#Paper Mario chapters all start and end the same way so its really easy to mix them up LOL

[jame7t]

hey jame i don't think the vod that just went up on the vod channel is vod 5 unless i am lacking critical info, there appears to be a timeskip of approximately one chapter

THANK you for the catch omg. Uploading the correct 5 now

[crusherthedoctor]

It goes without saying: the first level always matters. If it doesn’t leave a good impression, it would hardly motivate you to give the rest of the journey a chance, would it? Being in fanfic form aside, Beyond the Stars is no exception, and because of this, Gleaming Meadows was actually one of the longest zones to work out. Viridonia is meant to stand out from previous Sonic settings after all, and kicking things off with a poor man’s Green Hill wouldn’t cut it.

Since the first level in a Sonic game usually tends to be either a hilly area (Green Hill, Emerald Hill, Seaside Hill) or an urban area (City Escape, Westopolis, Windmill Isle to an extent), I decided a good way to set this zone apart would be to... combine the two! This was inspired very much by Neo Green Hill from Sonic Advance, since although that zone wasn’t a city, it did add some minor urban elements the further it went on, most notably the bridge at the end where you fight Eggman. So as tribute to a forever underrated installment, Gleaming Meadows does that too, but in a different way.

Creating Zone 1: Gleaming Meadows

1-1: Blossom Fields

What’s a good way to make your first level stand out from all the Green Hills? Give it more than green, obviously. While it’s important that the entire adventure is full of interesting locations, I really wanted the first level to sound as gorgeous as possible in order to leave a strong first impression for this new journey, so what better inspiration than tulip fields, particularly those of the Netherlands?

The added use of yellows, oranges, reds and pinks already help set it apart, but there’s also the fact that although there are some lakes and rivers here and there, it’s not particularly coastal.

This aesthetic not only serves to get things off to a good start, but it also sums up the running theme with Beyond the Stars in general. Namely, that although plenty of the basic level tropes will be familiar to us all, many of them will be handled in rather different ways, thus proving that as long as you can think outside the box, there’s plenty of life in them yet. Some examples are more extreme than others, but other times, even a simple change of colour, weather, or time of day can make all the difference.

I mentioned in Chapter 1 proper that the cliffs in Blossom Fields have unique markings that convey a vague, lore-hinting narrative. I couldn’t find a better image to explain how this would look, so I’ll have to resort to this shot from Paper Mario:

See the cliff behind them, with its starry patterns on the soil? That’s basically the gist, but with a more complex pattern.

Also mentioned was the addition of a tunnel near the end of the stage, which is one example of the Neo Green Hill-esque hillside with minor urban elements that I intended.

Don’t assume the inside is drab however. On the contrary, it comes with abstract graffiti in a style reminiscent of the Colinton Tunnel in Edinburgh:

Very Jet Set Radio, eh? In addition to simply being more interesting this way, I figured it fit Sonic perfectly.

But you might question what a tunnel inspired by Edinburgh is doing in a level inspired by the Netherlands. Well, this is another running gag with Viridonia. While not always the case, a lot of times there’ll be combined aspects of real world inspiration, as opposed to Unleashed and its clear cut Not-Greece, Not-New York, etc. This is not just me throwing things at the wall to see what sticks, there is in fact a purpose to it, as it’s one of the more subtle ways of showing how peculiar Viridonia can be compared to other places in Sonic history - partly due to the Ethereal Zone - with only the Little Planet truly competing with the island in that field.

And y’know, it gives it that extra bit of identity and variety, eh?

Now, with music choices to explain what sort of musical atmosphere I’d have in mind for each level, I’m gonna have to use basic links from now on, since I rediscovered the hard way that Tumblr only allows up to five or so direct posts. It’s also worth noting that if this were a real game, it would do what SA1 (and, uh, ‘06) did before it, with each level having at least two different bits of music for the appropriate sections to add even more flair. I’ll still be listing two examples each for extra comparison’s sake, so with that said...

First Section (the fields): Opening Demo (Sonic Mega Collection) Ending B (Sonic Advance 3)

Second Section (the tunnel): Topical Tropical (Sonic: Before the Sequel) Shooting Ristar

1-2: Swanky Suburbs

Continuing the Netherland theme going on, the local town has a touch of Giethoorn to it, with its calming rivers and little pathways. Though unlike Giethoorn, there would be some cars and short roads sprinkled about.

Again, really wanted to convey that feeling of low-key beauty and coziness, and provide more justification for why Sonic and Co would come here for a vacation. But that’s not all: when it comes to the houses and other buildings, the red and white colour scheme is more based on those of Portugal:

And of course, you have the local parks as well. You can even interact with the slides and swings if you want, because you’re never too old to make the kids wait their turn.

First Section (calm): Neo Green Hill Classic The Amazon (DuckTales Remastered)

Second Section (when Badniks start wrecking things up): Wave Ocean ~The Inlet~ (Sonic ‘06) Andy’s Neighborhood (Toy Story 2)

1-3: Yellow Hills

As we go on, we leave the Netherland influence behind, and with the countryside in sight, the clue is in the name. Lots of yellow to be had indeed.

And inbetween all these fields, we have some villages, of which the rural vibe suits the place just fine.

Then as we go into farmyard territory, the yellow actually starts taking a back seat in favor of red, because I guess even I’m not immune to the subverting expectations fever. Hopefully I’ve done it in a way that isn’t asinine though.

The barnyards would be the stereotypical red and white, since it works well enough with the autumn colours, and can still pop out despite there being so much red surrounding them.

And yes, there are many farm animals hanging around here.

Yes, that includes horses.

No, they’re not Trudy’s family.

First Section (yellow): Tornado Alley (Crash Bandicoot: The Wrath of Cortex) Mount Lineland (Super Paper Mario)

Second Section (red): Green Hill ‘12 (Tee Lopes) Menu (Mario Tennis)

1-4: Rusty Mill

A wooden mill doesn’t leave a lot to the imagination, so it would look pretty much exactly as you’d expect, albeit a tad more old and worn.

The same goes for inside, really. Since the interior of mills are tricky to find interesting images of when elaborating on your quirky Sonic the Hedgehog zone, I’ll be using another game for comparison instead, specifically Donkey Kong Country 3:

Except multiply the cobwebs by five.

It’s decayed, and a bit grim, but not enough to the point where it would feel like it’s near the endgame. Yet another thing I go in hard on in this story: escalation. In order for later zones and climactic moments to be more striking and impactful, you gotta start off by taking it easy. There’s still action to be had, and there’s still mysterious and/or ominous touches here and there, but it’s for the purpose of organically building things up, so that when things do escalate, you actually feel it when shit starts going down. Pacing, boys and girls! Learn it!

Then again, as with Angel Island in S3&K, this place gets set on fire halfway through, so maybe I need to remember my own lessons. But on the other hand, also like S3&K, it still pales in comparison to what happens later, so...

Lastly for today, when you’re fighting the fearsome Paindozer, the section of the mill that you confront it in suspiciously takes a form more akin to a old fashioned warehouse. Like... IKEA, I guess. But on fire.

So congratulations, you got through IKEA Zone. Looks like Eggman should have stuck with B&Q Zone instead.

First Section (calm): Pogo Painter (Crash Bash) The Walk of Life (Rayman 2)

Second Section (on fire): Vs. Rotatatron & Refreshinator (Sonic Colours) Set Point - Match Point (Mario Tennis)

[blurry-fics]

Chapter Six

Prove Me Wrong | Series Masterlist

Warnings: None

Word Count: 2578

Author’s Note: I accidentally went a little overboard when writing this chapter, as you can probably tell by the word count. I had a lot of ideas I wanted to include! Anyway, I hope you enjoy the chapter :)

I pulled my song folder out of my bag and set it on the table between Josh and I. He placed a hand on it and slid it towards him before slowly pulling out all the new sheets. The half-crumpled pages that Y/N had rescued from the recycling bin were still in there.

“Why are these so crumpled?” he asked as he pulled them out.

I smiled, “Long story.”

Josh simply nodded and began to flip through the pages. A smile flickered across his face now and again.

“This is looking really good, Tyler. There’s definitely a solid foundation for some new songs in this one.”

I grabbed the pages from him and flipped through until I found the one I was looking for. It was easy to tell apart from the others because of the little sun doodles that I had added in the corner.

“What do you think of this?” I asked, handing the single piece of paper back to him. “I think it would be good for an album closer, don’t you think?”

Josh read over the page a couple times. He rubbed his hand along his jaw as he did so, something he only did when he was really thinking about something. Slowly, he began to nod.

“Yeah, for sure.”

“Great. What do you say we run through some of the old stuff? Then we can work on writing.”

“Let’s do it.”

While Josh got up and began to mess with his drums, I neatly organized the papers and put them back into the folder. Years of watching Y/N meticulously organize her school supplies had rubbed off on me, especially when it came to something as important as my music.

“Alright, I’m ready,” Josh said. He was tapping out a rhythm on his drums that I didn’t recognize.

“Oh, I like that. Don’t forget that,” I said, pointing to him.

Josh looked down at his hands, as if he hadn’t even realized that he had been playing. He looked a little more focused as he ran through it a couple more times.

“Ok, it’s in here,” he laughed, tapping a drumstick to his forehead.

I sat down at the piano and took a moment to play some random melodies and get comfortable with the keys before we actually started to play. It was a habit that I had quickly developed after learning to play the keyboard in high school. For some reason, I was convinced it helped me play better.

“Where should we start?” Josh asked.

“Well, should we run through the whole thing? Or just practice some of the rougher songs?”

“How about we start at the top and see how we feel?” he suggested.

“Perfect.”

*     *     *

Josh and I, after deciding to practice the album in its entirety, figured it was best to take a break once we got through about half of the songs. Both of us were starving and starting to get irritable with one another, which was never a good combination.

“Let’s order some food before we end up tearing each other’s heads off,” Josh laughed.

“Agreed,” I said, already reaching for my phone. To my surprise, there was a text from Y/N. 

Y/N: I need your help. It’s important.

I answered instantly.

Tyler: What’s up?

My head was full of possibilities about what she could need help with, but I couldn’t really do anything until she told me what was going on. Josh noticed my concerned look.

“Everything ok?”

“Yeah, just a friend of mine said she needed help and I’m waiting to figure out what it is.”

“Y/N?”

My mouth curved up into a half-smile, “Yeah.”

“Shocking. Anyway, what are you in the mood for?”

“Pizza is easy and cheap.”

“And they deliver,” Josh chimed in.

“Then let’s do pizza.”

“Pepperoni?”

“No, no. Get Hawaiian.”

Josh’s nose wrinkled immediately, “There’s no way we’re getting pineapple on pizza.”

“Why not? It’s good!”

“No. It’s disgusting.”

“Come on, Josh! Y/N and I always get a Hawaiian pizza.”

“Of course you found a way to bring her into this,” Josh smiled.

“What is that supposed to mean?”

“You just talk about Y/N a lot,” Josh shrugged. “That’s all.”

“Right.”

Right.

“What if we just get half and half? Then you get your disgusting pizza and I get my delicious pepperoni.”

“I think that’s a good idea,” I nodded.

“Ok, I’ll go call it in.”

Josh grabbed his phone and walked into the other room, already dialing the pizza place. I, on the other hand, had a text from Y/N to attend to.

Y/N: Carter and I are having a debate: are carts or bikes better in Mario Kart?

I laughed and shook my head. Of course she just needed help settling a debate between her and Carter. The two of them were always debating some random topic or another.

