Geno (♥♪!?): Return of the Starsend Savior

[Droodle]

Look, we've discussed this to death already, it's just another mark on the "may or may not be real" list of things Geno has going for him, and unless something changes with it there's really not much else to talk about.

On an unrelated note. in case you haven't seen it yet, theres a new interview related in Origami King. And OOOOOH BOY, this might actually be WORSE than what we learned in the infamous 2012 interviews for Sticker Star (I think those were through Iwata Asks?).
https://www.videogameschronicle.com/features/interviews/paper-mario-origami-king/

• How do you make sure the story appeals to a broad audience? And what challenges does existing within the Mario franchise present to your writers?

Tanabe: In Super Paper Mario, the elaborate story led the game away from the Mario universe, so since Paper Mario: Sticker Star I’ve refrained from using stories that are too complicated. Personally, though, I like games with stories. During the production of The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past, we made use of a system for character settings and real conversations in order to build the story, which was a first for a game in a series. (I also wrote the text for this game.)

• Mario is famous for its iconic cast of villains. Can you talk about the new villain in this game and how you design a character to stand alongside all-time greats like Bowser and Kamek?

Tanabe: Since Paper Mario: Sticker Star, it’s no longer possible to modify Mario characters or to create original characters that touch on the Mario universe. That means that if we aren’t using Mario characters for bosses, we need to create original characters with designs that don’t involve the Mario universe at all, like we’ve done with Olly and the stationery bosses.

Spoiler: AHEM

View attachment 278701

Well, it certainly explains a lot, doesn't it. And before you ask, this doesn't seem like something that's JUST being applied to Paper Mario, in fact it actually explains some weird things in other games.
View attachment 278703
Remember all the weird inconsistencies in the changes for SuperStar Saga? You actually look and the sprites that are actually changed or redesigned seem to only be characters/enemies specifcally connected to the main Mario World and not the Bean-Bean Kingdom. (this includes changing all the unique Toads in Little Fungitown to generic ones which isn't shown here)

But what about Odyssey? Well, that game completely distances itself from the Mushroom Kingdom entirely, so it's allowed to do weirder stuff I guess. Also it's the main Mario team, they probably have more leeway. Either way, it's completely infuriating and I want to slap Miyamoto across the face because of it.

Some more comparisons before and after the committee was established for Paper Mario.

And just to prove this wasn't just some decision IS made and not the Mario committee. These are the concept art for a lot of characters.

It looks sooooo much better.

I'm just going to say that hopefully the Geno cameo was actually missing because Alphadream was going bankrupt and not because the committee didn't want Geno to appear in Mario SS this time.

 

[Dynamic Worlok]

So apparently something interesting came up in regards to Paper Mario and it's characters. https://www.videogameschronicle.com/features/interviews/paper-mario-origami-king/.

TL;DR: IS isn't allowed to make unique characters out of already established characters in the Mario Setting (like Goombario or Goombella), and while they can make wholly new characters that don't borrow design elements from the Mario Universe (Origami twins or stationery bosses); they can't keep on reusing them in the future (they're forced to be one offs).

And apparently this isn't just Nintendo controlling Paper Mario really hard either. According to this comment by a deleted insider at resetera from back in 2018 (this was made in a topic where people were wondering why Waluigi isn't in WarioWare).



Here's the truth:

Nintendo has a quality assurance team whose goal is to make sure that all of the characters and worlds stay consistent. It was established after the early Wii era...people like Miyamoto noticed around 2009-ish that Nintendo contractors like Camelot / Alphadream / Intelligent Systems were getting a little too liberal with their interpretations of the Mario IP...so now they watch over everything and establish standards.

It's this team that prevents Waluigi from appearing outside of sports games.



It's pretty much everything related to the Mario IP. AKA it's likely that this team also decides which Mario characters are allowed into Smash as spirits, mii costumes, assist trophies, and fighters. And considering that they're still being reluctant with allowing unique characters to return in future entries or giving them bigger roles in the rest of the Mario IP; I won't lie when I say it makes me a little hesitant on Geno's chances, so far every playable Mario character has had an appearance in multiple different mainline Mario games, so that may be the team's criteria for who gets to be playable or not. Waluigi for example is entirely relegated to spin-offs.

Hopefully Sakurai manages to convince this Mario IP team to let him add characters like Geno or Waluigi as playable characters this time, and maybe they end up seeing how much unique characters matter a lot to people and bring things like partners back.

Of all the absolute dreck. That explains so much. God, I hate that they felt the need to reel it in after such beloved stuff was made. It defies all logic. And it's annoying to think that Nintendo of all people might have been the ones holding Geno back, and not square.

 

[SpiritOfRuin]

Okay, I did this for another thread and it got pretty funny so I'll do it here.

