Non-Mario Kart Racers I Love

With the recent announcements of both Mario Kart 9 and Sonic Racing: Crossworlds, I've gotten into a bit of a kart racer mood lately. I've only ever talked about Mario Kart on here though, so I thought I might as well delve into some of the non-Mario kart racers I also happen to really like:

Kirby Air Ride: I've already talked about Kirby Air Ride so I'll be quick here. This game absolutely rules. Despite my initial skepticism towards its one button control scheme, Air Ride manages to wring out a deceptive amount of depth with its satisfying brake-drift system, variety of copy abilities, vastly unique vehicle designs, and abundance of shortcuts. The three major modes are each fun in their own ways, though the brilliant City Trial is the obvious standout, and the fleshed-out and influential achievement system has kept me playing for hours. Being developed by the Melee team also means Kirby Air Ride is stylish as hell, with slick menu design, a surreal GCN-ass visual style, and a gorgeous orchestral score. Despite or maybe because of its quirks, Kirby Air Ride is a wonderfully addictive experience that stands out from every other kart racer in its own unique way. It's one of my favorite games in the genre and one of my favorite Kirby games.

Crash Team Racing: As far as I'm concerned, I hold Crash Team Racing up right alongside Mario Kart 8 Deluxe and Kirby Air Ride as the holy trinity of kart racers. In terms of pure mechanical depth, CTR is still unparalleled, with its iconic drift system and fleshed-out hopping. But on top of that, the track design is absolutely stellar. Complex, memorable, and filled to the brim with potential shortcuts just waiting to be discovered. It's a technical juggernaut, showing Naughty Dog's mastery of the PS1 with its clean visuals and silky smooth control, and it even packs it a massive adventure mode that stands out as one of the best campaigns in a kart racer. Crash Team Racing was easily the best kart racer of the fifth gen, but it still holds up as one of my favorites overall. Nitro Fueled was solid too, but the microtransactions and live service elements mean I'd rather stick with the original.

Diddy Kong Racing: Diddy Kong Racing is another really solid kart racer of the time. While I think CTR has it beat in terms of control and track design, DKR still brings a lot of great ideas to the table like its satisfying zipper mechanic, its color-coded item balloons that lends the game some extra strategy, and of course the vehicle transformations. The adventure mode is also quite solid, with a more fleshed-out overworld and a bunch of collectibles and side content as you'd probably expect from Rare. Top it off with a character roster that marked the debut of Banjo and Conker, along with a great soundtrack by David Wise, and you get a great kart racer that's obviously beloved for a very good reason.

Sonic & Sega All-Stars Racing Transformed: Sonic has had several racing games of varying levels of quality, but as of right now, the one to beat is still Transformed. It takes the multiple vehicles of DKR and fleshes them out even further with some of the most dynamic and ambitious track design I've ever seen. Each track evolves and shifts over the course of each race, almost telling a story in themselves, which allows them to truly stand out among the genre. The gameplay also feels pretty good with its fair items and fun boosting mechanics, though its heavier arcade-y feel probably won't be for everyone. Transformed also has a solid story mode, lots of cool Sega fanservice, and an incredibly clean presentation which makes for easily one of the best kart racing packages in the last decade or so.

Pac-Man World Rally: Pac-Man World Rally was probably the most surprisingly great kart racer I've ever played. There really is no reason for it to be as good as it is, but it's deceptively fun. World Rally manages to perfectly replicate the loose, fast, and chaotic feel of Double Dash better than any other game at the time, with smooth control, powerful items, and memorable track design. It can be a bit lacking in polish, the Spiny Shell equivalent shows up way too often and a few of the tracks can feel a bit raw, but the game makes up for that in sheer fun and fluidity. I also love the way shortcuts work here, as you need to collect fruit to open them up which adds a neat layer of skill to each race. There's even a dedicated Namco cup with a few fanservice tracks, just to sweeten the deal.

Chocobo Racing: At a time when everyone was trying to jump on the kart racing trend to varying degrees of success, Chocobo Racing stood out by having the high production values of PS1-era Squaresoft backing it up. In the grand scheme of things, Chocobo Racing may not be especially remarkable, but everything about it just exudes polish, with its tight controls, solid track design, clean visuals, and great music. The story mode is also immensely charming as I love the cutesy take on the FF universe that these Chocobo games bring to the table, but the real standout aspect of Chocobo Racing is its brilliant item system which allows you to stack items to increase their power. It's a great package overall, just a shame it... uhh... didn't get a crummy microtransaction-laden sequel or anything...

Konami Krazy Racers: Konami Krazy Racers was a launch title for the GBA that just barely beat out Mario Kart: Super Circuit, though it sadly still seems to have fallen under a radar. It's a real shame too since I think this is probably my favorite mode 7 kart racer of all time. Super Circuit may have stronger track design and more mechanical depth, but Konami Krazy Racers stands out with its uncharacteristically tight and precise steering, great Diddy Kong Racing-esque item system, solid single-player offerings including a sort-of mission mode and a fleshed-out battle mode, and a slew of offbeat Konami fanservice akin to Parodius. You got Twinbee, Metal Gear, Castlevania, Goemon, Pop'n Music, and even some more obscure series like Rakugakids all represented here. It may be on the shorter side, but this is easily one of the most criminally overlooked kart racers of all time.

Bomberman Fantasy Race: I've brought this one up before in my Bomberman respective but I need to reiterate that Fantasy Race is way better and more ambitious than it has any right to be. Bomberman Fantasy Race has you play as Bomberman racing on Louies and Tirras, basically the series' Yoshi-esque mounts. This already gives you a lot of unique abilities like jumping and tossing bombs at your opponents, but that's only scratching the surface when it comes to the sheer amount of tech this game has to offer. There's wall-jumping, stamina management, reserve items, using precise bomb throws to propel yourself forward, and you will have to master all of it if you want to win. It may seem overwhelming at first, especially if you're playing the US version with its inflated currency values, but once the controls click, there truly is no kart racer like Bomberman Fantasy Race. If you want something a bit more mechanically complex and unique, check this one out, it actually goes so hard.

Dr Robotnik's Ring Racers: And now, here's the most polarizing one. Dr Robotnik's Ring Racers is the sequel to Sonic Robo Blast 2 Kart, both of which are mods of the super impressive fangame Sonic Robo Blast 2. Kart already was a really fun, polished, and chaotic kart racer but the lack of CPUs meant I didn't play it much myself. Ring Racers, on the other hand, boasts far more single-player content along with far more mechanical changes that helps it stand out as its own unique beast, albeit for better and for worse.

Here's the thing, Ring Racers makes a pretty bad first impression, and I initially bounced off it hard when it first came out. The game starts by making you do an hour-long tutorial that overwhelms you with explanations on its countless mechanics without really showing how they interact with each other. And once you do finally finish the tutorial, you discover that almost all the tracks, characters, and modes are locked behind hours of single-player gameplay, which feels really tonedeaf considering SRB2 Kart was praised for its easy-to-access online. Since launch, we have gotten a lot of patches that smoothed out some of Ring Racers rougher edges, and there is a password system that lets you jump into the game pretty much immediately, but it doesn't change the fact that Ring Racers is hard to get into.

But when you do give Ring Racers your time, you'll be surprised at how addictive it is. Ring Racers has a variety of fascinating mechanics, from a resource management system that has you using the rings you collect to speed around corners and up hills, to an Advance 2-esque trick system, to various boost types, to multiple item boxes, to a fast fall and spin dash, to a slipstream tether mechanic, and the list goes on. It feels like every mechanic from every prior kart racer has been squeezed together into this single package and while it seems overwhelming at first, it all clicks together surprisingly gracefully once you actually get into the races. There is a really satisfying flow to using rings to maintain your high speed, and the track design is usually good enough to encourage a wide variety of different lines and strategies.

With over 60 characters, 150 tracks, a beefy Grand Prix Mode with 30 cups, Chaos Emeralds and Special Stages, and a flourishing modding community, Ring Racers is also packed to the gills with quality kart racing content. Beyond just the Sonic cast, there's a ton of cool Sega rep ranging from iconic series like Nights and Sakura Wars to sleeper picks like Popful Mail and Treasure, and the soundtrack is filled with picks from some of my favorite soundtracks. I can even play as characters like Vivian or Bomberman thanks to mods which is so cool! And if you do want to unlock everything yourself by working through its massive Kirby Air Ride-inspired achievement table, that playtime will only grow even larger. Ring Racers feels like it's a game by kart racing fanatics for kart racing fanatics, a truly impressive passion project that stands out as one of the most ambitious fan projects I've ever played, to the point where I almost feel guilty playing it for free. It may be over-indulgent and at times hair-pullingly brutal, but when it all clicks, it truly feels like the best the genre has to offer.

Mario Kart 64 Track Reviews

For a while now, I felt pretty comfortable touting Mario Kart 64 as my least favorite game in the series, primarily for its overly large track designs, blatantly rubberband-y AI, and a few other minor gripes. However, while it's certainly not as consistent of an experience as its predecessor, Mario Kart 64 really grew on me during my last playthrough of it. The controls are not only far superior to Super's controls but they also have a lot of interesting nuances, the pacing is some of the most frenetic in the series, and its best tracks far greater heights, so let's go through all of Mario Kart 64's tracks and review them.

