Well, I'm now playing Paper Mario for the first time!

Good luck on the rest of the game! 

You are gonna need it.

Yeah timing can be tough but luckily most of the bosses aren't that bad, PM2 is harder but I think it's also simpler too. I've notice that PM1 bosses have sort gimmick and having the right partner can greatly ease the fight while PM2 has more slandered fights and more thought on the bosses style/tactic.

Cool looks good so far! It's clear that You don't use Goomario thus you don't get the hints of enemies and bosses, the trick with the Drak Koopas are when they start to grin and spin then that tell you they are about to use their spin jump, my suggestion with them as you'll see them later is Mutijump them so you flip them all over and if it's just a couple then Goombario plus normal jump should keep them at bey. To save FB just target the dizzy ones only. Quake hammer is useful but Multijump is just cheaper to use.

Ah yeah the C Stick, I know what ya mean with it thing, I hit C right then I wanted C Down. Happens a lot in the Port versions of this game. Also yeah I don't like Chap 3 since I tend to run out of FB and I always make sure to have Zap Tap on to deal with the Fuzzies. So enemies do decent damages and there a lot of them so HP items are a must. PM2 was worst for them damn Dazzies.

It doesn't really stack just reset the number. Yeah those Groove guy have that too but I find them less issues then the Dark Koopas. Yeah Lucky Chap 3 really is the only spot I really meed items, everywhere else isn't that bad resource wise. Speaking of Shy guys do you plan of fighting Anti guy or by pass him?

I might try fighting him. Can you still fight him if you come back during a later chapter?

Either way, I'm probably not gonna fight the Anti Guy Squad in Bowser's Castle. Three of those things sounds like hell to fight.

A few quick updates now...

Shy Guy's Toy Box was pretty good, though it really felt short compared to some of the other areaas. I mean, chapter 3 was absolutely massive compared to chapter 4, with the forest, ghost house, gulch and castle all being fairly big areas you could explore. Here on the other hand, you had a slightly more open location which you could clear in about a third of the time.

The trains were an interesting concept, though the music and animations got old real fast. You could skip part of it, but you still had to listen to the conductor talk for a bit at each end of the journey.

The Lantern Ghost battle was a tad annoying (cause of the lighting flash attack), but he went down pretty quickly none the less.

As for General Guy himself... again, not a massively difficult battle. Though I did have two attempts here, cause for the first one, I didn't see the boss coming and hence didn't have enough health or items to survive all the way to the end (though it was extremely close).

But yeah, Shy Guy's Toy Box was pretty fun. Next up is chapter 5, which I assume is going to be much more annoying by definition due to the areas involved being significantly bigger. But we'll have to wait and see, won't we?

Thanks. And yeah, definitely heard some bad things about the jungle and volcano enemies.

Flower Fields will be where it gets real 'fun' though. I've heard so many comments that the area is annoying to get through, or that the boss can be difficult.

Yep Flower fields are where things get a bit more challenging. Crazzy Daisy show up here so yeah. The boss there is a tough one Lava Piranha is really that bad but can get quite tricky if ya don't know what to expect from him. Specific a certain attach he does has a weird timing to block.

FF has a bit of maze kinda, but has a lot of areas and you need to figure out which area has what and when you have the right item to to the others, kind of thing.

Not much to say, ya pretty much said them already. Chap 7 is much more straight forward then 6 so it a nice area. By this point anti guy shouldn't be that much of a issue. I usual take him on right after General Guy (Chill out works wonders on him). Kent C. is one of the harder bosses and sleep has sort of a 50/50 shot of working on him. I think it's a bit easier for watt to paralyze him.

I love Chapter 6 in all of the Paper Mario games, but these chapters seem to annoy people. Some find the Excess Express too annoying with the backtracking and dialogue, and the same for Sammer's Kingdom.

What's you favorite chapter so far? Any order?

Well, I’ve done it! Chapter 7 is now over, and I’m right at the final boss battle!