Tyler: Bikes, all the way. They take up less space and are just better all around.

Y/N: THANK YOU! Carter has been going on and on about how much better carts are because they get knocked around less easily, but there’s no way that that single benefit outweighs all the benefits of a bike. Wait until he hears the opinion of our resident Mario Kart expert :)

Y/N’s text reminded me of all the weekends we had spent holed up in her den, having Mario Kart tournaments with her brother and eating whatever snacks we could find in their pantry. We hadn’t been able to do that much since I joined the band and Y/N went off to college, there just wasn’t time.

“Pizza should be here in twenty minutes,” Josh announced as he walked back into the room.

“Awesome.”

“You look happy.”

“Yeah, just-,” I waved my phone in the air for emphasis.

“Of course,” he grinned. “Did you figure out what she needed help with?”

“Yeah, there was just a debate she needed to settle with her brother. Nothing serious.”

“That’s good. Wouldn’t want you having to leave in the middle of practice.”

“You know that music is super important to me and I would only leave if the emergency was even more important than this.”

“I don’t know,” Josh laughed a little. “Y/N seems pretty important to you.”

“She’s just a friend.”

“Just a friend?”

I rolled my shoulders, “Yeah.”

“If you say so. I might go after her if you don’t.”

I laughed, but my body still tensed up at the mere thought of Y/N and Josh together. 

No. Stop. Tyler.

“I think I’m going to try and work out some new melodies on the piano,” I said, excusing myself from the conversation. “Let me know when pizza gets here.”

I grabbed my folder as I brushed past Josh towards my piano. All of the anger was probably just hunger talking, so some time playing music would help calm me back down. What I had said was true: Y/N was just my friend. Josh wanting to go after her was me being protective. That was all.

Twenty minutes later, Josh walked over and set the pizza box on top of the piano. It smelled amazing and my stomach rumbled in response.

“How much do I owe you?” I asked as I grabbed a slice.

“$6.50.”

With my free hand, I pulled out my wallet and gave Josh the change for the pizza. 

“Feel better now that you have food?” he smiled.

“Yeah, sorry for earlier.”

“It’s fine. It’s warm in here, we’re starving, and I was trying to get information out of you. It wasn’t really a winning combination.”

I laughed, “Definitely not.”

My phone buzzed in my pocket. It was another text from Y/N, this time a picture of her brother flipping off the camera while still playing video games with his free hand.

Y/N: He’s pouting because he was proven wrong and I beat him and his stupid cart while I was on a bike three times in a row

Tyler: Nice one, Y/N

Josh was watching me as I texted Y/N, but he didn’t make a comment about her this time. I simply raised my eyebrows at him and took another bite of pizza.

“So, I had this idea for the next album…” he started.

*     *     *

“Same time tomorrow?” Josh asked as I dropped him off.

“Yeah, I’ll pick you up at two.”

“Sounds great. Thanks for giving me a ride.”

“No problem.”

He grabbed his bag from where it had been sitting at his feet and shut the passenger door behind him. Once he had made it around the car and onto the sidewalk, I took off for my apartment. It was a fairly long drive home - twenty minutes, if I was lucky and traffic wasn’t bad - but I didn’t really mind. I liked having the time to think.

As I drove, I wondered what Y/N was up to. It had been a few days since I had last seen her, mostly because she was busy with projects and papers, and I was starting to miss her. In the spur of the moment, I pulled up against the curb and grabbed my phone.

She picked up quickly, “What do you want?”

“Hello to you too,” I laughed.

“Sorry, I made Carter pause Mario Kart and he’s getting impatient.”

“Yeah! Hurry up, Joseph!” Carter called in the background.

“That’s actually what I called about.”

“Mario Kart?” she asked.

“Yeah. I just got done with band practice and after you texted about the debate, it made me think about the tournaments we used to have when we were younger.”

“Are you asking what I think you’re asking?” she asked. The excitement was evident in her voice.

“Mario Kart tournament?”

“Yes! Get your butt over here!”

“Alright,” I laughed. “I just left Josh’s so it will be awhile, but I’ll be over as soon as I can.”

“I can’t wait to crush both of you at Mario Kart,” Carter added.

“Shut up, Car, I’ve beat you like every time.”

“I’ll see you soon,” I said.

“Ok, drive safe!”

“Bye.”

I tossed my phone back down and pulled away from the curb, already planning what strategy I was going to use.

*     *     *

“Again?” Y/N whined as I crossed the finish line in first place, yet again.

“You invited me over here!” I shrugged.

Carter leaned forward and snatched up the bag of Doritos that I had sitting by my leg.

“You don’t deserve these anymore,” he huffed.

“I bet it’s the Doritos making him win!” Y/N chimed in.

“Or the Oreos.” I gestured to the half-empty packet of Oreos by my knee.

“Whatever it is, you’re going to lose.”

Carter started up the next set of races and I took a moment to shake out my wrist. We had been playing for close to two hours now and keeping track of who had the most wins. I had about eight wins under my belt, but Y/N wasn’t too far behind. As for Carter, well, he had seen better Mario Kart days.

I was nearing the end of the third lap when Y/N leaned over and pushed me towards the floor. It threw me off just enough to make me lose focus for a second and allow her to pass me.

“Hey!” I said, “That’s cheating!”

“Not cheating,” she argued, still making sure to gently elbow my right arm. “Just a distraction.”

I managed to catch the wind from the back of her bike and race past her. The finish line was in sight, just ahead of me.

“Ty!” she screeched. “How in the world?”

“Talent.”

Just as I was about to finish the race, a red shell came rushing towards me and stopped my just shy of the finish line. Y/N zipped past me before I could recover, earning her the spot of first place.

“Yes!” she said, shooting up to a standing position. “I won the first race!”

“By cheating!”

“It was not cheating!”

“Was too!”

“You’re just jealous.”

“I’m not jealous.”

She looked so cute as she began to dance around the room in her oversized sweatshirt. In one dramatic motion, she grabbed a blanket and pulled it around her shoulders like a cape.

“I’m the queen of Mario Kart!” she announced.

“Y/N, you won one race. Tyler is still way ahead of you,” Carter said.

“Shh, peasant,” she held a hand out to him. “Your queen is celebrating.”

Carter and I shared a look as she continued to parade around the room. Eventually, she grew tired of the performance and took a seat back next to me on the floor, a little closer than she had been before.

“You still have three more races to win if you even want a chance at beating me,” I smiled.

“I’ll do it, just you watch.”

“And no more cheating.”

“No promises.”

We finished the next three races, most of which went by without incident. Although Y/N didn’t do anything drastic to aid her wins, she did manage to elbow me here and there. It’s not like she needed to, her arm simply brushing against mine now and again while she played was enough of a distraction.

“Ok, let’s find out who won and then I need to get home,” I said.

Carter grabbed the piece of paper that we had been scorekeeping on.

“With nine wins, our first place champion is…” Carter looked at the two of us. ”That’s your cue to drumroll,” he added with a whisper.

Y/N and I both drummed against our legs, creating a very quiet drumroll.

“Tyler Joseph!”

I stood up and did my own little happy dance around the room.

“But that’s not all!” Carter said. “Also with nine wins, making them tied for first place with Joseph, is…”

Another quiet drumroll.

“Y/F/N Y/L/N!”

“Yes!” Y/N cheered, immediately jumping to a standing position. “Ha! Take that, Tyler!”

I reached out to shake her hand, “Congratulations, Y/N.”

She shook my hand for a brief moment before grabbing her blanket cape from earlier. This time, she draped it around both of our shoulders. With one arm around my waist, she began to parade both of us around the room.

“Bow down, Car! Your brand new bike-using Mario Kart champions have arrived.”

“I’m not worthy,” he said sarcastically.

Y/N laughed and stopped leading me around the room, although she kept an arm wrapped around my waist. I knew I needed to leave, but she…

Nope. Not happening.

“I should go,” I said, already beginning to peel the blanket away.

Y/N’s arm dropped away and went to grab the loose end of the blanket that I had let fall. She pulled it up over her shoulder and wrapped it tightly around her so that it no longer looked quite like a cape.

“It’s late,” she nodded. Her mouth curled up into a slight smile. “Thanks for coming over, Ty. This was fun.”

“Agreed,” I said, returning her smile. “I’ll see you guys soon enough.”

“Later, Joseph,” Carter added.

Y/N waved to me before I left the room and headed down the stairs. I could already hear the two of them starting a debate about something new as I opened the front door. It had been a good day, that was for sure.

There was just a lot for me to think about.

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[ask-the-guiding-light-cast]

Guiding Light turns two years old today!

It’s crazy to think this all began only a couple of years back... and also hilarious it falls on the same day as “International Mystery Dungeon Day” over on Twitter. More after the cut. This is gonna be a long one, so I appreciate anyone willing to read this. ^^

For a long time, I had been a casual consumer of fan fics. It started in the late 2000s when I was in a Spyro craze thanks to the more story-driven Legend of Spyro trilogy. I had an itch that I needed scratched and FFN fulfilled that to some extent. I also looked at some Mario fics, including Paper Mario: The Temple of the Sun, which I greatly enjoyed and thought did a good job adapting the formula that made Paper Mario: The Thousand Year Door so beloved and putting a unique spin on things.

But it was until the early 2010s that I actually started getting back into Pokémon games with Gen V. After Emerald, I fell out of touch with Pokémon for a time. When Gen VI came around, I dipped my toe into the fandom through Twitch livestreams, but also through reading a few anime-based fics that are very long and still going, even now. 

At the same time, I ended up buying PMD: Explorers of Sky... and damaged my cartridge before I could properly finish the game with my Vulpix/Riolu team. So, I watched cutscenes for what I missed on YouTube, then got Gates to Infinity and, later, Super Mystery Dungeon and had fun with both of them... though more for the stories and characters than the actual gameplay. Truth be told, I don’t care much for roguelikes at all.

It was during the gap in time between Super’s release and the first official footage of Sun & Moon in mid-2016 that I found myself hit with a recurring thought: “What if someone made a PMD story where the hero and the partner are forced to fight one another with the fate of the world at stake?” I wound up (loosely) brainstorming an idea for a PMD story revolving around an antagonistic Hoopa character who would use its ring portals to collect entire communities, including the Pokémon living in them... all so that he would never be bored. This would lead him to “collect” the partner to add to his “toys,” so when the hero shows up, he’d sic the partner on them.

But that was as far as I got with the idea. I ended up graduating college and took a job with late evening hours. It left me pretty tired and exhausted and unmotivated to do much of anything. I withdrew from the parts of the Pokémon community I was involved in.

Then the Generation VII games came out and, while divisive in the fandom, I found myself really liking some of the concepts. There were so many times when I thought, “Gee, I wonder what this would be like if it were in a PMD game?” For example, one of the ideas I had was a sort of edgy rival rescue team akin to Gladion, which would have a Midnight Lycanroc, a Zoroark, and a Type: Null character in it.

So, toward the end of 2016 and early 2017, I started creating an idea for a Choose Your Own Adventure story with the intent of putting it on this really small forum I was a part of. It would be a Gen VII-themed PMD story, but because I didn’t think that sounded interesting enough, I decided that, not only would the human keep their memories, but they would be from the real world and be a major Pokémon nerd. The idea was that the choices the readers made would affect the relationship between the human and partner. I even came up with a point system. The more points the readers earned for their choices, the “closer” the relationship the hero and partner would have and the happier an ending the story would get. If the hero and partner couldn’t stand each other, one of them would likely end up working with the bad guy and winning. If they became steadfast friends, they’d work together to save the world.

