesn't mean that the series is done with need i remind you nintendo owns both mario and luigi but it's definitely the end of an era this is a very fascinating franchise that i feel doesn't really get talked about all that much they just happen to be the mario rpgs that you find on portable consoles then that's it five games and two remakes that is certainly an impressive lineup and i figured now is a better time than ever to take a look at what this entire series is all about starting off with of course superstar saga does anybody else remember when nintendo advertised this new sub series using live action shots of two boys playing around that was weird i can't say i don't have a few more questions but hey i got the game anyway so clearly they were onto something mario and luigi superstar saga aka the game where mario and luigi dance following the trend the original super mario rpg started superstar saga tells the story of the mushroom kingdom under peril from a brand new threat that of caculetta and her assistant fawful after disguising themselves to meet up with princess peach they managed to steal her voice and replace it with bombs whoa that's that's pretty sick dude and this is all to take control of the powerful bean star in order to take over the kingdom so it's time to of course bring in the mario bros to set things right i always loved this part here getting to play as toad right at the beginning it is the only time in the game you can do this but it does a good job letting you know right off the bat that this is going to be a bit of a different journey i mean for crying out loud toad sees mario naked i wouldn't want to wish that upon my worst enemies during this opening segment two of these series prominent features start to shine first off the humor primarily from luigi paper mario was certainly charming and funny as well but more of that stuff is certainly not a bad thing luigi didn't even want to be on this adventure but my boy he didn't have a choice and all of the original designs for the characters too it's so cool whether it be these quirky redesigns of siri staple characters or brand new ones that are very much out there it's just very pleasant and refreshing to look at and the bosses in particular are really neat one of them is like a hermit crab with a christmas tree shell finally my fantasy fulfilled and we have all of this on top of exploring a brand new land the bean bean kingdom i don't know what compelled the developers to make a land based on beans but hey it works as you progress the story stays pretty straightforward a couple hours in you actually get to encounter cacaletta and the bean star tackling the main antagonist in a battle that isn't the final one is something the series would go on to do quite often and it's kind of cool to see but naturally of course that's not the end just when you think things are all nice and safe fawful takes an injured bowser and implants him with cackletta's soul creating the incredibly disturbing looking bow letta another trend of the series would work with in the future oh and uh why is bowser injured you may be asking well that's because after bowser was shot out of a cannon and presumably lost his memory this little guy here popple threw a mask on him called him rookie and recruited him as his partner and after a battle that led them flying way up into the sky on an enraged bean star and just as bowser's memory is getting back to him they all fall off and scatter bing bang boom bowser looks scary now it's totally the lack of nose and the addition of breastplates pacletta really knew how to assert her dominance at the core of the experience yeah this is a pretty standard lighthearted rpg dare i say a gateway rpg a game that follows all the tropes of the genre but simplifies them to a bare bones level to keep things straight forward and at the forefront fun it's a style that the previous mario rpgs went for but there was a lot of stuff here that makes it different than those previous attempts and it all lies within the brothers actions being at your fingertips at all times well until one of them gets like abducted or something for a while this game is bonkers one brother is controlled by a and the other with b that simple approach keeps this entire quest engaging from controlling each of their jumps for platforming or timing their dodges when being attacked and yeah platforming there is a ton of it here and it feels great to do and throughout the adventure you also gain a bunch of new abilities that can be used for traversal in the overworld and new attacks for battles and speaking of the battles retain their action command system as well a must have for rpgs of the mario variety and something pretty cool that i always appreciated you learn the majority of your new moves from other duos they really took this whole red and green pair working together thing and went all out with it and it immediately gives this series a unique identity admittedly though the fire and lightning moves that you get do seem like a bit of an afterthought unlike jumping or using a hammer there's rarely any benefit of using them in battle and the overworld puzzles that you do use them in are far from clever but hey at least we get to see the brothers getting a massage that's always nice and then we have bean bean kingdom itself i love this place on paper a lot of it does seem like your traditional mario flair just with beans but a lot was actually done here to let you know that these aren't the lands that you're familiar with for one each section is named after some sort of synonym for laugh hoo-hoo village chucklehuck woods t he valley that's really clever i like it really adds to the cartoony charm here and admittedly since this is on the gba i remember thinking to myself for a while that the world felt pretty small but an hour or so into the game at the top of huhu mountain there's a telescope that you can interact with suddenly whoa this place is actually huge and you get to visit every inch of it it's a good thing you have your trusted passport on you at all times it may seem pretty minor but i would argue this goes a long way to world building there's only so much you can convey on a small screen so getting to see this huge landscape in the palm of your hands i love it and there's such a handful of memorable moments sprinkled throughout the entire landscape moving from one area to another via a mine cart segment or riding a top of luigi transformed into a surfboard you get to explore a brewery that's creating a ton of the popular drink chocola cola before fighting a monster made out of chicola cola after going inside woo hoo hoo university you are being greeted by the viruses from dr mario and these spouts of water that you find early on you can get mario fat off of them this game does everything there's also that part where luigi dresses up as princess peach and not gonna lie he nails the look oh and that's right there's also that part where gino shows up to explain that one random minigame and then that would be the last time he ever made an official appearance aside from a costume in smash brothers i'll never forget playing this game is a ton of fun but as time goes on signs of first game in the series itis do start to show things that later games would do better that end up showing some slight faults with this first attempt unlike the rest of the series there are no gimmicks tying anything together it is pure mario and luigi gameplay which is fine but just know that this is the only game in the series to not have some sort of overlying concept aside from purely going on an adventure and also the game is pretty short in at about 10 plus hours which again totally fine but it is also super easy whenever you level up you have a choice as to where some skill points will go just keep adding points to attack and this game is a total cakewalk nobody stands a chance it's not bad since it's all still a matter of mastering the timing-based moves you have access to but it's certainly odd to have really no incentive to grow the other stats unless you want to just make the game harder for yourself the stash stat is pretty neat though raising this grows your chances of critical hits and lowers item prices cool i just don't see any reason to put any extra points into it granted i guess it's not too different than playing paper mario and strictly upgrading flower points but i still feel like you have to strategize around your decision there here whether or not you main the attack stat really just makes the game easier or harder for yourself that's it the simplest bosses that took a few tries for me when i was younger don't stand a chance anymore they go down in like a minute honestly i know these were small complaints but they're the only ones i have i love this game to death i just don't want to come off as biased okay okay thank you regardless of how you lay out your stat points the end of the adventure is still pretty cool after all the trials and tribulations you face along your journey you eventually travel to bowser's floating castle rocking that same brick and lava aesthetic that we're all familiar with and within you get to fight the returning koopalings i always loved this series of fights while most people remember new super mario bros wii as the return of the koopalings yeah this game did it earlier it's a great use of them too each one is presented with a different gimmick rather than being slightly more powerful attack sponges i am a big fan the platforming here is really solid too bowser's castle in this game is just sweet overall and then there's the final cacleta fight oh man the final fight the initial form is a bit of a pushover if you keep attacking her head on especially with an all-out attack stat holy cow like 30 seconds is all it took i swear but then she inhales you and you get to fight kakleta's soul the atmosphere is eerie the music heart pounding you start with one health oh okay yeah this is cool and all but it is also a bit of a problem while this would definitely set the stage for future epic final fights in the franchise a common complaint with this game in particular is the difficulty spike with this encounter and to be honest it is the reason why i do like to play this game on the self-induced quote easy mode basically it's a fight that you can get good at but the game doesn't properly prepare you for what's in store dodging attacks is a lot more difficult opening up the weak spot takes a decent amount of time she'll regularly heal herself and if you screw up and die you gotta go back and do the fight before it once again since i've beaten this game multiple times already this is a total breeze but i've heard many stories of people who have played this game for the first time hating this fight and i can see why if you are at all familiar with this series you already know that final battles here are a big deal and this one unfortunately is one of the weaker ones but hey with enough perseverance kakleta's soul is gone for good bowser returns to normal and before he wakes up we leave him to fall with the crashing ship poor guy didn't know what hit him with the day saved the gang ride off into the sunset wrapping up the first adventure in this new series at the end of the day superstar saga is a simple fun and funny rpg there's like that one escort mission in the desert that kinda sucks and there's a fetch quest near the end of the game that does feel like a bit of padding but they're all relatively minor blemishes honestly if anything that final fetch quest is the only time in the game you're encouraged to explore the entirety of being bean kingdom so you can get to the paths that you pass over by going through the main adventure it is definitely padding that's just what it is but i always enjoyed running around to gather fruit to feed the different colored yoshis to spice up their special movie theater that's just cool any place showing a kirby and starfie movie has my support 100 there's a few side quests that you can tackle too like making a bunch of shirt patterns mini games that are mandatory during the adventure have some high score challenges when you return to them and probably the most famous of all [Music] beans back in the starbeans cafe you can take a ton of different beans that you've collected along the journey and assist professor e gad with making a bunch of different blends to gain some stat points and also obtain some extra prizes but what's known about this quest isn't what's here it's what isn't here taking a look at the cut content from the game shows that not only were you originally making these blends for eaged but also for other nintendo characters captain olimar samus link fox mcleod the excitebike racer this would have been so cool in the final product you already get items based on these characters too it makes their removal seem all the weirder sadly it would be a few more years before we get to see wario letting his gas loose onto the world but after all this time mario and luigi's superstar saga remains one of the most memorable mario adventures it is part of the one-two punch that made luigi a character worth caring about and it is easily one of the finest games the gba has to offer oh yeah the 3ds version 14 years later we were graced with a remake on the much more powerful 3ds and it's pretty sweet i wanted to focus on the original release for this video since it holds up so well but to be honest this is probably the best way to experience this game nowadays it looks better it sounds cleaner there's a ton of quality of life improvements