You get to design Geno's moveset, however, you have to make it as gimmicky as possible, while still staying true to the character.

What do you do?

Ok here we go...Geno of course has timed hits on all of his moves. On top of timed hits Geno has a mechanic where his neutral special is where he shoots one of his fists out and pressing it again allows him to shoot the other fist and pressing b a third time allows him to recall his fist which damage opponents on the way back. This can be done very quickly and allows you to rack up damage quickly even though his attacks aren't all that powerful. Due to all the timed hits and fists flying everywhere the screen looks crazy. Oh but also....Geno has different movesets depending on how many fists he currently has so 3 separate movesets: 1 with both fists 2 missing one fist and 3 missing both fists except his specials stay the same. Because of these advanced controls you actually need to use 3 simultaneous controllers to use him Instead of grabbing like other characters, Geno instead traps opponents inside his cannon body and fires them in different directions with inputs and actually follows the opponent at that trajectory. Geno will randomly get freebies which give him buffs. Geno's beam and whirl go all the way across the screen. Geno has a FP meter that is recharged by timed hits and big combos. All of Geno's taunts give him a random item from SMRPG which has varying effects in game. Geno whirl really does 999% damage if perfectly timed. Also Geno will refuse to fight Peach, Mario, or Rosalina and just leave his doll body for game over. Geno will randomly find different uniforms and weapons and will have to manage an inventory to equip and drop these.

 

[helloiamhere]

So apparently something interesting came up in regards to Paper Mario and it's characters. https://www.videogameschronicle.com/features/interviews/paper-mario-origami-king/.

TL;DR: IS isn't allowed to make unique characters out of already established characters in the Mario Setting (like Goombario or Goombella), and while they can make wholly new characters that don't borrow design elements from the Mario Universe (Origami twins or stationery bosses); they can't keep on reusing them in the future (they're forced to be one offs).

And apparently this isn't just Nintendo controlling Paper Mario really hard either. According to this comment by a deleted insider at resetera from back in 2018 (this was made in a topic where people were wondering why Waluigi isn't in WarioWare).



Here's the truth:

Nintendo has a quality assurance team whose goal is to make sure that all of the characters and worlds stay consistent. It was established after the early Wii era...people like Miyamoto noticed around 2009-ish that Nintendo contractors like Camelot / Alphadream / Intelligent Systems were getting a little too liberal with their interpretations of the Mario IP...so now they watch over everything and establish standards.

It's this team that prevents Waluigi from appearing outside of sports games.



It's pretty much everything related to the Mario IP. AKA it's likely that this team also decides which Mario characters are allowed into Smash as spirits, mii costumes, assist trophies, and fighters. And considering that they're still being reluctant with allowing unique characters to return in future entries or giving them bigger roles in the rest of the Mario IP; I won't lie when I say it makes me a little hesitant on Geno's chances, so far every playable Mario character has had an appearance in multiple different mainline Mario games, so that may be the team's criteria for who gets to be playable or not. Waluigi for example is entirely relegated to spin-offs.

Hopefully Sakurai manages to convince this Mario IP team to let him add characters like Geno or Waluigi as playable characters this time, and maybe they end up seeing how much unique characters matter a lot to people and bring things like partners back.

Honestly if this is the route they are gonna take on future PM games I'd rather Intelligent Systems just focus on Fire Emblem and WarioWare games.

 

[Powerman293]

I literally don't understand the point of this at all. Like, what makes the Mario spin-offs memorable is the lack of their conformity to the generic Mushroom Kingdom.

I can understand this committee for something like Mario + Rabbids. But to retroactively force these onto already existing developer partners sucks A LOT.

 

[Vector Victor]

Its s very interesting turn of events. That one sentence can be interpreted in several different ways. Its specific and vague at the same time. It reminds me of the initial debate over the Grinch Hoax when both sides offered valid explanations and people honestly couldn't come to a conclusion (definitely not like the later debates when everything was going to hell between groups and things were getting nasty).

Could be the costume reactions in 4. Could be the spirit in Ultimate. Could be the inclusion of Geno as a Fighter Pass character. The sentence could mean several things. But now we wait. It won't get answered until Nintendo finally gets up and announces a Direct.

And hopefully people don't bug her (not saying people here are). The Smash fanbase has a tendency to be........awful, really awful. Plus, even just from a pragmatic stand its pointless to ask her to clarify. She wouldn't be allowed to answer either way. So hopefully any new interactions she gets from Smash fans are those who wish her well and send happy messages.

 

[StarLight42]

If I wasn’t a grown manchild who’s sick and tired of this **** at this point, I think i’d legitimately cry reading this article

https://mobile.twitter.com/ArloStuff/status/1283790598655205376

They really know exactly what fans want and just don’t give a ****. Wow.

