Modern Game Weekly - Paper Mario Color Splash

Welcome to Modern Game Weekly, this series will be focussed on more recent releases and is based around the 0 to Z of Playstation 1 Games series, with information on what the game is, the gameplay, story, critical reception and availability of the game. The story section will not be the entire games story, just a small section to give you an idea of the plot, spoilers will be kept to a minimum where possible.

The games chosen for this series are at random from my own ratings database, the database currently contains the majority of console releases from 2016 to February 2018 with releases up to April of 2015 added as well, with each game rated and ranked. Each game has their own rating broken down into five different sections.

The first is the numbered ratings, this uses a scale of 0 to 100 with a total of 10 of these ratings. One of the things that a part of this rating are critic review scores, these scores come from all console platforms the game is released on.

So for example Okami HD, which was recently released on PS4 and Xbox One, as well as previously being released on the PS3, all three of these releases factor in on the games overall rating. As a result shoddy ports of a game will seriously hurt the games overall score.

The reviews section takes a total of 12 reviews for the game if that number are available, both the six best review scores as well as the six lowest scoring reviews for the game, this covers reviews for console releases only. Information here will not be full reviews but snippets that stand out from the reviews.

The Availability section works exactly the same with a look at how available the game is assuming they are not digital only releases, with retailers Gamedude, eStarland and Amazon.com, while Retrogames may feature as older games are added to my database, the site currently only covers games up to the Xbox 360 and PS3 era.

Paper Mario Color Splash is a turn based action adventure RPG that was developed by Intelligent Systems for the Wii U console. The game was published by Nintendo in Japan, the game was published by Nintendo of America for it’s North American release and Nintendo of Europe for the games PAL release.

The game also received additional development from other studios other than Intelligent Systems with Access Games, Bright Side Studio, Crafts & Meister, Digital Media Lab, Neuron-Age and Nintendo all assisting in the development of Paper Mario Color Splash.

The game released in North America  and Europe on the 7^th of October 2016, with a total of 13 countries In Europe receiving a release of the game. The Japanese release came the following week on the 13^th of October 2016, both as a retail release and as a downloadable release.

Notable people who worked on this game, Youhei Kubotsu along with Masahiko Nagaya, Yukie Kuwa and Daisuke Yasumatsu as well as a few others have been involved with the WarioWare titles beginning with the likes of WarioWare Twisted and WarioWare Touched back in 2004 to the more recent WarioWare: D.I.Y from 2009.

Paper Mario Color Splash is an action adventure RPG that takes mechanics from the previously released Paper Mario Sticker Star and elaborates upon them. Color Splash is based around Mario using a Paint Hammer to colourless elements, these elements include other characters as well as parts of the environment, Mario must do this in order to progress in the game, doing so will earn Mario Mini Paint Stars as well as the coveted Big Paint Stars.

Once the player has guided Mario through a course additional courses may become available, sometimes several new courses will become available at the same time, this is one thing that has changed, the number based course naming of Super Paper Mario and Paper Mario Sticker Star has been removed, the game does have a type of world map similar to what was found in Sticker Star.

The world map is divided up into colour coded areas, each of these main colour coded areas has four courses for the player to complete. Once the player has completed the four main courses they will be able to take on the boss course for each of the colours, the Red areas final boss being the Crimson Tower. Only the final coloured area does not have additional levels to it, this last area is where the final boss of the game Black Bowser is residing this is at Black Bowser's Castle.

Super Flags make a return as well, this time they are found at the main square in Port Prisma, the battles are based on the Battle Cards that can be painted to increase their effects, these cards can be purchased by the player from Prisma Cardware.

One thing of note, once a card has been used it will be discarded, it is also possible for the player to buy cards while in battle using the Battle Spin, when choosing this the player is presented with overturned cards with the player needed to choose one.

In total there are three types of cards, first up are basic cards, these have various uses including attacking healing and replenishing you pain supply, many attacks are similar to those from Paper Mario Sticker Star, hammer attacks now have a charging sign which indicates at which point an excellent attack can be obtained/

The second type of card is a Thing Card, these cards do not reduce the supply of paint that Mario has. These cards are used to summon Things, the player is only allowed to carry one of these cards at a time, these is an exception to this, Replica cards which have similar effects to Thing cards, these cards are less powerful version and multiple copies can be in a deck.