Unfortunately, the forum shut down before I got too far into planning it, so I shelved the idea and continued focusing on my job. And things stayed that way for several months, until I ended up getting into med school and scrambling to move.

During the downtime I had when I wasn’t doing moving related stuff, I decided to look at FFN again and found Pokémon Mystery Dungeon: Defenders of Warmth. I wound up reading through the entirety of the story quite quickly. I guess you could say it sparked something in my head. The fic itself focuses on what, at the time, was the newest Gen (Gen V). It also has multiple humans and is set on a continent separate from the canon locations (which were just the Air and Grass Continents, since Gates and Super didn’t exist when the fic was written). In short, it renewed my desire to pursue my idea of a Gen VII-flavored PMD story.

So, I set about creating my story outline. It is so... so much different from the actual story, though I’ve gone into that in previous posts (search for #amby answers). Originally, I used Mario & Luigi: Partners in Time as the framework for the fic: an alien invasion in a colorful, comedic world. I took more specific cues, too. Zero was meant to be a (mostly) silent antagonist a la Princess Shroob, for example.

The problem was, I really didn’t have much confidence in myself or my abilities. I’d like to say I was writing for myself, but I really did want validation, too. I think any author is lying to themselves if they say they don’t feel this way at some point. Because of this, I figured if I put the fic on FFN, it would get ignored. The site’s huge! There were, at the time, around 85k fics in the Pokémon section alone. (That number’s since gone up to over 90k!)

Given I had experience with forums, I decided to post it to Serebii, because the fic community seemed much smaller and more open to giving feedback to one another. In an effort to try and, y’know, establish some connections, I actually read other pieces and reviewed them before posting any stories. This also helped me build up a backlog of chapters and prove to myself I enjoyed writing this enough to keep going.

When I finally did post the fic, it was a bumpy start, for sure. I do think I made a lot of mistakes out of the gate, including uploading chapters way too quickly for readers on Serebii to (reasonably) try to keep pace. That probably cost me a few potential readers... or made them silent readers who I never ended up hearing from. Which is why I’m especially thankful to @girl-like-substance (who I can seem to tag, drat) for all of the well-thought-out feedback given throughout the fic’s run. I don’t think I would’ve made such significant strides in my writing otherwise... and there are plenty of long-running fics where the quality tends to stagnate.

In any case... it was thanks to a request from @deliriousabsol to put the fic somewhere more mobile-friendly that I chose to mirror Guiding Light on FFN starting in October 2017. I would’ve kept going on Serebii had she not asked so nicely, so she’s the one you can thank for it showing up there! (She’s a fellow author who does cyberpunk-themed fics and art and her characters have cameoed in the fic.)

And, honestly, I’m just... beyond shocked at what wound up happening to the fic once it hit FFN. Well, actually, for the first several months I was lucky if I even got a comment when I put up a chapter. I’m not sure any of the people who first commented on FFN still follow the fic anymore. I haven’t seen/heard from them at all, so I assumed they moved on with their lives.

In any case, around March of 2018, the word count on FFN passed 300k and... somehow, the fic starting getting more attention. Like, a lot more attention. This was... not really something I was even remotely prepared for.

(Yes, this means there’s gonna be a giveaway. More on that later.) I never would’ve thought I’d reach a number like this. I never imagined I’d meet another PMD author who’d be willing to do a fun collab (thanks @virgil134, Spiteful Murkrow, and Namohysip). I really did not imagine that I’d ever get fanart of characters that I wrote (huge thanks @thebreak-ofdawn, @ask-nicky-and-others, and @cresselia92). I mean, above everything, I not expect the fic or characters to resonate with anybody the way it wound up.

A part of me feels like I don’t really deserve it. I’ve made a lot of serious gaffes with writing this. When initial Serebii feedback had people intrigued by Shane’s jerkass attitude (when I didn’t actually intend for him to come off as a jerk), I dialed things up in the hopes I’d keep their attention. It probably cost me readers. Then there’s the slow pacing of the early episodes and the mistake of making Special Episode 3 as long as it was... which my speaks to my (bad) tendency to give into some of my strongest impulses even though I had an outline I was trying to stick to.

And, I mean, there’s also some of the “shamlessly shameful” stuff I’ve done with the fic. I’m not fooling myself. Guiding Light has grown progressively more furry and, uh, probably fanservicey, too. All the big furbait (and some scalebait) ‘mons are accounted for. There’s a lot more sexual humor when I initially promised myself I would stay away from romance and keep everything platonic. I practically turned Xerneas into waifu bait, if some of these asks are anything to go by. This blog certainly didn’t help in that regard. Maybe I’m just being my usual nervous self? 

I am worried that this fic’s performance has, somehow, affected my thoughts and behavior. There are very popular fic authors who let their popularity get to their head... or chose to open up Patreons (something that makes me uncomfortable) or start doing things like taking commissions for written pieces, which is understandable... though I think it’s an easy way to lose your passion for writing. I guess some of that worry stems from a debacle I learned about on a Discord server I’m in, but that’s not something I’m comfortable discussing publicly. 

And I haven’t even talked much about the blog itself. Like, it somehow passed 100 followers? Where? When? How? I don’t actually draw stuff like many other Pokéasks. And, like, for a lot of folks, I have no idea if they’ve actually read the fic or just check in on the blog. It’s the same with the fic, I suppose. If you’re a silent reader/follower, I would really love to hear from you! I promise... I don’t bite or anything. I’d love to know what (if anything) you’re thinking. And if you’re a blog that’s following this one and we haven’t interacted, please feel free to reach out! It’s honestly hard to tell if people like what I’m doing, so any feedback is always appreciated.

In any case, if I haven’t lost you by now, I guess all I can say is... thank you. Thank you all so much for all of the support... whether it’s on the fic, the blog, or both of them. I really do hope this final episode can meet your expectations. I’ll try my very best to make this an ending to remember. Nothing would make me happier than to hear you guys enjoy it and feel it does justice to the PMD series.

Sorry for all the rambling. The inbox is open again if you’d like to send any messages for the ficaversary. Again, thank you all so much! You’re the best!

[veryimportantsparkles]

Alright I’ve kept meaning to do sort of an infodump on my projects because I’ve been really slipping lately.  I dunno how obvious it is?  Probably kind of obvious.  I’ve also been really bad about checking messages and responding to people.  So I figure I can write up a status report and then point to it when I’ve been inadequate about communication.

My IRL job has been wiping me out.  I’ve been getting short, labor-intensive shifts in the evenings, and then random surprise morning shifts shortly after, which has been really hard to manage my time around.  My sleep schedule has been extremely broken and it’s affected my productivity a LOT.  Leadership in my department is about to shuffle around and I’ve been interviewed for the manager position.  If I get it I’ll be working an entirely different schedule, which could potentially be good for my sleepy brain but will definitely leave me with less art time overall.  I’ve also been enduring some back/shoulder issues over the past few months.  Nothing urgent, but it’s limiting how much I can draw each day.  I think replacing my desk chair is going to be a big factor but it’s not the only factor.  I just need to be a smart human and take care of my joints and not hunch over so much.  Working on it.

Here’s the current status of my various art projects:

Laserwing

I ended chapter 5 in June and said I would finish up some other side projects before I start concept work for chapter 6.  One of the projects I needed to finish was the Popkas Yugioh season 4 special, which I finished.  The other big one was my Neonmob card set, which is most of what I’ve been posting lately.  Once that’s out of the way (see below) I need to do concept art.  Chapter 6 will put all the Laserwing characters in new outfits which will need reference sheets.  I’ll need background sketches and layout diagrams so I don’t have furniture shuffle randomly around between scenes.  I also need to sketch out the chapter 6 draft page by page.  I’ve made Laserwing in GIMP up until this point and am going to try switching to Krita for chapter 6.  I might need to do a test page to make sure my process transfers over well into a slightly different system.  Once I’m ready to make real pages, those take a while.  Chapter 5 pages were going up maybe every 2-3 weeks.  I don’t know how many pages are going to be in chapter 6, nor can I say for sure how many chapters are in Laserwing.  An old outline had maybe 40 chapters.  It’s a story with a defined end point, I can say that for certain, but it’s intended to be long.

Popkas

I’ve had issues with Popkas for a while.  I keep picking new themes for dailies, thinking they’re going to be quick and easy, but then end up making them hard for myself.  It’s been to my benefit, I’ve forced myself into learning new art programs and techniques through Popkas.  But it’s hard to keep up the daily schedule.  Currently I’m doing the Paper Mario: TTYD bestiary, which has 124 enemies.  At a rate of one per day, by the time I’ve finished them, Pokemon Sword and Shield should be released and we’ll have all the info about the new Pokemon.  Those will be drawn in ‘Popka classic’ style (scribbly shitposts).  After those are finished, unless my IRL work situation dramatically changes, I’m considering putting Popkas on pause.  In order to do any other monster dexes I’d have to do a lot more research (for example, people have suggested Yokai Watch but I’ve never played one) in order to have anything meaningful to post.  Same deal with Popka Specials (the anime writeup things), those take prep time and anime-watching time that I might not have.  I don’t ever want to end Popkas, but a hiatus might be necessary.

Angelfire Hime

Did anyone even know about Angelfire Hime?  Well I want to post more but that involves finding, scanning, retouching, and transcribing my old high school scribble comics.  It takes as long as any other project but is also low priority because it’s all old content.  Nobody is waiting for the latest update because nobody but me actually knows what that content is, and possibly nobody but me can even read it.  It’s more a personal journey of self-reflection than anything.  I want to return to it but not at the expense of better work.

MeganFantastic dot com

I had a domain name linked to a tumblr that was supposed to be my news blog/front page and I barely use it.  Also, I let the domain registration drop.  Also, I had let a typo in my banner graphic go unnoticed for YEARS and still haven’t fixed it.  Even now, I’m writing this big post to my personal blog instead of the one for news.  The idea was to eventually buy some real hosting and make MeganFantastic a whole site of its own, but that’s a lot of work.  I’ve got a generally good idea of HOW I’d do it (probably wordpress) but I’m not a coder, it would take a lot of trial and error.  This would be a huge undertaking and eventually Laserwing, Popkas, and all my other junk would be contained on one big non-tumblr website.  But it’s uhhhhh not happening yet.

Hundera Youtube

My contribution to our LP channel is to show up, talk about video games, and then draw title cards.  All recording, editing, and channel management is maintained by Josh, and I can’t speak on his behalf about our update schedule.  I will say there are a lot of half-finished games we want to return to.  I will also say that when the new Pokemon comes out Josh is dead set on recording it.  I don’t know if he intends that to be a stream or a regular LP.  In the meantime he streams Minecraft with his friends every Sunday and we fit in our own streams and recordings when we can.

Commissions/Patron Art/etc

I’ve not been very good about this lately and I’m truly sorry!  I have a few things I’m working on, a few things I’ve promised to start working on, and a few things I’ve told people I can do once my workload lightens up, which hasn’t been happening yet.  I really don’t have an answer.  I almost never delete anything so if I’ve been sent a message in any form I should still have it, and I’ll be sure not to forget anyone.  And if I do forget someone feel free to throw rocks at me!