 

[MonkeyDLenny]

So apparently something interesting came up in regards to Paper Mario and it's characters. https://www.videogameschronicle.com/features/interviews/paper-mario-origami-king/.

TL;DR: IS isn't allowed to make unique characters out of already established characters in the Mario Setting (like Goombario or Goombella), and while they can make wholly new characters that don't borrow design elements from the Mario Universe (Origami twins or stationery bosses); they can't keep on reusing them in the future (they're forced to be one offs).

And apparently this isn't just Nintendo controlling Paper Mario really hard either. According to this comment by a deleted insider at resetera from back in 2018 (this was made in a topic where people were wondering why Waluigi isn't in WarioWare).



Here's the truth:

Nintendo has a quality assurance team whose goal is to make sure that all of the characters and worlds stay consistent. It was established after the early Wii era...people like Miyamoto noticed around 2009-ish that Nintendo contractors like Camelot / Alphadream / Intelligent Systems were getting a little too liberal with their interpretations of the Mario IP...so now they watch over everything and establish standards.

It's this team that prevents Waluigi from appearing outside of sports games.



It's pretty much everything related to the Mario IP. AKA it's likely that this team also decides which Mario characters are allowed into Smash as spirits, mii costumes, assist trophies, and fighters. And considering that they're still being reluctant with allowing unique characters to return in future entries or giving them bigger roles in the rest of the Mario IP; I won't lie when I say it makes me a little hesitant on Geno's chances, so far every playable Mario character has had an appearance in multiple different mainline Mario games, so that may be the team's criteria for who gets to be playable or not. Waluigi for example is entirely relegated to spin-offs.

Hopefully Sakurai manages to convince this Mario IP team to let him add characters like Geno or Waluigi as playable characters this time, and maybe they end up seeing how much unique characters matter a lot to people and bring things like unique NPC/partner designs back.

I'd like to believe the fan demand for Geno makes him a special case in this instance

God, I hope so

 

[Super10ZX]

Look, we've discussed this to death already, it's just another mark on the "may or may not be real" list of things Geno has going for him, and unless something changes with it there's really not much else to talk about.

On an unrelated note. in case you haven't seen it yet, theres a new interview related in Origami King. And OOOOOH BOY, this might actually be WORSE than what we learned in the infamous 2012 interviews for Sticker Star (I think those were through Iwata Asks?).
https://www.videogameschronicle.com/features/interviews/paper-mario-origami-king/

• How do you make sure the story appeals to a broad audience? And what challenges does existing within the Mario franchise present to your writers?

Tanabe: In Super Paper Mario, the elaborate story led the game away from the Mario universe, so since Paper Mario: Sticker Star I’ve refrained from using stories that are too complicated. Personally, though, I like games with stories. During the production of The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past, we made use of a system for character settings and real conversations in order to build the story, which was a first for a game in a series. (I also wrote the text for this game.)

• Mario is famous for its iconic cast of villains. Can you talk about the new villain in this game and how you design a character to stand alongside all-time greats like Bowser and Kamek?

Tanabe: Since Paper Mario: Sticker Star, it’s no longer possible to modify Mario characters or to create original characters that touch on the Mario universe. That means that if we aren’t using Mario characters for bosses, we need to create original characters with designs that don’t involve the Mario universe at all, like we’ve done with Olly and the stationery bosses.

Spoiler: AHEM

View attachment 278701

Well, it certainly explains a lot, doesn't it. And before you ask, this doesn't seem like something that's JUST being applied to Paper Mario, in fact it actually explains some weird things in other games.
View attachment 278703
Remember all the weird inconsistencies in the changes for SuperStar Saga? You actually look and the sprites that are actually changed or redesigned seem to only be characters/enemies specifcally connected to the main Mario World and not the Bean-Bean Kingdom. (this includes changing all the unique Toads in Little Fungitown to generic ones which isn't shown here)

But what about Odyssey? Well, that game completely distances itself from the Mushroom Kingdom entirely, so it's allowed to do weirder stuff I guess. Also it's the main Mario team, they probably have more leeway. Either way, it's completely infuriating and I want to slap Miyamoto across the face because of it.

This thread is like a roller coaster of emotions man. We go from insane excitement to this in just about 12 hours.

I’ve been a big fan of the Mario RPGs for most of my life, and I’ve always wondered why characters from those RPGs rarely appeared in the other Mario spinoffs. I would be so happy to see characters like Fawful appear in stuff like Mario Kart and the like.

After thinking about it for a long time, the only two realistic conclusions I thought up of were either the studios behind these other spinoffs not caring to use the RPG characters, or someone like Miyamoto was specifically putting them off limits. I desperately wanted it to be the former option, but now... I guess the ladder is true.

