Hot Take: Thousand Year Door deserved a remake better than Super Mario RPG, it was way too inaccessible than SMRPG and the game is considerably longer and has more content so the eventually 60 dollars price feel more agreeable than Super Mario RPG.
This isn’t a hot take in my book! I 100% agree that the game we probably needed a remake for was the one that at least couldn’t just be put on Nintendos already available subscription service for its original console. I’d much rather have gotten remakes (or even budgeted ports) of any of the Paper Mario games we couldn’t otherwise buy anymore
With the Mario rpg remake you could compare it to the Resident Evil remake and the Dead Space remake where the game itself doesn’t really need a remake, but the brand certainly does to revitalize it. Mario rpgs have been in a rough spot for a while and seeing a return to form is certainly welcome. They’ll be able to have some quality of life improvements and improve the overall presentation. Plus, Mario games in general were getting kind of stale and seeing more creative/crazy designs returning is a good thing. I REALLY hope that the original director of this game gets his wish to make a sequel then retire from the game industry. It would be interesting to see what a further refinement of the formula would be, and where they’d take the story. Hopefully Nintendo and Square’s relationship will remain good enough for the series to continue (assuming Sqiare Enix isn’t still committing self delete on their failed NFT project🤣. Even EA knew that was a bad idea). A while ago I was watching a play through of this Zelda rpg maker game and the whole time my brain was thinking about various ways it could be improved and made more true to Zelda. The thing fell into a bunch of the trappings of being an rpg maker game like an over world map that has unpreventable random encounters, the boring “combat” where you select through a menu that has a heavy reliance on rng, a lot of the assets were clearly taken from rpg maker and weren’t true to Zelda, and the Zelda stuff that was there were amateurish sprites or screenshots of enemies. The story was also pretty fan fictiony with certain things not really making sense, and the guy stretched the lore in some weird ways. The second game had some more Zelda elements, but it still had a lot of issues and the play spaces lacked the interactivity of Zelda. A lot of these issues can be forgiven since the guy who made it was like 15 at the time and now he’s gone onto make much better things like Star Fox Event Horizon, and Hyrule Conquest/Total War (before that last one was cancelled due to burnout). Search UndyingNephalim/IceCreamMan to see what the guy is currently up to. Event Horizon is AMAZING! Although, it’s pretty jank and there’s some questionable story choices. Some of the fixes I came up with were things like having the over world that connects the different play spaces function the same way as in Zelda 2 where if you go off the path monster icons will appear and if they touch you you’ll enter combat. This would make the encounters feel less random and you’d be able to actually avoid them. The play spaces would play exactly like 2D Zelda where you can interact with the world by solving puzzles, cutting grass, smashing pots, bombing walls, and other stuff. Combat would be like the Mario rpgs where you have timed attacks, but you’d also be able to use Zelda items, and your party members would have special attacks that resemble their Hyrule Warriors counterparts. Health upgrades and certain items would be obtained in the world and at stores (that’s one thing the sequel rpg maker game got right). There were also unique weapons and armor that only certain characters could use, and they’d just get reskins so they actually look like something that fits into Zelda. If you were to combine all these things you’d have a pretty strong foundation for a Zelda rpg. What do you think of this? Too bad that combination doesn’t exist. Great video. I’ll check out your other ones.
Snes online games though you dont actually OWN them. You pay for access to them. One day they will shut down the servers for these games and all the money you spent will be for what? They need to just bring back the E-Shop for the classic titles. That way you can actually pay and download the games to your console and they are yours to keep for as long as you have the system provided they dont shut down the servers when you could have possibly deleted it. Then you wouldnt be able to redownload it. Kinda like in the 3DS and WII and WII U. Just saying i think streaming games is pointless you dont own them. I hope it will be something that just goes away in time.
Niche, Mario RPG was also released for our fellow Canadian friends over here in the true north strong and free 😂 I remember picking up my complete copy at a microplay back in 97 or 98 ish. It was a time where I was tired of getting burned on crappy games like Batman forever, cool world and bubsy, when finally discovering all the amazing RPGs on the SNES
lmao good catch; my brain glossed over the fact that every site I read background info on the game was referring to [North] America and not America, America (whoever's bright idea it was to name a country after a continent that it probably doesn't even make up half of, along with a second completely unrelated continent deserves to get slapped in the back of the head lol)
I agree with the others saying your videos deserve a lot more views, subbed! It's odd as I always enjoy seeing remakes especially for games I love? But I understand why some would be put off with them, especially when the work could have went into making a new game. But for me I enjoy seeing it when they could use some improvements or just aren't available on modern consoles. & Especially when I just want to play them again with a friend and don't have the original console anymore (or the game itself). I'll definitely be buying the Mario RPG remake as I haven't played the original, and I'm really excited for the TTYD remake as it's one of my favourite games. An alternative perspective which I know I felt especially for TTYD, is that in the case where they aren't making games like it (Or Mario RPG's in general outside of the Mario x Rabbids games) I am hoping it could do well enough in gathering a new audience to potentially cause another game like it to be made in the future. So for a popular game I love such as Mario Galaxy I'd be annoyed seeing a remake when I'd want either a new 3D Mario or Galaxy 3 made instead (which is a lot more realistic than a new RPG Paper Mario for example), but for Paper Mario I was so happy with the remake when the Modern Paper Mario games are doing some different that I wasn't as into (and there were no signs that they were planning on ever changing that). But regardless of what happens, I'll be happy to play it again, perhaps with some new content and other additions that I'd be happy to see.