like full analog control there's an easier way to swap between all your bros abilities when you're in battle the alternate bros moves are now separated from the original ones which is awesome because now you're now required to remember a few button combos and you can speed up cut scenes thank god there is amiibo support as well which i i mean it's a thing we got some neat figures out of it so that's nice but the content itself not too compelling honestly the biggest argument against this version is the quotes lack of charm in the transition to a new console and trust me i love me a good pixelated aesthetic as much as the next guy but damn this game still looks super good there are certainly elements that should have been brought over to maintain that original identity like why did you change the tree that was far from the biggest issue about the original game but when you look at the entire picture it's really not too much of a downgrade i feel and unlike the other 3ds games in this series that opted for 3d worlds for this remake it plays on 2d art instead with much more advanced lighting effects and it is pure eye candy this also gives us a smooth 60 fps 2 and man it is so good to see up close and even though cacletta is still relatively tough here it's like one of the only things in this game that's a 3d model and that's pretty sick there's no geno anymore though that kinda sucks and those movie posters that i mentioned earlier got changed to more fitting art for the series which i guess is understandable i still want a starfie movie though and this game also doesn't support 3d i know contain your tears in general though the pros definitely outweigh the cons just don't play that new bowser's minions mode wow it's it's so so bad it provides more story details to show you what's happening when mari luigi are off somewhere else and that's kinda neat but oh man is this ever the most boring thing i've ever done in my life it's like the squad building thing of a bunch of the game's enemies and as a commander you issue orders to your group and on paper sounds pretty cool kind of sounds like pikmin but in practice oh man there is so much time that goes by with you barely doing anything i can't imagine a single instance where this isn't the worst thing ever you often literally do nothing this is insulting this beans war i genuinely appreciate the effort to add something new here i do but i would argue the core game is so strong this shoehorned side mode simply wasn't necessary at the end of the day it is nice having all of these games in this series now playable on 3ds i love that gameboy advanced version i have so much nostalgia for it but it's really cool being able to now have everything under one roof that makes this remake worth it for that alone yeah you're going to want to remember i said that for the future if you enjoy mario rpgs you already know that superstar saga is one of the finest it does sort of fumble at the very end and that entire side mode in the 3ds version is hot garbage but on the whole fantastic game and it is the great start to a fantastic series with many highs and many lows but let's say you're not into rpgs but for whatever reason this cartridge in particular really stuck out to you well need i remind you you can totally bypass the core adventure and just play arcade mario bros why did they do this welcome back everybody to mario month i figured this time around we'll start things off by continuing on with the mario and luigi series and also this video has been uploaded on mother's day so happy mother's day let's talk about some babies mario and luigi's superstar saga was such a damn good game we already had a couple rpgs in the mario universe at the time but hey you make a new land to explore you give luigi a spotlight tied with a unique control scheme and essentially make it the portable equivalent to the console paper marios and we got something really special i still love this game and it holds up incredibly well and looking back you know we got a successful mario game where are the sequels that's obviously gonna happen that's obviously gonna happen e3 2005. this is actually the first time i ever knew there was an annual event where a ton of new games were getting revealed at the time i kind of thought that they just happened this was the year nintendo unveiled the revolution that was enough clickbait to get me interested at the time and it turns out yeah they announced a bunch of stuff that year and what what's that a new mario and luigi game on the ds and i get to see the game in motion months before it releases this was an entirely new concept for me back then game announcements have excited me to no end ever since and thusly the game was mine that upcoming christmas alongside mario party 7 mario tennis power tour and ed neddy the miss adventures i am bringing that game up more than i ever thought it would mario and luigi partners in time the first foray onto the nintendo ds and that one game featuring lead speak hammer bros for some reason the baby mario bros are a main selling point here we got time travel now that's pretty cool this is surely something that a commercial featuring guys learning to take care of babies could really help get people excited about what's to come this one is often considered to be the forgotten game in the series it didn't get a 3ds remake like games one and three did it's just not really that talked about in general and even when you look at the box art outside of the original game outside of japan this doesn't do the white background with both mario luigi popping out of the logo this is just good art which is fine but it sticks out like a sore thumb as a result i wanted to get to the bottom as to why this is the forgotten game in the series some people seem to really love it some people seem to be indifferent to it what are my thoughts it's a mario and luigi rpg all right oh it's good to be back man this title screen is such a nostalgia trip two screens man this is so cool showing direct footage doesn't really do it justice they purposefully spaced out their graphics with the screen gap in mind so it ends up feeling like one big screen instead of two separate ones yoshi's island ds did the same thing i don't know man this is one of the coolest things ds games could do in my opinion alright so once again we're dealing with time travel here things can be a little bit fishy but let's give explaining the story a shot we start off back in peach's castle in the past where baby bowser is trying to steal baby peach and the baby mario bros go to stop him they've really been doing this forever before long the castle gets invaded by an army of alien ships forcing everybody to flee meanwhile in the modern era we learned that professor e gadd created a time machine and princess peach along with a couple of toads used it to travel back to the past and would you look at that it's just about time for the ship to return to the proper time period oh princess you don't look so good after dealing with the alien menace a time portal pops up out of nowhere in the castle's courtyard the brothers dive on in purely by choice bringing them to the past as well in the middle of another alien invasion so yeah the main villains this time are an alien race the shroobs not as creative as bean people i'm gonna be honest but hey it gets the job done little purple toad like things sure they're more adorable than evil in my opinion i want to just give them a good old pat on the head but hey we can make this work before long since everybody is now in the same time period both sets of brothers finally get to meet up for the first time and all board the koopa cruiser for safety barring the time both marios were playing golf for some reason we didn't ask questions back then that just happened well the escape plan fails to no one's surprise they crash land into bowser's castle and from that point on it's a quest to figure out just what the heck is going on with these new alien creatures we gotta put back together the cobalt star the power source for the time machine and of course save the princess all the while seeing just the most adorable interactions between brothers and baby brothers i could ever imagine [Music] baby oh and yes stuff well we have a new helper character now and he's a he's a suitcase which is kind of cute and he's um he's just there honestly realistically this could have just been a slideshow of the interactions between the mario bros and the baby mario bros and we would have had a 10 out of 10 on our hands i know time travel logic says you really shouldn't mess with yourself in a different time period but i don't care man this is totally worth it oh look at luigi's sharing a cookie with baby luigi this is the cutest thing i've ever seen i love it i love it i i just love it one of the main claims to fame for partners in time that you will hear from many people's opinions is that the plot is a lot darker than you would expect like early on we see a toad strapped to a tree have its life energy sucked out of it and then it turns into an actual mushroom what have i gotten myself into here but if i'm totally honest on the whole i don't know man it's not a bad story but i definitely wouldn't say it's all that dark if anything it's just more moody than ever the color palette is a lot more toned down same thing goes for the music and the whole purpose of the shrooms is to simply destroy the mushroom kingdom i get it but that being said some of the bosses standing in our way are a caterpillar trying to get a drink of juice and a chubby shroom holding a lollipop this does not scream dark and foreboding to me wacky antics are a major staple of the mario and luigi series and while it may not be as prominent as the last game there are definitely some moments of kooky goodness to be found here look at this baby mario got fed overall the story is still pretty straightforward however in this instance it's almost to this game's detriment once you get the ball rolling not much really happens that alien threat is constantly looming over your head and aside from the introduction of their leader princess shrub the entire point of the adventure is to simply repair the cobalt star whose pieces have been scattered randomly across the land like their dragon balls until the near end of the game that is pretty much the only plot point that is dragging you along you just kind of deal with some random alien shenanigans along the way the menace of the shroobs can be interesting but the plot itself isn't the developers definitely seemed more focused on simply wanting you in control of the bros and baby bros rather than tell a compelling story whether or not that matters to you is entirely subjective this is a mario game after all you may not care about the story but i will take anything we could possibly do to prevent baby peach from crying ever again it's the worst [Music] it's genuinely the worst thing i've ever heard in my life oh my god please make it stop on a gameplay front well this is certainly a direct sequel to superstar saga alright you run around explore solve some puzzles in the overworld and you have the tried and true action turn based combat for the battles and just based on that alone the game is still really fun alpha dream figured out a formula that works and for the most part the gameplay is still really solid there are a few big differences though two of which being pretty small alongside mario and green mario we have baby mario and baby green mario joining the fray finally putting the spotlight on the young luigi after yoshi's island you know at least one person asked for this and for a bulk of the adventure you're in control of all four at once similar to how the previous game took advantage of the gba's two face buttons partners in time takes advantage of the ds's four face buttons now you don't necessarily operate all four of them at the same time at all times rather the babies often act as a boost to things that you otherwise couldn't do accessing areas that are too high to reach normally combining powers to deal stronger damage stuff like that you also now have access to a new slew of bros items for your special moves which replaces the typical special move stat that we had in the last game i appreciate the change but it actually makes it really easy to cheese the stronger enemies here all it takes to use these moves endlessly is to just purchase them and that's not a hard thing to do you get plenty of cash overall it's a harder game than superstar saga however the enemies are still pretty easy to take down if you pile on the items also if you're willing to risk early stage carpal tunnel that is a possibility as well splitting up the group is also a major focus of the exploration where you switch up which pair of brothers you get to play as at the push of a button it usually just results in needing to hit a switch as the babies so the older brothers can progress it really doesn't get that much deeper than that honestly it also doesn't take long for this to feel like a pretty forced gimmick having the babies around is a cool idea but aside from doing slightly stronger damage they don't really add that much to the overall experience unless you count the multitude of adorable cutscenes and i wouldn't really blame you if you did a lot of the puzzles feel arbitrarily lengthened to take advantage of the baby concept things like swinging a hammer and the weird water inflation from the last game those are still here those are things that mario and luigi were perfectly capable of pulling off