Mushroom Cup

Luigi Raceway
Mario Kart 64 gets off to a bit of a slow start with its Mushroom Cup, which is mostly comprised of fairly basic loops. Luigi Raceway does have a cool Nascar-themed aesthetic, that iconic tunnel, and a balloon with a guaranteed Star hanging from it, but beyond all that set-dressing, it's a bent oval with two very wide turns and an abundance of dull straightaways. Mario Kart 64's tracks as a whole can often have a lot of downtime, but Luigi Raceway is one of the worst offenders here.
2/5 Stars

Moo Moo Farm
Moo Moo Farm is a track that actually grew on me a lot. I used to always pass it off for its incredibly short length and basic layout, but it's that short length and the bumpy terrain that make it a much more chaotic and frenetic track than Luigi Raceway. The standout is easily the Monty Moles though which are mostly placed in the near corner, which leads to a solid risk/reward system. This was also a thing in Donut Plains, but the Monty Moles didn't pop out of their holes nearly as much in that game as they do in 64, so hugging the corner in Moo Moo Farm actually feels genuinely risky and skill-based.
3/5 Stars

Koopa Troopa Beach
Koopa Troopa Beach is honestly way better of a track than it has any right to be. It might even be a perfect track. It takes the Koopa Beach setting from Super and really elevates it in a ton of dynamic ways, from the abundance of Koopa-themed rock structures to drive around, to a solid amount of ramps and shortcuts, to the fact that the water level can raise and lower keeping things varied. The atmosphere is pleasant as well especially with that stellar music, and the whole track just has a fantastic sense of flow to it.
5/5 Stars

Kalimari Desert
Kalimari Desert is a track that is conceptually and in fleeting moments very fun. Whenever the train shows up and you're about to cross the railway, you know things are about to get very chaotic. Whether you try to make it through before the train arrives or are frantically trying to brake before you get hit, it's a fun time... but it just doesn't happen often enough. I've gone through so many laps of this track where the train just doesn't appear, and it also doesn't help that the entire second half of the course has zero intersections with the train track which leaves it feeling really dry. I do like how wide open Kalimari Desert, I've always appreciated how explorative 64's tracks are, but it really needed more than just that train because as it is now, it's 90% boring and only 10% exciting.
2/5 Stars

Flower Cup

Toad's Turnpike
Toad's Turnpike is the first traffic stage in the series, and it might still be one of the best. The MK64 incarnation of Toad's Turnpike is brutal, it's absolutely packed with cars and you get seriously punished for hitting them. Compared to Mario Kart 8's version which is not only more open but adds more ways to get around the cars, I vastly preferred the more aggressive traffic in this version, especially in its infamous Mirror Mode incarnation. I also adore the sunset, vaporwave-y aesthetic of this original track that, once again, Mario Kart 8 completely ruined. So yeah, I really like this version of Toad's Turnpike, it's got a nice balance between sadistic difficulty and chill vibes making up for its fairly basic layout.
4/5 Stars

Frappe Snowland
Frappe Snowland is noteworthy for being the first truly twisty track in 64. After four fairly basic loops and a figure-eight, Frappe Snowland actually has a more dynamic layout that flows really nicely with its abundance of wavy roads. It's got a pretty cozy atmosphere with some nice visual flourishes too like the bridge, that giant snowman, and the snow tunnel at the end to keep things varied. The most polarizing aspect of the track are those exploding snowmen that can really set you back if you drive into them, which is especially problematic in that one place where they're just spammed across the track, but weaving around them does feel very satisfying once you've gotten used to the controls.
4/5 Stars

Choco Mountain
Choco Mountain is yet another really solid track in this very consistent cup. The chocolate visuals instantly help this track stand out, and it continues amping up the pressure with its turns compared to Frappe with its more cramped layout. The first third of Choco Mountain is quite strong too with its overlapping road and abundance of bumps, and the final third is easily the standout as it has you dodging boulders and trying not to fall off the cliff (I love how you get a guardrail in 50cc but not in the higher difficulties, very unique for this series). However, the midsection of the track is a bit dull as its mostly composed of a fairly light straightaway with little to keep things interesting, which ultimately prevents this otherwise great track from being a top-tier contender for me. It says a lot that the Tour/8DX version replaced that straightaway with a glide ramp.
4/5 Stars

Mario Raceway
Ending this cup off with yet another really strong track, Mario Raceway is easily one of the shortest and tightest tracks in the game, rarely ever giving you any downtime. There's an abundance of near-180 degree turns here, but there's also a lot of off-road allowing for cool shortcuts. If I had any gripes, it's that you can't drive up the side of the pipe at the end like in Wii, but that's a tiny nitpick at best. Most of Mario Raceway, while not the most remarkable, feels incredibly smooth to play on and is almost completely lacking in long straightaways.
4/5 Stars

Star Cup

Wario Stadium
Wario Stadium is a track that I consistently see at the bottom of people's track ranking and yeah, I kinda get it. The visuals are very rough (especially that Wario face) and it very much overstays its welcome. If Nintendo cut out that one long stretch where you're driving around the outside of the track, that alone could really clean up the pacing. But that aside, I don't know, I kinda like Wario Stadium. It's a nice skill check to make sure you know all the turns, starting really wide before getting smaller and smaller culminating in a genuinely tight final hairpin. There's also a whole bunch of bumps to convey that BMX feel (which I imagine would be very fun with a proper trick system), and the fact that missing the jump that send you back like a quarter of the track is honestly very funny.
3/5 Stars

Sherbet Land
Sherbet Land is basically Mario Kart 64's Vanilla Lake, having you drive around a giant lake formed out of cracked ice. And like with Vanilla Lake, this track is insanely hard, maybe even the hardest in the game for me. It's deceptively easy to slip off the ice, and the various cramped paths with penguins that can knock you out of the way are tough to manage. That being said, most of this track still feels pretty fair. A skilled player can easily hop over the cracks in the ice just like in Vanilla Lake, and the penguins' movement patterns are well telegraphed so that if you run into them, it generally feels like your own fault. At its worst, Sherbet Land can feel like a real frustration, but at its best, it's a solid challenge.
3/5 Stars

Royal Raceway
Royal Raceway is easily one of the tightest tracks in the game in terms of how much road you have, and like with Wario Stadium, the turns get tighter and tighter culminating in a really hard final stretch that has you carefully driving down a hill. Just like with Mario Raceway, there's a lot of potential for shortcuts, but there's now also a big pond in the middle of the track that can really set you back if you fall in which gives the course a solid amount of difficulty. I have no real complaints here, Royal Raceway is a legitimately fun challenge that further prepares you for the final track of the cup. And yeah, the Peach Castle easter egg is just the icing on the cake.
5/5 Stars

Bowser Castle
Mario Kart 64's Bowser Castle is easily the best track in Mario Kart 64, and it's still one of my favorite Bowser Castles in general. It's the only track in this game to be almost entirely comprised of 90 degree turns, but the detailed and varied environment and variety of memorable setpieces prevents the track from feeling stale. The moving Thwomps are a genuinely tense threat in the first half, and the spiral ramp followed by two tricky jumps make for a memorable finale. I also love the haunting atmosphere of this track, it's the most intimidating a Bowser Castle has ever felt in a Mario Kart game.
5/5 Stars

Special Cup

DK's Jungle Parkway
For the first three cups, Mario Kart 64 has had a pretty smooth difficulty curve with each track progressively increasing in complexity and quality. However, probably my biggest gripe with Mario Kart 64 is just how hard the Special Cup drops the ball, so prepare for a lot of gripes.

DK's Jungle Parkway isn't a bad course on the surface, and it has a few neat moments and ideas. The fact that you can get pelted by fruit for going offroad is a fun twist, and I love that big shortcut in the cave at the end which can really determine a race if someone gets a mushroom. However, the aesthetic is weak, with muddy visuals and dull music depriving this track of much energy. But most of all, the turns in DK's Jungle Parkway are really wide. Coming off the heels of the very difficult Star Cup, this track isn't hard at all, it just doesn't feel like a Special Cup track in any way.
3/5 Stars

Yoshi Valley
Yoshi Valley, on the other hand, stands up right alongside Sherbet Land as one of the hardest tracks in the game... but not for good reasons. Yoshi Valley is incredibly tight and lacking in guard rails, with the final stretch in particular being a pretty fun challenge. However, falling off the cliff will cause your character to slowly tumble to the bottom, and only then will you be picked up by Lakitu. Falling off is just too punishing in this track, it takes way too long and will almost always force you back into last place. And of course, then there's also the nonlinear layout. This is a cool concept in theory but the execution here is rough. Yoshi Valley only has a single objectively good route that's worth taking which pretty much mitigates any of that potential freedom, and not being able to see who's in first doesn't make the game more tense or difficult, it's just kinda annoying. I just don't think the N64 was able to handle Yoshi Valley, as is made clear by the Mario Kart 8 version fixing pretty much all its issues.
2/5 Stars

Banshee Boardwalk
Banshee Boardwalk is a bit of a slow burn of a track, with a fairly dull first half comprised of straightaways and the occassional sharp turn. Thankfully, as the track goes on, the turns get a lot sharper and the amount of guardrails decrease which makes the second half feel genuinely pretty tense. I also love the haunted house setpiece for its more open layout and the sheer amount of bats this game tosses at you. The bats in later Mario Kart games are barely a threat, but Mario Kart 64 launches so many at you that they can genuinely send you off course if you're not careful. I still don't think this track is as hard as it should be, but it still stands out as my favorite in the Special Cup (not that it's a high bar).
3/5 Stars