I really really really miss Super Mario RPG: Legend of the Seven Stars. While I admit the remake version is an extreme dream come true, I still wish Mallow and Geno appeared in many, many, more Mario games following their major debuts. They were some characters in my opinion. I really wish Mario, Bowser, and Peach met them many, many, more times. Also sorry if you criticize for adding this part, but thinking about Super Mario RPG like this also has me thinking about new characters.
I’m surprised Nintendo never made a direct sequel to it either. My only guess is that, after Square jumped ship to PlayStation, they couldn’t since the original characters were technically not Nintendo characters. I love Paper Mario and am glad we got them but I agree, it would’ve been nice to get more Super Mario RPG
Luigi's Mansion 3. Really liked that. Super Mario RPG wasn't released over here in the UK. It was hyped up in all the magazines and I really wanted it but it got cancelled last minute. God knows why. Would have been my first RPG. Final Fantasy 7 took care of that the year after tho And yeah you nailed the reasons why a remake is both desirable and puzzling. Cheers for the shout it in the vid! Didn't expect that. And extra nice for the shoutout to Rik Mayal. Love that dude RIP
Yeah I never quite understood why it never came out in PAL regions. I’m guessing it’s because translating it into all those other languages would’ve been too much work so late into the consoles life, but it’s a total shame either way. And good choice! I haven’t played by of the LM games since the original some 20 years ago, but that game is absolutely gorgeous on Switch! And of course; gotta show Mayall some love. The Young Ones and Bottom are two classic pieces of English television
>Bring some improvements from subsequent Mario RPGs >QOL improvements >Capitalize on the Super Mario Bros Movie (although Wonder could have been enough for that) >post game content (in this case, harder bosses) >banger remixes by the og composer
By denying us a localization of Super Mario RPG Nintendo robbed us of the one thing that gives us comfort: overly pessimistic German game reviews 😔 Btw thanks for the shoutout I actually cackled. QOTD: most definitely Mario Kart but Mario Party is a close second. If the question were about my most obscure spinoff I would have to say Mario's Time Machine which was an educational video game on the SNES that I never hear anyone talk about LOL
They were clearly afraid that the overly pessimistic DE game reviews would eviscerate it 🥲🥲🥲 I’ve always wanted to play Mario’s Time Machine! As a lover of edutainment, I’ve toyed with doing a video on that, Mario is Missing and Mario Teaches Typing (a game I don’t think I got to play but have vivid memories of my kindergarten class’s computer having)
RE: QotD My favorite Mario spin-off? It feels like a free-pass to say Mario Kart 😅 So getting the obvious answer out of the way, it's Mario Tennis for me. From the no-frills NES tennis, to the compelling RPG loop of the GBC version, to the classic N64 Mario Tennis, to the variety of Mario Tennis Aces, I love it all! As for Mario RPG: I sit on this line where I think the Super NES original is exceptional and only shows its age in the nit pickiest of ways, and that the remake doesn't look like it's doing anything different enough to justify a $60 (USD) remake. I am very glad you used Link's Awakening as an example in this video. It is not only my favorite Zelda games, but one of my favorite games period. The Switch version was visually beautiful, and had some small yet important quality-of-life updates (big fan of key items being permanently mapped), and it is now my preferred way to do repeat playthroughs of a game that means a lot to me. But it didn't do enough to justify a full $60 price tag for me, and I actually felt a bit of buyer's remorse once the original was released on Nintendo Switch online. I can't help but feel a bit of the same from this Super Mario RPG remake. Now, I do think it is wonderful that this remake means putting a well-aged game in the hands of new generations that might not be the biggest fan of the original's pixelated looks. And I, personally, am excited to see what sort of expressive new animations are present for the new character models. But to me, so far, it feels like more of a remaster than it does a remake, and it begs the question: "did anyone really *need* this?" Something something capitalism.
Funny enough I think this is the one time we’ve disagreed about something! I never got into Mario Tennis personally, though the switch one is pretty fun! I’m glad that we’re on the same page on Super Mario RPG though lmao. Like, you took the words right out of my mouth. I literally had to stop myself from doing a full dissertation on capitalism in this lmao (though some of it stayed in there for the sake of an ABBA joke)
I do think that the remake looks good but personally I'm more looking forward to Paper Mario TTYD next year along with Super Mario Bros Wonder, Sonic Superstars, and Spider-Man 2. Other than that Super Mario RPG is a fun classic game that can be enjoyed by people who don't even care about role playing games due to the action elements within the game.
I can see where you're coming from! I'm more excited about each of the games you mentioned too, though my reasoning (even though I am gonna play this over the holidays) has more to do with it feeling weird to remake one of the Mario RPGs that could have easily been an NSO drop. Then again, you can't get $60 from people that way I guess lol
@@NichePlays Yeah the big problem I have with nintendo right now is how many games from older systems they've ported and made $60 rather than just having a dedicated virtual console for there system
@@LoLRyRyRon yeah that’s where I’m at too. I’m aware that companies need to make money (though I’d also be the first to point out that every major company could actually stand to make less of it and pass the savings onto us), but i also believe the odd pro-consumer bone wouldn’t hurt either lol. Like, if you’re gonna remake something please have a good reason for it or do something to make it stand out
@@NichePlays I feel the same way I love to play retro stuff but I also love new stuff to come out too so just playing the same old games doesn't get old after a minute.