back then but they are now restricted to the baby's control taking longer to execute actions that were pretty quick to use before also do you remember in superstar saga you would often run into red and green characters that helped you along the journey to really bring home the idea of these two brothers working together because hey there's a bunch of red and green characters working together well aside from traveling back to yoshi's island one enemy in the late game and one battle against both forms of bowser they're kinda just there for the ride it's not necessarily a bad mechanic it just feels like a time-consuming way for nintendo to remind us that hey we're finally working with four buttons and two screens here oh yeah two screens this i remember being pretty neat back when the game first released when you split up and move apart the babies often occupy the top screen while the older bros take the bottom by doing this it's possible to coordinate both duos to be in different places in order to progress it's not really that big of a deal i know but it's still a cool use of the ds hardware it's even cooler during the battles because some enemies also take advantage of the extra screen space and many of the special moves that you can pull off require you pay attention to the top screen to better time your actions when they happen on the bottom it was 2005 the ds was not that old of course we were gonna get a bunch of two screen stuff shoehorned in by any means necessary and i do like how it's done here oh and speaking of ds specific features you do also get to use the touchscreen once whoa nintendo you gotta slow down unfortunately while the characters are fun to control exploration really isn't all that compelling either there's no big hub world to explore this time around that branches off into the different parts of the adventure you just have peach's castle that will keep popping up time portals that lead to new areas and as far as those areas are concerned well they're not bad but they often feel super linear and later on they start to go on for way too long and nothing interesting happens to keep them fresh there just aren't that many memorable set pieces here people seem to remember gritsy desert because that theme got remixed in smash bros and yoshi's island gets remembered because big boy this section is definitely the best part of the game in my opinion we're talking about mario and time travel here not including yoshi's island would have been criminal the fact they didn't overload this level with references to that game is honestly pretty upsetting at least paper mario did it right with a pseudo-return boss fight also you get to explore the insides of a giant yoshi and that's just kind of cool clearly alpha dream had a really big interest in this the rest of the areas here are simply a means to an end they get the job done but they're overall pretty forgettable if i bring up the vin factory you may have a blurry image pop up in your head you might remember what i'm talking about and if i bring up the lead speed hammer bros from the vin factory then yeah there's no forgetting that no matter how many times i try to forget these two just won't go away and on top of everything else there isn't much side content to go for either there are once again beans to collect and you can exchange them for items yeah that's it the fawfal cameo is pretty neat and all you know i'm glad he didn't die after we blew him up but this is the only option for something to do when you're not focusing on the story and you can beat the game just fine without ever messing with it there are a couple of mini games along the adventure that you have the option to replay but let's be honest that doesn't amount to a whole lot alright so i know i got a lot of complaining out of the way but the reality of the situation is even though the mario and luigi format is inherently fun and the baby gimmick is really interesting it seems like we got a lot of creative ideas implemented in not so creative ways but for what it's worth as you approach the end of the game things do get a bit more interesting after a very long trek through star hill and the star shrine we make our way to the shrub castle the result of the aliens successfully corrupting peach's castle in the past now this is pretty cool we've been exploring peach's castle the entire adventure so for the final dungeon to share the same layout just filled with aliens and darkness this is the most threatening these troops have felt the entire game we even get this four person minigame to take out some ufos and it's it's not great i'm not gonna lie it takes some time to really nail your shots but it's over before long once you're at the top though it is time for the final confrontation against princess shrub now the end of this game is ridiculous first we get a pretty lengthy fight against the princess which is one of the more difficult ones in the game and not for the wrong reasons like with cacletta which then leads to the formation of the cobalt star which in reality while we were trying to fix it princess peach has actually been trying to keep it apart because inside resides her older stronger and way more wiggly sister elder princess shrub now in an effort to avenge her sister another battle breaks out above the castle and then when that's done she powers up into a second phase where she is wiggly once again and this is probably one of the more emotional moments from the game the music is darker and more depressing than anything in series history and the fight ultimately becomes a battle between two entire races you can destroy her for sure but this will result in you essentially condemning an entire alien race to extinction and all the elder knows now is revenge she is a mindless fighting machine with so much weighing on your shoulders here can you in good faith destroy an entire race at the push of a button yeah of course i can a bunch of water is sent back through time in an effort to revitalize the ravaged past the time machine is repaired and all is well until a fallen bowser gets corrupted by the elder soul resulting in one more fight where you can't even attack you just reflect a bunch of attacks coming at you for a few minutes holy cow they really wanted to pad this game out i don't know why but alpha dream clearly had a quota of an end-game fight against a new form of bowser in these games this is a thing we have to make it a thing i don't care how last minute of an edition it is it is going to be a thing we get one final adorable interaction between brothers and babies they all go back to their respective time period and that concludes partners in time a good game for sure but one that certainly feels undercooked with how the plot and the baby gimmick was woven into the gameplay partners in time is fun just because it's often considered the weakest of the series doesn't make it a bad game it just has some really stiff competition if anything this is the one that needed a 3ds remake the most if you enjoy all of the other mario rpgs you're gonna like this one that's easy but when you start comparing it to the other super popular mario rpg on the ds bowser's inside story then we have a different conversation going it's hard to top this one but that's a story for next time i don't want to end things off on a sour note here this is the first episode of mario month in 2020 so uh hey luis can we uh can we play a clip of mario yelling out babies one more time babies 10 out of 10. now that we are two games into this series it is safe to say that nintendo has something really special on their hands mario and luigi superstar saga set an awesome precedent for a memorable mario rpg that you can take on the go and while partners in time often get saddled with a meh status nowadays it was still a really solid follow-up and a novel use of the ds's two screens not the touchscreen though that part sucked that one went for a darker tone which was admirable but i just don't think they went far enough with it it was still a fun ride though you know aside from baby peach crying a lot what more can you really ask for truly oh and also totally forgot about this it uses the ds's rumble pack raise your hand if you forgot the ds had an official rumble pack yeah yeah i think everybody just did so then after two successes what's next bowser that long time bad guy really does suck and i mean that in a good way i'm gonna miss that man that was e3 2009 and outside of that amazing out of context clip there's really nothing all that interesting about the pre-release hype for this third game in the series well outside of japan at least dude look at that title three exclamation points truly exciting times things definitely did feel a bit different this time around the previous titles were fun little adventures that ticked most of if not all of the boxes required to make an enjoyable portable rpg but for the third entry in this series it seemed like it was going to be a whole lot more ambitious you're not just playing as mario and luigi but bowser too finally after so many years and only a couple of small instances the big bad spiky turtle finally has some time to shine as a playable character and as for those famous brothers that the name of the series is based off of well they adventure inside of that big bad spiky turtle bro what on the surface this is already one of the most interesting concepts in the entire mario series and i know that opinion is shared by many people while partners in time is now considered to be one of the weaker games in the series bowser's inside story is considered one of if not the best and you can tell its quality because one generation later we would get a full-on remaster and boy we'll get to that nintendo ah these openings always fill me with joy [Music] man i've always loved this title screen jingle too same thing man it is just so joy-filled the music is really catchy you can mess with the water on the touchscreen it is awesome stuff remember that i said this the plot this time around is pretty strong probably the most notable thing about it is that we actually get a lot of spoken dialogue from both mario and luigi and it is absolutely incredible but fine the actual story itself uh-oh toad got fed so a mysterious disease the blorbs makes any toad it infects super thick and during a board meeting to discuss how to handle things bowser breaks in fails of course he does and peach can do this apparently and also introducing your new partner for this adventure starlo you remember stuffwell from the last game yeah i didn't think so basically sarlo is your new helper now and she's pretty cool i mean hey starlo got a spot on the box art stuffwell didn't get that so i think we know which one's better naturally after being jettisoned out of the castle bowser is very upset and in his despair he stumbles upon a salesman that gives him a special mushroom that gives him the superpower of massive suck really does suck bowser returns to where he initially failed inhales absolutely everything in the room and then passes out beginning one of the weirdest adventures in the entire mario franchise so like now mario and luigi are inside bowser from most of this game and bowser never knows he just hears voices coming from inside himself but he never learned that it was mario and luigi his heated rivals this story is amazing mario and luigi was already known as a comedy rpg but nothing gets wackier than this on your quest to solve the mystery of the blorbs bowser is the one who gets to explore the world while the two brothers once again travel inside of bowser and manipulate all of his insides to make him more powerful as well as take out any obstacles that i guess realistically could kill him this bug is just sitting on one of his pipes i feel like that would be a really bad trip to the hospital uh oh now bowser got fat actually mario gets fat too with like a direct airflow into his nose and luigi gets fat too with the new special move i i think alpha dream had a very common interest with their characters in this game and i don't really know how to feel about it one of the best parts about this game is it went all out with the idea of let's travel inside bowser and have things that kind of make sense in that context like inside bowser we get to fight goombas that are based on cells while outside bowser gets to deal with goombas that are based on being chubby we also get this pretty good new antagonist with midbus he's like this pig equivalent of bowser pretty cool we get assistance from a block person who needs help finding his block cats and by doing so you get to take on the help of his block dog and then there's this really creepy black woman who somehow made it into a raided e game and you even get to travel to bowsers oh no the storytelling and the pacing of said story is excellently handled constantly throwing you into new locations introducing new interesting characters and those locations you find yourself in are a lot more unique as well one of the areas plaque beach is just a sand paradise made out of teeth and one of the enemies here are pokies made out of teeth this is a very stark contrast to the more low-key and sometimes very messed up nature of partners in time before it and it is very appreciated we even get introduced to three of bowser's minions with actual names and titles there's sergeant guy corporal para plunk and private goomp featuring way more unique characteristics than paper mario has been willing to dish out lately they're not major players in the story by any means but we now have