Super Mario RPG: Legend of the Seven Stars

"Super Mario RPG: Legend of the Seven Stars is a legend that almost earns seven stars!"

Super Mario RPG is the first RPG that stars Mario. Super Mario RPG was also one of the last games to be released on the SNES, about four months before the release of the next console, the Nintendo 64. Did Nintendo give a good finale to the SNES?

This is a Mario game. The story must be that Bowser kidnaps Peach and Mario has to go recue her, right? Not exactly. The first five minutes of the game is pretty much when the story revolves around this, but after that, everything changes. A giant sword stabs right through the top of Bowser's castle and Peach, Mario, and Bowser all fly in different directions away from the castle, and the path to Bowser's castle falls, meaning there is no way back into Bowser's castle. It turns out that a new villain by the name of Smithy is trying to rule the world. Mario must stop him, but cannot reach him do to the fallen pathway to Bowser's castle, where he must go to defeat Smithy. In order to reach him, he must collect seven stars, which are unfortunately kept in captivity in different places thanks to Smithy himself.

Later in the story, Bowser wants his castle back, but he knows he can't defeat Smithy alone, so just this once, he is willing to join forces with Mario so that he can get his castle back. Three other characters also join Mario's party, and two of them are new to the Mario series.

The story is overall very different than other Mario stories, which makes this one quite unique and interesting.

In part of the game you battle enemies and bosses in RPG style (you already knew that, right?), in the other part you explore and complete puzzles and quests by walking in not just left and right like most of the SNES games, but in eight different directions almost like a 3-D adventure! This makes the game put two different worlds in one, and they are both very good.

While battling, you use the four buttons on the right side of your controller to select different options. A is used soley for physical attack, the attack you use with your equipted weapon. Y is used for special or magic attack, a choice between several attacks to spend flower points for the use of a move where you hold or press buttons, or rotate the control pad. These attacks can have some extra effects on the enemy as well. X is used for items, which you can use to heal, gain more flower points, attack monsters strongly along with side-effects, or a few other things. B is used to simply guarantee a defence for the turn or run away from a non-boss battle, which is sometimes successful, and sometimes isn't.

When you attack or defend, you press B or A to try to add more damage to your physical attack or reduce your enemy's physical attack. This mixes the strategy in this game with a little skill, spicing the game up a little more, and making it interesting and fun.

You have a total of five party members by the time you have all party members, but you can only have three battle at a time, and Mario must always be one of them. Each character has their own strenghths and weaknesses, and different magic/special attacks. This adds more strategy and ways to play to the game.

Every battle rewards you coins, which you use to buy items, armor, and weapons. Armor increases a character's defence, while weapons increase a character's attack and change the way you perform their physical attack. Battles also reward experience points, which level you up. When you level up, you can increase hit points, the amount of health you have, power, how strong your attack and defence are, or magic, how strong your magic attack and defence are.

In the exploring portion of the came, you can still level up by grabbing rare invincibility stars in chests, which make you become invincible, and if you run into an enemy, you automatically win the battle without battling! All level-ups are done after the invincibility wears off. Invincibility stars aren't very common though.

Some stores sell items, and some sell armor and weapons. Armor and weapons are usually more expensive then items, but are definitly worth their price. You can also sell to stores as well, but if you buy something and sell it back, you only get a fraction of what you payed for. Your inventory can only hold so much, unfortunately, but if you had unlimited space, the game would most likely be easier, so this keeps the difficulty high.

Puzzles, quests, and minigames are also done in the exploring part of the game as well. Puzzles are slightly difficult in some cases, and maybe quests at times, too. The minigames which come in a large amount are all very fun, and can be played over and over again. Minigames also award frog coins, which are special coins that can't be used in most stores.

The gameplay is the strongest part of the game. Nintendo and Squaresoft did a terrific job with this and knew that gameplay had to be focused on the most to make a very great game.

The graphics in this game are simply some of the best for the SNES. It's not a 2-D platformer like most of the SNES games, but a 3-D RPG! The sprites and backrounds are very solid and stick out to you. Some magic/special attacks have unique graphics of their own as well! I can tell Nintendo and Squaresoft took their time on the graphics, which is probably why the game came out very late in the SNES era.

The music is nice to listen to in a large portion of the game. I have a personal favorite soundtrack in the game, and others are bound to find one too, as there is a large amount of music in the game do to how large the game is itself. The music isn't hateable at all. However, there is one specific soundtrack that gets slightly repetitive, which is the one that plays whenever you fight regular enemies, but players get use to it quite quickly.

The sound is probably the only fall in the game, but just a little, and I mean a little. The sound is good and all, infact some of the sounds are roots of Super Mario Bros., but there is a slight amount of sounds with slightly low quality. There are also a few sounds out there that can get very repetitive, like the jumping sound for example. In other games, like Paper Mario, jumping is not a very common thing, but in this game it is definitely more common, causing it to get slightly repetitive.

The game is very long. It will take you atleast 10-15 hours to beat on your first playthrough. After you beat the game, there is still a little bit to do. There are a few secrets hidden deep in the game, which I won't say since that would be spoiling, and you might end up trying to max your level out as well. Minigames are also a good reason to come back to playing the game. But most of all, you might come back to this game to experience its true greatness a second time, and perhaps a third and fourth time, maybe a fifth time. Okay, I think you get the idea.

Super Mario RPG may have slightly repetitive sound and music, but the excellent gameplay makes up for that and more on its own! Not to mention the excellent graphics, new story type, and the good side of music. This game must have took a long time to make, no wonder this game wasn't released until the last second! Super Mario RPG is a little expensive these days. It's still worth that slightly expensive price you see, but thanks to the VC on the Wii, which you probably have, you can get this game for a cheap $8!

Reviewer's Score: 9/10, Originally Posted: 06/26/09

Game Release: Super Mario RPG: Legend of the Seven Stars (US, 05/13/96)