Rane Story 2

What the heck is Rane Story 2?  Well I guess I have to explain Neonmob.  Imagine if ChickenSmoothie and DeviantART had a baby.  It’s a virtual trading card site, which is fun and cute, and I’m drawing out a card series to release on there.  I’ve been using it as practice for painting backgrounds and to fill out some backstory for some 4th-string Laserwing support characters.  Before Mistaire came to Earth, she went to space high school, and that’s where Rane Story takes place.  You can preview the series, and when it’s finished I’ll post about it.  I’ll also repost all the art to DA.  If you scroll through the last several pages of this blog you’ll see some of the art.  I’ve put a lot of my brain energy into getting this done in spite of my work/sleep issues because I don’t want to resume Laserwing until I’ve finished it.  This is what’s stolen my life, guys.  Right now I have 6 more cards to make, and then I have to write and finalize all the text.  I should be done SOON.

Pokemon Nonsense

When my back and shoulder get too hurty and I have to take a break from drawing, one of the easy things to do is whip out a DS and play Pokemon.  I’ve done a lot of twitter shitposting about it lately.  I’ve also drawn up a bunch of gijinkas for my Pokemon.  I’m talking about it now because I also intend to draw up gijinkas for Pokemon to trade away.  I’ve already done a few.  However, I don’t know for sure how I’m going to distribute them.  The idea is people can trade actual Pokemon with me (in either X or Let’s Go Eevee) and the Pokemon they get will come with a character design for you to keep.  I was thinking I might do a discord server for organizing trades and such, but I haven’t yet.  Mostly because it’s low priority and I have SO many other things going on.  But actually playing Pokemon can happen when I’m too fatigued for real work, so the horde keeps growing.  Hopefully my posts and scribbles about it are entertaining.

I feel like there’s other projects on hold that I wanted to discuss, but right now I’m too braintired to remember, and some of my ‘projects’ never actually got talked about online so nobody’s waiting for an update.  My greatest problem seems to be that I try to juggle too many pointless side projects and then drop them all over the place.  Sometimes I’ll shitpost about an idea and even I won’t be sure if I was serious or not.  How do I end this post?  I don’t know.

tl;dr Megan is SLEEPY and dropped her spaghetti everywhere but somehow still has time to play POKEMON and WON’T STOP TALKING ABOUT IT

[videostak]

sooo basically i started playing deltarune abt a week or two ago and am a lil bit in chapter 2 rn and idk im not rockin with it and always had mixed feelings abt undertale.... like the stories cute and i rly like the main 3 in this game alot and i like the improvement w/ graphical animations (i think a bigger team worked on this one or smthn) and the introduction of grazing which is so cool in an rpg setting to get your magic up. i think undertale/deltarune really is like one of the few turn based rpgs(aside from paper mario and mario & luigi series which it obv takes lots of inspiration from) that manages to make the turn-based combat interactive in a way that doesnt feel awkwardly forced and doesnt feel boring after awhile/always feels fresh and exciting(i guess the mother 3 combos also can be added to those two others i mentioned). the bullet hell stuff always feels v fun but at the same time it feels like im more playing a visual novel lolllll ? like the gameplay is fun in that regard but it really does just feel like im watching a story and the gameplay is this lil bonus i guess that has to do more w/ it being easy so far and there not being much bonus content aside from the main story idk... also smthn abt the way u walk on the overworld is weird to me idk it feels v like rpg maker moment which i guess isnt bad but like it doesnt feel v polished maybe this is just a lil nitpicky thing. but since the games gonna be 7 chapters or smthn i think theres obv a lot of improvements that will be made as it progresses especially in difficulty and feeling more big n stuff. but like idk with undertale i think it really does have undoubtedly a very great soundtrack but deltarune doesnt have any songs that  go as hard yet but the music is still p good. like i have more mixed feelings abt undertale and i can agree that alot of the songs are amazing especially dummy, amalgam, the spider boss song, and death by glamour.. but also w/ undertale i do remember having mixed feelings after playing it. i mean i feel like it was a fusion of earthbound and yume nikki but i dont thing it was greater than the sum of its parts at all i dont even think it reached the sum of its parts. tho ill try to talk abt undertale less since deltarune is obv trying to improve alot abt it. i mean the humor in games are always usually p entertaining but it does feel like a story with lil gameplay elements alot of the time as opposed to like a complete game and alot of the times i play i feel like im just watching cutscenes with jokes and bits n stuff. which normally wouldnt mean much but given that its good stuff is so great like its bullet hell turn based combat stuff and soundtrack im just like oh ok.. like i dont feel like its doing much for the medium of rpgs or anything in the way earthbound and yume nikki did it just doesnt have that reach imo... like its a game that i play but maybe ive been really spoiling myself by only playing games that im in love w/ completely. i am sucha  picky person hawnestly... but at the same time ive really been buying games w/o playing them obv i guess ive just been lucky/smart with what ive been buying. im glad deltarune is free tho thats so cool! iKinda feel like i wish it had more polish n stuff particularly undertale and i rly didnt like having to play thru the game three times to experience ‘all of it’ iirc u had to play the game atleast twice to get the true ending or whatever and i thot that was kinda annoying but i have alot of problems with multiple ending games that i dislike but thats my own lil separate rant lol. i mean idk im kinda dumb its hard for me to talk abt an indie game w/o it v quickly becoming me talking abt what i would do if i made a game lollll... i mean undertale/deltarune as a game feels very heavily reliant on its story/comedy then on its gameplay/battle mechanics they just feel there so that it qualifies as a game. lol.

[baconpal]

so heres the long super paper mario post

strap in for why super paper mario is fucking bizarre and why that’s pretty much awesome

gonna be a good amounts of spoilers, so if you’re on desktop then hit that read more, and if your on mobile, then here’s your punishment for using this god awful app

super paper mario is a game that is incredibly difficult to put into words, but it leaves such a powerful, lasting impression on me and i can’t come to say anything first other than I love it so much, and if you havent played the game, please just go do it now, even if you have to pirate or emulate or something, just let yourself play this game. It’s one of those games that I really feel I can just recommend to anybody

it’s difficult to think of where to start with dissecting this thing so i’ll just start with the art since lookin at things is pretty easy

ART/WORLD DESIGN

every world in SPM is completely unique, not just in what type of environment, but it’s art style, and this is premised with the fact that none of these worlds are capable of existing together and are completely separate, and NOT part of a cohesive universe (LOOKIN AT YOU ODYSSEY I STILL THINK YOU LOOK STUPID)

The hub and the first 2 worlds are mostly just slight variants on the same general style of simplistic shapes and colors, with world 1 delving into more linework type aesthetics, and 2 focusing more on impressions and silhouettes, 

world 3 changes this completely with what is obviously an 8 bit kind of style, but instead of jarring over sized pixels, the world is composed of detailed tiles arranged to look like pixel art that imply a more real world, and not a gamey one, 

world 4 focuses on patterns and big patches of color to give the impression of the vast emptiness of both space and the surface of a barren planet, before giving you the “Whoa Zone”, with a striking mix of wire frame and futuristic UI style to it

world 5 takes the idea of nature being crude and simplistic and humanity being sharp, angular, and extreme and flips that on its head, with humanity and the space they occupy being these absolute memes with no sense of depth, and the plant life existing in a system of clean cut caves with futuristic technology and elegant historic values

world 6 simplifies a kind of colored Japanese painting aesthetic, down to the funny cylindrical cloud clusters and brushstroke trees

world 7 depicts what is essentially hell (yes there’s hell in this game keep your pants on) as a squarish blur of bright greens and warm reds and purples, and depicts heaven as fluffy land of clouds and Greek temples

and lastly, world 8 is inverted greyscale, where light is black and darkness is white, its simplistic and striking and i couldn’t think of a better style for the final area of a game so focused on the concept of light and dark

MUSIC

I’ll just try and keep it simple, the musics fucking cash money

The game makes great use of motifs when it needs to, where specific themes and instruments are used in other songs to suggest relationships and put battles and travels into perspective

And when it ISNT doing that, it’s just fucking funky stuff, with a weird trend of BOING and PLOP and SPLISH noises in the percussion because fuck you i guess

There’s a lot of good songs that do lots of interesting things, any of the like 5 final battle songs are great things to point to, but i’ll just go ahead and say the main theme of world 8 “Castle Bleck” is one of my favorites that isn’t super highly rated. It brings in the types of instruments that have been associated with the villain the entire game, but also throws in 2 very important things; a sudden triumphant burst of almost JRPG styled chiptune that pushes away the constantly building tension, which is then followed by the sound of a clock ticking, which is a musical motif only present in the songs “Memory” and “Promise” which is played whenever the memories of the player’s little guide thing and the main villain’s past lives together are alluded to. This one song holds a lot of weight, as well as simply being a fucking cool song.

GAMEPLAY

This is, sadly, the one place I’ll not mince any words and say the gameplay is not amazing by any standard, it’s pretty much a classic mario game if it had RPG stats, items, and random abilities granted through the character and partner systems. The 3D flipping mechanic is nothing astounding, though it is very interesting to see how worlds are constructed

One of the biggest flaws people will mark the game for in its gameplay is that it’s tedious, and while I have to agree, that’s because I’ve already played the game before, and the tedium only comes from not being completely invested in the experience anymore. I’ll get some specific examples in a bit, but there’s a few cases of “tedium” that i believe are 100% intentional and drive the story in an interesting way

STORY/WRITING/GAME DESIGN

Thats a fuckin broad section, but its pretty much everything else i have to say on the game, and where the most spoilers and random praise is gonna be

I’m not actually gonna talk about the whole story, more just the strong parts of it, under the assumption you’ve already played it or understand a story as simple as “villain wants to destroy world, hero wants that to not happen”

The writing and characters are just flawless, everyone is fun to be around, especially the bad guys, who you see more antics of than your own party. There’s goofy running plotlines about O’chunks and mimi essentially getting grounded and being forced to write essays about why they fucked up at beating mario, and big stinky brother dimentio teasting and bullying them and sneaking them out to do his bidding when The big Count Bleck is away

The game is full of referential humor to not just mario itself but all kinds of games, there’s skeletons in hell who are clearly just Marios from the mainline games who died in stupid ways, there’s an actual dragon quest turn based boss battle in hell too, and chapter 3 has an otaku villain who tried to get with peach in a simulated visual novel

but the humor exists not just in references, but in simple good scenarios, with things like “Having a game show in a bathroom when everyone's life is at stake” and “locating an ancient manuscript to use as toilet paper” or “flying through black holes to find a convenience store” and things of that nature

It also interacts with the players emotions in many interesting ways, one of the more lauded being chapter 2-3, where mario is forced into working off a massive debt of fictional money, and is required to do hard, boring labor. There isn’t anyway to avoid doing both the hitting a block 100 times and the running on a treadmill for a few minutes thing, but the constant feeling of “there has to be a faster way to do this” drives the player to prod around, find the secrets, and slowly discover how to break the system wide open and get to the end, and i love it for that

This entire game is some sort of bait and switch, to put it simply, while it’s already a bit of a departure from both mario itself and the paper series, the first 5 worlds are pretty fucking tame stuff, other than the void, which is a giant black and purple spot that sits in the sky, always, every single world has the void growing in its sky, and it does grow, every chapter it gets bigger and bigger and takes up the sky, but where this truly culminates into the “switch” part is chapter 6, which starts itself by presenting you with the most TEDIUS sounding chapter possible, fight 100 enemies in a row, and nothing else, and for 25 straight fights, that is all it is, so you’ve locked yourself into it at this point, you know whats up, but the void in the background begins to grow to the point of being the entire fucking background, and every enemy you face speaks as if they know they’re all going to die, and by the 30th fight, one of the villains comes to stall for time as the void completely swallows the world, and the party is sent back to the hub. When they decide to go back in to world 6, its empty, the entire world is a white void with a single black line making up the ground, and colorless destroyed structures occasionally peaking out of the ground.