These replicas have a REPLICA watermark added to the front of the animation, these replica cards also do less damage than their original counterparts. Also these replica cards are useless against the Koopaling, which will nullify the replica card resulting in the playing having to use the original. Thing cards are not only used in battle but also to solve puzzles.

Thing cards are obtained by squeezing Things into Thing cards, these is a shop in Port Prisma where the player can buy Things to squeeze into Thing Cards. The final type of card is the Enemy Cards, these cards are dropped by defeated enemies, these cards are used by the player to summon and enemy as a temporary ally.

The player can only have one at a time helping them, these allies will attack enemies as well as defending Mario from attack, these allies stay in battle until defeated, these allies however will run away if the player is facing off against a boss.

Sometimes at the beginning of a battle Kamek can appear, Kamek will either flip all of the cards or steal many of them. If the battle is won, all stolen cards will be returned with additional coins obtained as well. when in battle.

When in battle Mario has the use of his trusty jump for an attack as well as his hammer, unlike the previous game Sticker Star, damage inflicted on enemies is not shown as a number above the enemies head, instead the character loses colour from their feet upwards, with an enemy or Mario defeated when they turn completely white. When a battle is completed Mario will receive coins as reward

When in battle Mario’s current HP is displayed in the bottom left of the screen, with Mario’s current HP and maximum HP number displayed. Mario starts out with a maximum HP of just 50 and a jump attack and hammer attack of just 3.

In order to increase the amount of HP Mario has along with increasing Mario’s attack strength the Big Paint Stars must be obtained, each Big Paint Star obtained by the player, with six in total adds an additional 25 HP to Mario’s total hit point maximum. In addition each of the Big Paint Star’s will increased Mario’s jump attack by varying amounts.

Additional coins can be obtained by completing side quests and mini games , one example is a finding Luigi who Is hiding somewhere, as well as playing Super Roshambo against several different opponents, these opponents can be found at the Roshambo Temples that are dotted around Prism Island

The red Big Paint Star will increase Mario’s jump attack by 2, while the yellow Big Paint Star will increase Mario’s jump attack by 3. The Hammer attack strength is increased in the same way, with the Red Big Paint Star adding 3 to Mario’s hammer attack, while later Big Paint Stars such as the purple and orange Big Paint Star’s will only add 1 to Mario’s Hammer attack.

At Port Prisma on the island of Prism Island, lots of Toads are enjoying playing with various colours of paints, looking on from above is Bowser who just into the rainbow painted area in the middle of the Big Paint Stars with the intent on giving his shell a nice rainbow hue.

However Bowser’s jumping around in the pain inadvertently creates Black Paint which proceeds to brainwash Bowser, and turning him into Black Bowser, once transformed Bowser steals all of the Big Paint Stars and orders his minions to drain Prism Island and all of its inhabitants of their colour. Seemingly unaware of what has happened to Bowser the Koopa Troop willingly follow the orders of Black Bowser.

Meanwhile Mario is in his house when Princess Peach and Toad arrive at his door one night during a storm. Surprised Mario lets them in and is handed a mysterious note. The letter turns out to be a Toad completely drained of its colour, Mario horrified by this stands back in fear, noticing the stamp on the letter says Prism Island, Mario, Peach and Toad head to Prism Island by boat, braving the storm outside to do so.

Toad accidentally loses Mario's hammer during the trip. Upon arriving, Mario finds a replacement hammer and uses it to reach the town square, that is deserted and full of elements whose colors have been drained. Toad then heads off, while Mario and Peach, after activating an emergency mechanism, meet Huey, a mysterious 3D talking paint bucket. Mario and co then hear a scream, Mario, Huey, and Princess Peach quickly head over to the sound only to find a red Shy Guy with a straw, called a Slurp Guy, draining the colour from Toad.

Starting with the Zero2Zed rating for the game, Paper Mario Color Splash starts off with a good run of scores in the first half or ratings, with the game peaking at a very good 91, along with some four very good ratings all hitting 90.

The second half scores did do some serious damage to the games overall rating, while the game did receive four above average ratings of 60, the game also received a below average and almost poor rating of 40 which really did knock down the game overall average.