brand new characters to associate with this specific sub-series i think that's really cool but easily the best part of the entire plot is of course the return of fawful as the main antagonist he was already a fan favorite in superstar saga for his mannerisms and he did have a cameo in partners in time which was pretty cool but being the main villain now that just makes perfect sense but the really shocking thing is having actual continuity in a mario game this rarely ever happens usually every game in this franchise is a unique tale for better or for worse and having a returning character show up for more than simply being fan service is awesome and his motives are revenge and thanks to the toads now being all fattened up and also brainwashing the majority of bowser's minions his ultimate goal is to harness the power of the dark star and take over the kingdom he still inherently a pretty funny character putting that big dumb grin on everything he now owns but his more nefarious side also feels really fleshed out here making for just an overall awesome bad guy and actually when looking back at superstar saga 3ds's mediocre bowser's minions mode the story within actually introduced a new lore that showed that fawful was planning to betray caculetta and become the ultimate bad guy all along some of those fawful robots you find at the tail end of bowser's inside story he already had those in development back in superstar saga it is the only part of that mode that isn't total garbage and boy are we ever gonna touch on this topic later the story evokes that same adventurous vibe that superstar saga had we have new locations new characters a compelling villain plenty of comedic moments it's all there with the added element of bowser really does suck god i really am gonna miss that man rather than trying to be an upgrade to the play style that the previous two games had bowser's inside story strives to follow the same vibe while also making things feel very different like for mario and luigi their segments play out as side scrollers that same level of exploration is still there occasionally throwing in some platforming as well as running into plenty of battles featuring the same tried and true battle system that we're used to but the main difference is in the perspective as well as the aesthetics really making this feel totally unique there's a bunch of mini games that pop up from time to time as well as ways to improve bowser's abilities and none of them feel forced or out of place some of them use the touchscreen and they are a much better use than the one scenario where you used it in partners in time they are perfectly for lack of a better word digestible and there's also a sweet music track that plays alongside them i love them so much it ramps up as you get near the end of the minigame and it's so good and not only that but they're also a great use of the two screen setup as well actions from the brothers on the bottom screen affect bowser in the top screen it is so much more of a natural use of this style than again what partners in time did that extra space does come into play with the battles once again but it is a whole lot less common and as for the battles themselves well there really isn't anything going on here that's different than before jumping swinging your hammer using special moves leveling up and allocating points to specific attributes it's all here and it's all enjoyable the special moves are handled differently though in my opinion the best way the series has done them yet sort of similar to getting them through the story as extensions to your natural abilities you unlock these moves by finding attack pieces spread throughout the areas that you explore in essence it is kind of the same thing but i do think the method of getting these pieces is a bit weird sometimes you get multiple pieces from a single block sometimes you get all of them in one go and at that point i don't know you may as well just find the move in one box and call it a day but regardless they are back to being performed with special points instead of an item inventory like in partners in time so that immediately makes this way better and you can all rest easy any chance of getting early stage carpal tunnel is no longer a concern throwing fireballs is nowhere near as painful and my wrists are very thankful and need i remind you once more luigi gets fat but then we have the star of the show bowser now this is where you get to explore all of the nooks and crannies of the mushroom kingdom in a totally different way you can throw heavy punches breathe fire roll into a spiky ball of doom and move about your leisure even climbing walls it's awesome it may be slower but he is a very satisfying character to play as and it's the same thing for when you're battling as him these play out basically the same but there are very different ways to approach attacking and defending those punches you can pull off ah they feel so damn powerful dude it's awesome this battle system is great you even have the option to inhale your enemies during these sometimes it simply affects the tide of battle but sometimes you bring an enemy inside of bowser for the bros to take down which is such a smart use of an absolutely insane idea and as for the special moves for bowser these utilize groups of minions that you free from their cages throughout the adventure i'm not really sure why you get a special move from only hitting one of these boxes here and multiple inside of bowser but here we are and all of these moves actually use the touchscreen and i don't know about you but i do love me some sporadic touch controls in my ds games even if it's an rpg where no one asks for it these moves are very satisfying to pull off they deal a lot of damage too so it's really a win-win all around look at this big old clump of goombas i don't know man i just think that's pretty funny i want my own clump of goombas this combination of the slower more powerful style of bowser perfectly contrasts the slightly quicker more acrobatic style of mario and luigi and near the end of the adventure you do actually get to explore the mushroom kingdom as the bros proper which lets you get into a bunch of secrets that you've stumbled across along the way that you couldn't access with bowser so really all of the bases are covered here this would also be the first time in the series we get introduced to a special battle gimmick a few times throughout the story bowser gets really big alpha dream really couldn't handle themselves and i for one am uncomfortable you turn your ds sideways and now we get to take part in a massive gimmick battle and these are just all right in my opinion all of the options you have available to you are so easy to pull off and none of it really requires any strategy it's definitely cool visually and when it comes to having memorable moments here we are bowser's fighting a building but gameplay-wise this offers very little substance this would however start a trend of gimmick battles that the following two games would implement as well so all things considered on their first attempt here it's fine nothing all that great but it's fine but in some really good news unlike partners in time we have substantial side quests to go for as well mini game score challenges completing puzzles boss gauntlets that lead to a hidden boss fight beans again there's even an entirely optional boss fight with some shroobs it turns out that some of them were actually frozen in bowser's castle after the events of the last game dude i still can't believe the continuity this game is sticking to that's so cool i went and fought them before doing the final boss so they were a total cakewalk so that battle didn't really last more than like 20 seconds or so but still it's pretty cool all of these things combined this is just all awesome partners in time felt like a stripped-down adventure with nothing else to really distract yourself with but bowser's inside story is not only way more fleshed out but there is a ton of side stuff to do as well ultimately this is why bowser's inside story is so good and partners in time kind of falls flat they both have very interesting concepts but while partners in time never really reaches its full potential bowser's inside story takes an absolutely ridiculous idea and goes far beyond anything you could possibly anticipate with you going through the insides of bowser what are we doing here i'm sorry i just can't believe someone at nintendo was like we should put mario and luigi inside of bowser and then it became one of the best rpgs in the franchise i can't believe that's reality i gotta give a special mention to the game's overall presentation because man the art style and the soundtrack are so damn good this might come off as hyperbole but in my opinion this is one of the best looking sprite-based mario games ever created and the music is absolutely incredible some of yokoshima mora's best work by far and it's not even like the sprite work is simply really good and that's it but every character in this game is so expressive and full of energy and the use of the dark outlines makes everything pop out so well whether you're playing it on a real ds or looking at direct capture footage it all looks great this is all i really want when it comes to my mario rpgs personality like easily this is my favorite interpretation of bowser ever i love the more jokey side that we get with games like this and thousand year door and while sometimes bowser can be this threatening menace who is mario's main rival for a reason sometimes he can also just be a big ol lovable meatball and his design here and his mannerisms complement that perfectly again remember i'm saying these things and now it's time to approach the final moments of the adventure on mario and luigi's quest to create the miracle cure that solves the blurb crisis fawfel and midbus managed to awaken the dark star infecting bowser in the process this was all done so the star can absorb bowser's dna and replicate his body and despite the mario bros best efforts it succeeds and to make matters even worse once dark fawful is dealt with because he turns dark and subsequently kind of scary looking he turns into oh god a weird spider thing gross but with their powers combined dark bowser is complete it does seem kind of cliche to simply have a darker form of bowser as the final boss i mean hell we already got this in the previous two games but the build up to it all witnessing the corruption of fawful getting to see how threatening the dark star can actually be it is in my opinion the best implementation of this idea yet it all takes place in a corrupted version of peach's castle as well again an idea that we just saw in the last game but i think it is handled way better here everything has been forfalized those smiles are all terrifying and then yes of course we have the final battle against dark bowser you know it's only like the most defining moment in the entire franchise honestly it's it's kind of perfect the location high up in the castle is great the music is unnaturally fantastic like holy cow i did not think a game like this would have music this epic but here we are hitting bowser essentially against himself makes for a really engaging boss fight and then by inhaling the dark star bug from it mario and luigi get involved as well doing battle with fawfal once again in his much more twisted spider state there is so much going on here that is just so so damn good and unlike the difficulty spike that we have with cacletta or with how long it takes to deal with princess shrub this battle with dark bowser and dark fawful it's handled perfectly once you take out dark bowser for good fawful has one more trick up his sleeve blowing himself up from within bowser to bring everyone out with him instead this just gets everybody finally out of bowser's body for good and peace has been restored to the lands for everybody except bowser who finally sees that it was mario and luigi within him the entire time and oh he's not very happy about it so now he's got to do what he's got to do mario luigi and bowser all do one more battle as the credits begin to roll and it looks like bowser lost said battle all is right with the world but hey the princess sends over a cake to make up for that or something i don't know the main hero of the game gets brutalized and then that's the happy ending what a way to go out maybe it sounds like i'm exaggerating here but this game is as close to a perfect mario rpg that you could possibly get bowser's inside story walks that fine line of cartoony humor and serious overtones so damn well without either of them ever feeling forced the art style is fantastic the music is so so good the combat is super satisfying maybe some of the later battles go on for a bit too long but that's pretty minor in the grand scheme of things this is kind of the perfect mario rpg i know people tend to give that title to thousand year door and that's totally fair both of these games overwhelmingly succeed in the tone atmosphere and all of the mechanics they set out to achieve they are both in my opinion the best that these two series have to offer with this game the mario and luigi series transcends being that portable equivalent to the console paper mario games and becomes a franchise that is worth keeping your eyes on and then they released the remaster like 10 years later to a resounding why okay so superstar saga getting a 3ds version made total sense in my opinion people were super nostalgic for it you couldn't play the game on that