Introduction
Remember Paper Mario? Well, it looks like the Mario & Luigi series will be making a return, and this time they will be on an adventure within the paper world.
It all starts when Luigi knocks over a book and causes the paper world to mix into the world of Mario & Luigi. If you never played Paper Mario then you either weren’t born, missed out, or were too young to play when the N64 was Nintendo’s latest console. It was an incredibly challenging, but fun and addicting experience for me when I was about about eight years old.
Still, I don’t believe I ever completed the game as it was too difficult for me at all the time. I am hoping Paper Jam is similar in nature, as I think I can handle the challenge this time around. With that said, I didn’t play the rest of the Paper Mario titles, only the first. I know little about them so I probably won’t mention or refer to them throughout this article.
I haven’t had the opportunity to play the Paper Jam demo yet, but I have watched gameplay footage and read up on everything I could find related to Paper Jam. I know everything there is to know about this game and I am going to share everything I gathered with you in an easy to read article. I will break everything up as much as possible so you can skip through and find out about the gameplay, featured characters, items, etc.
Gameplay
For the most part, gameplay in Paper Jam is similar to the previous Mario & Luigi games. What’s different? For starters, you will now play with Paper Mario! So, you will control Mario, Luigi and Paper Mario, who can be controlled by pressing Y. It might sound tricky controlling three characters at once, but hey, it’s not like they do much! It’s also good to know pressing X will make them all jump at once, and if you hold it down they will stay in the air just a little longer. That can become very useful when you need to jump over ledges with all three of them.
If you continue to hold X after jumping repeatedly you can charge up a dash. To use the hammers you will press A, C, and Y since all three of them have a hammer. If you do this fast enough the three of them will unleash a shockwave capable of destroying large blocks.
Quests in Paper Jam
During the demo at E3 we got to see a few quests that put the player in charge of finding and rescuing Paper Toads in an area. In the final game there will likely be more of these quests, although it isn’t clear if the Toads will be used as collectibles or what purpose they will serve. Right now we know these quests are just another feature, but dropping in a town just to find a bunch of Toads doesn’t seem exciting and we hope the game has more interesting quests.
Mario, Luigi and Paper Mario Together in Battle
In Battle, the star of this game is definitely Paper Mario, who fights alongside Mario and Luigi independently. Paper Mario has more abilities during a battle, such as being able to replicate himself to increase his attack damage. Mario and Luigi are controlled very similar to the way they were controlled in Dream Team. For each hit he takes, Paper Mario will lose a copy of himself. However, he can quickly replenish his clones before using another battle command, so it’s not so bad.
Paper Mario brings many advantages to the trio, such as his ability to jump dodge and flutter to stay in the air longer than both Mario and Luigi. Just like in the previous games, players will be able to use Bros. Attacks with Mario and Luigi, and in Paper Jam we are getting a new feature called Trio Attacks.
Trio Attacks are a minor, but cool new addition to the gameplay, and they’re basically when the characters team up together for a mini-game-like attack. Sounds weird, right? Well, the trio attack basically has your enemies falling from the sky, while you use tennis rackets to knock them out with balls. Oh, and they’re not just regular enemies falling down, they’re paper versions.
That’s not the only new addition to the battle gameplay, as we also know about papercraft battles, which puts players in battle with characters on top of a giant papercraft Mario, while using it to take down other gigantic papercrafts. It’s different, but it seems interesting nonetheless.
Graphics and Visuals
Mario & Luigi and Paper Mario are two similar video game series with drastically different visuals. Obviously, the paper world is different from the 3D world in Mario & Luigi, so combining them isn’t something most fans would have ever expected. Still, from what we’ve seen so far, it definitely works. This game’s success is relying on fans of one or both series, and it’s definitely not going to feature ground-breaking visuals. But, it’s more about the story, dialogue and exciting turn-based combat so that’s okay!
Conclusion
Fans of both the Paper Mario and Mario & Luigi series have a ton of things to like about Paper Jam, it’s the perfect combination of both series and it appears to keep the great writing, dialogue and gameplay we all know and enjoy. The idea of mixing the two series together is awesome, although I do wish they would release it for the Wii U and not just the 3DS. Both series always had similar gameplay, but the visuals are what makes them different. It’s cool to see a Paper Mario with the same characters we play with in Mario & Luigi.
Regardless, if you own a Nintendo 3DS handheld console then this is definitely one of the games you have to look forward to and its coming out in spring of 2016. Right now there is not an exact release date for the game, but more information is certain to be revealed as we get closer to 2016.
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