Rainbow Road
Ah, N64 Rainbow Road, my beloathed. So, obviously, this track is stellar from an aesthetic standpoint. The music is absolutely lovely, the contrast between the vibrant rainbow and the pitch-black expanse of space is striking, and all the constellations of the cast really give off the feeling of a victory lap. Sadly, the track itself is an absolute slog. Rainbow Road is supposed to be the final challenge, but this incarnation has insanely wide turns, zero gaps, a ton of straightaways, and a crushing length of 6+ minutes. This track utterly drags and since there's no real way for anyone to catch up, it also means it's the absolute mother of all frontrunning tracks. The one saving grace are the Chain Chomps which granted do cause a bit of panic whenever I see them in the distance, but they go by so fast and don't show up often enough to save what's otherwise the dullest track in the series.
1/5 Stars

Final Rankings

Now that we have all the tracks reviewed, here's my final tier list, with the battle stages for good measure:

 Overall, Mario Kart 64 is honestly a better game than I previously gave it credit for. Mechanically, it's leaps and bounds above its predecessor between the more nuanced controls and the introduction of a proper item system, it still has some of the best multiplayer in the series, and the otherworldly N64 era aesthetics still stand out to this day, but it also has quite a lot of solid tracks especially in the midgame. It may not have as smooth of a difficulty curve as Super, with a slow start and a frankly bad final cup, but at its best, Mario Kart 64 is the series at its most frenetic and cutthroat which is really what you want from a Mario Kart game.

Exploring Id Software

Doom is one of those games that everyone has played at least once, it's on a similar level of historical significance to something like Super Mario Bros. But while I have played it in passing several times, I also never really "got into Doom". Meanwhile, Quake is a game I knew next to nothing about, and it only ever struck my interest when I stumbled upon its technically impressive Saturn port. Both are series that I've been curious about trying out especially with the recent Nightdive remasters of both the Doom and Quake duologies. And with the Lunar New Year sale, I decided to get both the Doom & Doom II collection and the Quake 1 & 2 Enhanced Bundle for my Switch and really delve into what Id Software's work has to offer, once and for all.

Ranking Tomb Raider Levels

Tomb Raider was always a series I was somewhat afraid to approach, mostly due to its infamous tank controls. Even as someone who tends to disagree with the concept of "games aging", I was never sure if I would be able to adapt to Tomb Raider's more deliberate and punishing style of platforming. Now that I've just played the first game though, I really shouldn't have been worried. The first Tomb Raider game is great, and still a total blast to this day. It makes the most of the hardware capabilities of the time to foster a palpable sense of exploration and discovery, the platforming puzzles are incredibly satisfying to nail, and it truly paves the way for so many of my favorite adventure games. But most importantly, the level design remains pretty spectacular across the entire game, perfectly balancing exploration, platforming, puzzle-solving, and combat. With so many good stages, I thought this would be a perfect game to do a ranking. So here's my ranking of Tomb Raider 1's stages:

16. Natla's Mines
In theory, Natla's Mines should've been my favorite of the bunch. Outside of a few boss fights, it's almost entirely devoid of content, instead prioritizing puzzle-solving over all else. However, compared to some of the best puzzles in the game, I found Natla's Mines to be really tepid and kinda dull. There were a few memorable visuals like dropping the house and climbing the pyramid at the end, but most of the stage was running back and forth through samey looking caverns and dealing with tedious block-pushing puzzles. It also doesn't help that the boss fights themselves were all really bad since they were against human opponents, who Tomb Raider's combat system is just not equipped to properly handle. And to top it all off, this is easily the longest stage in the game and it really drags. Natla's Mines isn't a bad stage, but it was the one I was the most bored playing.

15. Lara's Home
Even though it's a tutorial and not technically part of the main campaign, I decided to count Lara's Home regardless since it is still technically a "stage" in its own right. The concept of getting to run around in the main protagonist's house and messing around with the controls in a variety of different training rooms is honestly really charming and starts Tomb Raider on a pretty good foot. Lara's tutorialization strikes a nice balance between being charmingly delivered and effectively instructive, while still giving the player the space they need to learn how the movement works. That being said, it is still a very linear tutorial and it's entirely devoid of any form of exploration so you can't really expect me to rank it too high.

14. Tomb Of Thihocan
I remember reading that this stage was meant to be part of The Cistern but ended up getting broken off into its own stage, and it's not hard to see how. Most of it boasts a very similar aesthetic to The Cistern and expands on its central gimmick of raising and lowering the water levels by introducing blocks that float on top of the water. It's a much more linear affair than The Cistern though, bridging its rooms together with tight underwater corridors, but it also doesn't do too much to stand out from the previous stage. The titular Tomb Of Thihocan looks really cool, but it's a single room with two basic boss fights, one of which is entirely skippable.

13. City Of Vilcabamba
City Of Vilcabamba kinda feels like two levels sandwiched together, and both being of uneven quality. The first half is the first truly wide open space filled with water tunnels, enemies, and hidden nooks that you must search to find the key that lets you move onto the next part. While I do appreciate the openness, I can't exactly say there are any particularly memorable setpieces here and a decent chunk of the rooms feel entirely optional. The second half has you scale a few towers to unlock the gates to the exit and it's a lot more fun in my opinion, being the first setpiece in the game that truly tests your platforming skills. Carefully scaling the first tower as the (very good) Tomb Raider theme plays really stands out as the high point of the stage.

12. The Great Pyramid
As a whole, I thought the Atlantis world was the weakest of the bunch, even if it wasn't bad. The Great Pyramid mostly just suffers from being the final boss stage, so it's naturally not as complex, puzzle-focused, or atmospheric as the best in the game. That being said, it was a strong finale with two of the better boss fights in Tomb Raider (though that is faint praise), and an unbelievably chaotic escape sequence where the game tosses every single trap variation at you in increasingly cruel and complex ways.

11. Caves
Being the first stage in the entire Tomb Raider franchise, it shouldn't come as too much of a surprise that Caves is fairly simple. However, it's a really well-designed first stage that silently teaches you everything you need to know about the game. It's mostly linear, but there are just enough branching paths and hidden secrets to make exploration feel rewarding, and the stage has a decent amount of environmental variety from the iconic snowcap opening to the lush greenery of the interior ruins to that dingy final area. 

10. City Of Khamoon
The first Egypt level is generally pretty strong, even if I wouldn't say it's one of the more memorable stages overall. It has some awe-inspiring wide open areas, a few memorable setpieces like climbing up a sphinx and filling up a room with sand to escape, and even a near full level skip that can be pulled off pretty easily. That being said, I think what really holds it back for me is a singular room, the panther room. If you've played this stage, you probably know which one I'm talking about. Between my repeated failed attempts at jumping onto the pillar in the center, having to tediously fight six panthers all at once (despite the guide I was following claiming it was four), and that mummy jumpscare in the cramped hallway right after, I was just not having a good time. The rest of this stage was great, but that one singular room really soured my mood by the end.

9. The Colosseum
The coolest thing about the Colosseum is its titular setpiece. Walking into a massive colosseum so big and open that the game can't even render it all at once must've been one of those big jaw-dropping moments back in 1996, and once again, the open layout of the stage does really help it stand out. That being said, The Colosseum is a very combat-focused stage, constantly tossing in lions and gorillas for you to deal with on occasions and including a whole bunch of Pierre encounters. While exploring The Colosseum on its own is really fun, the abundance of combat, which has always been this game's weakest aspect, does hold it back from being one of my favorite stages.

 8. Tomb Of Qualopec
This is technically the first proper tomb you visit in Tomb Raider and it makes a strong impression. After three stages of cavernous ruins, the Tomb Of Qualopec immediately stands out with its ornate scarlet and gold interiors. It's got a nice array of booby traps and puzzles, from boulder chases, to crumbling tiles, to moving platforms around with switches, and the build-up and payoff to retrieving the first piece of the scion is a really memorable moment. It's very obvious that Tomb Raider is heavily inspired by Indiana Jones, but this stage more than any other feels like I'm playing through the opening of Raiders.

7. Atlantis
While I was a bit wary about this stage knowing that it would be a lot more combat-centric than the two stages it was sandwiched between, I'm pleased to say that Atlantis is a really strong endgame stage. It makes a lot of clever layout choices, from giving many of its rooms multiple layers for fighting the different kinds of enemies, to building itself around a tall vertical room you repeatedly visit to convey a sense of progression, to having its secrets lead to shortcuts that make the stage easier. As a result, Atlantis is able to test you on everything you've learned throughout the game without feeling downright frustrating or like you're being dealt too much of a bad hand. Also props to that incredibly creative doppleganger setpiece, it would easily be my favorite boss fight in the game if it counted as one.

6. Obelisk Of Khamoon
Something you'll notice is that I really like the more puzzle box-y stages, and Obelisk Of Khamoon is a really solid puzzle box. The main premise is that there is an obelisk with four artifacts hanging from it, and you need to activate four bridges to reach them. The stage gives you a lot of freedom to take this puzzle in whatever order you want, but each of the bridge switches aren't in disconnected rooms either, everything clicks together in a really satisfying way and each shortcut you discover makes the whole stage easier to navigate. It doesn't have any of the huge memorable setpieces that some of Tomb Raider's most iconic stages have, but it's a consistently strong puzzle with few low points.