console there were plenty of quality of life changes that needed to be addressed as well and i mean yeah some people aren't all that keen on the art style but overall i think it's a great way to experience that game but you can already play bowser's inside story on a 3ds due to the backwards compatibility who is asking for this i already went over this in the entire video but that game was already damn near perfect partners in time is the one that needed fixing but okay here we are bowser's inside story plus bowser jr's journey great you know that bad bowser's minion side game from that last remaster well we got a sequel to it here and it's still not good so that's something they do throw in some brand new characters that are exclusive to this story so that's kind of neat but it is still so unfun that i doubt anybody will ever get the chance to see them for themselves but fine what about the main bowser's inside story portion of this package well essentially it is the same adventure but i don't really know how else to describe this the entire game just feels slower going through your options in battle takes a little bit longer loading times to get into the battles takes a little bit longer the game runs at half the original frame rate individually these things may not seem like that big of a deal but man that time definitely adds up it all just feels so sluggish by comparison if you play it on its own it's probably fine but i played both of these back to back and the remake is simply not as fun to control and i would say the frame rate plays a big part in that not only did the original run at 60fps but so did the remake of superstar saga i was fine accepting no 3d in that one for the sake of having a smooth frame rate but here we have no 3d plus a worse frame rate also while i did say that i liked how superstar saga looked on the 3ds i actually don't share that opinion with bowser's inside story that game oozed charm from every orifice imaginable including bowser's oh no but here i don't know man it's something about bowser's design it just doesn't click with me i don't think the comedic moments come off as entertaining as they did before when they were initially delivered by a pixelated meatball but i get it it's totally subjective at least now we get to see toads being fat in 3d so hey that's pretty cool also there's new title screen music and there's no water to mess around with how dare you there is a large list of minor changes made to this version of the game and some like having a map on screen at all times does make a stronger impact than others but with how good the original still is i think you're better off playing that version instead also they censored luigi's striped socks in the artwork and i for one am completely outraged bring back luigi's sucks wait a second mario's right foot is also slightly larger in the 3ds art i know it's not a big deal by any stretch of the imagination but that makes the change all the more confusing oh i'll get to the bottom of this one day you have my word from what i can gather people seem to share my opinions here bowser's inside story for the ds was a massive success one of if not the best-selling rpg in the mario franchise bowser's inside story plus bowser jr's journey for the 3ds is one of the worst selling games in the entire mario franchise right alongside mario's tennis on virtual boy my god that game had donkey kong jr in it i don't know how that one didn't sell well it is crazy to me that essentially the same game breaks two different sales records on completely opposite sides of the spectrum regardless of the poor sales it's not a bad game but definitely an unnecessary one it's still good because the original is also still good before its release alpha dream stated that they remade bowser's inside story instead of partners in time because they wanted to remake the best received title in the series and they also wanted to further explore the parent child's dynamic of bowser and bowser jr which we got in bowser jr's journey boy would i hate to tell him that that is literally one of the plot points of partners in time they also wanted to maintain the dual screen elements of the ds which is why they opted to make this for the 3ds instead of the switch even though a lot of these things could have probably been implemented down into one screen just fine now i don't know about you but those reasons or some could say excuses seem a bit weird the sales were bad the existence of the game simply confused people the answers the developers gave to the questions just seemed very very weird honestly that combined with the average reviews that their last original game paper jam got which we'll get to in the future don't worry it honestly didn't really come as much of a surprise to me that soon after bowser's inside story on 3ds released alpha dream would file for bankruptcy they made a lot of weird decisions the original bowser's inside story is still amazing let's not end things on a down note here play this game it is incredible easily my favorite in the series it may not be as replayable as superstar saga since it's longer and there's a lot more stuff going on but it is definitely a more fulfilling experience and it makes the idea of getting a sequel on newer hardware sound oh so exciting unlike partners in time this game never got ported to the wii u virtual console which is upsetting so the question then is what if you don't have a ds and only a 3ds then yeah still play the original it works in a 3ds just fine what are you doing why was there a 3ds version so with all that being said next up on the pipeline is mario and luigi dream team a game that heavily focuses on luigi so i'm going to take this time to practice my luigi impersonation i have a line that i want to practice with real quick let me go ahead and i can't do it i can't do it i've been trying for two months i can't do it i have been waiting a very long time to ask you all a very specific question do you remember the year of luigi let's travel back to 2013 in one of nintendo's best marketing ideas ever they decided to dedicate an entire year to the one the only oh yeah luigi kicking things off in an early nintendo direct it was revealed that a major spotlight would be put on mario's often neglected brother we got luigi's mansion darkmoon new super luigi u he was one of the first things we saw when mario golf world tour guy revealed they announced he was coming to the new smash brothers you know as if that wasn't gonna happen hell yeah dude that's so hype and of course dr luigi how could anybody forget about dr luigi yeah me i i totally forgot about dr luigi and yes arguably the biggest announcement of all he was going to be the main attraction of alpha dream's next title mario and luigi dream team this is awesome all the pieces are in place for something really special here bowser's inside story was a massive success the best game in the series yet and at the time nintendo was also trying to really redeem themselves after the initial 3ds failings when it first launched so we get to travel into luigi's dreams as a follow-up to the previous fantastic adventure and we get some extra bells and whistles since we're now on newer hardware man i am super excited the year of luigi that was such a cool thing nintendo did man you remember when luigi did the harlem shake in the nintendo offices do you remember that fresh meme this is real this is a real thing that happened making the jump to new hardware with an existing franchise is always inherently exciting partners in time may not have been the greatest rpg in the world but it was still an interesting showcase of the ds's new capabilities but now on this next console jump we get to explore luigi's dreams it may not be as outlandish as traveling through bowser's disgusting insides but i'm still excited all the same oh yeah this is a pretty cool title screen the music is so bright and peppy we can mess with luigi on the touchscreen as he makes these little moaning noises finally my dreams come true we don't get the brothers yelling nintendo like the previous games but that's really not that big of a deal i guess one thing though in europe the game is called dream team bros which i always found kinda odd i'm pretty sure everybody already knew that mario and luigi were brothers right oh man bowser's inside story such a fantastic game that mario and luigi man they make such perfect cousins that family dynamic that's family goals right there i can't wait to play the sequel they're what on top of that they also removed luigi's snot bubble from the japanese box art this one i'm okay with though because that is gross first and foremost we gotta mention the new art style when we jumped over from the gba to the ds things stayed pretty consistent just more detailed here though on the 3ds we get a total shift in art style and uh i don't know it's it's okay i guess i raved over the sprite work in the last game the way the series was handling its colorful landscapes and these solid borders on all the characters was excellent by comparison i do think the previous games looked a lot better and the characters don't feel as expressive this time around but dream team still looks nice just not as nice in my eyes i guess we didn't get the signature outlines to make the characters pop a lot more since hey we have 3d now that actually works they probably don't even need an outline anymore it also helps that the worlds themselves are proper 3d as well if we look at the remakes on 3ds we get to see the same sprite work that started here but all the locations were flat images with lighting effects thrown on top of them not here though 3d all the way again it's all subjective here i do think they all look good i just think the other games in the series do some things better the soundtrack is a jam though dude the upgraded audio quality does wonders for the music most of my exploring was accompanied by me timing my jumps to the beat of the music like the entire game [Music] that's half the fun of the entire package the adventure begins with the crew all getting invited to enjoy a peaceful holiday over on pillow island and luigi almost dies happy year of luigi everybody on their flight an evil pillow falls onto the blimp and this huge dark figure pops out oh no but it's okay it's dealt with in like five seconds huh oh but it ends up messing up the blimp and now everybody's gonna die oh but it's okay that was all just a dream luigi was having what's going on at the start of this game here i'm so confused as mario and luigi explore pillow island taking part in some of the festivities they eventually travel to the underground section of pillow castle where they stumble upon a special looking pillow and not wasting a single second luigi does the quick math in his head and decides to take a nap on it i respect those priorities but you actually don't know where that pillow's been by doing so this somehow summons a crazy looking portal over his head and this mysterious aura manages to suck in princess peach okay naturally mario jumps in right after her leading into the mythical dream world and while they are unable to save peach at this time they do discover a new helper character in the form of the formerly imprisoned prince of the pillow people dreambirt he's a big old dork and from there the adventure to save peach rescue the remaining pillow people scattered throughout the lands and to solve the mysteries of that shadow creature as you explore all of pillow island as well as their respective dream worlds begins soon after we also learn of the dream stone and the dark stone artifacts made up of people's happy dreams and scary nightmares respectively and both have the ability to grant its users wishes so there you go there's the motivation but yeah that's basically the entire plot and honestly it's a bit underwhelming in my opinion bowser eventually shows his face and teams up with that shadow creature whose name is antasma by the way which is kind of a neat dynamic i guess but it's also hard for me to take bowser as a serious threat in a marion luigi game after seeing him get fat in the last one it's almost as if despite bringing back a bunch of characters it's kind of like the last adventure never happened a true shame because that last game handled continuity with fossil so well like popple is here for some reason remember that one mini boss who was pretty funny in superstar saga and then didn't show up in the next two games well he's here now and he has no recollection of the bros and after a battle with the wiggler near the end of the game he just disappears never to be seen again and spoilers he doesn't show up in the sequel why was he here and on top of all of that regarding antasma you may have not known what he was at the start of the game but you legit take him out within the first five minutes of the story and it's not like when you fought cac letta halfway through superstar saga and then fought a stronger form at the end that first antasma fight is super similar to the final encounter he doesn't even become all that much more threatening throughout the adventure so it's just a bunch of strange choices all around also the way i see it the entire dream thing is inherently not as interesting as the last game's premise granted it would be very hard to combat traveling through bowsers oh no but man if these are truly luigi's dreams then he's got nothing interesting going on in that noggin of his there's a slight message of self-confidence here with luigi wanting to prove his worth to his much more accomplished