Hey everyone! I hope you enjoyed this latest video. To reiterate my point for the millionth time (ahead of somebody trying to bad faith me lol) - I’m eager to try out the remake this winter and to be proven wrong in my statement that it feels unnecessary! I also just think that there wasn’t much to improve on the first time around :) Anyway, some announcements for my channel/various projects I’m working on. The next video will be about 007 Nightfire (Gamecube, GBA and PC) and will be coming out the week before [American] Thanksgiving, unless it gets delayed and drops on Black Friday lol. Until then though, my movie podcast Media Obscura is back with a brand new episode about Wild Wild West, which you can check out on your favorite podcast player: pod.link/themediaobscura Additionally, if you visit my site and sign up for my monthly newsletter, you’ll be able to read a book I wrote for free in the next week or so! That’s right… for free! I’m doing a promotional run ahead of its launch next month to help collect early reviews so newsletter subscribers will be able to read it early in exchange for a Goodreads or Amazon review after launch. It’s a fictional coming of age comedy in the vein of movies like Adventureland, American Graffiti, and Scott Pilgrim Vs.The World: nichecaesar.com/
There are a lot of people who aren't interested in older graphics, and regardless if we think they're spoiled or not, updating the graphics on older games is likely the only way to get those people to experience the effort put on classic games. The amount of younger gamers willing to sit through classic games is a lot less than the youtube gaming sphere implies
@@j23roa I see where you’re coming from but politely disagree that it automatically means remaking a game specifically because of the graphics is the answer. Like with other art forms such as music and movies, we should actively encourage them to engage with the game on its own merits when stuff like the art style and pixel art is a part of its charm. Taken away from the SNES, Super Mario RPG’s identity feels a little obfuscated from how the reason for its aesthetic is no longer there. Stuff like the squished Mario sprite, isometric camera, etc are there because it was the only way to make the game work on a 16 bit console. But on the switch, those reasons don’t really hold up. We can easily have a traditional 3D camera or a “normal” looking Mario now, so leaving those things there but with better graphics feels uncanny to me in the same way that colorizing a black and white movie does. Plus, we don’t even need to pander to people who don’t like sprite based games. Like, it’s fine if it’s not for them and we don’t need to dwell on it past that, but it doesn’t make sense to me to remake something specifically because it’s old/people may not be into it because of that. Doing that sort of thing when the original hasn’t aged outside of its aesthetics feels revisionist to me because we’re changing things for the sake of changing things, not because they necessarily needed them 🤷♀️ like if we’re gonna remake/remaster Metroid Prime and change it’s controls to work the way other shooters do, sure, that makes sense because of the reasons I said in the video. But if we’re updating a 90s JRPG to not look like a 90s JRPG, we’re risking losing something special about it in the translation. Either way, idk where I said people sounded spoiled for wanting a remake - I mean, I literally said that I’ll be picking the thing up myself and was excited about it lmao. I just felt like pointing out that, yeah, it was probably unnecessary
@@NichePlays not pandering to people who don't like sprite based games sounds like a nice thing to be proud of, but for a business sense in trying to broaden the appeal of your product, you gotta try to sell to the people who would more likely pay up. I understand your channel name has the word Niche, so i get it that you specially are more open to seeing the artistic value in these things, but just as the word implies, niche things appeal to a smaller group of people, in Nintendo's case a smaller amount of sales. If i was still 7 years old and someone asked me to try out pacman on atari instead of the nes, I'd probably never play pacman
@@j23roa see I still can't agree with you there though; like not everything has to be for everybody. It's fine if not everybody wants to play pacman if it doesn't appeal to you. Plus, it might hit you at a later date that you really want to! (other than the fact that Atari pacman might be the worst version of it haha) And we can speak broadly and say that it might hurt a business when they don't try to expand their audience endlessly but: 1: It's Mario. It wasn't going to do poorly anyway, especially after the movie came out this year. 2: It's Nintendo. They're already on top of the world. 3: Artistic value probably shouldn't be a niche thing. I know that many view games as amusements or things for kids, but you can still work to preserve the artistic integrity of a work when you rerelease it. Either way, it's sorta apples and oranges isn't it? Honestly, so long as Nintendo does us a heckin' solid and puts the game on NSO in conjunction with the remake (or a few months later, etc) I could care less. The remake looks fun, but I still feel that the original will likely be a more cohesive and enjoyable experience
@@NichePlays i agree with the points that you're making, the point I'm sticking to is that Nintendo and other videogame companies have other motives and strategies which i can align with moreso than just hoping the majority of potential players also have the patience and curiosity to view older games with the mindset of an older era. I am in my late 30's, i work with and have friends in their early 20's and i overhear conversations from people who play games much younger and much older than myself, and i believe that generally most people won't be bothered to learn how to play with emulators, or even touch the Nintendo switch online classics. I know that i watch a lot of videogame content on TH-cam and i also understand that the TH-camrs i watch represent a very small minority of the types of people who buy and play videogames. My taste and opinions on videogames are probably close to yours from what I've seen in your videos, but i also know that the game companies are making the right decisions remaking games with updated graphics. Imagine you were in the team that created mario rpg decades ago. Think of all the creativity and passion put into it. And now think of today with a larger install base of switch owners and different types of gamers with different values(maybe shallow? maybe unappreciative of retro?) for their interests for games. As a creator of the original game, wouldn't you want to share your work in an updated way for newer players to experience the work you put in decades ago and make some money while you're at it? I'm an artist myself and i often consider remaking my past creations with my updated skillset, because today my skills are better than years before, but my ideas from back then are still great, i just feel i can execute it better today