5. Palace Midas
Palace Midas is another one of those stages where you have to find all of the things to unlock the gate to the exit, and they really do tend to be my favorite stages in the game. Palace Midas just has a nice balance of pretty much everything that makes Tomb Raider great, from large aquaduct structures to scale, to memorable puzzles, to surprising setpieces like Midas's Hand that will turn anything you give it into gold, including Lara herself. This is also the first stage to really force you to make awkward diagonal jumps and the punishment can be pretty severe, but as long as you're patient and careful, it still feels really satisfying to conquer. Also that one garden room stands out for how lush it is amidst an otherwise very orange stage.

4. St Francis' Folly
From what I hear this is the most beloved Tomb Raider stage and I kind of understand it. The big setpiece is this large vertical room where you have to open up four smaller challenge rooms, get all the keys within those challenge rooms, and use them to unlock the door. The challenge rooms are each themed after gods like Thor, Atlas, and Damocles which helps them really stand out. Aside from the shoddy hit detection with the lightning in Thor's room, each of these rooms are really fun and memorable, and exploring that vertical central room is Tomb Raider platforming at its best. That being said, there is about 10 or so minutes of content prior to this iconic setpiece and most of it is pretty uninteresting. This is a great stage overall but it does take a bit to really get going. I'm also very much not a fan of that one missable secret placement with the ramps, if you know you know.

3. Sanctuary Of The Scion
Despite how primitive it may seem now, I think the low draw distance can really help some of Tomb Raider's locals feel vaster than they actually are, and none of that is more apparent than in Sanctuary Of The Scion. This stage puts a big emphasis on precariously climbing across giant Egyptian strucutres, from a massive sphinx to large Set and Horus statues, and the vast scope of each room does so much to make the player feel small in comparison. While dealing with the mutants for the first time can be a tad tense, the vast majority of this final Egypt stage is on exploring those aforementioned massive rooms and really tough but satisfying platforming sequences. Out of the final stages for each area, I think Sanctuary Of The Scion has the most climactic feel to it.

2. The Cistern
From what I can tell, The Cistern is often singled out as TR1's worst stage and I can kinda see why. It's a pretty dingy sewer stage filled with rats and crocodiles, it's incredibly wide open and confusing to navigate, and it's built around raising and lowering the water level to access a variety of rooms. Put simply, it's basically this game's version of the Water Temple. But if you know anything about me, you'd know I love the Water Temple for its tough spatial navigation puzzles and soothing atmosphere, and The Cistern is no different. The whole map is really well laid-out and once you figure out how everything connects, it's really seamless to get from one area to the next (also you only need to change the water level once if you know what you're doing). There's a nice balance of swimming and platforming, the blue hues of the walls and minimal enemies give the stage a calming atmosphere, and the memorable checkerboard floor room helps end The Cistern on a strong note. While it still has a few flaws like that infamous softlock and a few too many Pierre encounters, this was still one of my favorite stages to crack open just from how thoughtful its design was.

1. The Lost Valley
The Lost Valley is one of the most iconic stages in the entire PS1's library. While I was personally spoiled on the appearance of a hulking T-Rex, I can only imagine what a huge surprise it must've been for someone playing in 1996. But that's just a single moment, and I'd say The Lost Valley as a whole still manages to live up to that iconic shot. I really like the more open and explorative design, giving you this vast jungle area filled with cave systems and tunnels and just letting you run loose to find the three cogs you need to access the exit. The platforming setpieces are also very memorable, from that tense bridge jump to hopping back and forth over a rushing river. And with a whopping five secrets, there truly is so much to discover here on repeat playthroughs. From a pure exploration standpoint, The Lost Valley easily stands out as a high point in the first Tomb Raider.

My Definitive, Official Mario RPG Ranking

 As I said in my Brothership review, I wanted to dedicate my post to doing a proper ranking of all of the Mario RPGs. I've talked a lot about these games over the past year or so between the recent releases and my Top 100 Games series, but with how scattered all those posts are, I wanted to compile all of my thoughts on the series in a single place. This is a bit of a loose ranking since there are some games that I feel occupy a similar place in my heart, and thus the same spot on the list, so its primary purpose is to show how I hold up the various Mario RPGs we've gotten up to each other. So without further ado, let's do this:

12. Paper Mario: Sticker Star

Wow, I know, big shocker, Sticker Star in last place. This is probably the coldest take you could have, but my slightly warmer opinion is that I don't think Sticker Star is one of the worst Nintendo games ever made? Like, this game does do quite a bit right. Obviously, the papercraft artstyle is gorgeous especially for the hardware, and the jazz-infused soundtrack is a highlight in a franchise already packed with stellar music. The overworld design also took a big step-up with Sticker Star, with each area feeling more like a level from 3D Land with how it's filled with coins to find, secrets to uncover, and platforms to hop across. The actual environments, however, are pretty bland and repetitive especially compared to this game's successors, and that same blandness carries over to the writing. This is the least funny Mario RPG and barely any of the dialogue gags got even a chuckle out of me. I know some people find Kersti really abrasive but I honestly wish she was more abrasive, but she had such a non-presence for so much of the game. At its core, this is my primary issue with Sticker Star, it just lacks the sauce that nearly all the other Mario RPGs have.

But then there's the battle system and you know what, I don't hate it. Dare I say, it's the strongest element of the game. People rag about the lack of XP as if it's some cardinal RPG sin, but plenty of great RPGs do away with XP, including the Battle Network series which has a similar focus on collecting attack moves. If you have the patience to actually try and play by Sticker Star's rules, fighting every battle you see, trying to fill up the Sticker Museum, making as much money as possible to fill your stickerbook with Things, you don't have all that bad of a gameplay loop right there. Battles go by fast, and creating an overpowered album can feel extremely satisfying. The main problem is that the game rarely ever conveys its intentions to you. The fact that all stickers and all attacks are one-time use only means players are going to want to avoid battles out of fear of being left with nothing, at the cost of being left with underpowered stickers and no coins. The fact that Things are very frequently used for overworld puzzles and the game never hints to you which Things you'll be needing means players won't want to use them in battle out of fear of getting stuck on puzzle. And some of the nuances of the battle system like how you can get more coins for finishing battles early aren't even properly conveyed to you. I think Sticker Star is a fine game and I can actually get a solid amount of enjoyment out of it, but it clearly has the most issues and really only has the simple fun of sticker collecting to keep me compelled.

11. Mario & Luigi: Paper Jam

Mario & Luigi: Paper Jam is a game I find myself constantly being harsher on than I think it really deserves. In the moment, Paper Jam is a fun little RPG. It carries over Dream Team's stellar battle system with some additional flourishes like the cards and the addition of Paper Mario, while also improving on the pacing issues its predecessor had quite a bit. The overworld exploration is still fun, the comedic writing is still pretty solid, the soundtrack is more Shimomura goodness, and the story manages to explore a lot of mainstay Mario characters like Toadette, Wiggler, and the Koopalings in a way we hadn't really seen up to this point. I do have a few gameplay gripes like how the game teases you with Bowser's Castle at the midpoint only to make you retread old ground (a Mario & Luigi staple at this point), and the abundance of missions that disrupt the flow of exploration, but for the most part, Paper Jam is a really solid, mechanically sound game.

But you know where this is going, Paper Jam shouldn't have just been solid. It should have been amazing! This was a crossover between the two big Mario RPG franchises, it needed to be a big event but what we got feels so sterile and lacking in ambition? Sure, seeing classic Mario characters get more depth is cool, but that feels like a consolation for the fact that we barely got any nods to either series. The only RPG-original character in Paper Jam is a flanderized Starlow, and most of the locations you visit are just generic NSMB biomes. And speaking of which, while Paper Jam isn't inherently unfunny, it easily suffers the most in terms of the sincerity issues Mario & Luigi games tend to struggle with. Paper Jam is so focused on giving you a good laugh that it feels entirely unconcerned with making you invested in what's going on, which means that the one time it actually tries a sincere emotional beat with Wiggler's fake death, it feels completely tonally jarring. While Paper Jam is a better game than Sticker Star, I almost find it to be the bigger disappointment because at least Sticker Star tried something new. Paper Jam just feels like Alphadream going through the motions.

10.  Mario & Rabbids: Kingdom Battle

As I've said here plenty of times, I'm not a tactical RPG guy. It's not impossible for me to like one of them, but even for the ones I do genuinely enjoy like FF Tactics, Disgaea, and Advance Wars, I can't exactly say I'm very good at them either. So while I can acknowledge that Kingdom Battle is a good TRPG, it's just not really my thing. That being said, I appreciate the attempt to make the game more accessible for beginners in a similar fashion to how the Paper Mario games were gateways to turn-based RPGs. The arenas are dynamic, there's a solid amount of customization to give the game some depth, and I really love the more explorative segments in between battles that give the player a bit of time to breathe. From a more objective standpoint, my only real gripe with the gameplay here is that you're stuck having Mario in your three-person party which does limit your options a bit too much.

However, I am also a bit split on Kingdom Battle from a narrative and presentation standpoint. There's no denying that the Mario & Rabbids games look fantastic for the Switch, with the animation quality in particular being absolutely outstanding. Mario's interactions with the Rabbids are so charmingly and expressively animated, making this the most charismatic the Rabbids have ever been (and this is coming from someone who actually likes those freaks). However, while the moment-to-moment gags are pretty great, Kingdom Battle is pretty light on plot. It has a very rigid world-based structure and lacks the stronger overarching plot that its sequel has, and it certainly doesn't help that the world itself has a very blocky and generic feel to it. And as much as I love Kirkhope and his work, even the soundtrack isn't especially standout to me outside of a few tracks. Maybe it's just because Sparks Of Hope upped the ante in pretty much every single aspect here, but as time passes, Kingdom Battle just feels more and more forgettable to me.