and you walk on this white void for so long and you just feel nothing but regret and fear and no matter how fast you make yourself go you feel like you’ll never find anything, but you do eventually get your plot item and escape

then, Dimentio, one of the villains you’ve seen the least of, appears in the hub world, the safest place in the universe, and kills mario

he just fucking kills him

he puts mario in a box and fills the box with explosions and mario fucking dies and goes to hell because fuck you mario

then you go through all of chapter 7 just to escape hell (called the Underwhere cus how could we possibly be allowed to take hell seriously) and join up with your full party before confronting the final world, which i’ve already stated i just love the design off

the game just takes the comfortable ride you’re on and throws it into the fucking sun and burns you alive and i love it so much, even the very end of the game doesnt let up, where the main villain is overtaken by that absolute madman Dimentio (Whose name is a play on both Dimension and dementia), who clearly was powerful enough to have done the whole “ending of the world” himself, but did it this way for the theatrics of it

there’s a lot i could still say about the game, but this post is absolute rambling and its 2 in the morning but as usual, i just wanted to shit my thoughts onto the internet to people could maybe learn somethin about either the game or me and how i think and look at and respond to stuff, and as always, anybody who read this whole thing is cool and i love you a whole heck of a lot

[greyliliy]

Paper Mario: The Origami King

I loved Paper Mario: The Origami King. A lot. It's my first Paper Mario game and it is an understatement to say that I adored it. Enough so that I want to write a full review on my thoughts for the entire game. o-o It’s been so long since I’ve felt the need to do that and it feels good. It feels so good. T-T

So let’s do this. :D This is going to be a long one, and I’ll probably put the cut right before I start talking about individual chapters. Hopefully before that there are no major spoilers, but afterwards its’ a free for all discussion. So spoilers will be present! :D

A Brief History of my Relationship With Paper Mario

I saw an Arlo video talking about it when I was randomly browsing videos on his channel (I found him for something else believe or not) and I think that was the first time I even realized this franchise existed. Lol. (Which is funny because I have a Wii U and Paper Mario: Color Splash was like the last big game for that console).

I was curious so I browsed the Paper Mario Reddit and watched his Color Splash reviews and got interested in the series.

I ended starting to watch play throughs of Thousand Year Door (where I am mostly through the game? The players just finished the area where you get Vivian) and Color Splash (where I am halfway through the game maybe?).

My opinion on both games: They both look fine. TYYD has it’s good points. Color Splash has its good points. I feel like I would be irritated by random battles in both of them, no matter the combat methods. Lol.

But honestly I leaned more toward Color Splash because I love the Paper Aesthetic. Good story + Paper Themed World = My jam.

Which  means that first Origami King trailer smacked me in the face because it looked like I’d be getting both. I preordered the game as soon as I saw the trailer and it did not disappoint. Lol.

General Stuff

The Good: The characters! I adored all of them. Every character, whether generic minion or unique, was bursting with fun dialogue and moments that made me smile. Olivia was precious. I want an Origami Olly to put in my room (I love him so much) and the Legion of Stationary was surprisingly fleshed out. They were easily my favorite bosses in the game, which was a surprise after all the teasing they got in the trailers. Lol.

Plus: LUIGI. Oh my gosh. He’s amazing in this game. XD

The Music doesn’t need my praise. Everyone has praised the music in this game and it deserves it. Every. Single. Track. Is the greatest and I love this soundtrack. I’m listening to it right now (Where can I buy this Nintendo. TELL ME).

I also really enjoyed the battles. It had a nice blend of Turn Based & Overworld Action, keeping things mixed up and fresh. I wasn’t great at some of the combat (Which I’ll talk about below in the chapter by chapter section) but the game makes stuff easier if you fail too much...which I appreciated. LOL.

Oh. And the Confetti thing. I liked it. Filling holes with confetti was satisfying in a nice completionism way. It was kinda soothing, too, and it was nice to physically repair the world in addition to trying to save it in general.

The Critique: The game needed more time with Olly. I’m not just saying that as someone who loved him, I’m saying it as a story miss. We see Olly at the beginning. And we see him for like two seconds at a time between chapters to half-handedly ask Olivia to join him, and then...the final boss fight. One or two cut-away scenes showing what Olly and Peach were doing between the Streamer Banners would have been great and done wonders for fleshing out the story.

The Combat: Opinions on this have been highly mixed. Specifically, I have noticed a large crowd saying the combat is too easy; they line everything up on the first turn and kill everything on the first turn and then they’re drowning in coins so there’s no point to battle.

And then there’s Me: I rarely got the puzzle right on the first turn, which means I didn't get the bonus coins, and I usually burned through weapons and faster since I didn’t get the “Great Line Up!” on the first turn bonus. So I was...constantly fight enemies for coins (Stuff gets expensive in this game) and using them to get help from the Toads.

So when I got puzzles right on the first turn, I felt super accomplished. Lol. I did eventually get better at them (and used one of the help items from the Battle Toad) and was beating them in one turn 60% of the time. So while I really enjoyed the puzzle turn-based battles, I can see how some would get tired and bored of them.

I think a difficulty setting might fix the wildly different experiences with this. The puzzles get much tricker later, so if you’re solving even those too fast--the game could have given you harder stuff to solve.

Though it is sort of funny. If you do well at puzzles, you get a ton of extra bonus coins. But if you’re good at the puzzles, you don’t need those coins since coins are mostly spent on “Getting help for puzzles.” Which the people who are bad at puzzles need but don’t get...fun times.

Boss battles, however, were mostly scripted and I’ll talk about those in detail in the spoiler section below. XD

The Game

Okay! Let’s get into the meat and talk about each Streamer Section individually. o-o Whoooooooo. I’m glad the Game8 Wiki has a nice layout for me to reference. XD

Prologue

This is when I knew I was going to love the game. Luigi is adorable. Origami Peach is every bit as creepy as the trailer promised. And Olly stealing the castle was great. :D

The Red Streamer

This entire streamer is a tutorial. I can see how that could get irritating if you don’t like Olivia holding you hand (and I have seen many complain about it), but this is the only chapter where she does that. 

Which I understand. Every streamer follows the same sort of pattern (explore two or more themed areas to open up a path to a temple, beat a temple, beat a Vellumental, go clear the boss building/area, fight the Stationary Boss). Giving the audience a clear how-to guide to get through an entire Streamer Chapter isn’t the worst.

Plus Olivia is adorable and I used X to talk to her all the time, whether I needed the hint or not. Lol.

Whispering Woods

The mini story with the trees and the the little Toad camp ground are cute. I was surprised that I had to back track here later in the game a few times. XD

Toad Town

The hub world! Here you can find the Museum (which has all the fast travel pipes), the Battle Practice area (which if you visit 3x will give you items to make the Ring battles easier), and the shop (please remember to actually use your membership card you get from here and don’t be like me who paid 24,000 coins in the late game for a collectible when I could have had it HALF OFF but I forgot to equip the membership card).

It also features: A cool Graffiti area I need to visit again because I heard it gets more art as you progress through the game, many Macho Gumbas to beat, the Docks, a Toad that’ll tell you what Power Up Hearts you are missing, more fast travel options, and a great scene with Luigi that kick-starts his sub-story as he hunts for Princess Peach’s Castle Key.

Picnic Road & Overlook Mountain

So many hidden Toads. Everywhere. XD It’s a very lovely area, but again, since this is a tutorial-ish Streamer there isn’t much there aside from enemies to practice fighting and a lot of examples of how Toads hide (including in the ground, in walls, as folded origami, on the other end of small over world puzzles, etc.)

Earth Elemental Temple & Fight

I loved the lead up to this Temple. The fake Koopa one with the small tour boxes was so great. It was funny, cute, and I loved that the fake Temple Tour ended with a real Temple.

The fight was easy (again...tutorial streamer) but I still messed up a few times. Lol. It took me a while to get the hang of the boss rings (and I kid you not, it was like five streamers in before I realized you could move the boss ring panels front and back in addition to rotating the rings).

Olivia turning into a Vellumental was a huge surprise. I’m not sure how I feel about it as a whole, but they use her transforming powers the entire game, so it’s thematically appropriate.

Overlook Tower & Colored Pencils

Fighting your way up the tower to get to the boss was fun. I loved the elevator bits & the drawings everywhere (Colored Pencils drew Olly!!!).

It was a very nice introduction to the future “Boss Building before the Fight” that you’ll face in every Streamer.

Also Colored Pencils having a personality was such a delight that I couldn’t help but grin. Legit, the Legion of Stationary are some of my favorite characters and I’m amazing at how much life and personality they shoved into these office supplies.

I’m sad they die afterwards though. T-T

But with the Red Streamer done, the game stops holding your hand and the game really gets going. :P

The Blue Streamer

One word: Bobby.

It’s fun having the second world be your favorite in the game. Lol. But it just hit all the right beats and made a great impact.

Autumn Mountain

Very pretty area. Lets you get to know Bob-omb (aka “Bobby” as Olivia likes to call him) and his personality as you explore a gorgeous, autumn area. Lots of warm colors and great music tracks. It had a few frustrating areas with the stupid falling Chestnuts (oh my gosh how long did it take me to figure out I needed to hit the wall to break it lol), but overall a good area.

Water Vellumental

I cheated on the slide puzzles. I’ll admit it. I paid the coins to have the Temple solve its own puzzles. LOL.

Years of playing Zelda made me terrified of a Water based Temple but it wasn’t that bad aside from the slide puzzles. A very lovely temple with a great design.

The boss fight was one of the easier ones, but I was still getting the hang of figuring out the pathing for boss fights so it took me a while to figure out how to execute the things I wanted to do (I figured out early I had to use Olivia’s Earth Vellumental form to avoid the Water Attack, but I wasn’t so good at lining u the On Button and the Magic Circles to do it lol).

Eddy River

Lord this was annoying. I missed one of the Holes to fill with confetti and that was the moment were I was like “I will never 100% this game” because the thought of going down that river again made me go “No.” XD

Shogun Studios

I loved running around this amusement park. There were puzzles and character interactions everywhere. (So many item trades between NPCs lol) and the Ninja Mansion was fun. Even if I had to do it twice because I missed Luigi the first time around...

Big Sho’ Theatre & Rubber Band

This was amazing.

Riding the up the tower in the audience seats. The captured Toad audience. The paper Macho actors. The different stage plays. Rubber Band yelling in the background before showing up as the Diva they are.

The Rubber Band fight was also a blast. I figured out the trick immediately and had a great time wrecking that boss. XD

It was fun. The Rubber Band Tower & Fight are easily my 2nd favorite Boss Area and Fight in the game.

Sweetpaper Valley to Breezy Tunnel

I know this area is technically part of the Yellow Streamer, but it feels like an interlude section, so I’m putting it in its own section.

I will admit, I had this part of the game spoiled for me. I knew about what happened to Bobby and I was like “Really. The game’s going to go there.”

And it did.

When you get to the Valley, Olly drops a bolder on Olivia and Bobby’s like “I know how to fix this.”

He takes you on an awesome adventure through the Princess Peach Cruise Ship that involves an incredible Macho Battle on the boat and the retrieval of a special item, and then when you get back...

Bob-omb saves Olivia.

The death of Bobby itself wasn’t the sad part. Honestly it was a little funny because the bolder explodes into a bunch of confetti that Mario picks up as he walks through it.

The sad part is Olivia.

