The Highs and Lows of The Origami King

When Nintendo announced and showed a brief snipit of Paper Mario: The Origami King, I was cautiously optimistic that the company was returning to what made the first two titles in the series so fantastic. Then they showed the puzzle battle system. Then they announced via an interview with Game Informer that there wouldn’t be any experience points. And my hopes for the game went from an 8-9/10 to a 2-3/10. Gutted would have been the correct word to use.

In a year that hasn’t seen a ton of new releases from Nintendo – remember, Xenoblade is a remake – I wanted Paper Mario to be so good, so much like the originals. In one way, Nintendo did return to those titles opting to create a seamless world and doing away with the levels and worlds of the previous titles. That’s the first big win for The Origami King, bringing my excitement level to a 4-5/10.

Heading into my play time with the game, I was at 4-5/10. The beautiful graphics, hilarious writing, and gameplay that made me keep saying, “Just 10 more minutes.” quickly brought the scores higher and higher. By Picnic Road, I was at a 7/10. By The Princess Peach, I was at an 8.5/10. By the time I finished of the ninja amusement park, and ventured into the dessert, I was at a 9/10, and was saying (what some people would consider silly) things like this:

I have a #PaperMario hot take….

1. The Thousand Year Door
2. The Origami King
3. Paper Mario 64

Yup, it's number two, no doubt! pic.twitter.com/vQRmefjjAj

— Adam Roffel (@AdamRoffel) July 24, 2020

The game does fall just short of perfection for me, and that still revolves around the battle system. While I’m now OK that the game doesn’t have experience and levels – I’m shocked I don’t miss it more – I just find the battles fairly pointless overall. I battle to earn coins, to use in battles. Yes, I know coins are used to purchase accessories and more, but I earn enough in the over world and from boss fights to not really need coins from random enemy battles. So I avoid at all costs, which makes me feel just a bit disappointed.

Still, The Origami King is right up there with The Thousand Year Door when it comes to the greatest Paper Mario games of all time. If you haven’t checked it out yet, please do – it’s a fantastic experience from start to finish.