Nothing wrong with a clearcut answer lmao! I personally would go with MK64 as my choice for the series due to nostalgia, but I also think that 8 deluxe is an absolute powerhouse of a game! I mean, the original reason is literally why I bought a Wii U, and later sold my copy for the Switch port
There is a pretty significant thing to come out of this remake... multiple new translations. Originally it only had Japanese and (US) English, but there's like 7 more languages on top of that now. That's not something they could've done with just an NSO-type release (especially for Chinese/Korean). I think a few languages even have alternate options for different regions, like French/Spanish. It gives them a chance to fix the original script/localization too. Whether it be typos, mistranslations, or just a lack of info they couldn't fit into it the 1st time. Like, nearly 1/2 of the accessories in the game have this problem. Take Boosters Amulet for example, all it says is "Great item, bad smell.". It raises your each of your main stats BUT you lose Speed too. However, there's a hidden ability on top of all that... _it cuts all elemental damage in 1/2!_ More infamously we have the "Ghost Medal", that claims it "Raises defense while attacking". Such an effect doesn't exist. What it _actually_ does is... _cut _*_all damage_*_ in 1/2?!_ God damn! Anything related to elemental damage or instant KO attacks aren't shown when they should be. (...aside from 1 item that specifically mentions "mortal blows", though it does other stuff too.) It's also unclear when you're hitting an enemy with its weakness or a status effect. Status changes (like Attack/Defense Up's) are basically invisible. You can't easily tell if any of them are active, been taken off, or can stack. Which leads to the infamous "Shredder" situation, where a Boss uses that, or a similar spell, only for it to do seemingly nothing. (Turns out those spells reset your status to normal, removing your Atk/Def/Invincibility boosts.) This remake also lets them make Action Commands (particularly Defense) less, well... bullshit. 'cause let's be honest for a minute here, many of the enemy attacks in this game are nonsense. Some of them are ridiculously fast or just have really weird timing to be blocked. (Like when the attack is still across the screen from you, or when it's _almost_ finished the animation, etc.) Others actually have hidden damage multipliers, doing anywhere from 1.5x to 4x normal damage. Which could also be mixed with a status ailment and/or be _unblockable,_ often at the same time! Now, they've added fading { ! } bubbles over characters to better show the timing for Attack/Defense, as well as a warning for when attacks can't be blocked. Certainly more reasonable/fair like that. So you won't have to play the guessing game for something you couldn't actually do anything about. Mallows -"Psychopath"- Thought Peek ability is much more useful in the remake. Not only does he appear to start with that ability now, but it shows an enemy's elemental/status weaknesses, among other details. (Before, all it did was show an enemy's remaining HP and a random, useless thought if you got the timing for it.) With that info going into a new "Monster List" you can check from the menu as well. The shops were overhauled so you can actually see the stats an item gives you _without_ having to buy it first. (On a minor note, they also broke the shop into tabs now, instead of having everything in 1 giant list.) The original had no way to speed up text or skip cutscenes, the remake might give us that ability. 32:45 - As we found out a few weeks after you wrote this, that meter in the corner is for powering up a special team move (which changes based on what your current team is). There will also be post-game Boss rematches. 36:53 - Depending on who you ask, we haven't gotten those in quite some time. For Paper Mario, it hasn't been an RPG since, either, 2004 or 2007. For Mario & Luigi, it hasn't had an original game since 2013 or 2015. (Also the company that made them is dead and we haven't heard from the series in ~5 years now.)
While I agree with the sentiment on paper, I do think there are cases where remaking something can make a lot of sense. For instance, a Persona 3 remake makes a lot of sense on paper. It’s an older game with a frustrating combat system where you don’t get to control your teammates, it’s animated sections aren’t in HD, and the most developed version of the story is locked behind the PSP port and the remaster of that, which has compromised gameplay. The only problem is that, as you pointed out, companies are gonna capitalism and remake games that don’t need it for the clout, as well as do baffling things like only remake the original Persona 3’s story and not the P3P version (presumably so that they can do an enhanced version a few years later like they usually do)
@@NichePlaysI agree with you, there's a lot of potential in some games to be remade (for example Star Ocean: The Second Story R) But what im saying is that companies will act on their bottom line above everything; will it sell? for comparison, square enix complains FF16 undersold, (while FF7 remake is doing good), and like you mention with atlus and P3, they'll probably re-release the remake with the extra bits, like p5royal, like p4golden, at this point is a tried and true milking-the-fans strategy... let alone the initial $70 price tag, not great.
@@maniau yep, I'm with you on that. It's a racket and unfortunately, we're the losers when we buy things that didn't need to exist in the first place, or could have at least had the decency to just be the full package at launch since it was a remake anyway.
1.56k subs for a video of this quality is a crime
Glad you enjoyed it and feel that way! I’m just a humble guy doing what he can lol
I fully agree, you got this Niche
You're so right
Hot Take: Thousand Year Door deserved a remake better than Super Mario RPG, it was way too inaccessible than SMRPG and the game is considerably longer and has more content so the eventually 60 dollars price feel more agreeable than Super Mario RPG.