brother which we do only get to see deep within his dreams and it is a nice touch but it doesn't really get that much deeper than that that's the equivalent of like the journal that luigi keeps hidden in paper mario i don't know man if you really wanted to show luigi's dreams maybe show his true reactions to constantly being the butt of everyone's jokes that'd be something that's a running gag throughout the entire franchise near the end of partners in time where this big star gives mario words of encouragement and praise he then looks to luigi and says um good luck out there he's a savage dude at the very least i would have expected some like luigi's mansion references or something you know i imagine he sees booze in his sleep every night as it is but nothing here the dreams just end up becoming watercolor versions of the areas he fell asleep in easily the best thing this gives to the players is the ability to fondle luigi's face whenever he's sleeping it is tied to special moves in the game but you can do it whenever you want i mean yeah we all fantasized about experiencing this gameplay mechanic right ultimately though those are pretty minor issues the game is still super funny at times which is what the series does best again nothing really as outlandish as some of the best moments of bowser's inside story but still good the real problem though comes in the game's pacing the main focus of the story gets established relatively early on not much really happens on the journey towards that destination and any moments where stuff does happen takes far too long to get to dream team is a long adventure man a basic playthrough took me 28 hours as opposed to bowser's inside story which took me a mere 17. and in my opinion the story simply isn't there to pick up the slack what we have here isn't bad but it's hard to get even slightly invested in what's going on here it feels like they wanted to make this sequel longer just for the sake of it and that mentality kinda bleeds into the gameplay as well but nowhere near severely we are four games into the series at this point yeah the game plays exactly like all the rest you run around a bunch of different lands as the bros and each of them get a respective button to call their own for specific actions like jumping and swinging a hammer you touch an enemy so you can jump into a battle where that same two-button approach applies this is all a tried-and-true system and it is still fun here it controls a lot smoother too upgrading to the circle pad on the 3ds and having that smooth 360 control oh it feels great and when we return to the dream world we see the return of side scrolling mimicking the style of exploring bowser's disgusting insights which is also where fondling luigi finally has a purpose oh thank god throughout the different dream worlds are chances to throw dreamy luigi into the background which allows you to manipulate the environment by just doing the most unspeakable things to a sleeping person while keeping the game rated e you mess with a few platforms thanks to a sneeze you fling mario around with luigi's elastic mustache spin a drill around by breaking luigi's nose we can also multiply dreamy luigi to a ton of copies to move throughout the environments in different ways just mowing down hordes of enemies that dare stand in your path it's pretty satisfying there's no part of the game where these things get remotely challenging but it's at least a solid use of the touchscreen messing around with luigi's face to benefit yourself this is clearly the influence for the romancing options and fire emblem fates and undeniably the best thing dream team brings to the table is the dreamy battle system okay so like i said before if you played one mario luigi battle you've essentially played them all enemies have specific tells requiring specific inputs for dodging there are special bros moves that take proper timing to get right yeah it's the same as it's always been it's fine it works there's some motion controls this time around that's kind of cool but yeah it's the same it's the same thing they did ruin the fire flower though now you have to wait for the ball to get big and then you just press the button once it does completely eliminate the potential for carpal tunnel which is appreciated but it's not as satisfying to pull off and only one screw-up knocks you out of an entire all-out attack yeah no this one sucks now but once we're in the dream world dreamy luigi essentially fills mario with his essence allowing him to harness the power of dozens of luigis for every attack doing a lot more damage as well as being able to take down a bunch of enemies all at one time you only get a single action per turn now as opposed to two but you always do a lot more damage than before and the special moves now called luiginary attacks very clever are so much fun to pull off if anything maybe i would say some of these moves go on for far too long and that time really does add up since it makes sense to use these moves a bunch but i thought they were fun from start to finish so that's hardly a complaint it kind of makes the normal battle system feel so dull by comparison the badge system that was in bowser's inside story is a whole lot more prominent this time around but that applies to both battle types so even then the standard battles once again feel a bit lacking it's just not as successful of a dynamic as the bros and bowser but this still totally works also the music for both battle types is fantastic so that definitely helps and speaking of piggy backing off of bowser's inside story giant battles are back as well if you recall i said i thought that they were just okay before definitely cool thematically but you had limited options that left a lot to be desired in my opinion and i am happy to say that it's been totally fixed here giant battles in dream team play out like proper boss fights where you have to consistently assess the situation and figure out which move is best at the right time that's all i wanted a lot of it is still doing the obvious quick time event when the game tells you to but there was clearly a lot more thought put into them this time around as blatant as dream team is at ripping off bowser's inside story this i approve of it's certainly a whole lot better than oh man we'll get to it also luckily once again there are side quests of plenty to dig into from a trading sequence in the main city photos that you find throughout the land that you can then solve yourself skill challenges for all of the different special moves a super difficult gold beanie enemy that is really rare to find and gives you a ton of xp if you manage to defeat it hidden floor beans again okay listen i get it having hidden items spread throughout the world makes a lot of sense and at least bean people do show up in this game but come on now this over reliance on beans is getting to be a bit much it's getting a bit gassy in here don't you think there's even for the first time ever in unlockable hard mode after beating the game once that's pretty neat it doesn't solve any of the pacing issues with the game so i wasn't really thrilled at the idea of doing a second run immediately after the first one but hey still nice and this is all very cool stuff mechanically speaking dream team does a lot of good but again the pacing ruins all of the excitement nearly every single time a brand new mechanic shows up the tutorials dude oh my god the tutorials dream bird would you just shut the hell up oh the game just can't help itself man rather than giving you the chance to i don't know figure something out for yourself you always always get stopped in your tracks to be told how to do literally everything in the game it's crazy dream team has become sort of infamous for the amount of tutorials found within and man on this playthrough i can confirm wholeheartedly that what you've heard is true i was in the final dungeon of the game roughly 25 hours in and they were still hitting me with tutorials i don't know what was wrong with the idea of throwing up a text box that had the controls on it and then you move on it also kind of stings a whole lot more after playing the other 3ds games that included the ability to fast forward cutscenes that is simply not a thing here honestly if nintendo would have taken the time to patch that in after the fact it would have done the game a world of good and you want to know the insane thing there is one ability that doesn't give you a tutorial i thought it crashed or something man i got this new power in the game just to let me play with it on my own why it sounds like hyperbole when you say it out loud but the tutorials constantly kill the pace of the game while later uses of the mechanics are totally fine and when the game lets you play at your own pace it is great but it would be a whole lot better if dreambird would just keep his pillowy mouth shut and just overall while dream team is totally mechanically sound there are so many of these little annoyances that keep popping up so constantly it kind of muddies up the entire game there are so many fetch quests in this game regularly putting you in direct sight of your end goal but oh man we're missing the five things required to make this thing work so just run around on these different points on the map to get them that's fine this actually happens quite often causing most of these areas to feel like they're overstaying their welcome some of the puzzles like this really stupid tile one take way too long to solve even though the solutions are incredibly straightforward it took me nearly 13 hours of gameplay time for fast travel to finally unlock which is absolutely ridiculous while it can be fun to use there is a bit too much reliance on the touchscreen for basic maneuvering in the dream world for my liking sometimes i want to just move from one platform to the other but oh man gotta jiggle the nose for a little bit first and the same thing goes for some of the motion controls and the bros moves a couple of them just didn't work as i would hope and it caused me to not do as much damage that i wanted to and i would just do a different move instead in general i feel like the developers really focused in on taking advantage of the 3ds's newer capabilities rather than solely focusing on making the game fun first and foremost i mean when i found equipment that powers you up on your birthday and one that increases power based on how many steps you took that day okay that's when i knew oh don't mind me i'm just grinding in an rpg dream team is definitely a good game but it is totally lacking in focus hey we have much more powerful hardware now we got to make the game a whole lot longer and we got to cram in as much new technology as we possibly could and the final product overall it's just kind of meh admittedly at the time of its initial release i remember not even thinking about any of the complaints that i have now my old save file here has everything completed 100 so clearly i just loved that we had a new 3ds game at the time i also spent 40 hours in this game holy cow i surprised myself so based on that information what i think i would say is on its own played in short bursts a lot of the issues i mentioned earlier probably won't matter but it's only when coming right off the heels of the previous games where the shortcomings are a whole lot more apparent but but but but but what if i told you that by the end of the adventure and tasma gets fat ah hell yeah dude eventually antasma and bowser get their hands on the dream stone surprise surprise as their one major wish they get a massive castle encased in an impenetrable field and the only way to get through is to summon the great z keeper a majestic powerful incredibly large and beautiful rainbow bird who is like incredibly chill dude like wow what okay i like him a whole lot with a special beam of energy from the z keeper they succeed in breaking down the castle shield and now it's time to enter neo bowser castle probably named after neo bowser city for mario kart 7. that's nice dude i really like that track oh yeah that's right the elite trio are here too man for being original characters based on mario enemies something similar to characters you would find in paper mario these guys really don't get as much screen time as they should they don't show up in the sequel either so this is all we get from them uh that's missed potential and yes we're traveling through bowser's castle once again this time lacking much of the interesting theming all of the previous adventures had not a terrible final dungeon i just missed the smiles of fawful from bowser's inside story and the cool implications of being in peach's castle in partners in time but soon enough our heroes make it to the top of the castle for our final few encounters oh hey look at that bowser's eating a lot of food that's a reference i think first up we got a giant bowser battle again big fan of these and this is no different really fun time the end of the battle is like bowser and luigi spinning a bunch and you gotta knock each other off the field it's like what i'm playing beyblade now okay luigi let it rip and then we battle antasma who is fairly difficult i'll give him that and it's in the dream world this time so we get to use all those cool abilities but man i cannot get over it being so identical to the first five minutes of the game that's so weird paper mario 64 did do something really similar but at least the first fight in that game is unwinnable so it made sense and it made the following encounter a whole