First Thoughts: Super Mario RPG (Switch)
4since recording this, i've played most of the game - i'm up to bean valley, if you're familiar with this game's usual progression - and i've increasingly become a big fan of it. some thoughts, which may spoil parts of the game, so don't read on if you want to avoid that!
- i'm still not really down with the renamed enemies, especially bosses. i know this is basically a new localisation so it's Gonna do that? but yaridovich sounds so much cooler than speardovich, even though i know yari is just the japanese word for spear. i'll cope, it's not ruining the game for me or anything. but a setting for using the classic names, like you can do with music, would have been welcome imo
- the always-on limit break gauge is a little distracting, but it's really easy just not to press its button if you don't want to use a limit break. i haven't voluntarily used any limit breaks since the hammer bros fight you saw in the video and the bosses have been fun and a good challenge this way
- there was one scripted fight that actually forced me to use a limit break, but it didn't really bother me? specifically after you defeat bowyer in basically the normal way, he has a new desperation move where he disables ALL THREE action buttons at once, making it completely impossible to hit him with regular actions. it's a pretty funny addition and suits his character, i liked it. in response you unlock "triple moves", which use the same limit break gauge to activate, and vaporise him with the mario + mallow + geno triple move. you're required to win the fight with that limit break, but because you already basically finished the fight before that happened, it doesn't feel cheap or disappointing like the hammer bros fight did for me
- triple moves are cool i think? there's a distinct move depending on which two of the four swappable party members are active, which is why i needed to say mario + mallow + geno above. some triple moves heal or buff you, others hit enemies especially hard. so there's some extra strategy in swapping your party members to get the optimal triple move for your current situation, which i think is neat
- speaking of swapping your party! you can do that during battle now?? whenever it's a non-mario party member's turn, you can swap them out for one of the standby party members for free. it doesn't take a turn, it's like quick change in paper mario. this is even allowed if the party member is asleep or dead and would normally just have their turn skipped over! obviously this feature does make the game easier, since the original snes release didn't let you swap out your party during battle at all, but it honestly makes the battles better and more interesting to play so i have no issue with it. also you kinda need that ability so that mallow can tattle on every boss without being the only character you're allowed to use for the whole game
- the chaining and splash damage you get from timed hits are actually. not bad? i've come around to liking them, i think it's cool that the game has them. they do admittedly feel excessively powerful in the very early game, but by the time you get to seaside town, which has been usually considered the first vaguely tough part of smrpg since the original game, the enemies have become tanky enough that the boosts you get from timed hit combos honestly just feel balanced and appropriate for the game's difficulty
- also! i worked out how to reliably get the splash damage, which is a thing that was bothering me in the video. it works just like the perfect guard: if your timed hit is Okay then you get an Okay damage boost, and if it's Perfect you get a Big damage boost and it splashes onto all enemies. pretty simple!
- i didn't have to fight booster because i'm good at curtain minigame. the item you get for doing this is now called "booster's charm" rather than "amulet", which fits with its "bad smell!" description a bit better imo. interestingly however, booster and his thought peek showed up in my tattle log anyway, while other bosses i forgot to tattle on are missing their thought peeks. this behaviour seems to suggest that somewhere in this game you can rematch bosses or buy missing tattle logs? interesting
- i find it a bit weird that you can't permanently see enemy health, even after using thought peek on them? this is true to the original game, but in this remake you have a permanent log of which enemies you've peeked on (like thousand-year door), so imo it should also give those enemies health bars during battle (like thousand-year door). this would also make it much easier to keep track of which enemies you need to tattle on and which you don't, which currently is not indicated anywhere when you're in combat
overall i like this game a heck of a lot! an update that adds a Really Hard Mode would be welcome though