This isn’t a hot take in my book! I 100% agree that the game we probably needed a remake for was the one that at least couldn’t just be put on Nintendos already available subscription service for its original console. I’d much rather have gotten remakes (or even budgeted ports) of any of the Paper Mario games we couldn’t otherwise buy anymore
With the Mario rpg remake you could compare it to the Resident Evil remake and the Dead Space remake where the game itself doesn’t really need a remake, but the brand certainly does to revitalize it. Mario rpgs have been in a rough spot for a while and seeing a return to form is certainly welcome. They’ll be able to have some quality of life improvements and improve the overall presentation. Plus, Mario games in general were getting kind of stale and seeing more creative/crazy designs returning is a good thing.
I REALLY hope that the original director of this game gets his wish to make a sequel then retire from the game industry. It would be interesting to see what a further refinement of the formula would be, and where they’d take the story. Hopefully Nintendo and Square’s relationship will remain good enough for the series to continue (assuming Sqiare Enix isn’t still committing self delete on their failed NFT project🤣. Even EA knew that was a bad idea).
A while ago I was watching a play through of this Zelda rpg maker game and the whole time my brain was thinking about various ways it could be improved and made more true to Zelda. The thing fell into a bunch of the trappings of being an rpg maker game like an over world map that has unpreventable random encounters, the boring “combat” where you select through a menu that has a heavy reliance on rng, a lot of the assets were clearly taken from rpg maker and weren’t true to Zelda, and the Zelda stuff that was there were amateurish sprites or screenshots of enemies. The story was also pretty fan fictiony with certain things not really making sense, and the guy stretched the lore in some weird ways. The second game had some more Zelda elements, but it still had a lot of issues and the play spaces lacked the interactivity of Zelda. A lot of these issues can be forgiven since the guy who made it was like 15 at the time and now he’s gone onto make much better things like Star Fox Event Horizon, and Hyrule Conquest/Total War (before that last one was cancelled due to burnout). Search UndyingNephalim/IceCreamMan to see what the guy is currently up to. Event Horizon is AMAZING! Although, it’s pretty jank and there’s some questionable story choices.
Some of the fixes I came up with were things like having the over world that connects the different play spaces function the same way as in Zelda 2 where if you go off the path monster icons will appear and if they touch you you’ll enter combat. This would make the encounters feel less random and you’d be able to actually avoid them. The play spaces would play exactly like 2D Zelda where you can interact with the world by solving puzzles, cutting grass, smashing pots, bombing walls, and other stuff. Combat would be like the Mario rpgs where you have timed attacks, but you’d also be able to use Zelda items, and your party members would have special attacks that resemble their Hyrule Warriors counterparts. Health upgrades and certain items would be obtained in the world and at stores (that’s one thing the sequel rpg maker game got right). There were also unique weapons and armor that only certain characters could use, and they’d just get reskins so they actually look like something that fits into Zelda. If you were to combine all these things you’d have a pretty strong foundation for a Zelda rpg. What do you think of this? Too bad that combination doesn’t exist.
Great video. I’ll check out your other ones.
Snes online games though you dont actually OWN them. You pay for access to them. One day they will shut down the servers for these games and all the money you spent will be for what? They need to just bring back the E-Shop for the classic titles. That way you can actually pay and download the games to your console and they are yours to keep for as long as you have the system provided they dont shut down the servers when you could have possibly deleted it. Then you wouldnt be able to redownload it. Kinda like in the 3DS and WII and WII U. Just saying i think streaming games is pointless you dont own them. I hope it will be something that just goes away in time.
Niche, Mario RPG was also released for our fellow Canadian friends over here in the true north strong and free 😂
I remember picking up my complete copy at a microplay back in 97 or 98 ish.
It was a time where I was tired of getting burned on crappy games like Batman forever, cool world and bubsy, when finally discovering all the amazing RPGs on the SNES
lmao good catch; my brain glossed over the fact that every site I read background info on the game was referring to [North] America and not America, America (whoever's bright idea it was to name a country after a continent that it probably doesn't even make up half of, along with a second completely unrelated continent deserves to get slapped in the back of the head lol)
I agree with the others saying your videos deserve a lot more views, subbed!
It's odd as I always enjoy seeing remakes especially for games I love? But I understand why some would be put off with them, especially when the work could have went into making a new game. But for me I enjoy seeing it when they could use some improvements or just aren't available on modern consoles. & Especially when I just want to play them again with a friend and don't have the original console anymore (or the game itself). I'll definitely be buying the Mario RPG remake as I haven't played the original, and I'm really excited for the TTYD remake as it's one of my favourite games.
An alternative perspective which I know I felt especially for TTYD, is that in the case where they aren't making games like it (Or Mario RPG's in general outside of the Mario x Rabbids games) I am hoping it could do well enough in gathering a new audience to potentially cause another game like it to be made in the future. So for a popular game I love such as Mario Galaxy I'd be annoyed seeing a remake when I'd want either a new 3D Mario or Galaxy 3 made instead (which is a lot more realistic than a new RPG Paper Mario for example), but for Paper Mario I was so happy with the remake when the Modern Paper Mario games are doing some different that I wasn't as into (and there were no signs that they were planning on ever changing that). But regardless of what happens, I'll be happy to play it again, perhaps with some new content and other additions that I'd be happy to see.