lot more epic here you kind of just use the same strategies that you used at the start of the game just more and there's this weird motion controlled dodging mini game that you play to avoid some attacks and that's not really fun and it happens often and that's man it's not it's not that good but the real final fight takes place after bowser foolishly eats the dream stone transforming him into dreamy bowser uh dreamy despite just being a different form of bowser for like the fourth time now this is a really solid final boss i mean bowser is basically a god in this one it is slightly more intimidating than whatever bowletta was trying to be the music is fantastic you got some massive attacks that are pretty difficult to avoid you gotta take out both hands before attacking the center to deal the most damage uh oh oh it's just like the cac led a soul fight all over again huh better than partners in time though a few good hammer swings later bowser blasts off again and peach is finally saved z keeper to the rescue as the castle crumbles under everybody's feet and after touching down back on pillow island he transforms the recaptured dreamstone into a dream coin spawning infinite money for all of the villagers to buy their wishes instead of simply relying on a mere object and hoping for them to come true so the moral of the story here is money is the true key to happiness the end of the game is it's okay as i said before much of the game tends to drag on and the build up to the final encounter isn't super strong anyway so while the final battle is really cool thanks especially to the sweet music i was honestly more so relieved to have it finally over with rather than invested in what was going on and satisfied by what happened the journey to get there can be pretty enjoyable at times but i felt pretty drained by the time i got to the destination unlike again bowser's inside story okay listen i know there's been a ton of comparing going on here between these two games but i can't help it alpha dream did such a fantastic job with bowser's inside story and rather than having dream team feel like a proper evolution of the formula it feels more so like they wanted to find a way to do a lot of the same stuff all over again without explicitly reusing the same ideas the graphics and the soundtrack are top notch i do prefer the looks and sounds of the previous games but it's hard to complain about what we actually have here and when i look back at my time with dream team i just remember an adventure that feels unnecessarily longer filled with a ton of obtrusive tutorials there was an antagonist that wasn't very intimidating bowser was a bad guy again which i really couldn't take seriously and the primary gimmick of luigi going to sleep feels like it never met its full potential we have a game here that is fun don't get me wrong there's plenty of good things about this but there is too much holding this game back from true greatness in my eyes patching the ability to fast forward cut scenes nintendo i know you don't care about the 3ds anymore but come on come on but in the grand pantheon of the mario and luigi series i would probably put dream team right up there with partners in time not a bad game but definitely near the bottom of the list if you want to play it for yourself it'll still be fun but be prepared to have your hand held with tutorials the entire time dream birt needs to shut the hell up and if i'm totally honest i'm actually a bit worried now bowser's inside story fantastic game they definitely wanted to mimic that success with dream team i just hope that in the next game we don't just have a massive gimmick that's there to justify a new game but the game itself is just pretty meh i have a feeling that's going to happen and i'm not looking forward to it wouldn't be good not at all wouldn't you know it that's exactly what we got next up on our final stop on the mario and luigi journey we have paper jam the final original game alpha dream developed before they resorted to making two remakes the latter of the two did so poorly it helped contribute to them going out of business this is gonna go great e3 2015 aka that one time nintendo used puppets for their game showcase oh oh simpler times i don't really think this is much of a hot take but this was one of nintendo's weaker e3 events in my opinion some solid games all around but nothing much in the way of new announcements need i remind you this is where they announced animal crossing amiibo festival i still don't think i've recovered from that one of the bright spots though was the announcement of the newest in the mario and luigi series a crossover with paper mario mario and luigi paper jam dude that's such a good idea i know i just said i wasn't the biggest fan of dream team but i was still ready for whatever this new adventure had in store crossovers are inherently really exciting and the name paper jam oh man even the name is perfect the potential for this is immeasurable the important word there is potential crossovers are just one of the most exciting things to happen in the video game world you take two good things you put them together you get one really good thing that's basic mathematics but that's not what we got here at this time the mario and luigi series was riding high after dream team and the 3ds in general was a console that was simply exciting to own there were just so many great games you can play on it a very stark contrast to when dream team released when the handheld was just getting out of its initial sail slump paper mario on the other hand different story but one that you're all familiar with i won't bore you with the details sticker star bad yes we get it but it is important to this story i promise what was once a franchise filled with life energy original characters and stories became a sterile version of its past self resembling new super mario bros more than paper mario so with this new crossover on the horizon which paper mario are we gonna get well we already know the answer to that question now we know paper jam as the final original game in this franchise and despite being excited for it when it was new i just couldn't bring myself to complete it this is going to be my first time going through this game from start to finish for some reason back then i couldn't get past the halfway mark there's got to be a reason for that oh no we're being invaded all right well two games in a row we are still lacking the bros yelling nintendo nintendo so that's a shame right off the bat on the offset though things are looking pretty good here mario and luigi's art style may not be as pronounced as it was on the gba and ds but seeing the paper characters interact with everyone else yeah that's that's exactly what i bought this game for oh and once again it's still weird while the game is known as paper jam in america it is known as paper jam bros in europe why it didn't really make much sense with dream team bros but at least there the dream team are the bros the bros are the dream team that's fine paper jam bros is three words they threw together and called it a day i don't understand this one day while luigi and toad were doing some spring cleaning they come across a special book that once opened unleashes a paper company's worth of creatures from within and scatters them all across the land this includes a bunch of structures toads goombas and other typical enemies i can never look at a paper ba-bomb the same way again after origami king no i'm not ready to talk about it princess peach kamik bowser jr bowser and of course mario shenanigans ensue no paper luigi though and i know exactly what you're saying paper luigi would have been perfect for this it makes so much sense and you'd be right more on that later our main goal at the moment per paper peach's request is to save all the paper toads simple enough but soon after our real motivation for the rest of the story presents itself bowser steals peach times two honestly as much as it's going to sound like a cop-out this is kind of the entire plot there's no original villains you occasionally have to save some toads every now and then you work towards rescuing both peaches and by the end you take out both bowsers that's it the koopalings do show up again yay i don't dislike the koopalings in fact i would say i'm a big fan but when they're thrown in because they couldn't really be bothered being creative their presence is pretty annoying in my eyes this was a similar issue in color splash as well admittedly some characters do make their series debut like nabbit and king ba bomb which is kinda cool but overall yeah this story is really bland humorous at times usually when paper mario is using his paper-ness that stuff's pretty good uh the year of luigi gets a mention a one-line mention that was really cute there's this one scene where paper peach escapes her cell by walking through it that's probably the best part of the game but otherwise the humor much like dream team is pretty subdued we still get a bunch of gut punches to luigi throughout though boy gets his own year and he is still the butt of everyone's jokes that's not fair dream team may not have been a storytelling masterpiece either but at least there we did have an original villain with unique characters to interact with that is non-existent in paper jam and well we may as well get this over with bland is kind of how i would describe this entire adventure missed potential is unfortunately the true name of the game here there is so much fan service that could be pulled from both the mario and luigi and paper mario franchises but the final result we got barely has anything that made those two series so much fun in the first place how did you screw that up before paper mario enters the story the battle theme is a remix of the one from superstar saga that's pretty cool paper mario and friends coming out of a book is kind of a reference to thousand year door and super um at some point bowser's castle goes way up into the sky which did also happen in paper mario 64 but i don't know these are a bit of a stretch call me selfish but i wanted more return to the bean bean kingdom and give popple a more pronounced role he has yet to be seen since he just ran off near the end of dream team maybe bring back classic partners for cameos or maybe even the star spirits working with an ultimate power would totally fit right at home with paper mario or better yet crazy thought something entirely new without needing to defeat bowser and go through the most generic of locations like grass desert island snow to get there all those block people from the previous two games gone the elite trio henchmen that were created exclusively to this sub-series nowhere to be seen oh but starlo's here having less to do with the plot than ever before the disappointment here with what they could have done is pretty vast and i still can't get over the lack of paper luigi that is totally bizarre his inclusion would have been perfect he is the only one out of the two pairs of brothers that can speak full sentences there you go that would have made the game 10 times funnier apparently him not being playable was due to the developers wanting to stick to a three button control scheme one for each character because four buttons would have been too difficult i don't know should we should we tell him regarding simply its crossover appeal paper jam very much wants to be like mario plus rabbids kingdom battle or professor layton vs phoenix wright games that combine elements from both series in an attempt to satisfy multiple types of audiences but in reality paper jam is more like crash purple inspire orange games that are trying to sell itself on its brand recognition above all else and you never want to go full crash purple inspire orange this may be marketed as a crossover but make no mistake about it this is just another mario and luigi game lacking all of the original flair that made the series special in the first place except this time paper mario's there in name only but he's there that's about all i can give it but i will say as disappointing as that aspect is there is still a lot more to this game than just that regardless we are five games into this series a lot of what's worked in the past still works now running around and doing some simple platforming and getting into action command based combat is just as enjoyable as it's always been there's also no extra side scrolling gimmicks like in the last two games the gameplay style that you start off with is the style you play most of the game with there are some notable additions though there's a really helpful dash which is really nice because the worlds are otherwise super big and pretty barren to explore there's a lot of special moves that you can activate by pressing the three bros buttons in order like this one grabby move going over gaps with a paper plane nice little throwback there i will admit and drilling into the ground so you can climb up walls and collect collect beans all five of these games have beans you couldn't think of anything else it only really made sense in superstar saga that's what the title of this game should be man not paper jam bros but paper jam beans from time to time there are also these rescue toad missions that you can take part in and man i i don't know these feel really unnecessary they're not as big of a pace breaker as all the previous games tutorials but it does suck when you're trekking along but you can't continue because uh we gotta stop and do some mini games to progress they're okay at best but every