When she realizes what happened to Bobby and runs away. Ug. Sitting with her in the dark as she sobs. Her grief. It’s so sad in the best way. And then Bobby! Bobby tells you to cheer her up and man.

That tiny “That’s not fair” she says to Mario when he makes her laugh? That’s the spot that got me teary eyed for the first time in the game.

It’s so good and it solidified this game as an all time favorite. Even if the rest of the game was horrible, it can’t take that scene away.

The Yellow Streamer

The. Music. This area has my favorite music. Every track is such a jazzy, awesome beat and I could hang out in the Snif City Hotel Pool Room all day to listen to that song. XD

Scorching Dessert & Snif City

Driving through the Desert areas felt a little like padding since you had to keep backtracking everywhere, but it wasn’t nearly as bad as the Purple Streamer later, so in hindsight it’s less annoying. Lol.

Snif City has a fun design and I loved exploring it, along with the desert area. The Luigi cameo was pretty fun (as was the intentional game over I triggered to see the animation lol).

Professor Toad is a fun partner character, though I will admit I got stuck for a while because I didn’t realize you could use him to dig in spots that weren’t glowing (oops).

Olivia singing to raise the temple was a treat.

The Fire Vellumental

This temple is how I found out the game makes stuff easier if you fail too many times. There was a jumping area where you have to only jump on blocks that light up and I failed so many times it dropped all the blocks you couldn’t jump on. Uh. Oops. XD

The Fire Vellumental has my favorite design. It’s basically Moltres and Olivia looks awesome as a fire bird.

The Temple of Shrooms and Hole Punch

This might be my favorite Stationary Lair & Fight. The temple was great to explore. The Faceless Toads were fun and creepy. And oh my gosh the DJ dance room caught me so off guard I couldn't help but laugh.

Great music. Great Boss.

The fact he wouldn’t come out unless everyone was partying was fantastic. The fight itself was also pretty fun with the guy hole-punching Mario and having to find your pieces on the grid. The Hole Punch’s theme “Disco Devil” is also so good I can’t take it. Who gave a song a right to be that catchy?

I loved every second of this temple & fight.

Captain T.Ode

And then of course everything ends with Professor Toad finding the Toad he was looking for, finishing out his mini story arc. And using your fire powers to free him (And after the Shangri-Spa Toads worked so hard, too!! Lol).

The Purple Streamer

This is the only area of the game I didn’t like. It had a few good moments (Luigi and the Mushroom Island, a few of the puzzles islands) but overall I wanted to get through it as fast as possible and almost rage quit at one point.

The only saving grace was the ending with the Stationary Boss.

The Great Sea

It took me way too long to realize I had to take the boat out into the mist before it would prompt Captain T.Ode getting his submarine. WAY TOO LONG. I was sailing around aimlessly and screaming in the Museum wondering why the guy didn’t come get the Marino yet for like a solid thirty minutes.

Everything about this area was slow. Swimming from Island to Island. The loading screens between the Submarine sections. The small Island puzzles.

Just. Ug.

And of course when I find out I can upgrade the boat to go faster I didn’t have enough coins. So I had to go to another area to fight baddies to get coins and come back. XD

Even meeting Olly’s creator on an island (with a great Luigi sequence) was a disappointment. It was so short and all we really learned was that Olly is the one who made Olivia (which makes him more her Dad than her Brother...which I have talked bout before but will let the topic drop here for now). And that was IT.

Give me a flashback to Olly being made. Give me more of a hint to what the Origami Maker wrote to make the kid go nuts. Just. Something. Anything! *throws hands in the air*

The Ice Vellumental

This temple was annoying. The sliding ice puzzles were just...no. They aren’t actually that bad. I was just really burned out from all the sailing when I got to this temple and was in a bad mood. I’ll be fair--the temple itself was fine.

(Except for one area where you had to climb the stairs while dodging falling boulders and I kept messing up  my jumps and having to do it over and ARRRGH).

BUT THE BEAR.

I hate the bear. I had my first game over with the bear. I nearly rage Quit with the bear. And I beat him EVENTUALLY with 10 HP and because the game had pity on me and stuck the 1000 Arms Technique panel on the outer row.

I was fine up until the “Memorize the path and recreate it” section. The path would look easy. I’d remember where it was. But then the rings would get shuffled and I could not recreate the path for the life of me. I tried it so many times. I failed so many times.

*stares into the distance* 

I watched a Youtube Tutorial that beat that boss in five minutes. It took me like an hour. There is a special type of frustration that comes from “I know what I need to do and I know the trick but I can’t seem to make it work.”

The Three Trials

I paid coins to make these easier. I was so done with everything by that point, that failing the stupid Strength Trial twice in a row was enough to just. End me. XD

The Sea Tower and Tape

A shining light in a horrible Streamer. Lol. The Tower was fun to climb and I got excited for the Tape boss.

Who did not disappoint.

His greaser Punk personality and calling Olly “Boss” was the first thing that made me really grin this entire streamer. Even Tape’s fight gimmick taping the panels down was almost a relief and a much easier fight than the Ice Vellumental.

I loved the Tape fight. XD

The Green Streamer

Aka “Kamek is awesome and bless the Bowser Minions.”

Shangri-Spa

I liked this area more than I thought I would. When I first got there and saw the theme of Angel Toads I was like “Why” and then I saw Bower’s fallen Castle, met all the minions paying off their debt cleaning, and Olivia thought Kamek was a housekeeper.

Bless all of it.

And then Bowser Jr. gets cut into pieces by a pair of scissors and it was like “Oh, shit.”

You fix him of course, but the implications were like “Dude, those scissors killed Bowser Jr.” I honestly think one of the reasons they leaned so much harder into the “paper” aesthetic was to get away with more violence/darker content. The entire Scissors lair and fight is the perfect example. It sort of follows TV and Cartoon logic - if it’s not human, you can get away with a LOT more violence (like robots getting ripped apart or derezzing characters in Tron).

It’s not actual gore, but if you think about what it symbolizes, it really hits you (and why Mario Game Overs getting cut in half instead of reviving with his Green Mushroom).

You get a small break after that exploring all the Spas and their mini puzzles to fix Bowser Jr. The Jungle Area is the longest of which and has some nice scripted Game Overs that are fun to trigger and Olivia, Kamek, and Bowser Jr. have a good “Pick me!” scenario that gets repeated.

The boss of his area is also Macho Chain Chomp which is a win in my book because Chain Chomp is Best Mario Baddie.

(I love Chain Chomps. I have a Chain Chompette on my Keychain.)

Bowser’s Castle & Scissors

I noticed a lot of people saying Scissors was their favorite Stationary Boss and I didn’t quite get why until this Castle & Fight. He’s not knocking Hole Punch out of the way on my own list (Seriously that Boss fight music), but he is up there on the “Dude” factor.

Scissors is creepy. He is a literal sadist who tortures everyone he gets his hand on. His shadow paper minions are creepy and have cool Ring Battles.

The mutilated minions he used to make up a paper Macho Buzzy Beetle was dark if you thought about it too long - but it was a great Kamek moment. XD

Scissors himself had a great “I want a challenge!” attitude and his fight was intense.

I also screwed up and broke the blade guard on the first turn and uh. I died very quickly. XD That note that says “DO NOT BREAK THE GUARD” wasn’t kidding. I’m not super at timing action commands, so uh, jumping over the blades didn’t work out so well (especially when Scissors started cheating...).

Second time went much better. I figured out how to time attacks to avoid hitting his guard. I got to see the awesome cut scene where he took the guard off. I actually dodged a hit. I had fun. XD

And then Bowser enters the scene for the final areas of the game. Whoooo!

Finale

Bowers’ Air Ship appearance was epic. Very cinematic and I loved how he was like “I might use this against you later.”

Mario and Bowser team ups never fail to disappoint, honestly.

The air battle was messed up.

After that entire scene with Bobby in the Blue Streamer...I am now firing Bob-ombs at planes freely and in mass numbers because I have bad aim. I just. I don’t know if I want to laugh or cry. XD

The crash landing and the race out of the volcano were fun, though.

Peach’s Castle & Olly’s Castle

Luigi finally brought us the right key. I haven’t talked about Luigi much, but every single one of his appearances brought a smile with them. I loved how he had a key in every chapter like clockwork, and even now, he came through.

Bowser talking about Luigi was also pretty great. XD

But most importantly:

I love Olly. His few appearances here desperately made me wish there had been more of him earlier. He’s a dramatic little brat and I want to hug him.

The transformation of Peach’s Castle to Olly’s Origami one? Amazing. One of my favorite cut scenes in the game.

Fighting the Origami Castle itself? Eh. Aside from the great music tracks, it was a little tedious. It lacked the cool levels of the earlier Boss Areas and was mostly “use 1000 folding arms” to progress. I didn’t hate the area, but it was a bit of a let down.

Stapler was nice though. He was a good dog. That I crushed in combat. o-o

King Olly

His throne room covered in Paper Cranes is my favorite designed room & man, I wish I remembered to take more screen shots. It was so creepy and so dark and it looked so good with this tiny paper King sitting alone next to an empty throne since Olivia “Betrayed” him. 

I loved how his castle still had Olivia everywhere. Like they were meant to be together, but still separated. So good. T-T

The Princess Peach reveal was also so creepy and great.

But also made me wish for more cut scenes. Why did Olly want to make her into the wall? Why did he want her quiet? Did she annoy him? Or What? Tell me, game. Tell me!

Aesthetically it made the room look perfect though as his creepy little room. XD

As far as Olly's motivations go...I have mixed feelings. On the one hand, yes, it’s a little shallow. “A Toad wrote on me so now I’m going to destroy all flat paper beings and make them origami!” is sure...a thing. But I’m also a fan of Evil Characters that are just...evil. Maybe Olly really did just want to make everything Origami so they were like him. He was the first “Living” Origami creature and maybe he was just lonely. That’s why he made Olivia and wanted everyone to be like him. 

But that’s also reading into it...and makes me want to write a fanfic exploring it, but this is a review. XD

I’m fine with “Olly was looking for any excuse to go nuts and take over the world and the writing will just have to do.” Even if it does make his little “I guess I lost so now I’m redeemed” moment feel forced. XD

The Fights

The Bowser Origami Sumo vs Giant Olly thing was...okay. I get what they were going for, but it kinda missed the mark with me.

The Actual Olly fight? Oh lord. I had to do it like 10 times.

I failed the Action commands...a lot. Which meant a lot of game overs since I went into the fight with like 40 health (I may or may not be bad at jumping and the Sumo fight throwing stars may or may not have wrecked my health) and didn’t doge Olly's attacks.

Thankfully the game made the ring puzzle easier each time so I could actually finish it.

And it only took me 4 times to get the action commands right? XD Something like that.

I DID IT which is the point.

(This is a case of “If I was better at gaming I would have loved the fight” but my poor skills made it longer and more tedious than it should have been - only’s awesome speech at the beginning loses its bite after the fourth time hearing it.)

The Final Cut Scene

Olivia saying Goodby to Olly had me teary eyed. Her holding his little hand. Reading the message their creator left. Olly’s request for her to make him into the last crane.

Olivia’s freaking WISH. Knowing that She, herself, was one of Olly’s creations.

The cut scene was beautiful. The cranes. The light. The castles’ return.

The party at the end. The two little empty thrones.

I was sniffing through the (very well done and great to watch) credits.

Olivia was such a good girl and I miss her and Olly so much.

This ending was the perfect example of “Wouldn’t change it because it made me sad in a good way but Bless Fanfics and their “Everyone Lives” alternate universes.”