I really really really miss Super Mario RPG: Legend of the Seven Stars. While I admit the remake version is an extreme dream come true, I still wish Mallow and Geno appeared in many, many, more Mario games following their major debuts. They were some characters in my opinion. I really wish Mario, Bowser, and Peach met them many, many, more times. Also sorry if you criticize for adding this part, but thinking about Super Mario RPG like this also has me thinking about new characters.
I’m surprised Nintendo never made a direct sequel to it either. My only guess is that, after Square jumped ship to PlayStation, they couldn’t since the original characters were technically not Nintendo characters. I love Paper Mario and am glad we got them but I agree, it would’ve been nice to get more Super Mario RPG
@@NichePlays Well, still, whatever happens in the next future. I am still never ever giving up on Mallow and Geno.
Luigi's Mansion 3. Really liked that.
Super Mario RPG wasn't released over here in the UK. It was hyped up in all the magazines and I really wanted it but it got cancelled last minute. God knows why. Would have been my first RPG. Final Fantasy 7 took care of that the year after tho
And yeah you nailed the reasons why a remake is both desirable and puzzling. Cheers for the shout it in the vid! Didn't expect that.
And extra nice for the shoutout to Rik Mayal. Love that dude RIP
Yeah I never quite understood why it never came out in PAL regions. I’m guessing it’s because translating it into all those other languages would’ve been too much work so late into the consoles life, but it’s a total shame either way.
And good choice! I haven’t played by of the LM games since the original some 20 years ago, but that game is absolutely gorgeous on Switch!
And of course; gotta show Mayall some love. The Young Ones and Bottom are two classic pieces of English television
>Bring some improvements from subsequent Mario RPGs
>QOL improvements
>Capitalize on the Super Mario Bros Movie (although Wonder could have been enough for that)
>post game content (in this case, harder bosses)
>banger remixes by the og composer
By denying us a localization of Super Mario RPG Nintendo robbed us of the one thing that gives us comfort: overly pessimistic German game reviews 😔 Btw thanks for the shoutout I actually cackled.
QOTD: most definitely Mario Kart but Mario Party is a close second. If the question were about my most obscure spinoff I would have to say Mario's Time Machine which was an educational video game on the SNES that I never hear anyone talk about LOL
They were clearly afraid that the overly pessimistic DE game reviews would eviscerate it 🥲🥲🥲
I’ve always wanted to play Mario’s Time Machine! As a lover of edutainment, I’ve toyed with doing a video on that, Mario is Missing and Mario Teaches Typing (a game I don’t think I got to play but have vivid memories of my kindergarten class’s computer having)
RE: QotD
My favorite Mario spin-off? It feels like a free-pass to say Mario Kart 😅 So getting the obvious answer out of the way, it's Mario Tennis for me. From the no-frills NES tennis, to the compelling RPG loop of the GBC version, to the classic N64 Mario Tennis, to the variety of Mario Tennis Aces, I love it all!
As for Mario RPG:
I sit on this line where I think the Super NES original is exceptional and only shows its age in the nit pickiest of ways, and that the remake doesn't look like it's doing anything different enough to justify a $60 (USD) remake.
I am very glad you used Link's Awakening as an example in this video. It is not only my favorite Zelda games, but one of my favorite games period. The Switch version was visually beautiful, and had some small yet important quality-of-life updates (big fan of key items being permanently mapped), and it is now my preferred way to do repeat playthroughs of a game that means a lot to me. But it didn't do enough to justify a full $60 price tag for me, and I actually felt a bit of buyer's remorse once the original was released on Nintendo Switch online.
I can't help but feel a bit of the same from this Super Mario RPG remake. Now, I do think it is wonderful that this remake means putting a well-aged game in the hands of new generations that might not be the biggest fan of the original's pixelated looks. And I, personally, am excited to see what sort of expressive new animations are present for the new character models. But to me, so far, it feels like more of a remaster than it does a remake, and it begs the question: "did anyone really *need* this?"
Something something capitalism.
Funny enough I think this is the one time we’ve disagreed about something! I never got into Mario Tennis personally, though the switch one is pretty fun!
I’m glad that we’re on the same page on Super Mario RPG though lmao. Like, you took the words right out of my mouth. I literally had to stop myself from doing a full dissertation on capitalism in this lmao (though some of it stayed in there for the sake of an ABBA joke)
we need a sequel
I do think that the remake looks good but personally I'm more looking forward to Paper Mario TTYD next year along with Super Mario Bros Wonder, Sonic Superstars, and Spider-Man 2. Other than that Super Mario RPG is a fun classic game that can be enjoyed by people who don't even care about role playing games due to the action elements within the game.
I can see where you're coming from! I'm more excited about each of the games you mentioned too, though my reasoning (even though I am gonna play this over the holidays) has more to do with it feeling weird to remake one of the Mario RPGs that could have easily been an NSO drop. Then again, you can't get $60 from people that way I guess lol
@@NichePlays Yeah the big problem I have with nintendo right now is how many games from older systems they've ported and made $60 rather than just having a dedicated virtual console for there system
@@LoLRyRyRon yeah that’s where I’m at too. I’m aware that companies need to make money (though I’d also be the first to point out that every major company could actually stand to make less of it and pass the savings onto us), but i also believe the odd pro-consumer bone wouldn’t hurt either lol. Like, if you’re gonna remake something please have a good reason for it or do something to make it stand out
@@NichePlays I feel the same way I love to play retro stuff but I also love new stuff to come out too so just playing the same old games doesn't get old after a minute.
great video! great producition, great editing, keep it up!