So how was it? Well, the Crystal King wasn’t a particularly difficult boss, all things considered. He never successfully froze Mario, I always took out his Crystal Bits quickly and multiple target attacks obliterated the clones before they could become an issue.

But here’s the real killer here; Repel Gel

I started the battle with one of those, got invincibility for three turns, followed up with Chill Out and basically tore him to shreds. These items (and I assume their follow up, Boo’s Sheets in the sequel) just let you tear boss battles wide open. Any amount of complete invincibility just wrecks any boss in sight.

Either way, I followed this up with a few sidequests. Like say, conquering the Dojo.

And here’s Paper Mario’s other difficulty ‘issue’; Zap Tap is also pretty broken. Why? Cause the Master can only do real damage by using a combo attack, which is stopped after one hit by Zap Tap. So his massive 16 damage combos were reduced to 5 or so damage single attacks Either way, he went down pretty quickly, with the final blow even being dealt by the Zap Tap badge for good measure.

I also looked for Super Blocks I’d missed, which was a pain. Those sewers and the volcano are painful to backtrack through.

After which it was onto Star Haven and Bowser’s Castle itself! Nothing too special here, though the Embers did get a tad annoying on the way up.

Bowser’s Castle… well, that was a fun level to explore. Lots of neat puzzles, some fun enemies to battle and a few quiz games for good measure! Oh, okay, I did avoid the three Anti Guys one, since I thought that would be an extremely painful battle even prepared.

Jr Troopa wasn’t too bad, though he was definitely a tad more challenging than in his first six or so fights.

But the main difficulty ‘issue’ here was like so:

Your status attacks are too good. One Mega Shock can easily paralyse all enemies on screen for up to three or four turns, which just breaks Bowser’s Castle wide open. Hammer Bros, Magikoopas and Koopatrols seem very weak to these types of attacks.

Healing was actually easier than in every other level in the game. Three jail cells with beds to heal at? Multiple healing blocks? Another bed to use in Peach’s Castle? That’s a lot of easy healing and FP restoration, meaning there was no downside to going all out with the most powerful moves possible.

Suffice to say, most enemies didn’t get the chance to move before being obliterated.

Bowser’s first phase was… pretty average difficulty wise. Bit more challenging than the Crystal King and Jr Troopa, and arguably more annoying than the Master’s early phases were.

Why? No combos. He just does huge damage with each single attack, which means it’s much easier to take large amounts of damage than against someone whose combos get blocked really easily.

Either way, I suspect his final phase is gonna go down quick with a few Repel Gels, some charging attacks and a lot of Mega Bounces. That seems to be the way with the bosses here; the minute I start struggling, it turns out they’re nearly dead. Nothing has enough HP to survive long enough to be a real ‘threat’.

Some General Thoughts:

Oh, and here are some other, general thoughts on the game:

1. Does anyone else find it weird how a lot of partners only have one attack here? Cause it seems like some have nothing but direct damage attacks (Kooper, with three shell dashes) and some (like Watt) have almost nothing but status effect dealing attacks. You can basically separate it like this:

Mostly Damage Attacks:

Kooper
Bombette
Parakerry
Sushie

Mostly Status Effects:

Watt
Lakilester

Mixture:

Goombario
Lady Bow

It’s interesting given that in Thousand Year Door, the partners all seem to have a mostly even mix of damage attacks and status attacks. I mean sure, Koops has just one status attack and Ms Mowz just one damage attack, but the rest seem to have at least two of each.

2. This game seems a lot less linear and the world a lot bigger than in the sequels. I mean, the first five or so chapters have a lot of big, open areas to explore and a level design style a bit closer to Mario 64 than anything else. On the other hand, the later games seemed to get more and more corridor like as they progressed, with Super Paper Mario being literally 2D and Sticker Star onwards being much like Thousand Year Door’s corridor design in style.

And weirdly, you can even see this design philosophy actually creep in as this very game ends. Mount Lavalava, Flower Fields, Shiver Snowfield, the Crystal Palace, Star Haven and Bowser’s Castle feel like they’re levels from the Thousand Year Door. They’re very corridor like, quite linear, mostly keep you to one path with puzzles to solve and seem like the point the series transitions into the style found in all the later games.