That being said, the Donkey Kong DLC is fantastic, a wonderful love letter to the character's history that might genuinely be better than the main game? The music certainly is, Kirkhope really killed it for the DK tracks.

9. Paper Mario: Color Splash

Color Splash is a frustrating game because while it does try to fix most of Sticker Star's big gameplay issues, I'd argue it's a half-step at best and a regression at worst. I genuinely think the battles in Sticker Star are better since they're a lot snappier and faster-paced, compared to Color Splash's battles which drag since you have to slowly sift through and paint your card deck to be able to use a single attack. You do have XP now, but it's only for your paint hammer, and while you now have an NPC in town that tells you which Things you'll need in the future, their implementation in boss fights is straight up a downgrade since you need them to win rather than being able to tank through without them through smart sticker usage. And yet, despite all of these issues, Color Splash isn't just higher than Sticker Star, it's multiple spots higher. That's because everything else about Color Splash is flat-out incredible.

While the story is still fairly basic, it's a real wonder how much having a genuinely good partner in the form of Huey helps me get more invested in what's going on. Hell, I think Huey might even be a Top 3 Mario RPG partner along with Starlow and Vivian. Not only is he an immensely likable and chill dude, but he also has a genuinely strong arc where he goes from a complete coward to a real hero in the end. The comedic writing is also some of the best in the franchise if not in all of gaming, the jokes fly fast and furious and pretty much always land. Beyond the story, the level design is also stellar, taking advantage of the color theming to offer far stranger and more varied environments and setpieces. In what other game can you fight a steak in an RPG boss fight, go on a parallel-universe hopping pirate expedition, partake in a gladiator match, and break the boundaries of Super Mario Bros 3 with Super-esque dimensional flipping? Color Splash genuinely has some of my favorite levels and areas in video game history, and the addition of paint spots does a lot to make me want to explore them even more. Add in the improved HD visuals and audio, and you get a genuinely great game in every way except the battle system, which is my least favorite in the entire franchise. That's the real shame about Color Splash, I could easily see it as a pretty high ranking Mario RPG if it didn't drop the ball so hard with one of the most crucial elements.

8. Mario & Luigi: Partners In Time

Mario & Luigi: Partners In Time has often been held up as the most underappreciated Mario RPG, with many claiming it deserves to be held up alongside Superstar Saga and Bowser's Inside Story as one of the greats. Sadly, I don't agree. Partners In Time is a game with a lot of mechanical issues that really prevent me from loving it as much as I wish it could, so I'm just going to quickly run through a bunch of them. The level design is more barren and linear than in any of the other Mario & Luigi games, there's a serious lack of side content, Stuffwell's relentless tutorials in the first hour are a real slog, the addition of the babies makes both navigation and combat a bit more cumbersome than it needs, and the Bros Items while not deal-breakers are a notable downgrade from the BP system of the other games because of how easy it is to load up on them. But most of all, the balancing is pretty messy all around, arguably even moreso than in Superstar Saga. Depending on which version of the game you'll play, you'll either have encounters with massively overtuned health bars or ones that end way too quickly and the abundance of Bros Attacks with no timer means with enough skill, you can end pretty much every battle in the latter half of the game in a single turn.

That being said, even with all these issues, Partners In Time still has the same strong base that the other Mario & Luigi games have. Hell, there are even a decent amount of improvements over Superstar Saga like the additional buttons and touchscreen streamlining platforming along with the flashier Bros Moves. There's still plenty of memorable and fun locals, and the boss fights have some incredibly fun attack patterns and clever bits of strategy that only get better as the game goes on. That being said, what truly saves this game for me is the atmosphere and presentation. Partners In Time is infamous for being one of the bleakest Mario RPGs, taking place before, during, and after an apocalyptic alien invasion. The Shroobs are a fantastic and menacing threat, and the game never pulls its punches when depicting the horrors of their actions. I kinda love this about Partners In Time though, it gives the game such a uniquely haunting vibe coupled with its darker color palette and Shimomura's phenomenal score. And yet, Partners In Time never really loses that Mario & Luigi charm. It's a blisteringly fast-paced and offbeat whirlwind of an adventure that balances the series' staple humor with the darker elements pretty much flawlessly, making for a really fresh experience even with its many flaws.

7.  Mario & Rabbids: Sparks Of Hope

Since I didn't love Kingdom Battle, I held off on getting Sparks Of Hope since I had kinda just accepted that tactical RPGs probably just weren't worth getting. But then, just last year, it got a free trial thanks to NSO. So I gave it a shot and god damn, this game is good! Sparks Of Hope improves on pretty much all of my issues with Kingdom Battle and then some, while also leaning more on the RPG elements to great effect in my opinion. I can see why some would prefer Kingdom Battle if they wanted a more focused tactical experience, but the addition of leveling and mob encounters really helps with the pacing (and as someone who sucks ass at tactical games, having grinding as an option also really helps get past any potential walls). The battle system itself is also a lot more fun thanks to the newly added movement mechanics, along with the fact that Mario isn't mandatory anymore, thank god. Even the overworld is more fun to explore since the locations are a lot more sprawling, naturalistic, and visually-interesting. There's sidequests! And dungeons! And heaps upon heaps upon heaps of collectibles!

And as I hinted at when talking about Kingdom Battle, Sparks Of Hope also improves upon the presentation in pretty much every way. The graphics are so crisp and clean that people genuinely thought this was a Switch 2 build when it was first announced, and the animations are even more detailed and fluid than ever before. The soundtrack is also a massive step up with Yoko Shimomura and Gareth Coker being brought on to work with Kirkhope, and they all absolutely brought their A-game to this one. But best of all, the story is really strong too. The mystery of Cursa is a really engaging central plot, the Spark Hunters are so fun and charismatic (especially Edge) that I almost forget they're supposed to be Rabbids half the time, and the addition of light voice acting really helps Sparks Of Hope stand out. And once again, the DLC is superb, with the easy standout being Rayman's first proper game appearance in so freaking long. While I will always prefer turn-based battles at the end of the day, Sparks Of Hope is the closest a game in this genre has gotten to really hooking me and that's a very high point of praise.

6. Mario & Luigi: Superstar Saga

Mario & Luigi: Superstar Saga is pretty much the baseline for what a good Mario RPG should do. I can't exactly say it does much wrong. The Beanbean Kingdom is one of the series' most iconic original settings for a reason, its open layout makes it a joy to explore and the way it messes around with your expectations of what a Mario location can be really helps establish the offbeat tone that Mario & Luigi as a series would become known for. The battle system is also really fun, expanding on Alphadream's prior experience with Tomato Adventure to create a more skill-based and interactive turn-based system than anything we've really seen up to this point. The ability to tune the difficulty of the Bros Attacks to your own skill level gives the combat a decent level of mastery, and the way your overworld and battle progression are intertwined is absolutely masterful. Beyond the strong base gameplay, the pacing is incredibly tight, the art direction and animation is some of the most vibrant and expressive on the GBA, and Shimomura's soundtrack is iconic even if it's held back a tad by the hardware. As I said, there really isn't much to dislike here. Superstar Saga is just an incredibly solid package all around.

However, I do personally think Superstar Saga is a bit overhyped, especially compared to its more developed successors. While there's something to be said about the simplicity of SS's action commands, I'll admit that I vastly prefer the flashier attacks that later games would introduce. The difficulty balancing is also pretty off, since the open overworld means it's very easy to accidentally overlevel, trivializing the rest of the game up until the difficulty spike of a final boss. Speaking of the ending, the mostly stellar pacing does come to a pretty severe halt once you arrive at Joke's End which is both the worst and longest area of the game by a pretty wide margin. On top of all that, I'm also not huge on the story of Superstar Saga. It's an incredibly funny game, but it does feel more like a series of sketches than an actual cohesive narrative. Compared to my gripes with something like Partners In Time, these issues are all a lot smaller and more nitpicky, but they do play a part in me not placing Superstar Saga as high as some others. It's an incredibly consistent game and stands out as a high point in the GBA's library, but it doesn't quite reach the highs of my favorite Mario RPGs.

5. Mario & Luigi: Dream Team & Brothership

This is where I'm going to start ranking some games together, and I think Dream Team and Brothership sharing the same spot makes total sense since they share very similar strengths and weaknesses. So yeah, let's get the bad stuff out of the way first. Both of these games have some serious pacing issues, though to different degrees. Dream Team is infamous for its slow, tutorial-heavy start, and while I personally wasn't bothered by it quite as much as others, I can't exactly say it's not noticeable. Once it does pick up, though, Dream Team's pacing does start to level out. Brothership's pacing is a lot more schizophrenic. Its story is purposefully a slow burn so it mostly keeps a pretty deliberate pace, but even taking that into account, the first stretch takes way too long to dole out most of your abilities, and the multiple moments of backtracking in the second half really drag the momentum to a halt. The pacing issues across both games are certainly glaring, to the point where I'd totally understand if they're deal-breakers for you, but man is there so much to love if you just stick it through.