This game is also a banger!
Thank you! I’m glad you enjoyed the video
Hey everyone! I hope you enjoyed this latest video. To reiterate my point for the millionth time (ahead of somebody trying to bad faith me lol) - I’m eager to try out the remake this winter and to be proven wrong in my statement that it feels unnecessary! I also just think that there wasn’t much to improve on the first time around :)
Anyway, some announcements for my channel/various projects I’m working on. The next video will be about 007 Nightfire (Gamecube, GBA and PC) and will be coming out the week before [American] Thanksgiving, unless it gets delayed and drops on Black Friday lol. Until then though, my movie podcast Media Obscura is back with a brand new episode about Wild Wild West, which you can check out on your favorite podcast player: pod.link/themediaobscura
Additionally, if you visit my site and sign up for my monthly newsletter, you’ll be able to read a book I wrote for free in the next week or so! That’s right… for free! I’m doing a promotional run ahead of its launch next month to help collect early reviews so newsletter subscribers will be able to read it early in exchange for a Goodreads or Amazon review after launch. It’s a fictional coming of age comedy in the vein of movies like Adventureland, American Graffiti, and Scott Pilgrim Vs.The World: nichecaesar.com/
There are a lot of people who aren't interested in older graphics, and regardless if we think they're spoiled or not, updating the graphics on older games is likely the only way to get those people to experience the effort put on classic games. The amount of younger gamers willing to sit through classic games is a lot less than the youtube gaming sphere implies
@@j23roa I see where you’re coming from but politely disagree that it automatically means remaking a game specifically because of the graphics is the answer.
Like with other art forms such as music and movies, we should actively encourage them to engage with the game on its own merits when stuff like the art style and pixel art is a part of its charm. Taken away from the SNES, Super Mario RPG’s identity feels a little obfuscated from how the reason for its aesthetic is no longer there. Stuff like the squished Mario sprite, isometric camera, etc are there because it was the only way to make the game work on a 16 bit console. But on the switch, those reasons don’t really hold up. We can easily have a traditional 3D camera or a “normal” looking Mario now, so leaving those things there but with better graphics feels uncanny to me in the same way that colorizing a black and white movie does.
Plus, we don’t even need to pander to people who don’t like sprite based games. Like, it’s fine if it’s not for them and we don’t need to dwell on it past that, but it doesn’t make sense to me to remake something specifically because it’s old/people may not be into it because of that. Doing that sort of thing when the original hasn’t aged outside of its aesthetics feels revisionist to me because we’re changing things for the sake of changing things, not because they necessarily needed them 🤷♀️ like if we’re gonna remake/remaster Metroid Prime and change it’s controls to work the way other shooters do, sure, that makes sense because of the reasons I said in the video. But if we’re updating a 90s JRPG to not look like a 90s JRPG, we’re risking losing something special about it in the translation.
Either way, idk where I said people sounded spoiled for wanting a remake - I mean, I literally said that I’ll be picking the thing up myself and was excited about it lmao. I just felt like pointing out that, yeah, it was probably unnecessary
@@NichePlays not pandering to people who don't like sprite based games sounds like a nice thing to be proud of, but for a business sense in trying to broaden the appeal of your product, you gotta try to sell to the people who would more likely pay up. I understand your channel name has the word Niche, so i get it that you specially are more open to seeing the artistic value in these things, but just as the word implies, niche things appeal to a smaller group of people, in Nintendo's case a smaller amount of sales.
If i was still 7 years old and someone asked me to try out pacman on atari instead of the nes, I'd probably never play pacman
@@j23roa see I still can't agree with you there though; like not everything has to be for everybody. It's fine if not everybody wants to play pacman if it doesn't appeal to you. Plus, it might hit you at a later date that you really want to! (other than the fact that Atari pacman might be the worst version of it haha)
And we can speak broadly and say that it might hurt a business when they don't try to expand their audience endlessly but:
1: It's Mario. It wasn't going to do poorly anyway, especially after the movie came out this year.
2: It's Nintendo. They're already on top of the world.
3: Artistic value probably shouldn't be a niche thing. I know that many view games as amusements or things for kids, but you can still work to preserve the artistic integrity of a work when you rerelease it.
Either way, it's sorta apples and oranges isn't it? Honestly, so long as Nintendo does us a heckin' solid and puts the game on NSO in conjunction with the remake (or a few months later, etc) I could care less. The remake looks fun, but I still feel that the original will likely be a more cohesive and enjoyable experience
@@NichePlays i agree with the points that you're making, the point I'm sticking to is that Nintendo and other videogame companies have other motives and strategies which i can align with moreso than just hoping the majority of potential players also have the patience and curiosity to view older games with the mindset of an older era.
I am in my late 30's, i work with and have friends in their early 20's and i overhear conversations from people who play games much younger and much older than myself, and i believe that generally most people won't be bothered to learn how to play with emulators, or even touch the Nintendo switch online classics. I know that i watch a lot of videogame content on TH-cam and i also understand that the TH-camrs i watch represent a very small minority of the types of people who buy and play videogames. My taste and opinions on videogames are probably close to yours from what I've seen in your videos, but i also know that the game companies are making the right decisions remaking games with updated graphics.