It's like the game design structure changed mid development.

3. The items also seem really weak and limited in this game. As I said before, you get barely any Ultra Shrooms (and can’t buy them in shops), Life Shrooms are rare (only in the Boo’s Mansion shop, the Shiver shop and the Star Haven shop) and Jammin’ Jellies can’t ever be bought directly. In the sequel, the former can be bought in a shop, the Life Shrooms can be bought in multiple (easy to access) shops and Jammin’ Jellies can be bought in shops as well. I guess they wanted you to cook more in this title?

4. It seems to be much harder to charge Mario’s attacks here han in the sequel. Certain charge moves here can only apply to the partner who uses them, not Mario himself.

5. Finally, badges seem much rarer this time around. Well, some of them anyway. In the sequel, you can buy lots of damage boosting badges and Danger Mario setup ones very easily, while here you’re much more limited. That plus the higher BP there means you can turn Mario into a veritable power house in Thousand Year Door, but can’t get anywhere close in this title.

Yeah, they are really easy to paralyse. Even if the bar is only filled up about half way, it'll usually stun everyone on screen for a turn or two.

Either way, I completed the game for real now. Bowser has been beaten in the final boss battle, and the ending has been seen. So do I have any more thoughts?

Well, I'm a tad disappointed there's not much of an epilogue here. Again, the other games let you wander around and explore the world after the final boss was beaten, which was a neat touch. Yeah, you'd lose access to Bowser's Castle, but you could easily have some sort of time travel mechanic to let you re explore the final castle and refight the final boss again at any point. It'd be like Partners in Time, which also had a pretty poor 'epilogue' (read, disguised cutscene to reach the ending).

Bowser himself was quite fun, though he wasn't really much harder than any other boss. He did kill Mario once, but that's only cause I had a Life Shroom and decided to attack instead of healing. He also made a very dumb move near the end of the battle, where he decided to use the Star Rod instead of healing despite being at just 3 HP. Still, it was a good battle, and did make a nice finale for the game.

And hey, a few other random things I noticed:

1. Bump Attack only seems to half work in this game. It kills most enemies before a battle, but didn't work against Dry Bones and flying Magikoopas, despite neither enemy giving me any EXP because I was at the final level. Maybe it's also based on your attack stat or something? Dunno, but I swear it wasn't quite like this in Thousand Year Door.

2. Level 27 as the maximum one is a very odd choice. I get why it's like this (50 max HP + 50 max FP + 30 max BP = 26 level ups), but even then, it's a weird number. Seems like level 25 or 30 would be a more rounded level cap.

Ah well, it's nice that it's fairly low for once. After all, only a madman (read, myself) would go for the level 99 cap in Paper Mario 2 and Super Paper Mario. And given how the Mario & Luigi titles (which set the cap to either level 99 or level 100) require tens of extra hours grinding to max out the level counter, it's nice to have a game where reaching the cap is actually somewhat reasonable for a change. Where you only need two or three Amazy Dayzees to get 100 Star Points at level 26.

3. Bowser's Castle is a pain to backtrack through. Yeah, I know it's the final dungeon, but I do wish they had a teleporter or magic spot or vehicle parked near Peach's Castle to provide a quick way back to the surface world. Cause you have to currently trek through (*checks a map*)... 34 rooms to get from just before the final boss to outside of Toad Town. This includes all of Peach's Castle, all of Bowser's Castle, a vehicle scene (half skippable), Star Haven, the path to Star Haven and another scene to Star Hill. Other final levels require a lot of backtracking too, but it's still obnoxious. Add the ten or so enemies you'll likely walk into and have to fight/escape from (if less than level 26 or not wearing Bump Attack) and it makes for one hell of a trek. Thank god the Mario & Luigi games made this sort of final dungeon backtracking less painful with warp pipes.

And that's it. Another Mario RPG game down, a few more to go I guess.