Kosmikros Sisters

About a week back, I began Super Mario RPG on Switch, which is an absolutely true and wonderful retelling/remake of its Super Nintendo predecessor. The story and everything is nearly identical to the original, but with everything getting a gorgeous makeover with some nice Quality of Life adjustments as well to make things easier and/or quicker.

So after a quick romp through Bowser’s Castle to save Princess Peach, the save is abruptly interrupted with a massive Sword falling from the sky and penetrating Bowser’s Castle throwing Bowser, Mario, and Peach out and far away from it.

From there, Mario crash lands back at his house: Mario’s Pad and is greeted by Toad trying to escort Peach back to the Mushroom Kingdom, only to find out she’s been Kidnapped by Bowser – again. After some quick optional tutorial lessons from Toad, Mario is off to Bowser’s Castle again only for the Sword, that is part of the Smithy Gang, to destroy the bridge losing access to said castle. Mario flees back to his pad to tell the tale to Toad. Thus leading both of them off to the Mushroom Kingdom to tell the Chancellor of what has all happened.

Real quick shout out to the menus. It’s nice that the battle controls can be changed back to the SNES version, which allows for selecting and executing the different options with A, B, X, Y, instead of hitting say X, and then hitting A to execute it. For us older players, this can be confusing who are used to the old controls. So it’s really nice this option exists. Another thing is allowing to change the difficulty at any time too for folks who just want to see the story and not worry about all the RPG elements.

Once the tale is explained to the Chancellor, Mario goes off to meet Mallow, a ‘Tadpole,’ who is chasing after a feller named Croco that stole his coin. After a fun new cutscene, Mallow and Mario join up and they seek after Croco. Originally in the SNES version, when Mario used Fire on Croco, a text box would simply come up saying ‘YEOUCH!’ hinting his weakness. This version his tail catches on fire and is ‘stunned’ for a turn, giving the player a free hit. It’s a nice change to make the early levels a bit easier.

Upon returning to the Mushroom Kingdom, it’s being overtaken by some of the Smithy Gang. Claymorton (originally named Mack in the SNES version), being the leader of this part of the gang that Mario and Mallow have to take on. The fight is fun, and afterwards, Mario & Mallow are awarded the first Star Piece, along with being told to go to the Kero Sewers and forwards after that to Tadpole Pond to meet Mallow’s ‘grandfather.’

Kero Sewers is the first major ‘dungeon’ in the game, but it’s not too rough with a cat-like boss named Belome at the end of it. Belome likes to eat a lot, and certainly shows it in the fight with some other debuff mechanics to try and slow Mario & Mallow down. Once defeated, the gate opens, a lot of water comes through, and the two are off to the Midas River! This concludes the first whole area of Super Mario RPG, the next part starts off with a fun mini-game course before heading to Tadpole Pond.