![]() Mario is the king of stackable attacks, but Bowser has some and Peach works as not only a great healer, but a damage-dealer with her cast-iron cookware. Pressing a button at the exact right time allows damage to either be halved when you’re taking damage or sometimes doubled or more when you’re using an attack that can be stacked. Traditional platforming skills like timing are put on display for not only on-field platforming sections, that can be a odd with the isometric perspective, but also for the timing-based combat. The battle system was an interesting experiment because it was turn-based with action thrown in. Bowser is a heavy-hitter, while Mario is an all-arounder who deals out a great mix of physical damage with his hammer and jumping abilities while also doing damage from a distance with fireballs. Having Mario and Bowser as allies is common now, but in ’96, it was brand-new and Square did a fantastic job of making everyone who was around before this game feel natural for an RPG. While he starts off fighting Mario in his castle in a gorgeous set-piece battle with Princess Peach hanging in the balance (literally), they both get kicked out of the castle by Smithy, who takes it over and sends Mario all around the world to capture seven stars to rebuild the path to the castle. The overall tone of the adventure is light-hearted like most Mario works, but starts off stronger dramatically and was the first game to really show Bowser in a sympathetic light. ![]() That being a motivator for me is one reason I stuck with the game until the end and the game was a nice gateway for her into RPGs like it was for me - just in a different way. The casino in particular was something that stood out a lot because my mother loved any game with such content as a big bingo player and this small part of the adventure made this game something we would both enjoy and get use out of. Seeing not only all kinds of art throughout it, but also guides on how to unlock things like a latter-game casino and proper event chains to avoid frustration made it a more enjoyable experience. Super Mario RPG was one of the first games I ever bought a strategy guide for and it was a life-saver for a new genre. This Nintendo and Square co-production was the first RPG experience for many, myself included, and wound up opening the door to a genre that Final Fantasy VII would blow open a year later on the PS1. Super Mario RPG marked the final time the companies would work together for several console generations. Nintendo was preparing the Nintendo 64 hardware across the globe and Square was preparing to end their time on cartridges with the move to the PlayStation’s larger-scale CD format. 1996 was a particularly interesting year for the gaming industry, as both Squaresoft (now Square-Enix) and Nintendo had transformative years for their business.
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