On every other level except the pacing, Dream Team is Alphadream working at the peak of their craft. The introduction of fully 3D environments make exploring the overworld more of a joy than ever before, and the battle system is probably my favorite in the entire franchise with how complex, engaging, flashy, and purely fun pretty much all of the action commands are. The Giant Luigi battles are probably my favorite of the gimmick fights in these later games too, such exhilarating and massive spectacles that I always look forward too. The story takes a more earnest approach than what Alphadream is normally used to, delving into Luigi's psych and character in some really affecting and compelling ways, and using the setting of Pi'llo Island to pay homage to the entire series through the abundance of returning faces from previous entries. And speaking of which, the atmosphere of Pi'llo Island is just so enchanting. The ethereal landscapes and color palettes are just gorgeous, and I've already raved about how incredible Shimomura's soundtrack for the game is. I mean it when I say that Dream Team knocks pretty much everything out of the park, it's an incredibly addictive RPG that hits in a way none of the other Mario & Luigi games have. If the pacing was ironed out, this could easily rival or even surpass Bowser's Inside Story as my favorite game in the series. 

Brothership is a much stranger case. Being made by Acquire, it almost feels like its own thing entirely. With the more strategic battle system and more character-focused story, it almost feels like some strange Mario & Luigi/Paper Mario hybrid and I think that kinda rules. However, as I said, many of Brothership's greatest strengths are shared with Dream Team's. The overworld traversal is similarly strong in how it makes the most of its 3D landscapes, and the battle system easily ranks as one of the best in the franchise with the added cinematic flair and fun battle plug system. I still think I prefer Dream Team's battle system overall since Brothership has some pretty irritating enemy attacks at points, but it comes damn close. The presentation is also quite storng too, with its stunningly expressive cel-shaded art direction and infectiously catchy tropical-sounding score that grows on me more and more by the day. But the place where Brothership really excels is the story which, now that I've finished it, I can definitively say is one of my favorites in any Mario RPG. The slow burn and focus on character development is an acquired taste, especially when it comes at the cost of the comedic side of the series, but it makes for one of the most sincere and emotionally affecting tales a Mario game has ever told. I've never been this attached to a cast of characters in a Mario RPG, from Connie to Snoutlet to IDLE to Technikki to Burnadette & Chilliam, to even all the returning characters like Starlow and Bowser Jr getting some really great development here. And that final act goes shockingly hard in so many ways, what a game. 

While Dream Team managed to get me to fall in love with Pi'llo Island through its atmosphere, Brothership got me to fall in love with Concordia through the characters that inhabited it. Either way, both games managed to make up for their rough pacing with strong gameplay fundamentals and stellar world-building. They may not be my first picks for a replay, but I will never forget the time I spent with them.

4. Super Mario RPG

Considering the time it came out, Super Mario RPG really is such a weird entry on the console. Stuff like having a more involved overworld with platforming, and action commands in combat weren't really a thing yet. But to this day, Super Mario RPG still feels like such an oddball in all the best ways. Sure, both the Paper Mario games and the Mario & Luigi games built off its groundwork, but neither of those series have the sheer Squaresoft DNA that this first installment has. Like, this really is just Final Fantasy but with action commands, and that's really cool. And yet, Super Mario RPG doesn't really feel its age either, it holds up incredibly well. All the remake really did was spruce up the visuals and add a few small mechanics to flesh out the combat a bit, but otherwise, it's so intuitively designed that anyone playing it for the first time wouldn't notice it was made over 25 years ago.

But beyond the circumstances of its creation, I think what I like about Super Mario RPG is that it has all the best strengths of all the best Mario RPGs, just in a more compact form. It's got an involved overworld that's fun to explore and filled with charming secrets and easter eggs and a great battle system that combines turn-based strategy with skill-based timing, but it's also an incredibly briskly-paced thrill ride that you can beat in a mere 10 hours that never lets up for anything. Even Superstar Saga had a Joke's End, but Super Mario RPG never has a dull moment. The story also strikes a perfect balance between strong comedic writing, and fleshing out the Mushroom Kingdom and its characters. SMRPG is easily one of the funniest Mario RPGs for its stellar slapstick gags, but it also has a lovable dynamic between the main party and really strong character arcs for Bowser and Mallow that anchor the story in sincerity. Like, gawk about the isometric visuals all your want, they allow for expressive and dynamic posing the likes of which the SNES has never seen. And that applies double in the remake where you can see the character's expressions a lot more clearly. Top it off with yet another fantastic Shimomura score, and you get one of Squaresoft's most joyous games. Despite its simplicity, Super Mario RPG is just too impossible for me to hate and easily ranks as the most replayable Mario RPG to this day.

3. Paper Mario & Paper Mario: The Thousand Year Door

 I've been very split on whether I prefer the first Paper Mario or The Thousand Year Door. They both have such drastically different strengths and weaknesses, and yet, they also both have the same core appeal. These are, after all, the only two truly "classic" Paper Mario games. The iconic battle system, the distinct blend of cheeky humor and touching character moments, the intricate world-building, the more diorama aesthetic, all of which are traits only these two games can really claim. For a while, I stood by Paper Mario being the superior entry and trashed TTYD any chance I got. Then, I played and fell in love with the TTYD remake in a way that I never had with the original so I shifted to it being my preferred of the two. But now that a lot of time has passed, I think I've leveled out to both games being roughly even, for their own unique reasons.

Paper Mario is the comfiest and most consistent Mario RPG experience. It was also my first Mario RPG period, so it's probably the one I have the strongest personal connection with. The pastel, pop-up book presentation inspired by Yoshi's Island is still unlike anything else in the franchise, and stands out as the best-looking visuals the N64 has to offer. The quirky soundtrack also really accentuates the comfy vibes with its simple but catchy melodies, wild genre shifts, and occasional dips into pure lo-fi. While the story itself isn't quite as powerful as other entries, I also love how it expands on the basic "Bowser kidnaps Peach" plot and the Mushroom Kingdom as a whole. This is still probably my favorite iteration of the setting to this day. On a gameplay level, Paper Mario isn't as complicated as its sequel, but it's far better balanced and paced. There aren't many moments when Paper Mario drags or forces you to backtrack all that far, and the addition of a spin move (which later games are sorely missing) helps to keep up the pace. The battle system does a lot with very little, encouraging you to strategize with the items and badges you're given while not being too exploitable like many of the mid 2000s entries. While I think SMRPG is more inherently replayable due to its short length, Paper Mario is the entry I've replayed the most because it's just pure, distilled fun the whole way through.

The Thousand Year Door, on the other hand, is a lot more challenging, thematically speaking. It's got higher highs and lower lows than 64, but those highs are so high that the game sticks with you all the more. The battle system may be more exploitable, but the abundance of new mechanics and options to consider make it more fun to engage in regardless. The overworld progression may not be as fast, but the locations you visit are far more interesting and dynamic. The overall presentation is as strong as ever too, especially in the remake with its multiple great soundtracks and its gorgeous diorama look that feels like the perfect style for the Paper Mario series going forward. But it's the story that's the real standout compared to 64, as while I have a few gripes with it, it does a lot more to invest you in the world and characters. The partners are far more developed and interesting, with Vivian in particular standing out as one of my favorites for pretty obvious reasons. Rogueport is a much stronger hub in how it goes from abrasive and unwelcoming to feeling like home by the end of the game. There's more memorable running subplots like the mafia drama, the humor is more dark and biting, and the game more frequently resorts to telling its story through the gameplay in really striking and memorable ways. Similarly to Dream Team and Brothership, I was so invested in TTYD's world that I just didn't want to leave by the end of playing the remake.

Paper Mario 64 and TTYD are the most classic Paper Mario games, so to speak. There's an enduring charm to both of them and their battle systems still hold up as some of my favorites in any Mario RPG. While I wouldn't call either of them these unimpeachable masterpieces that every Mario RPG should aspire to being, I do very much understand why they have such a broad, long-lasting appeal. There's just something magical about them.

2. Mario & Luigi: Bowser's Inside Story

 As far as the pure RPGs go, Bowser's Inside Story is my favorite Mario RPG ever made. It's so good, too good even. I'm sure you've noticed most of the top of this list is occupied by Paper Mario, and that's mostly just because Bowser's Inside Story is so good that every other Mario & Luigi game suffers by comparison. I've gone on about how incredibly well-paced BiS is as an RPG before, it almost feels like it always knows when you're about to get tired of an area or enemy type before tossing you a new one. But unlike Superstar Saga and Super Mario RPG, it's not too short or too easy either. This is a beefy adventure, and the fact that it manages to go on for almost 20 hours without having any fat to it is really impressive. Beyond the pacing, the battle system keeps the flashier Bros Attacks and quality of life improvements that PiT added while smoothing over pretty much all of that game's rougher edges, the soundtrack is one of the most iconic and catchy in the series, and the comedic writing is flat-out the best in the entire franchise. Color Splash and SMRPG come close, but Bowser's Inside Story is the funniest Mario RPG in my opinion, filled to the brim with iconic jokes, gags, and line deliveries, partially thanks to the reintroduction of Fawful as main villain.

But the thing that really elevates Bowser's Inside Story is in the name. This is the only game in the entire franchise that makes Bowser not just a playable character but a pivotal one that all of its design revolves around, and it's for the better. Playing as Bowser is an absolute joy, maybe even more fun than the Mario Bros himself. Alphadream expertly toes the line between making Bowser feel like a badass power trip without having him trivialize the game, and the way the overworld is built around both Bowser and the Mario Bros is incredibly cool. Bowser is also the beating heart of the story, as his growth into a reluctant hero forms the backbone of the narrative that adeptly balances the stellar comedy with solid emotional stakes. And of course, I also can't go without talking about the introduction of my beloved Starlow, whose interactions with Bowser are always a ton of fun to watch.

