Super Mario RPG: Legend of the Seven Stars
From Freepedia
| Super Mario RPG: Legend of the Seven Stars | |
| Developer(s) | Squaresoft |
| Publisher(s) | Nintendo |
| Release date(s) | May 13, 1996 |
| Genre | Adventure, Role-playing game |
| Mode(s) | Single player |
| Platform(s) | Super NES |
Super Mario RPG: Legend of the Seven Stars was the last Mario game made and released for the Super Famicom/Super Nintendo Entertainment System, and was the last Squaresoft-produced game for a Nintendo video game console until 2003, with the debut of Final Fantasy: Crystal Chronicles for the Nintendo GameCube. This was also the first role-playing game (RPG) in the Mario series. It contains token similarities to Chrono Trigger and the Final Fantasy series with a story based on the Mario universe. Since it was an easy-to-play RPG starring Mario, it introduced many long-time Mario fans to RPGs and as such is sometimes seen as an introductory RPG. It is one of very few video games to feature closed captioning, the other being the Paper Mario games.
Contents |
Story
In this game, an extraterrestrial named Smithy takes over Mario's world. In order to stop him Mario and his friends have to find seven star pieces, a form of the collect the pieces plot.
Subplots include helping Mallow find his parents, finding Princess Peach, and helping King Bowser get his keep back. This is the first game in which Mario and Bowser are allied; however, the pair have been reunited since, in games such as Mario and Luigi: Superstar Saga.
Gameplay
The battles featured a cross between platforming and traditional RPG battles. All enemies were seen on the world map; Mario must approach the enemy to begin combat. This allows the player to avoid unwanted battles by jumping over or walking around the foe.
The other wrinkle to the battles was the use of timed button presses and other movements (such as rotating the D-pad or pressing Y repeatedly) to increase, or in a few cases, determine, the power of the moves the characters were using. The constant button presses in between menus kept a player engaged in the battle the whole time, or else it was a lot harder to win. Unlike many RPGs before and after its release, much of the gameplay was outside of monster battles. As a result of Mario's ability to jump, the game played in some parts similar to a 3D platformer.
Audio
The Super Mario RPG musical score was composed by Yoko Shimomura (Front Mission, Kingdom Hearts). She also arranged music by Koji Kondo (Super Mario series) and Nobuo Uematsu (Final Fantasy series) as part of the score. "Beware the Forest's Mushrooms", a cue played in a wooden area of the game, has been remixed by a few people from forest sounds to a computer voice making witty comments about the game.
Sequels
Paper Mario (Nintendo 64), Mario and Luigi: Superstar Saga (Game Boy Advance), and Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door (Nintendo GameCube) and the upcoming Mario & Luigi: Partners in Time are considered to be its spiritual successors. In fact, Paper Mario was originally titled Super Mario RPG 2. However, because of Square's involvement in the original game, direct sequels were not legally possible after the Nintendo-Square split in the mid-1990s. However, some of the original team members (including some from Square) that worked on Super Mario RPG worked on Mario and Luigi: Superstar Saga as well, including director Yoshihiko Maekawa and music composer Yoko Shimomura.
Certain conventions established in the original Super Mario RPG have also carried over to the de facto sequels as well, such as the use of "Flower Points" instead of magic points, timed attacks that require precise button-pressing, and the basing of the collecting of the seven stars on the collecting of the seven stars in this game, although it borrowed the idea from Super Mario World. Paper Mario also took the non-RPG concept from Super Mario RPG and expanded upon it, allowing Mario to jump, hammer, butt stomp, and a variety of other techniques.
References to other games
Super Mario RPG contains many references to other games by Square and Nintendo. Culex of Monstro Town is a reference to Final Fantasy-style bosses and has Final Fantasy-esque battle music (the boss battle theme of Final Fantasy IV (sample ▶(?)), the traditional pre-Final Fantasy VII victory theme (sample ▶(?)), and the Final Fantasy prelude theme (sample ▶(?)) were all reused in this segment). Also, Link and Samus Aran made cameo appearances sleeping in various inns of the game. The enemies Chained Kong and Guerilla bear a resemblence to Donkey Kong. Also within the game are models of Captain Falcon's and Samurai Goroh's F-Zero racers and a Star Fox Arwing. In addition, there is an Easter egg in the Booster Tower area that allows the player to control the original Mario as he appeared in Super Mario Bros. on the Nintendo Entertainment System for a short time. A similar trick (as revealed in Nintendo Power), is also present in Paper Mario, as well as its sequel, Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door.
It should be noted that the Axem Ranger bosses and their mecha are references to the television programs Super Sentai in Japan and Power Rangers in western countries.
Re-release
There have been many fans who've wanted to have Super Mario RPG to be re-released for either the Game Boy Advance or for Nintendo DS for quite some time. However, it seems Nintendo and Square Enix are not inclined toward doing so, thus disappointing fans. An online petition was made and over 18,000 signatures were made and to this day, this still doesn't convince Nintendo or Square. However, the Nintendo Revolution will offer NES, SNES, and N64 games via download, and it has been speculated that Super Mario RPG may be one of the available titles.
See also
External links
| Mario series |
|---|
| Donkey Kong | Mario Bros. | Super Mario Bros. | Super Mario Bros: The Lost Levels | Super Mario Bros. 2 Super Mario Bros. 3 | Super Mario Land | Super Mario World | Super Mario Land 2: 6 Golden Coins Super Mario 64 | Super Mario Sunshine | New Super Mario Bros (tentative title) | Super Mario 128 (tentative title) |
| Mario RPG subseries |
| Super Mario RPG: Legend of the Seven Stars | Paper Mario | Mario & Luigi: Superstar Saga Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door | Mario & Luigi: Partners in Time |
| Alternate versions |
| Super Mario All-Stars | Super Mario Bros. Deluxe | Super Mario Advance | Super Mario Advance 2 Super Mario Advance 3 | Super Mario Advance 4 | Super Mario 64 DS |
| Yoshi games |
| Super Mario World 2: Yoshi's Island | Yoshi | Yoshi's Cookie | Yoshi's Safari | Yoshi's Story | Yoshi Touch & Go Yoshi Topsy-Turvy |
Categories: Mario role-playing games | Super NES games | Square games | 1996 computer and video games