To me characters from the RPGs really expanded the feel of the Mario world and made it so much more interesting. And to know now that these characters can pretty much never appear again, or have to specifically be given one off status for the one or two new characters we’ve gotten each game... it hurts. The Best Fitness Friends in the BIS remake gave me hope, but now...

...Smash really is the only way we’ll get to see these characters even acknowledged.

 

[helloiamhere]

Love to have selection of items from a Staples aisle as my bosses in my Paper Mario games over Rawk Hawk, Doopliss, Smorgs, and Hooktail. Great ****ing job Nintendo.

 

[SpiritOfRuin]

Nintendo: "let's create a team specifically dedicated to removing all semblance of creativity and uniqueness in our flagship franchise and also shove "innovative" gimmicks no one wants down everyone's throats to prove that we can sell whatever the heck we want and never lower prices and still make bank off these idiots...also...**** Geno"

 

[Vector Victor]

So apparently something interesting came up in regards to Paper Mario and it's characters. https://www.videogameschronicle.com/features/interviews/paper-mario-origami-king/.

TL;DR: IS isn't allowed to make unique characters out of already established characters in the Mario Setting (like Goombario or Goombella), and while they can make wholly new characters that don't borrow design elements from the Mario Universe (Origami twins or stationery bosses); they can't keep on reusing them in the future (they're forced to be one offs).

And apparently this isn't just Nintendo controlling Paper Mario really hard either. According to this comment by a deleted insider at resetera from back in 2018 (this was made in a topic where people were wondering why Waluigi isn't in WarioWare).



Here's the truth:

Nintendo has a quality assurance team whose goal is to make sure that all of the characters and worlds stay consistent. It was established after the early Wii era...people like Miyamoto noticed around 2009-ish that Nintendo contractors like Camelot / Alphadream / Intelligent Systems were getting a little too liberal with their interpretations of the Mario IP...so now they watch over everything and establish standards.

It's this team that prevents Waluigi from appearing outside of sports games.



It's pretty much everything related to the Mario IP. AKA it's likely that this team also decides which Mario characters are allowed into Smash as spirits, mii costumes, assist trophies, and fighters. And considering that they're still being reluctant with allowing unique characters to return in future entries or giving them bigger roles in the rest of the Mario IP; I won't lie when I say it makes me a little hesitant on Geno's chances, so far every playable Mario character has had an appearance in multiple different mainline Mario games, so that may be the team's criteria for who gets to be playable or not. Waluigi for example is entirely relegated to spin-offs.

Hopefully Sakurai manages to convince this Mario IP team to let him add characters like Geno or Waluigi as playable characters this time, and maybe they end up seeing how much unique characters matter a lot to people and bring things like unique NPC/partner designs back.

Crap like this is why people were horrified when Sakurai said at the start that Nintendo picked the DLC. It made 'characters' like Pink Gold Peach a potential reality.

This probably can also explain their horrible picks in Mario Kart and why there's 17 Marios and Peaches.

 

[Genome]

Fighter Pass 2 leak (CREDIBLE)
https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachme...18880/Screenshot_2020-07-15_at_9.53.04_PM.png
Sakurai told me this is what he wanted himself

 

[zferolie]

Yeah this new news does seem to point to never getting new designs based on classic characters, or OCs in a game ever appearing again. That deleted resetera post is telling for sure. Makes sense why waluigi and daisy never appear outside of sports and party games now for sure, and why we will never see geno in another game(not just for the square stuff if that was actually ever a thing)

I get wanting to be protective of your property, and making sure it doesnt stray fromnyour path. Disney does this for mickey and friends. But i think nintendo is going way too hard on this with Mario and its hurting some stuff i feel.

 

[Ayumi Tachibana]

There was a random post on 5chan basically saying that Square Enix is fully aware of the demands for Geno from core smash fans but he won't be in because SE is concerned people to recognize him as "smash" character.
In the same post this guy was also mentioning that there are hardly no demands for Genos' come back other than from smash fanbase.
Plus, there was also a rumor back years ago said that SE suggested Nintendo to buy the rights for some SMRPG contents but Nintendo refused.
And Japan seems to think these two are lining up.

Yes, this one.
The orginal post is more like gaming industry inside talks than a smash leak to me.

I can't find the source for SE selling SMRPG rumor. I think it was from 3 or 4 years ago.
I remember it was saying SE tried to sell "some SMRPG contents" not the game itself since it contains FF elements.

My old posts.
I couldn't find the original text for the said rumor but definitely there was a leak-ish post on 2chan (or maybe futaba I'm not quite sure) years ago saying that Nintendo is the one who refused to buy SMRPG contents from SE.