Bowser's Inside Story isn't just a great Mario RPG. I think it deserves to be held up as one of the greatest RPGs in general. It's just nonstop, propulsive inventiveness that never lets up for its entire runtime.

1. Super Paper Mario & Paper Mario: The Origami King

Super Paper Mario & The Origami King are the biggest oddballs in the entire Mario RPG pantheon. One may even argue they're the black sheeps. Super Paper Mario is technically an action RPG, but only barely. On almost every other level, it's so drastically different, it almost feels wrong to call it a part of the same series. The Origami King is more like the RPG entries on a surface level, but in practice, it's the closest any of these games have come to feel more like a straight-forward adventure game. And yet, despite how drastically different and bafflingly singular they are, these two games hit so different. They're truly unlike any other gaming experiences I've ever had, and I love them for all their weirdness.

On pretty much every level except the battle system, The Origami King is an absolute masterpiece. I know this sounds similar to what I said about Color Splash but it's amplified here. The overworld is easily my favorite in any Mario RPG, with engaging platforming and puzzles, large open spaces to explore, tons upon tons of collectibles, and an interconnected layout that helps the world feel more cohesive than the previous two games. The papercraft visuals are at their absolute best here, and the soundtrack still stands out as one of the greatest and most diverse in all of gaming. The story is the first one in years to lean towards a more character-driven narrative, with an incredibly earnest tone that Brothership would proceed to run all the way with. Yet unlike Brothership, The Origami King still manages to almost rival Color Splash in pure hilarity. There are so many memorable and wacky setpieces here from the big play sequence to the disco pyramid to the elaborate Zelda reference, but there's also a lot of really touching moments like Olivia's development, anything involving the Bowser family, and especially Bobby's arc. The only subpar element in The Origami King is of course the ring-based battle system, but as a fan of puzzle games, I can enjoy it enough that it doesn't detract too much from the overall experience. Everything else is so magical and consistently fun that despite that one issue, The Origami King is a game that I just get choked up even thinking about.

Super Paper Mario is almost a similar case but even more extreme. You can definitely pin down a lot of flaws with Super like its trivial combat and several tedious puzzles, but I'm once again willing to put up with them because this game manages to accomplish things no other game really does. I've never played a game that leans this hard on being able to flip from 2D to 3D, and the novelty of it all never really wears off. The way Super manages to translate tropes and mechanics from its direct predecessor into this new 2D platforming action RPG style is so incredibly seamless that I've seen people call it an honorary sequel to TTYD, and it's not hard to see why. The soundtrack is once again one of my personal favorites in all of gaming, the digital-inspired aesthetic is so aggressively 2000s in all the best ways, and then there's the story. Super Paper Mario's story feels like a logical extension of TTYD. It has an even larger scale and sense of intensity, it has even stronger emotional stakes in the form of Tippi and Bleck's relationship, it has even darker and more meta comedy, it plays around with the way the medium can tell stories in even more interesting ways, and it has some of the best characterization for Bowser, Peach, and Luigi. Nothing in any other Mario RPG even comes close to topping the shocking hilarity of the Fort Francis sequence, or the memorably tedious events at Merlee's Mansion, or the stunningly bleakness of the World Of Nothing, or the sheer intensity of the entire final act at Castle Bleck. Super's gameplay is fun and novel and all, but it all works to service this absolutely incredible story.

For as much as I like to tout gameplay over story, I feel like RPGs are the one genre where that doesn't really apply for me. If I had to pick between an RPG with perfect gameplay and mechanics, and an RPG that put its emotional hooks into me with stellar storytelling, I'm picking the latter any day of the way. From a gameplay standpoint, both Super and The Origami King are fairly experimental and imperfect, but their sheer novelty combined with how well they manage to prop up their strong narratives still make them stand out as my favorite Mario "RPGs". 

And that's why I love these games at the end of the day, because they manage to take a fairly story-light franchise and try to give them genuine depth that the mainline entries probably never will. Mario RPGs can expand upon the veteran characters and introduce a ton of lasting new ones, they can tell more emotionally-driven stories or go even further into cheeky comedy, and they can take really interesting risks both mechanically and story-wise. I play Mario RPGs to see how Nintendo can push the limits of what a Mario game can be and most of the best ones (aka Sparks Of Hope onward) manage to do that with flying colors.

Other Thoughts On Game Remakes

A while back, I made a post about remakes, looking through a bunch of more recent remakes to see whether or not they were collectively a good or a bad thing. To be blunt, I'm not especially proud of that post, it felt really oversimplified and lacking in nuance. The fact is that there are always going to be good and bad remakes, and whether or not they are good or bad depends on the person. You can't just calculate if remakes as a concept are good by pure math.

Since then, remakes have had some pretty fiery discourse in the year 2024, with the release of some fairly divisive remakes of Persona 3 Reload, The Thousand Year Door, and Silent Hill 2. I've seen many people just straight up swear off the concept of remakes entirely this year, and considering how common they feel now and how much discourse they spawn, I can't exactly blame them from getting tired of it all. However, it did also cause me to think about my thoughts on remake culture as of late. Why do I endlessly praise some remakes for being incredible modernizations that sand over all my issues with the original and at times replace it entirely, while also harshly criticizing other remakes for exactly that? Why I am I fine with the Super Mario RPG remake adding in an unnecessary amount of quality of life features that arguably make the game too easy, while also turning my nose up at the Return To Dream Land remaster for doing the same thing?

I think what I was missing with that first post was that no remakes are objectively better or worse than the originals. The quality of a remake relative to the original is entirely based on the person playing it. Discussion of remakes is an inherently vulnerable thing, you can't talk about them without opening up about your own history with the source material. I grew up with Return To Dream Land, it was one of my big childhood games, and some of the quirks that others may criticize like the do-or-die Energy Spheres or the precise Stomper Boot timing are things about the game that I've grown to find charming. While I played plenty of Super Mario RPG as a kid, I can't say I had anywhere near the same emotional investment to it, so any changes it might have had didn't really phase me. I was just happy to have a version of the game that kept a similar artstyle while boasting more detail.

That's not to say you need to be emotionally invested in the source material to prefer it to its remake, though. Sometimes people might just... prefer the original for their own reasons. The N Sane Trilogy is loved by many fans for its more realistic visuals, smoother movement, and improved save features, but despite never growing up with Crash, I simply prefer how the PS1 versions play. They just feel better to me, and that's that. I've even seen people voice their preferences for remakes that I thought were pretty much untouchable, like preferring the more isolating and obtuse vibe of NES Metroid to Zero Mission, or preferring the lighter B-movie charm of Resident Evil to its bleaker REmake. I said that remakes "need to be a love letter" to be good, but that doesn't guarantee everyone will love it. Besides, I'm sure Vicarious Visions put their heart into the N Sane Trilogy so who am I to say it's not a passion project because I didn't like it? The fact is that there will never be a remake that everyone will prefer to the original, there will always be that one change that sets someone off.

However, I still think remakes are important, even if not everyone is going to be welcome to their changes. For whatever people a remake alienates, there will probably be just as many people who discover one of their new favorite games through these remakes. Like, for as easy as it is to just tell someone to emulate the original, not everyone knows how to do that or is even willing to learn. The fact is that remakes and rereleases are the best way to re-introduce a game to a wider audience, and maybe also people who didn't even like the original. I've seen the argument that remakes are inherently worse because the source material was made that way for a reason and any change is just messing with the original vision, but that's not true. No game has a spotless development, and sometimes developers may genuinely just regret decisions they made the first time (the Ocarina/Majora 3D remakes being a notable example of this).

For me, The Thousand Year Door is the best example of this. While I never hated TTYD, it was originally a game that I was incredibly critical of, only for its remake to address pretty much all of my complaints and win me over in the process. Sure, the remake did have a few downgrades like the easier Pit Of 100 Trials and certain music tracks not sounding quite as good, but the diminished backtracking, more tactile visuals, and especially having a canonically trans Vivian are way more important to me personally. Vivian being trans is a special case because it was pretty much always the developer's intention, the localization just wrote it out because it was 2004. So that's just a case of the remake straight-up affirming the game's original vision, and it gave trans people another character they can see themselves in, in the form of Vivian. That's why remakes are important, because they can leave their own unique mark on players that the original game may not have been able to reach.

So ultimately, I think my verdict on the "original vs remake" debate is... both. Both is good. I'm glad we get remakes because they allow more players to discover old classics, and they serve as a way for developers to address feedback and concerns that fans had towards the original. However, the original game should also be readily available for those that already love them the way they are, and that's sadly the big issue. Not every game can be like Metroid Zero Mission, not every remake includes the original bundled in, and there are a lot of cases where the remake is the only version of a game that's legally available. At the end of the day, that's the biggest tragedy here, and the area where companies and developers are failing us the most.

Remakes aren't inherently good or inherently bad, and with how personal discussion about remakes can be, I don't think we'll ever find an "objective" answer to the matter. But as long as the original exists in some form, a remake, remaster, or rerelease existing doesn't harm it in any way, it only further extends its reach. More options is always a good thing in my book, so even if not every remake lands for me, I'd say remakes as a whole are generally a net positive.