Critic reviews play a major part in this scoring system and Paper Mario Color Splash was a mixed back, at the top end of the critics scale the game did very well, peaking at a 91 and receiving a good number of 90 rated review scores, as well as a good number of scores in the 80s range.

The game however received equally as many reviews in the 60s and 70s range, with the game receiving nine 60 rated review scores which did hurt the games overall critical reception. Add in the 40 rated review from Giant Bomb and the game did rate a fair bit lower than you would have thought going by its best review scores.

Grading wise the games first half grades were very good with the game receiving a five A- grades. It was however the second half grades that hurt the games overall performance, with the game receiving four C- grades as well as a disappointing E+ grade. The game overall rated at a score of 731, averaging out at a 73.1 game rating, grade wise this averages out at a C+ grade for the game.

On to the first critic review which comes from Gaming Age, with an impressive 91 rated review, the reviewer finding the game true to Paper Mario’s great sense of humour, art and constant series revisions, it should be no surprise to long time fans that they’re in for a treat one way or another.

The reviewer continued by saying. Maybe they'd like a return to form, but for now, to anyone who skipped Sticker Star, Color Splash is worth the price of admission just to luxuriate in what has clearly been a labor of love for the Paper Mario series.

IGN Sweden were next up with an impressive 90 rated review, one of ten 90 rated reviews that the game received. The IGN Sweden reviewer finding Paper Mario Color Splash to be everything that they could have hoped for, with amazing visuals, well written dialogue and a lot of variations in level design.

GameSpew are next up with a 90 rated review, the reviewer calling Paper Mario a gem, and a look back into what Nintendo can do and a shining example of why they should never be counted out. The reviewer continued by saying. It’ll keep you laughing, engaged and having a blast. The reviewer finding the game truly took my breath away at times, and looks and plays with staggering beauty.

Hobby Consolas are next with their 90 rated review, the reviewer finding the game world for Paper Mario Color Splash to be a great and colourful island, with a big sense of humour waiting for Mario, Princess Peach and Toad.

The reviewer concluded by saying. Exploration, turn-based fighting, a mystery to solve, collecting letters, humour, colouring the entire Prism Island ... Mario Paper: Color Splash has enough elements to give it a chance, its approach will surprise and its great sense of humour can make us the belly of laughter hurts.

COGconnected are next up with yet another 90 rated review, the reviewer finding that while the game does not bring anything significantly new to the Paper Mario franchise, it does bring a nearly perfect Paper Mario experience which in itself is worth the price of admission.

The reviewer praised the games visuals calling them beautiful, they also praised the nostalgia filled soundtrack that accompanied the game. The review also praise the diverse assortment of levels that are on offer in Paper Mario Color Splash. While the reviewer did have heaps of praise for the game the did have some issues.

The reviewer was disappointed with the game sticking to the same old cast of bad guys and the lack of voice acting or narration in the game. The reviewer also found the card battles that are in the game can get boring, some instant death situations were also annoying for the reviewer.

The last of the best review scores comes from Digital Spy who rated the game at a 90 as well, the reviewer finding that Paper Mario Color Splash may not be the Paper Mario game everyone wanted, but it’s a game that oozes polish and manages to sit somewhere in a niche between RPG and Adventure game. they concluded by saying. It’s a memorable journey full of charm, craft, chuckles and a whole lot of paint.

Heading down to the other end of the review scale we find Digitally Downloaded who rated the game at an above average 60. The review while finding the game an endlessly charming and cutesy journey that represents a greater achievement for the art directors and script writers than Intelligent Systems as a whole.

They continued by saying, It’s a shame that such a talented studio opted to only tweak the flawed Sticker Star, and as a result, dull and unbalanced gameplay often holds back this whimsical romp. Concluding the reviewer said. As one of the final Wii U titles, though, it’s certifiably hilarious and might just warrant a second look.

GameCrate are next up with a 60 rated review as well, the reviewer finding the Paper Mario Color Splash could have been so much more that it was. The reviewer finding its attachment to the failed mechanics of Sticker Star holds the game back.

Cubed3 also rated the game at an above average 60, the reviewer finding Paper Mario Color Splash to be a joy aesthetically, looking and sounding fantastic, they also praised the very amusing script work done on the game. the reviewer however found at it’s core, whilst attempting to mix things up as much as it can in order to keep the action fresh, its battle system grows tiresome very quickly, dragging the enjoyment factor down several notches.