 

[Firox]

Of all the absolute dreck. That explains so much. God, I hate that they felt the need to reel it in after such beloved stuff was made. It defies all logic. And it's annoying to think that Nintendo of all people might have been the ones holding Geno back, and not square.

Yeah.....I'm convinced now that if Geno still gets the shaft when all is said and done, it's going to be Nintendo's fault for being idiotically stingy for no legitimate reason. We all need to remember that this is the same company that three years after release of the Switch still only has two background colors for the UI. I mean, come the **** on, people. Adding blue and red would literally take all of 5 minutes of programming. Sometimes Nintendo is just inexplicably stupid.

 

[Mushroomguy12]

Yeah.... can we please just remove Tanabe from this series (and keep him away from all RPGs period) and bring back Ryota Kawade (the guy who made the first 3 games) and bring in Yoshiaki Koizumi more (the guy who wrote Rosalina's storybook in Galaxy 1 and allowed Odyssey to have unique and original character designs)?

 

[Dynamic Worlok]

My old posts.
I couldn't find the original text for the said rumor but definitely there was a leak-ish post on 2chan (or maybe futaba I'm not quite sure) years ago saying that Nintendo is the one who refused to buy SMRPG contents from SE.

If that's the case, then I am platinum mad.

 

[vivala]

I'm just confused about what Nintendo thinks it's protecting with this decision. Like, did anyone like Mario less because its spinoffs got weird? Did anyone like Mario more because the NSMB series, 3D Land/World, and Mario Parties 9 & 10 stuck to a pretty tame interpretation of the franchise? It's not like the core games have some sort of deep story/lore that other games could undermine.

 

[Vector Victor]

This interview coming out a day before a new Paper Mario game that has constantly split the fanbase may be one of the worst times they could release this. This would completely torpedo (Ted) any hype for the game and actually strengthens the side that hates the path Paper Mario is taking.

Who the hell is working in Nintendo's marketing department this year? Literally every move they made since last December has been stupid.

 

[Powerman293]

This interview coming out a day before a new Paper Mario game that has constantly split the fanbase may be one of the worst times they could release this. This would completely torpedo (Ted) any hype for the game and actually strengthens the side that hates the path Paper Mario is taking.

Who the hell is working in Nintendo's marketing department this year? Literally every move they made since last December has been stupid.

People blame Corona for all these weird decisions, but it only exposed how bad this year was gonna be for Nintendo.

 

[cmbsfm]

**** Tanabe

All My Homies Hate Tanabe

 

[Dynamic Worlok]

Nintendo needs to realize that there's a reason people keep asking for more of the classic formula. Why people keep taking about characters like Vivian, fawful and Geno, and yet you'd not catch even a whisper of Kersti, or Huey (who's name I didn't even know until yesterday) they want a uniform representation of their brand, but that's only going to allow for stagnation, this is how brands die. Maybe Mario's too big to fail, I dunno. But it's really frustrating that to think that despite a vocal outcry, Nintendo elects to continue not giving a ****. They basically spelled it out in the tanabe interview. They know what we want, they just don't care. They want it to be Mario's Crafted World now.

 

[Droodle]

Yeah.... can we please just remove Tanabe from this series (and keep him away from all RPGs period) and bring back Ryota Kawade (the guy who made the first 3 games) and bring in Yoshiaki Koizumi more (the guy who wrote Rosalina's storybook and allowed Odyssey to have unique and original character designs)?

The thing is that it's not even Tanabe at this point, although I wouldn't say he's completely innocent from the questionable changes with Paper Mario. Even if Kawade got brought back, he likely wouldn't be able to do super unique takes on different versions of a Goomba or Toad, the NPCs would probably be generic; and chances are Miyamoto was involved in some of the questionable gameplay changes anyways. So really, maybe the story might be better; but it still wouldn't be as memorable as 64/TTYD/SPM.

Really the only way to get Mario RPGs back to why they were so unique in terms of tone from the rest of Mario games, is if the commitee decides to change its mind on limiting creativity. But considering that they haven't in over 10 years, the chances are looking slim.

Nintendo doesn't realize that people liked Paper Mario because they were super weird, and not what you'd expect from a traditional Mario game tonally. JRPGs especially are really reliant on their writing, once the writing is forced to become less creative/clever it usually struggles in terms of being likable. While I wouldn't say that Mario RPGs were the most well written JRPGs or anything, they really felt like they had a super unique Mother-esque tone in terms of being both light and dark at the same time. Nowadays, they are mostly reliant on their "lighter" tone while the "darker" tone is usually rarer to find with maybe 1 to 2 moments that could be called that.

 

[MattX20]

Tanabe really ran this franchise into the ground, good lord

 

[Vector Victor]

I think with after this interview, if Geno is still declined in Smash or anything, then its all on Nintendo. Square is off the hook.