Mario & Luigi Brothership: Early Impressions

So yeah, as I said in my last post, I got Mario & Luigi: Brothership as a gift. It kinda felt like a big wrench in my plans for the new year at the time, since I purposefully held off on getting it due to its infamous length and divisive nature. Considering I tend to not beat lengthy RPGs unless it's under very specific circumstances, I wasn't sure if I'd actually have the patience to stick it through, especially if I ended up not liking it. So to make things easier on myself, I'm just going to give my relatively early impressions after playing Brothership for the first 10-or-so hours, as in up to the third sea. I'd say that's a pretty good place to gauge whether or not the game is working for me.

So, what do I think so far? Well, honestly I'm kinda mad. I put off getting this game for a month because of all the negativity surrounding it. I probably would've put off getting it for even longer if I hadn't gotten it as a gift. With the way people talked about Brothership, I was expecting an absolute mess of a game but... no! I'm actually really liking Brothership. It's a fun Mario RPG, really fun even. It certainly has its flaws and I probably wouldn't call it a top-tier entry in the series, but it's a totally solid Mario & Luigi game that does so much right.

The main premise of Brothership is that Mario, Luigi, Peach, Bowser, Starlow, and a whole bunch of other Mario characters have been teleported over to this plug-themed world called Concordia which has been fractured into a whole bunch of different islands. So now you have to sail around, find the various islands of Concordia, and reunite them while also stopping whichever evil force is trying to keep them apart. As far as the core plot goes, it's not anything particularly special so far. The villains are fun but don't have too much going on yet, and it's very obvious early on that Brothership is a game about connection, and it lays down these themes pretty thick. The comedy is also admittedly not as snappy or prevalent as it has been in prior Mario & Luigi games. Not to say Brothership didn't make me laugh, because it definitely did, but it's not as uproariously funny as something like Bowser's Inside Story. And yet, that's not really all that bad of a thing because that's not what Brothership's story is primarily trying to achieve. But at its core, Brothership is a slow burn, character-driven narrative. Over the course of the game, you'll slowly meet a large array of different characters, each with their own struggles, subplots, sidequests, and contributions to the narrative. The hub of Shipshape Island starts out pretty barren, but as the game goes on, it slowly gets populated with people from the other islands and really starts to feel like a home base you can get attached to. It may be different from your average Mario RPG story, but I honestly really vibed with this approach, it feels very akin to a Trails or Pokemon Mystery Dungeon game in how it slowly eases you into the world to set up future plot points.

But none of this would work is Brothership didn't have a strong cast of characters, but thankfully, it does, boasting both memorable new cast members and plenty of great returning faces. Connie and Snoutlet are great partners, super charming and wholesome, and helpful without being obtrusive. The IDLE crew is a ton of fun, especially once Peach and Starlow join them. Maykit's poetic dialogue was surprisingly charming, and Technikki quickly became a standout for her cool design, smart and friendly personality, and surprisingly real arc. While I haven't gotten to those parts yet myself, I also need to praise how Starlow gets a sidequest hinting at her dynamic with Bowser, and how Bowser Jr's character development is continued from prior games. Even Mario and Luigi feel more emotive than ever before, with their brotherly dynamic shown in full force. But despite the size of its cast, not a single character feels like they're being lost in the shuffle, everyone gets a chance to interact with the other characters and make their voices heard during major story events. So yeah, I'm really enjoying Brothership's story so far. I think there's a place for more deliberately-paced RPG stories like that of Brothership and more frenetically-paced RPG stories like that of Bowser's Inside Story, one approach isn't inherently better than the other.

The main gameplay loop, as expected, has you visit a variety of different islands and work your way to the lighthouse at the end of each of them. While the early game definitely suffers from having a few too many forest-themed islands, I generally found these islands fun to explore since they balance fun platforming and varied puzzle-solving quite well. Being the first properly 3D Mario & Luigi game, the exploration in Brothership definitely reminds me of the more recent Paper Mario games in how each island almost feels like a 3D Mario stage in its own right. I also like how the world has a real metroidvania feel to it, as I'm constantly running into paths I can't access yet and collectibles tantalizingly out of reach that make me want to return in the future with new abilities. My biggest concern with the overworld in Brothership was the fact that you aren't really able to directly control Luigi like you could in the previous games. In Brothership, Luigi follows along you automatically, and while you can make him jump, it's usually more efficient to instruct him to move on his own. In theory, I thought this was the dumbest change Nintendo could've made, but in execution, I do kinda get it? This definitely feels like a response to the shift towards more three-dimensional movement, and 90% of the time, it feels pretty natural. That being said, this is the first game in the series where Mario and Luigi can get actively desynced from each other and that always feels pretty crummy.

The combat, on the other hand, is left almost completely untouched. It's just as great as always. The action commands are snappy, enemy attacks and animations are well-telegraphed and clear, and every time I enter into a battle, it feels like the series hasn't even left in the first place. One notable change is that standard attacks are more complex, often playing out like one of the Bros Attacks in Superstar Saga. This had me worried at first since the more complex attacks in Partners In Time are a big reason why I find it to be one of the weaker entries, but the timing is generous enough that they didn't feel super overwhelming here. My actual gripe is the fact that you can't select Luigi's actions with the B button, it really just throws me off. The bros attacks work pretty much the same as well, and they're just as fun as ever. Definitely in the vein of the more interactive and flashy ones from the 3DS games (which is a good thing in my eyes), and the camerawork does a great job at making these attacks feel exciting without losing clarity. And that's what I think this combat system primarily excels at. Each fight feels like this cinematic fluidly-animated spectacle but it never gets in the way of the actual mechanics and button timing. The one big new system is the addition of these Battle Plugs that are these buffs that you can equip at the cost of using up their limited charges. It definitely has the potential for a decent amount of strategy since you're encouraged to constantly be switching up your Plugs and changing up your tactics, but I feel I'm still a bit too early on in the game to really be taking advantage of this.

Speaking of which, the biggest criticism a lot of people seem to have with Brothership is the pacing and I can definitely see why, especially compared to other Mario & Luigi games which are known for their blistering pace. I think the biggest culprit is how slowly certain abilities and characters are doled out to the player. It takes way too long the player to get access to the full battle system, and it definitely takes too long for mainstay characters like Peach or Bowser to show up. The load times also aren't great, entering battles takes a bit too long and I really hope Nintendo's future console is able to improve on this. These are issues that I definitely won't defend. However, I think the majority of the pacing accusations are a bit overblown. You don't spend very long in any particular location, cutscenes can almost all be sped up or skipped entirely which is a rarity for Nintendo, and the tutorials which are often the worst thing about a Mario & Luigi game have now be relegated to brisk pop-ups that can be quickly dismissed. Even backtracking to previous islands isn't that bad and sailing around isn't that tedious since the game quickly gives you a whole bunch of fast travel options to speed up the process. I just really don't think Brothership's pacing is that much worse than your average RPG, and even compared to other Mario RPGs, it mostly falls roughly in line with games like TTYD, Origami King, and Dream Team for me, all of which I still really like in spite of their pacing issues.

Putting aside the aforementioned loading times, though, I do think Brothership is a very pretty game. The cel-shaded look is a joy to look at, the environments are incredibly vibrant, and the characters are very expressive. This applies the most to Mario and Luigi themselves, and I'd argue that this is the most lively the two brothers have ever looked. There's a real Gamecube vibe to how much everything squashes and stretches and it really makes for a great translation of the original M&L artstyle. It's not the most polished game out there, Brothership definitely has its fair share of jankier animations, but the sheer charm of the visuals vastly overpowers any seams. On the topic of sound design, I also love the cute character voices, and the soundtrack is not that bad. Obviously, I was very skeptical since Shimomura is my favorite composer and replacing her is such a tough task, but while it's definitely not on her level, Hideki Sakamoto did a fine job. The area themes in particular I found to be really pleasing and comfy to listen to, and the battle themes while unusual-sounding at first do really grow on you.

Overall, I'd say Mario & Luigi: Brothership is a good time so far. Considering this is essentially a new start for the Mario & Luigi series with a new developer, this is a more than solid first attempt that I would love to see expanded upon. It certainly has its fair share of rough edges like the slow rollout of abilities, iffy optimization, weaker soundtrack, and the Luigi controls, but those are all nitpicks in the grand scheme of things. At its core, Brothership nails most of the fundamentals of what I like from a JRPG. The world design and exploration is solid, the combat is fantastic, the story is fantastic, and the presentation is charming. Even if it's not on the level of a Thousand Year Door or a Bowser's Inside Story, it's at the very least around the level of something like Dream Team and that's more than good enough for me.

Tentative Score: 4.5/5 Stars

Update: So I did end up beating Brothership making it the longest RPG I have ever beaten. It was good, and most of my early impressions did hold true. The story definitely kept getting better over time with the ending in particular being incredibly emotionally effective, and I think I feel comfortable calling it one of the best Mario RPG stories right alongside Super Paper Mario. My biggest gripe aside from the obvious pacing issues is that the combat got a tad frustrating in the second half with how lengthy certain enemy attacks were, but that's really it. Overall, I absolutely adored Brothership and I think it's a game that will really stick with me for years to come.

If I had gotten Brothership before making my end of the year list, I'd probably have placed it right above Princess Peach Showtime. And as far as my current ranking of the Mario RPGs go, maybe I'll save that for when I finish Brothership...