I'll throw my hat in to the ring of Super Mario RPG experiences.
I was all about the Virtual Console on Wii. My earliest forays on the internet were marked by me visiting what was VCReviews.com (I believe that's what it was called before things merged into Nintendo Life?) to hear the latest news and play the old classics. Part of this had been influenced, of course, by my interactions with the Super Smash Bros series. I had started playing Melee in 2005/2006 when I got a Gamecube for Christmas, and after admittedly not completely comprehending how to properly play early on, I absolutely became enthralled with the game.
I had been playing Nintendo ever since I was old enough to practically hold a controller. Super Mario Bros is the first game I can remember playing/watching my baby-sitter as a kid play on the original NES (My early, early childhood memory is admittedly a bit fuzzy). So, you can say that I was sort of initiated in to the tradition of Nintendo from an early age. The likes of Duck Hunt and Pac-Man were also pretty present, and those three games pretty much color the earliest parts of my childhood (So if anyone ever suggests cutting Pac-Man and/or Duck Hunt, you're probably going to receive my spite on that issue). My first console was a Gameboy Advance, and I probably played more of Super Mario Bros Deluxe and Pokemon Blue than anything else starting out.
So, Super Smash Bros Melee sort of kindled an expanded interest in all things Nintendo. As I said, I had been raised on classics, so I had to figure out where all of these characters came from and if their games were any good. I just remember spending hours online looking through Wikis and the more bare-bones chat boards for the Gamecube-Wii era. I loved learning about Nintendo games. And oh boy, when Brawl was announced and the Dojo was up, there was no experience like it.
Around the same time, I became aware of Super Mario RPG. With the list of classic Nintendo games on the VC filling out, people started to notice a couple of holes in the lineup. One of the big ones that seemed to get mentioned everywhere I went was Super Mario RPG. That led me to look up the game, and I was completely enthralled by the way it looked. As I said, I was a big fan of Mario when I was younger, and for whatever reason I hadn't taken to Paper Mario at the time. But Super Mario RPG looked amazing, and in my own way I tried to support the notion of Super Mario RPG on the Virtual Console as often as possible (Probably to the point of annoyance, I was like 11 at the time and on the internet). I waited weekly to find out if we were getting Super Mario RPG, and remember constantly being disappointed. I didn't have a SNES at the time, and back then pre-VC release Super Mario RPG was a fortune anyways, so I couldn't play it otherwise. All my hopes and dreams rested upon the Wii Virtual Console release of this game.
And then, it finally happened. The game was released in Japan on the VC, and I went ballistic. Sure, I didn't have the game yet, but it was happening. I just had to wait until it finally came to the States. I remember that almost 3 month interval between release in Japan and the States was super agonizing, and even more when Europe got it a week or so before us since then I knew an English translation existed and had been officially released. It was time that I finally got to play this game I had fallen in love with from afar.
So September 1, 2008 rolls around and I'm terribly excited for the game. I had $20 set aside for a Wii Points Card for the longest time, and I'm sure I eagerly anticipated us going to Walmart so I could pick one up and use it to download the game. And I just played the game all that night and for the immediate future.
I think it took me like a month to beat the game. I had never beaten any RPG other than Pokemon at the time, so it took some getting used to, but as we all know, Super Mario RPG is the perfect RPG for just that. I loved just running around the world and exploring, maximizing all my stats and finding everything I could. The art style, for whatever reason, just completely drew me in and always had. Playing it was even better. I loved being able to see enemies before I ran into them after years of being super frustrated with Pokemon and the random encounter battles. The animations of things like the save mechanic, the Nintendo cameos, I absolutely fell in love with this game.
As for how I played? I pretty much ditched Mallow the first chance I got. I just didn't like him as much as the rest of the lineup. Geno was super cool and had some good opportunities for stuff as far as I remember. I definitely abused the Geno Whirl for Exor though. He was a pretty consistent member of my party until the end of the game. At that point, a fully equipped Mario, Bowser, and Peach comprised the actual lineup that I used to beat Smithy. I remember fighting so hard to finish that boss battle and the feelings of pure joy when I finally achieved it.
Simply put, I fell in love with Super Mario RPG and it remains one of my favorite games to this day. I've never replayed it, in part because I rarely replay games that aren't the original Super Mario Bros with so much out there. I sorely need to though. Geno in Smash never even occurred to me for the longest time, however, as I thought it was a small miracle that I'd ever even been given the chance to play a Square game on the Wii VC at the time. That was my personal victory when I was younger, and not much was going to top that.
When I came to SmashBoards, I threw my hat in for supporting Geno (This was post-Robin reveal for Smash 4), but I didn't seriously consider him at the time. He seemed super cool to have in Smash, but I was also a much bigger supporter of the big three of that game (Ridley, King K. Rool, and Mewtwo) and again, he seemed pretty unlikely for Smash 4. Then Cloud happened alongside the Geno costume, and that definitely lit a fire under my Geno support coming into this game.
I really do think, as far as requested characters go in the community, Geno should absolutely be the next character from everything I've seen and heard. There's a reason he is my current most requested character, and was number three on my list after Ridley and King K. Rool prior to this game's official blowout at E3. I want Super Mario RPG representation in Smash. Geno seems the best way to do that, but I'd take anything more legitimate than the painful little portion we have seen so far.
I may not always agree with this thread on their appraisals of Geno's chances or his importance as a character, but I am certainly with you when it comes to loving him as a character and loving Super Mario RPG as a whole. And I will continue to support him until he's in Smash or Square gives up on us again (Which I fear is sooner rather than later). Geno's just ridiculously cool as a character concept and always has been. Trust me, I'm as irritated as anyone when people deny that part of his character. It seems I'm a bit of a Geno centrist in some regards haha, but I do love and support him.
As for my favorite color? Purple, then orange.