 

[GolisoPower]

So can I just say something real quick about all this?

If Geno is the next Fighter, the no-doubt positive reactions to him would probably remind Nintendo of what made Mario spin-offs so weird and maybe even convince Miyamoto and Nintendo to go back to the pre-Sticker Star formula. Because look: Geno's been one of the most popular Mario RPG characters in history, up there with the likes of Fawful and the like. If Geno's revealed, and Nintendo sees everyone rejoice over him(They've done a compilation of the cheers of the last Pass's fighters for crying out loud), then they'll think, "Oh wow, they really liked Geno, we should make another Mario RPG like this", and get around to making one.

 

[vivala]

RPGs especially are really reliant on their writing, once the writing is forced to become less creative/clever it usually struggles in terms of being likable. While I wouldn't say that Mario RPGs were the most well written JRPGs or anything, they really felt like they had a super unique Mother-esque tone in terms of being both light and dark at the same time. Nowadays, they are mostly reliant on their "lighter" tone while the "darker" tone is usually rarer to find.

One thing I'll push back on here is that Color Splash (and hopefully TOK by extension) has perhaps some of the most fun and likeable writing in the franchise. What it's lacking is a strong identity in its world. There's not a lot of unique, named characters for you to get attached to (though Huey is great, imo) and little to no story/lore to connect you to the world itself.

Because of this, CS struggles with the most important aspect of the RPG genre: the role-playing. Prism Island is charming as hell. It's beautiful, its dialogue is fantastic, and its setpieces are wacky and fun, but I can't get immersed in it like I can with Rogueport. Because of that, as much as I adore Color Splash (and will probably adore TOK), it will never hold a candle to the likes of TTYD and Bug Fables.

 

[helloiamhere]

I'm pretty sure (99%) it's Nintendo who scrubbed Geno from the SSS remake for the 3DS. This thread likes to assume otherwise but I really don't think Squeenix really cares about Geno or even 'holds him hostage'. It's much more likely he doesn't fit the """""""quality assurance""""""" that Nintendo has since implemented.

Keep in mind, this

was replaced with a generic mechakoopa in SSS remake.

 

[Spatulo]

The thing is that it's not even Tanabe at this point, although I wouldn't say he's completely innocent from the questionable changes with Paper Mario. Even if Kawade got brought back, he likely wouldn't be able to do super unique takes on different versions of a Goomba or Toad, the NPCs would probably be generic; and chances are Miyamoto was involved in some of the questionable gameplay changes anyways. So really, maybe the story might be better; but it still wouldn't be as memorable as 64/TTYD/SPM.

Really the only way to get Mario RPGs back to why they were so unique in terms of tone from the rest of Mario games, is if the commitee decides to change its mind on limiting creativity. But considering that they haven't in over 10 years, the chances are looking slim.

Nintendo doesn't realize that people liked Paper Mario because they were super weird, and not what you'd expect from a traditional Mario game tonally. JRPGs especially are really reliant on their writing, once the writing is forced to become less creative/clever it usually struggles in terms of being likable. While I wouldn't say that Mario RPGs were the most well written JRPGs or anything, they really felt like they had a super unique Mother-esque tone in terms of being both light and dark at the same time. Nowadays, they are mostly reliant on their "lighter" tone while the "darker" tone is usually rarer to find with maybe 1 to 2 moments that could be called that.

THANK YOU.

This isn’t about just Tanabe, this isn’t about just Miyamoto, this is about Nintendo internally putting a stranglehold on the Mario franchise. Think about it, Camelot created a core Mario character. Hell, the Mario Land team did too. And at Nintendo they said “heeeeell no” and now they don’t want anyone creating any recurring characters except them. Which leads to my next point...

So can I just say something real quick about all this?

If Geno is the next Fighter, the no-doubt positive reactions to him would probably remind Nintendo of what made Mario spin-offs so weird and maybe even convince Miyamoto and Nintendo to go back to the pre-Sticker Star formula. Because look: Geno's been one of the most popular Mario RPG characters in history, up there with the likes of Fawful and the like. If Geno's revealed, and Nintendo sees everyone rejoice over him(They've done a compilation of the cheers of the last Pass's fighters for crying out loud), then they'll think, "Oh wow, they really liked Geno, we should make another Mario RPG like this", and get around to making one.

You really nailed it on the head. There’s a good chance that Geno getting in is our win condition. It’s the end of the ****in movie and everyone is dead, AlphaDream is gone and Intelligent Systems is crushed under foot, and then Geno will be the one who blows up the Death Star and everything is happy and sunshine and rainbows again.

 

[Blankiturayman]

I'm pretty sure (99%) it's Nintendo who scrubbed Geno from the SSS remake for the 3DS. This thread likes to assume otherwise but I really don't think Squeenix really cares about Geno or even 'holds him hostage'. It's much more likely he doesn't fit the """""""quality assurance""""""" that Nintendo has since implemented.