time i got into one i just wanted to get back to the main game ten plus hours in the toads are still running away from me why i'm on their side and then there's the combat where paper mario really gets to show his stuff nothing really exciting on the marion luigi front you jump and you use your hammer as your main forms of attack with plenty of options for bros moves you have no doubt played at least one of the previous four marion luigi games before this you have played this one as well by proxy the fire flower has been fixed though so that's a positive finally the series can go back to triggering my early stage arthritis one of my biggest issues with dream team overall the new lineup of attacks that we have is pretty solid they all serve different purposes too so while technically they do get stronger the later on you receive them i was still pulling out the attacks i got early on in the late game so that is definitely a success listen i love bowser's inside story as much as the next guy but really a lot of the different moves in that arsenal got pulled out mostly if i just wanted different buttons to press at that moment also happy to report none of them use motion controls definitely do not miss those so yeah it's mostly the same for the two bros but i still like what's on offer here but easily the star of the show here is paper mario showing off a brand new copy mechanic where you can stack multiple marios on top of itself to power up your attacks he can also float for some reason okay it is all a bit weird since again this has absolutely nothing to do with the games paper mario is from but it does spice up the gameplay just enough to keep things exciting whenever it's his turn to make a move he also comes equipped with a lineup of not bros attacks but trio attacks more cinematic affairs that require all three characters to activate and as you would expect usually dealing a lot more damage if performed successfully ultimately this all makes for a very fun battle system it's no longer one repeat system with the bros and a second fresher system with bowser or dreamy luigi that makes the repeat system seem like it needs freshening up here it's only one and it's a good one at that it's not all perfect i feel like the enemy tells indicators that tell you which characters are going to get attacked are harder to distinguish than ever before which leads to taking more hits than i felt were justified this was one of the things the earlier games did so well but really that's not that big of a deal overall it's still really fun but a bit slow when it comes to some of the opposing attacks if anything you can also no longer customize where your final experience points go whenever you level up this one is definitely a weird thing to remove leveling up does happen at a super constant pace for all three characters so that's nice but not having that extra little bit of customization that the previous four games had is a confusing choice how i would describe it is the way paper jam utilizes three different characters is really fun intuitive and engaging but again the way it's specifically uses paper mario is not sometimes he is nothing more than a cheerleader and we also can't fondle him like we could with luigi and dream team give the people what they want put paper mario on the touchscreen and let me fold his creases for him to make the paper plane it sounds weird when you say it out loud but admit it it would be pretty fun oh but of course if you thought that was the only battle system in this game do i have something to show you of course we had to have some other big gimmick to have an additional battle system no matter what while the previous two games had giant battles that were slower and require you to rotate the ds and 3ds 90 degrees here we have giant papercraft battles thanks to toadette and a bunch of the toads that you rescue along the way these massive cardboard beasts get created for you to ride on top of and go to war and they're just kind of okay in these encounters you run around a big 3d arena ramming into and jumping on top of multiple enemies all of which uses up some of your stamina and to regain stamina there's a rhythm minigame that you take part in whenever you desire each battle also introduces a new cardboard character to control equipped with a brand new mechanic like papercraft yoshi being able to use his paper craft tongue so no two encounters feel that much alike but i don't know man these do nothing for me similar to the toad rescue minigames these feel pretty mindless they come off as distractions for the sake of variety and nothing more we didn't need something like this to keep the adventure interesting the game itself was doing a good job of that guys paper mario is in this game we gotta have some battle gimmick that's kind of like paper it's definitely a mindset carried over from sticker star like those toad missions they're not terrible but they're pretty unnecessary did you get it tear terrible that was a paper joke as a whole though the bright side on the entire game is the pacing of it it is way better than dream team all of that whack tutorial garbage is gone and we also have the ability to fast forward cut scenes oh thank goodness this is the first game to introduce that it is extra important since the story is as lackluster as it is good to know it's not a forced punishment to sit through this time around as a result you end up constantly being on the move rarely ever are you stationary well except for paper mario at least he's always stationary that that was another paper joke please don't leave it ends up being a bit of a toss-up between the two 3ds adventures which one did i have a better time playing dream teams certainly had better set pieces and more unique characters but paper jam was more enjoyable with the moment-to-moment gameplay the side content though is definitely lacking i will admit doing every single toad rescue mission is optional there's a few quizzes that you can partake in which nets you just a few items and nothing else you have the typical bros move challenges as well as boss gauntlets which does lead to a special final boss fancy there but that's about it nothing substantial to really sink your teeth into it's also a noticeably shorter adventure than dream team as well took me seven hours less to get through this one that really puts into perspective just how much a dream team was those damn tutorials the reason i didn't beat this game all those years ago was due to that lack of original content as well as the crossover fan service not appealing to what i wanted but giving this game a second go coming right off the heels of playing dream team paper jam's positives shine a whole lot brighter oh and just in case you thought things would pick up by the end of the game let's just go ahead and squash that right now no thanks to all of the paper toads that you end up saving you're able to travel into the sky to neo bowser castle yep it's the same exact name they used the last time you got some pretty basic puzzles you end up chasing nabbit for like 30 minutes that takes up most of your time here there is a mega man styled boss rush with all of the papercraft bosses because you know i did say i love those i couldn't wait to fight all of them again back to back to back and after taking out both camecs in a traditional boss fight as well as all of the koopalings the final encounter is upon us bowser and paper bowser phase one nothing really too special here both bowsers at once you got plenty of strong moves in your arsenal to handle them easily no big deal phase two though when the good music and all the 3d modeling budget comes in this is the true final battle shiny robo bowser and honestly it's an enjoyable flight although the pattern is pretty easy to figure out chip away damage to get the weak spot exposed then go all in on those strong attacks before the shield comes back and you gotta do it all over again and it also kind of goes without saying this is the fourth and technically fifth time the ultimate battle in these mario and luigi games is an altered form of bowser we've done this before nothing here is special with enough bops to the head bowser blasts off once again from his castle the heroes managed to send paper bowser back into the book he came from and with that it's time to celebrate both peaches give a kiss to their respective marios which is nice but then they both kiss luigi at the same time brings a tear to my eye the true hero finally wins in the end we cut to a parade that's it i blinked and then the credits started rolling just as bland as it was getting here the ending it just happens though i guess ending a game with the parade is another paper mario reference but man i am i am really stretching here i got nothing else to work on you do unlock a sound test though so that's kind of cool oh you put him here so yeah that's mario and luigi paper jam definitely better than i remember it but it's just kind of there upon its release paper jam's reviews were positive however sales were below expectations performing a lot weaker than the four games before it selling better than only the two 3ds remakes that released after it which is a bit of a segue to discuss the poor state paper jam sent alpha dream into while they crafted a very fine game they clearly lost a lot of their mojo from their earlier games that put their name on the map sure sticker star suffered from a lot of that too but it's hard to tell if mario luigi's lack of creativity is anything more than a coincidence rather than giving it another shot with the new original story a bunch of original characters and a bunch of wacky things the bros could be doing the company decided to go back to the past and remake superstar saga instead with the assumption on my part that they were going to try and remember what made that game so memorable all those years ago people may be a bit indifferent to the art direction but i thought the superstar saga remake was really well done regardless nostalgia couldn't save this one it did not sell well at all but hey the switch was on the horizon maybe the lessons learned and the money gained from this remake will help this franchise's jump to an hd console that's not an outlandish thought i mean fire emblem kinda did that as well and then we got a bowser's inside story remake instead and the company filed for bankruptcy soon after damn it sounds cliche but you hate to see it alpha dream became a name that was worth caring about because they made a bunch of games that nintendo handheld gamers truly loved and they also made a handful of hamtaro games i cannot let them go unnoticed this year i wanted to dedicate time to playing through the entirety of the mario and luigi series and now that we are finally at the finish line i can happily say i did exactly that outside of those new side modes and the remakes but they weren't really good anyway so who cares because of this adventure i went on i was fortunate to see all of the games highs and lows in such a short amount of time and looking back on it all man mario and luigi is such a good series paper mario may have been thriving in those early years but these games these are the ones that carried the torch that super mario rpg on the super nintendo left us these are the games that put our heroes in some of the wackiest of scenarios you could possibly imagine wrapped up in humorous stories really engaging bad guys super fun gameplay it's awesome beans babies beans bowsers oh no even more beans some dreams and did i mention beans a whole lot of beans just a whole bunch of beans and also paper mario was there for a second these five games may have lost some of the creativity as we got to the end of them but they still did a lot mostly with beans did i mention that part alongside luigi's mansion green mario finally had a strong enough spotlight on him to make him the endearing character that we know today i would argue that is the biggest net positive of them all and many of these games accomplishments and failures will stay exclusive to history here papa will remain m.i.a until the end of time i promise you that these are definitely still adventures that are worth experiencing and by doing so the mario and luigi series will be remembered forever and well since people are going to ask anyway before we sign off i'd probably just rank all the games like this maybe a bit different than how you would do it but hey that's the sign of a good series i would love to see how all of your rankings stand compared to mine if you watched this retrospective from beginning to end i want to really thank you for your support knocking out a 5 rpg long series nearly back to back to back certainly takes a whole lot of time but a lot of you out there seem to really enjoy it and i appreciate that support and for alfred dream the company responsible for these games well i got one final thing to say to you i still still can't do it i was trying i was practicing still can't do it but truly comes from the heart thank you [Music] babies

Channel: AntDude

Views: 1,935,026

Keywords: AntDude, Mario & Luigi, Mario & Luigi series, Mario & Luigi retrospective, Superstar Saga review, Partners in Time review, Bowser's Inside Story review, Dream Team review, Paper Jam review, Mario & Luigi review, Dream Team Bros review, Paper Jam Bros review, Superstar Saga 3DS review, Bowser's Inside Story 3DS review, Superstar Saga + Bowser's Minions, Bowser's Inside Story + Bowser Jr's Journey

Id: tbspCQqJRKs

Length: 107min 32sec (6452 seconds)

Published: Sun Jan 31 2021