THE END

The game had a few hiccups but overall? I loved it. I can very easily see how “Your first Paper Mario is your favorite” is going to hold true. Wonderful game.

I might have to actually go back and try to 100% the game to get that extra ending I’ve seen spoiled.

[allcheatscodes]

paper mario the thousand year door gamecube

http://allcheatscodes.com/paper-mario-the-thousand-year-door-gamecube/

paper mario the thousand year door gamecube

Paper Mario: The Thousand Year Door cheats & more for GameCube (GameCube)

Cheats

Unlockables

Hints

Easter Eggs

Glitches

Guides

Get the updated and latest Paper Mario: The Thousand Year Door cheats, unlockables, codes, hints, Easter eggs, glitches, tricks, tips, hacks, downloads, guides, hints, FAQs, walkthroughs, and more for GameCube (GameCube). AllCheatsCodes.com has all the codes you need to win every game you play!

Use the links above or scroll down to see all the GameCube cheats we have available for Paper Mario: The Thousand Year Door.

Genre: Role-Playing, First-Person Action RPG Developer: Intellegent Systems Publisher: Nintendo ESRB Rating: Everyone Release Date: October 11, 2004

Hints

Danger Mario

Danger Mario is tough. To have him work, you have to equip 20 or 30 power rushes which can be found at the pianta parlor after you get the 6th crystal star and when you clear frankie’s trouble. Danger Mario’s attack power will be increased x2. He can also defeat the toughest enemies the Shawdow Queen and Bonetail.

Maximum Coins You Can Hold At A Time

The Maximum coins you can hold at once is 999.

Jabble The Jabbi

It is possible to Unlock a Jabbi that will travel around the Great Tree in Chapter 2 with you as well as your puni. If you remember correctly Punio mentions a friend of his when he first tells you about the Jabbi tribes in the tree. Well if you go to Pungent’s Store to the left of the same area he told you this in, you can find Jabble hiding behind the three random pillars all the way to the left. He doesn’t count for anything in terms of Puni count, but come on who doesn’t want a Jabbi as a friend?

Danger Mario

Danger Mario is tough. To have him work, you have to equip 20 or 30 power rushes which can be found at the pinata parlor after you get the 6th crystal star and when you clear frankie’s trouble. Danger Mario’s attack power will be increased x2. He can also defeat the toughest enemies the Shawdow Queen and Bonetail.

Broken-Neck Mario

When you are under a small ceiling do an ultra-jump. When he hits the top pause the game then un-pause, it looks like he has a broken neck.

Yoshi Colors

When you pick your name for the Yoshi, name it the color you want it like “Orange” and it will turn that color but if you think that’s stupid name him after something that color like “Fireball” and since fire is orange he will turn orange.

How To Defeat Blooper

You need to be able to go to this sewer (not the main sewer) and jump on Blooper’s thing. He will say something and you need to fight him. Defeat his things and he will fall down from the top of the stage. If you have the Power Smash, you’d might as well use this (have a lot of BP or FP!)a lot in this fight. (Tattle with Goombella for details) Have either 95 or 99 star points there. If they ask you what you want up, reply ‘HP’. Then you can also go to Petal Meadows.

Star Point Craze

To do this, the best place to go to is Keelhaul Key after you have completed chapter 4. But I advise that you get Ms. Mowz before you set sail (upgrade her to Super Rank before you go). Now when you arrive on the island, you will see that there are 3 fire ghosts (Embers). You beat them and then you go to the jungle and you will see a Green Fuzzy and he will jump right to you. Now when you’re in battle, have Mario defend himself, while Ms. Mowz hits the enemies with her Love Slap. But when there are 4 of them, let Mario use his Power Bounce to kill 1. If you do this correctly, then you should have a whole bunch of star points in the end of the battle. Good luck!

Shine Sprites At Poesly Heighs And Star Pieces At Hooktails Castle

One sprite is at the very left of poesly heighs. Another one is in the place with the sixth crystal star, do a spring jump at the poles, go left and go straight down. You will also see the luigi emblem, but thats another cheat. One piece in hooktail castle is in the room with the paper airplane, you go to the crack again and go right. Another is in the part when you jump out of the window, instead go right then you will get a star piece.

The Soft Touch

The soft touch is very simple, all you have to do is equip two or more soft stomp badges. If you do that, the enemy will be soft for about five or more turns.

Snow Bunny

To make a snow bunny, you have to mix a Spicy soup with a Golden Leaf , but first you have to solve Zess T. ‘s trouble by getting the legendary cookbook first.

Counting Sheep

To have your enemies in an endless sleep, you need to equip 2 or more sleepy stomps, which will knock out your enemies 5 or more turns, but temporarily.

Shriny-dink

Performing shrinky-dink requires 2 or more shrink stomp badges. The enemy will be shrunken for 5 or more turns.

Not So Simple Mario

To become unsimple Mario, you have to buy 2 or more unsimplifier badges at the howz of badges.

All The Partners Where When And How To Get Them And What They Do

Goombella:where rougeport, how to get:beat lord crump and go up the stairs, when:the beginning of the game, what she does:she can tell you about anything and anyone in the game in and out of battle. Koops:where just outside of petalburg, how to get:get the sun and moon stone and then go back to petalburg and walk out of the borders of the town, when:near the beginning, what he does:he can be shot out forwards and attack enemies or retrieve items Madame Flurrie:where her house in boggly woods, how to get:beat Vivian, Marilyn, and Beldam get her lucky necklace and go back to her house, when:just before you are able to get into the great tree, what she does:she can blow great gusts of wind to make enemies dizzy for an easy escape and to blow away invisible things to make whats under them visible ? (you get to name this partner yourself):where the hot dog stand in glitzvile you get the egg and then it hatches after you lose the battle for rank ten, how to get:King K will tell you the hot dogs are amazing then you go out to the hot dog stand and chase the egg until you catch him on the roof of the hot dog stand, when: (the egg) when King K tells you to gop get a hot dog (the actual partner) after you lose battle number 10, what he does:you can ride him to go faster and to glide for a short period of time Vivian (yes the same one you fought in boggly woods): where in twilight town, how to get: beat doopliss and go back to twilight town, when: after you beat doopliss and he steals your body you go back to twilight town and find the superbomb for Vivian, what she does:she can pull Mario into the shadows and hide from enemies and other stuff like that. Bobbery:where keyhaul key, how to get:get the chuckola cola from Flavio and give it to Bobbery, when:after you revive him with the chuckola cola, what he does:you can throw him and he will walk a few steps and then blow up but if you press X before he is supposed to blow up he will blow up. Ms. Mowz:where after getting the fourth crystal star you can take her trouble at the trouble center, how to get: you finish her trouble at the trouble center (her trouble is you have to find a badge in hooktail castle, after you finish her trouble you get her and the badge), when :after getting the fourth crystal star, what she does: she can sniff out items and badges if you are really close to something and not moving her nose will twitch.

All Of The Places And The BOSSES

Hooktail castle, HookTail HP=20 D=1 Att=5The Great tree, magnus Hp=30 d=1 Att=2glitzville, Macho Grubba Hp=60 d=0 att4Creepy Steeple, Doopliss Hp=40 d=0 att=4Keehaul Key, Cortez Hp=20 (back to life 3 times) d=1 attack=4Excess Express, Smorg Hp=50 d=1 att=5x-naut fortress, Magnus Von Grapple 2. 0, Hp=70 d=2 att=6Palace Of Shadows, Shadow Queen, Hp=150 d=1 att=7Pit of 1oo trials, Bonetail, Hp=200 d=2 att=8 hardest one of all!

The Actual Legendary Treasure

After you beat the Queen of Shadows, start the game again. You’ll see all of your allies standing in front of rogueport. Professor Frankly will tell you what the treasure actually was. And it turns out. It’s a dried shroom. I know. Disappointing. But at least he gives it to you!

Darkly

To find darkly, go to professor’s Frankly’s house. Talk to him and he will tell you to find darkly. Exit the house and talk to the Goomba. He tells you a hint. Go to the left of the house of the person that powers up your partners. Walk up to the wall and a secret passageway will open. In that passageway Larson will be there. Keep going and you will see Darkly hiding.

Important Facts

When talking to someone, if a word is in redprint, that means that it is important an youshould remember it.

Speech Backtrack

Sometimes, when some one is talking and their pastthe 1st speech bubble, press “Z” and you will goback to the first bubble

Happy Lucky Lottery

In the happy lucky lottery a new number is drew atmidnight. its a good idea to change the clock totomorrow so you have a better chance of winningright? WRONG!! if you change the clock toyesterday lucky will find out. he will ask you ifyou did it. if you say yes he will have this HUGEFIT! and you will have to buy a new ticket for 500.

Strange Sack

On the 50th floor in the pit 100 trials, thetreasure chest has a strange sack in it. Thestrange sack allows you to hold up to 20 items.

Who Runs The Trouble Center?

Wanna know who runs the trouble center? Use papermode to slide through the crack between thetrouble center and Bobbery’s house. Once behind,use Flurry to blow away the invisible thing thatscovering the back door of the trouble center. Gothrough the door and you will find out who runsthe trouble center. Its Goose from the gang ofrobos! Shh don’t tell anyone!

Every 10th Floor Of Pit Of 100 Trials

Every 10th floor of the pit of 100 trials has atreasure chest containing something. See whatsinside each one!

The Legendary Treasure

In the are of the sewers by the Thousand Year Door, is the legendary Pit of 100 Trials. As you can imagine, there’s 100 battles. The last one is against Bonetail, Hooktails oldest brother, with 200 hp and an attack of 8. When you beat him, he upchucks a box with the legendary – Return Postage badge. This badge is like an upgraded Zap Tap badge, and gives an enemy half of the damage it gave you on direct attacks.

Glitz Ville , Great Blow Aways

When your in the storage room in the Glitz Pit use Flurrie’s powers to blow away the boxes covers.

How To Make A Couples Cake

To make a couples cake, you need a snow bunny item and a spicy soup item, then go to Zess T’s house and mix them. Note: you need to have solved Zess T’s trouble at the trouble center.

Boat Mario

In chapter 5 go to the pirate grotto and go into the chamber with the big boat and go into the crack in it. Next, go up to the black chest and talk to it and then a blue flame will appear, battle it to get the black which will open the black chest. Then go through the practice session of being boat Mario.

Doubledip Badge In Fahr Outpost

When you first enter Fahr Outpost through the blue pipe, go to the right until you see a tree and jump in front of the tree to reveal a double dip badge.

Ms. Mowz In Trouble Center

In story mode, you will get six characters (Goombella, Koops, Madame Flurrie, Yoshi, Vivian, and Admiral Bobbery). However after Chapter 4, go to the Trouble Center and take the chore of the mystery person. You will figure out that it is the mouse thief and when the mission is over you get the partner Ms. Mowz. Also after Chapter 4, a trouble in the Trouble Center that has the recipient, ???. It is Ms. Mowz. She needs a badge in Hooktail Castle. In the room where you fought her, in the middle is an invisible chest. Use Flurrie. Give the badge to her, and she will join your party.

Who Is The Evil Spirit In The Thousand-year-door?

The evil spirit will only apear once you defeat leader of the X-nauts. Oops! I’ve said to much. But the name of the evil spirit is the Queen of Shadows. She uses Princess Peaches body for power. She has 150hp. At the start she 10 damage. Once you get her down to 100hp she gets bigger and she does 24 damage. I think if you get her do down to 50 she absorbs the audience and she restores ALL of her health. She knows the Shadow Sirens. They are her servants. When she grows she gets hands and they can suck up your hp. One of her attacks she gains 3 hp & fp.