Keep in mind, this

was replaced with a generic mechakoopa in SSS remake.

AlphaDream was in a pretty bad state money-wise at the time of the SSS remake, so I'd like to think it was them not being able to get the rights for him from SE again that had him cut, but it's true that Nintendo just wanting him out is a possibility too, which is a shame. I guess there's not much to do out of guessing there.

 

[Vector Victor]

People blame Corona for all these weird decisions, but it only exposed how bad this year was gonna be for Nintendo.

Pretty much when the VGAs in December rolled around. Sony and Microsoft both unveil new consoles. Nintendo's counter to that was to advertise three Switch games, none of them first party (or potentially even Switch exclusives). That was well before this virus kicked in.

And as we have seen, while there are delays, other companies were able to announce news, games and updates. Meanwhile, Nintendo went silent and when they finally DO hold an event, they reveal Bakugan for the start of their holiday season.

I bet you Nintendo had nothing this year. They really are going to flush away all the success and goodwill the Switch recovered for them after the Wii U.

 

[JarBear]

Nintendo: So the first few Mario RPG games were well received and beloved. Let's change the formula, more paper, less story, less creativity in characters and see how that goes.

*Sticker Star and Color Splash backlash*

Nintendo: Ok ok, alright fans and customers, give us some feed back since we "listen."

Fans/customers: Less paper, more story, more creativity in characters like they used to have.

Nintendo: Got it, ok, we understand.

*Oragami King, rinse and repeat.*

Nintendo: Screw you fans and customers.

 

[TheCJBrine]

Nintendo’s “quality assurance” team for Mario sure sounds ridiculous and stupid. So many illogical choices. If they’re why Waluigi doesn’t appear outside of spinoffs and the other stuff, and why original characters never appear outside their first game besides minor references and cameos, they’re incredibly out of touch and are being very dumb.

 

[Firox]

I'm just confused about what Nintendo thinks it's protecting with this decision. Like, did anyone like Mario less because its spinoffs got weird? Did anyone like Mario more because the NSMB series, 3D Land/World, and Mario Parties 9 & 10 stuck to a pretty tame interpretation of the franchise? It's not like the core games have some sort of deep story/lore that other games could undermine.

Am I the only one that actually liked the Mario spinoffs BECAUSE they got weird and different? I mean, SMRPG is one of the most legendary (hehe) Mario spinoffs ever and that's because of all the crazy liberties they took with it.

 

[Mushroomguy12]

> Paper Mario removes all original characters and creative storytelling and is never going to be an RPG again.
> AlphaDream's bankrupt, so Mario & Luigi is dead too.
> Super Mario RPG sequel - happening never ever.

 

[Fatmanonice]

Crazy theory but what if we get a SMRPG Remake then we get Geno to promote it.

Why would they do that? Can't you tell that the fanbase is perfectly fine with the last 7 1/2 years of Mario RPGs and absolutely loves the current state of Paper Mario?

 

[Bremy]

Nintendo: So the first few Mario RPG games were well received and beloved. Let's change the formula, more paper, less story, less creativity in characters and see how that goes.

*Sticker Star and Color Splash backlash*

Nintendo: Ok ok, alright fans and customers, give us some feed back since we "listen."

Fans/customers: Less paper, more story, more creativity in characters like they used to have.

Nintendo: Got it, ok, we understand.

*Oragami King, rinse and repeat.*

Nintendo: Screw you fans and customers.

The story/writing/world has been the one thing that's been universally praised in origami king. I know there arent many new unique characters, but the writing has only dipped in sticker star.

 

[RedMachine123]

You know, I always wondered why Nintendo didn't use any of the original characters from the Mario RPGs in other spinoffs games, initially I thought that it was because their fan demand wasn't good enough. But then I started asking myself if Nintendo was trying to avoid these characters. This is why whenever I thought about Geno's chances my biggest worry wasn't his fan demand or if Square Enix would allow him, my biggest worry was if Nintendo would choose Geno. And after reading this, my hopes for Geno really went down.

In fact, this could explain why Geno and Mallow aren't in Mario Sports Mix, It wasn't because Square Enix was stingy and they didn't allow them to be in, in fact I'm pretty sure that Square Enix proposed this idea, it probably was because Nintendo rejected them.

 

[Deleted member]

Look, we've discussed this to death already, it's just another mark on the "may or may not be real" list of things Geno has going for him, and unless something changes with it there's really not much else to talk about.