Imagine you were in the team that created mario rpg decades ago. Think of all the creativity and passion put into it. And now think of today with a larger install base of switch owners and different types of gamers with different values(maybe shallow? maybe unappreciative of retro?) for their interests for games. As a creator of the original game, wouldn't you want to share your work in an updated way for newer players to experience the work you put in decades ago and make some money while you're at it?
I'm an artist myself and i often consider remaking my past creations with my updated skillset, because today my skills are better than years before, but my ideas from back then are still great, i just feel i can execute it better today
This might be the most simple answer but Mario Kart 8 Deluxe is my personal favourite Mario spin-off. I also enjoy The Thousand Year Door.
Nothing wrong with a clearcut answer lmao! I personally would go with MK64 as my choice for the series due to nostalgia, but I also think that 8 deluxe is an absolute powerhouse of a game! I mean, the original reason is literally why I bought a Wii U, and later sold my copy for the Switch port
There is a pretty significant thing to come out of this remake... multiple new translations.
Originally it only had Japanese and (US) English, but there's like 7 more languages on top of that now.
That's not something they could've done with just an NSO-type release (especially for Chinese/Korean).
I think a few languages even have alternate options for different regions, like French/Spanish.
It gives them a chance to fix the original script/localization too.
Whether it be typos, mistranslations, or just a lack of info they couldn't fit into it the 1st time.
Like, nearly 1/2 of the accessories in the game have this problem.
Take Boosters Amulet for example, all it says is "Great item, bad smell.".
It raises your each of your main stats BUT you lose Speed too.
However, there's a hidden ability on top of all that... _it cuts all elemental damage in 1/2!_
More infamously we have the "Ghost Medal", that claims it "Raises defense while attacking".
Such an effect doesn't exist. What it _actually_ does is... _cut _*_all damage_*_ in 1/2?!_ God damn!
Anything related to elemental damage or instant KO attacks aren't shown when they should be.
(...aside from 1 item that specifically mentions "mortal blows", though it does other stuff too.)
It's also unclear when you're hitting an enemy with its weakness or a status effect.
Status changes (like Attack/Defense Up's) are basically invisible.
You can't easily tell if any of them are active, been taken off, or can stack.
Which leads to the infamous "Shredder" situation, where a Boss uses that,
or a similar spell, only for it to do seemingly nothing.
(Turns out those spells reset your status to normal, removing your Atk/Def/Invincibility boosts.)
This remake also lets them make Action Commands (particularly Defense) less, well... bullshit.
'cause let's be honest for a minute here, many of the enemy attacks in this game are nonsense.
Some of them are ridiculously fast or just have really weird timing to be blocked.
(Like when the attack is still across the screen from you, or when it's _almost_ finished the animation, etc.)
Others actually have hidden damage multipliers, doing anywhere from 1.5x to 4x normal damage.
Which could also be mixed with a status ailment and/or be _unblockable,_ often at the same time!
Now, they've added fading { ! } bubbles over characters to better show the timing for Attack/Defense,
as well as a warning for when attacks can't be blocked. Certainly more reasonable/fair like that.
So you won't have to play the guessing game for something you couldn't actually do anything about.
Mallows -"Psychopath"- Thought Peek ability is much more useful in the remake.
Not only does he appear to start with that ability now, but it shows an
enemy's elemental/status weaknesses, among other details.
(Before, all it did was show an enemy's remaining HP and a random, useless thought if you got the timing for it.)
With that info going into a new "Monster List" you can check from the menu as well.
The shops were overhauled so you can actually see the stats an item gives you _without_ having to buy it first.
(On a minor note, they also broke the shop into tabs now, instead of having everything in 1 giant list.)
The original had no way to speed up text or skip cutscenes, the remake might give us that ability.
32:45 - As we found out a few weeks after you wrote this,
that meter in the corner is for powering up a special team move
(which changes based on what your current team is).
There will also be post-game Boss rematches.
36:53 - Depending on who you ask, we haven't gotten those in quite some time.
For Paper Mario, it hasn't been an RPG since, either, 2004 or 2007.
For Mario & Luigi, it hasn't had an original game since 2013 or 2015.
(Also the company that made them is dead and we haven't heard from the series in ~5 years now.)
Games don't need to be remade, old fans don't need their fav games to be remade, companies need to re-sell you the same game
While I agree with the sentiment on paper, I do think there are cases where remaking something can make a lot of sense. For instance, a Persona 3 remake makes a lot of sense on paper. It’s an older game with a frustrating combat system where you don’t get to control your teammates, it’s animated sections aren’t in HD, and the most developed version of the story is locked behind the PSP port and the remaster of that, which has compromised gameplay.
The only problem is that, as you pointed out, companies are gonna capitalism and remake games that don’t need it for the clout, as well as do baffling things like only remake the original Persona 3’s story and not the P3P version (presumably so that they can do an enhanced version a few years later like they usually do)
@@NichePlaysI agree with you, there's a lot of potential in some games to be remade (for example Star Ocean: The Second Story R) But what im saying is that companies will act on their bottom line above everything; will it sell?
for comparison, square enix complains FF16 undersold, (while FF7 remake is doing good), and like you mention with atlus and P3, they'll probably re-release the remake with the extra bits, like p5royal, like p4golden, at this point is a tried and true milking-the-fans strategy... let alone the initial $70 price tag, not great.
@@maniau yep, I'm with you on that. It's a racket and unfortunately, we're the losers when we buy things that didn't need to exist in the first place, or could have at least had the decency to just be the full package at launch since it was a remake anyway.