Bubble Float

After getting Crystal Star number 2, go to the secend door and enter it. That pool at the bottom (bubbles will come up) you can jump in the pool and you float up for a bit!

How To Get Space Food

To get space food you can go to Fahr Outpost andsleep in the inn. Every time you wake up therewill be space food on the table. It replenishes 5hp.

Beat Hooktail Without The Cricket Badge

Before you enter the tower put on your Power Smash badge or your Power Jump badge. Then keep using it and you will beat the dragon in no time.

Stronger Battle Enterances

Instead of using your regular ol’ Normal Jump or Hammer attacks while hitting a foe before a battle, you can use the special Jump and Hammer attacks too. For example, if you ground pound an enemy before battle, you’ll enter the battle with the ground pound attack. (Note:You can’t do this with the spring jump move.)

M&L: SS Reference

Before you get Bobbery as your partner, he will ask you to get him some Chuckola Cola to cure him after being attacked by embers. Chuckola Cola is the same drink from the GBA game Mario and Luigi which was used to turn Queen Bean back to normal from a monster.

Free Sleep

For free sleep, you can either sleep in the beds in Glitzville, your bed on the Excess Express or you can just try finding inn coupons which allow you to sleep for free in inns throughout the game.

The Confusing Hallway In The Palace Of Shadow

In the Palace of Shadow in that hallway that sends you back to the previous room if you go the wrong way may be stressful. Well, all you have to do is follow the direction of the lit candles. Once you’ve finished this, you won’t have to do this anymore.

Puzzles In The Thousand Year Door

Once youv’e beaten Gloomtail, go back to the room with all that water and those bomb dogs. There will be 2 statues of those dogs on each side of the room on a pipe. Use your bomb-omb person a make him blow those statues up. Go in each of them and hit the blue box at the end of the other side of the pipes. The boat mode thing will appear under the statue of the stars. Sail to the tower building. Go in and go to the first door on your left. Hit the far left box 3 times and the far right box 2 times and get the key. Go to the next door on your left and enter it. There should be 4 boxs, 2 red and 2 gray. Use your Ultra Hammer on the gray box on the far left then exit that room. Then go to the next door. I think its a room with nothing in it so take out Fluire and use her to blow away something in the middle and take the key. Go to the next door and enter it. There should also be nothing in there but walk straight to the other side of the wall and keep walking.(you will automatically walk through the wall)Get the key and go upstairs. Go to the frist room to the left and there will be those koopa skeletons. You must beat them in this order: the koopa with the green shoes, the red koopa, the red shoed koopa, then the completely blue one. And thats all I remeber so far. 😉

Ultra Hammer

Once you know how to do Spring Jump, go to Rougeport. Go in front of the inn and walk to the right intill your under a gaint box. Use your Spring Jump under it and it will fall off. Then you open it and get the Ultra Hammer. That will also be the last time you see Toadette!!!

Luigi’s Adventure Friends

As you go through the game, you will see Luigi somewhere in Rogueport with a friend. Luigi will talk about his adventure. These are the list of his friends he went on an adventure with:

Blooey the BlooperJerry the Bob-OmbTorgue the Buzzy BeetleHayzee the Crazy DayzeeScreamy the ????Blooey the Blooper(again)

Level Up Your Partners For The Second Time

Go into Hooktail Castle in the spikey room. Go to the far right of the room and take out Bobbery. Have him blow up the crack in the wall and go in it. Inside the wall you will see a blue block. Hit it and a chest will appear with an Up Arrow in it. Take it to Merlon in Rogueport. This will allow you to level up your partners for the second time when you find more shine sprites.

Get Missing Tattles

If you didn’t tattle on bosses like Hooktail, just go to Professer Frankly’s house and you will see something in the yellow garbage can. Go to it and press A when the ! appears. Now you have the tattle for the enemies you’ve missed.

Toadette Appearance

Every time you find a big chest with either boots or a hammer in it, you will see Toadette from Mario Kart Double Dash teaching you how to use them.

Showering Peach

In any event where you control Peach, go to the bathroom right next to her room. When you see the ! in front of the shower press A then she will take a shower. When she comes out, she will have a different hair style. It will go back to normal once you leave the room.

Parakarry Appearance

At the begining of the game, you will see Parakarry from Paper Mario 1 delivering your mail.

See The Owner Of The Trouble Center

Slide through the crack in the house on the east side of Rogueport. Then use Flurrie’s Gale Force to reveal a hidden door behind the Trouble Center. When you go in it you will see the owner of the Trouble Center.

In Creepy Steeple

When you first enter the creepy steeple there will be no enemys. Turn into a tube and move upwards, there will be a hole in the wall that you can go through. In the room you will find 2 chest, one will have a cookbook(which can be used in a trouble). If you try to open the doors a boo will appear. He will say he is friends are gone and won’t let you in the door. Go to the statue of the star and push it so that a hole appears.Go down the hole and to the left. Open the chest and 200 boos will come out. Go up the hole and talk to the boo, say you won’t hurt him. Then all the boos will try to attack you. Use your hammer swing a couple times on them then they will turn into Atomic Boo which has 40hp. Defeat him and leave through one of the 2 doors. Hit the switch so the stairs are close to the side of the screen. Go through the door and get the key, then hit the other switch so the stairs are on the oppisite side they were on.Use the key in the door go up the stairs and fight doopliss.

8-bit Mario And Partners

In the X-Naut Fortress, go in the ventilation shaft in sublevel 2 and drop through the far right vent into the dressing room. Open the curtain of the stall you fall into and Mario and all his partners will become 8-bit (they will look as they would on an 8-bit system like the NES) until you leave the room.

Get A Peachy Peach

To get a peachy peach, sleep in the inn in Twilight Town. When you wake up you will see a peachy peach on the table.

Fight Bonetail

To fight Bonetail, go to the 100th floor of the Pit of 100 Trials. He’s probably harder than the last boss unless you happen to grow a level before reaching him. Bonetail is the oldest of the Hooktail brothers. Bonetail is just bones and he has 200HP. Be sure to bring alot of items the can heal FP or HP.

Jr. Troopa Appearance

To see Jr. Troopa from Paper Mario 1 check the e-mail you got from Zip Toad. Scroll down to the very bottom of the e-mail until you can see his picture. On the picture look at top left of it and you will see a picture of Jr. Troopa flying in the background.

Lottery

You know you can get a lottery number on the west side of town. Well when you get a number, instead of waiting a whole day, just set your Gamecube date up one day. Just keep trying until you win.

Wario Clothes

To get Wario’s clothes, go to the central area of Rougeport with 360 Coins. There should be a merchant with a large mustache. He sells something called a Wario Emblem from time to time. It is a badge that requires no badge points to wear.

Luigi Clothes

To get Luigi’s clothes, go to where you get the sixth crystal star. From here, do a spring jump up to a pole on the left side. Do another spring jump to reach a ledge with the Luigi Emblem.

Waluigi Costume

If you want mario to look like waluigi, put on the luigi emblem and the wario emblem at the same time. Mario should look like waluigi.

Easy Leveling Up

After Chapter 5, if you go into the sewers of Rougeport, you’ll find an enemy called Koopatrol(they look like turtles in armor). When you fight a koopatrol, try to get it’s life down to 1 or 2 withour killing it and it will call another koopatrol. If you continue this, you could basically battle non-stop koopatrols, and earn star points for every one that you defeat.

Crystal Stars And Boot/Hammer Upgrades

1st: Hooktail Castle2nd: The Great Tree (SUPER BOOTS)3rd: Glitzville(SUER HAMMER)4th: Twilight Town5th: Keyhaul Key6th: Poshley Hights(ULTRA BOOTS)IN ROUGEPORT, HIT THE BIG CHEST OFF THE PODIOUM-LIKE THINGY FOR ULTRA HAMMER)7th (and last!!!): THE MOON!!!

Crystal Star Bosses

1st: Hooktail 20 Hp2nd: Magnus 30 Hp3rd: Macho Grubba 60 Hp (yeah, he's bad)4th: Doopliss ??? (sorry, never tattled it)5th: Cortez 20 Hp (I thought this was the hardest so far but Flurrie can blow away the weapons using Gale Force, and he revives too!!!)6th: Smorg ??? (never tattled it either-not really a Crstl Str boss, but on the train, yes)7th: Magnus 2.0 70 Hp

Note: If you’ve never tattled a boss like hooktail or red bones, look in the trash can in Frankly’s book-infested home.

Break In Hooktail’s Castle

Get two stones which is Sun Stone and Moon Stone from the fuzzy’s home. Defeat the Gold Fuzzy and get out of there. Place the stones on the rocks with holes, two switches will appear. Use Koops’ holding ability to hit the first switch and use your jump or hammer to hit the other switch. A pipe will appear. Go in to it and go to Hooktail’s castle.

See Bow And Bootler From Paper Mario 1

To see Bow and Bootler the Boos,you’d have to beat the last boss first, then go to Poshley Heights and you will see them standing in front of The Poshley Sanctum.

Getting Mrs. Mowz

In chapter 4, go to the trouble center on the east side of Rougeport. Take on the trouble “Elusive badge” from ???. Mrs. Mowz meets you near the badge shop. Go to Hooktail’s room. Stand near the very center and use Flurrie’s power. You’ll find a chest. Open it and take the badge to Mrs. Mowz. She will then join your party.

Beating The Monster Of Creepy Steeple

After beating him on top of Creepy Steeple, he steals your body and name. You must find his real name to defeat him. His name is Doopliss. If you go back to Twilight Town, he will ambush you and ask you to say his name. If you try to write his name, the “p” is not there. You will be forced to fight him. Run. When in Twilight Town, help Vivian find the bomb. You can not leave because your name has been stolen. Give the bomb to Vivian and she will join your party. Go back to Creepy Steeple (after running from Doopliss) and climb down the well. Move to the next room and push the wall. Hide using Vivian’s power and sneak under the door. Keep following the trail until you find a room with a bird and 4 chests. Open the 4 chests and take what’s inside dissapear when there is a . sign above you. He will say the monster’s name: Doopliss. Go back to him and say his name. You must have had opened the yellow chest in the room that contained a “p”. He will run back to the steeple. Go there and Vivian will find out you are Mario. You will fight Doopliss, and if you win, you get your body, name, and crystal star back.

Cheats

Currently we have no cheats or codes for Paper Mario: The Thousand Year Door yet. If you have any unlockables please feel free to submit. We will include them in the next post update and help the fellow gamers. Remeber to mention game name while submiting new codes.

Unlockables

How To Get The Strange Sack

To get the strange sack go to the Pit of 100 Trials and reach the 50th floor. Go to the big chest and open it, you will receive the strange sack.

Easter eggs

Currently we have no easter eggs for Paper Mario: The Thousand Year Door yet. If you have any unlockables please feel free to submit. We will include them in the next post update and help the fellow gamers. Remeber to mention game name while submiting new codes.

Glitches

Currently we have no glitches for Paper Mario: The Thousand Year Door yet. If you have any unlockables please feel free to submit. We will include them in the next post update and help the fellow gamers. Remeber to mention game name while submiting new codes.

Guides

Currently no guide available.

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Currently no guide available.

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Currently no guide available.

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Currently no guide available.

Currently no guide available.

Currently no guide available.

Currently no guide available.

Currently no guide available.

Currently no guide available.