On an unrelated note. in case you haven't seen it yet, theres a new interview related in Origami King. And OOOOOH BOY, this might actually be WORSE than what we learned in the infamous 2012 interviews for Sticker Star (I think those were through Iwata Asks?).
https://www.videogameschronicle.com/features/interviews/paper-mario-origami-king/

• How do you make sure the story appeals to a broad audience? And what challenges does existing within the Mario franchise present to your writers?

Tanabe: In Super Paper Mario, the elaborate story led the game away from the Mario universe, so since Paper Mario: Sticker Star I’ve refrained from using stories that are too complicated. Personally, though, I like games with stories. During the production of The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past, we made use of a system for character settings and real conversations in order to build the story, which was a first for a game in a series. (I also wrote the text for this game.)

• Mario is famous for its iconic cast of villains. Can you talk about the new villain in this game and how you design a character to stand alongside all-time greats like Bowser and Kamek?

Tanabe: Since Paper Mario: Sticker Star, it’s no longer possible to modify Mario characters or to create original characters that touch on the Mario universe. That means that if we aren’t using Mario characters for bosses, we need to create original characters with designs that don’t involve the Mario universe at all, like we’ve done with Olly and the stationery bosses.

Spoiler: AHEM

View attachment 278701

Well, it certainly explains a lot, doesn't it. And before you ask, this doesn't seem like something that's JUST being applied to Paper Mario, in fact it actually explains some weird things in other games.
View attachment 278703
Remember all the weird inconsistencies in the changes for SuperStar Saga? You actually look and the sprites that are actually changed or redesigned seem to only be characters/enemies specifcally connected to the main Mario World and not the Bean-Bean Kingdom. (this includes changing all the unique Toads in Little Fungitown to generic ones which isn't shown here)

But what about Odyssey? Well, that game completely distances itself from the Mushroom Kingdom entirely, so it's allowed to do weirder stuff I guess. Also it's the main Mario team, they probably have more leeway. Either way, it's completely infuriating and I want to slap Miyamoto across the face because of it.

I don't quite get what you're pointing out with the M&L changes... Very little actually changed, aside from the artstyle and one or two small things? Like that obvious White Mage guy getting changed... I think we can wrap our brains around why that happened. The most outlandish one is what I assume to be the replacement of the robot dog with a mechakoopa? I get being upset over that one.

There's a lot about modern Mario that comes off to me as "sanitized", and that's not necessarily bad, because it's important to have a style guide and stick to it, especially when you're moving into uncharted territory like potentially letting indie companies work with your IPs. We're dealing with a franchise worth tens of billions and the last thing the owner of that property would want is some new developers or even just a team of young bloods turning it on its head. I think this is a big reason that we see things like standardized Hammer Bro or Koopa designs - I mean, least we forget, there was a time that according to Mario artwork, a Koopa walked on all fours, and the sprites reflected as much, until all of a sudden they were upright in Super Mario World... until you kicked them out of their shells and they walk either on all fours again, or so hunched over there's virtually no difference. Avoiding those inconsistencies is important.

I agree that it's disheartening to see the Hammer Bro or the Koopa have the run-of-the-mill design every time, but that doesn't preclude the possibility to use the same body type and recolor the character, or even give them some accessories to set them apart. We've seen Mario Odyssey put a hat on a Koopa (and a Goomba... and everyone else!), there's just a desire to keep things straight so that in the future, everyone knows which character they're looking at and no one has to second guess simplistic things. Ultimately, it's a franchise for the whole family but further, a game for children, and children are going to want to try and know what species their favorite character is, and if they can't figure it out, mom and dad will have to tell them.

But more importantly, look at how all of the original characters didn't suffer a redesign, or at least not much of one outside of the sprites being a different level of quality and the game being at a slightly different angle. There's nothing stopping them from making original characters, reusing original characters, etc. I totally understand that it's depressing to see another Paper Mario game come and go with nothing in the way of partners, no RPG mechanics and none of the strange and fantastic Paper Mario NPCs outside of toads and generic Bowser minions, but all the hope isn't lost and if you're super hung up on Tanabe's words, explain how this smug looking ************ happened:

Clearly, there's some nuance to what he said, maybe something lost in translation or not easily understood. There's a very clear message that Tanabe doesn't like that the story ends up making the game feel like it isn't Mario anymore, so it could be safe to say he's simply holding himself/his team back from doing too much because he's afraid that it'll start to rob from what he views as Mario's simplistic charm. I can't speak for the guy, I'm just taking a guess.

I like to blame Miyamoto as much as the next guy, but let's be real, the only crimes he's committed have been forcing motion controls into everything he touches. If there's any water to be held by the rumor that Nintendo's going to be more open with their IPs, that thought isn't congruent with a world where they don't allow original Mario characters to be used in a Mario game. Just my two cents on the matter and I hope that this kind of rationalization helps people understand it isn't all doom and gloom for the future of Mario RPGs.