Shacknews found Paper Mario Color Splash to be a kind of simple and lightly enjoyable experience, that they may have gotten lost in a one point in their life. It's mostly inoffensive, usually charming, and a visual treat. The reviewer however found Color Splash to have a battle system that is a drag, they continued by saying.

but it's emblematic of a larger problem that is also reflected in the quests: it simply doesn't respect the player's time. With more aggressive story editing and less desire to reinvent the wheel, this may have been something truly special. Instead it's merely fine.

The penultimate review which comes form MetroGameCentral who rated the game at a 60, while the reviewer did find the dialogue in the game to be wonderful, funny, charming and occasionally subversive. Along with excellent graphics that allow for some interesting puzzles and stage designs.

However the reviewer continued by criticising the combat, which they found to be completely pointless and rarely much fun, they particularly found the boss battles can be very irritating. Concluding the reviewer had the following to say. Nintendo continues to paint over some of the best features of previous Paper Mario games, but the great script just about saves the dull combat.

The final review and by far the lowest scoring for Paper Mario Color Splash, this review comes from Giant Bomb who rated this Wii U exclusive title at a below average 40. The reviewer having trouble remembering the last time they were so divided on a game.

The reviewer finding that one part of them loves the game, with it being genuinely funny, with fantastic writing and locations, with the writing finding Prism Island gorgeous and a soundtrack that meets the high bar of quality that Mario games are known for. The reviewer finding it staggering how much this one system routinely destroyed my enthusiasm for the game.

Concluding the reviewer had the following to say. With more traditional RPG mechanics and a real progression system, Paper Mario: Color Splash could have been one of the best games in the series. Because of some unfathomably ill-conceived decisions during the development process, it’s one of the very worst.

In the end the reviewer however spent the most amount of time avoiding the biggest part of the game, with every combat encounter reminding the reviewer of how broken a critical element of the game is.

This is the part of Modern Game Weekly where is visit four online retailers and see what the availability of the title is, and what price you would be looking at if you wanted to pick this title up, the sites that I will be using for this are Amazon.com, eStarland.com, retrogames.co.uk for older generation titles and Gamedude.com I know the last one is very location specific, but from a podcast I listen to, I’ve heard they have a huge stock of games, Ebay has now been dropped unless the game is unavailable at other retailers.

So lets get down to business with Gamedude, where we find a trade in price of Paper Mario Color Splash currently sitting at the $20 mark, if on the other hand you are in the market for a used copy of the game from Gamedude this will set you back $39. Also on offer is a new copy of the game, this setting you back $49.95.

Moving on to Retrogames.co.uk we sadly don’t find the game available or even listed so we will quickly move on to eStarland.com. Here we find both a complete used copy of the game as well as a new copy on offer, starting with the used copy which is priced up at $41.95.

If however you prefer a new copy of the game, this will set you back a steep $57.95 from eStarland. Also on offer at eStarland is a trade in offer for the game, with up to $22 being paid for a complete copy of Paper Mario Color Splash. This price will fluctuate depending on the completeness of the copy, with only $9.90 being paid for a disc only copy of the game at trade in.

Lastly we have Amazon.com where we find an impressive supply of copies on offer, with the current cheapest copy on the market being a good condition used copy, which comes complete and is priced up at $29.54 once shipping has been added in.

We find a very good condition copy priced at just a few cents more at $29.96, this copy also comes complete in addition we also find a like new copy of the game hidden away on one of the latter pages of listings, this copy while not stating the completeness of the copy can be picked up for $30.56.

You can also find a new copy of the game for a similar amount of money, with prices for a new copy starting from $32.45. Also on offer around the same price point are a cluster of four like new copies, all of which come complete and are priced between $32.48 and $33.99.

We find a good number of new copies following this with around 10 new copies priced from $33.99 up to $37.60. New copy prices from this point continue to steadily rise, pushing past the $50 mark with the majority of copies peaking at $64.55. The usual couple of overpriced copies are beyond this point with one copy priced at $103.69 and the final copy coming in at a stupid $150.

  

Written by

P J Gibbon