Paper Mario: The Origami King Developers Clarify Comments About Original NPCs

Paper Mario: The Origami King's developers clarify their comments about original non-player-characters in the series. Nintendo fans were none too pleased when a recent interview from the devs indicated that they were not allowed to make cosmetic alterations to existing Mario characters. That interview with VGC started an online conversation that spread like wildfire. Now, in a conversation with GamesRadar, the team has offered some additional perspective on what sparked that change and some of the parameters around the series as it relates to the original characters and enemies that fans of the series have been clamoring for. It might not make some segment of fans feel better, but more clarity is a good thing in this case.

"From the production of Paper Mario: Sticker Star onwards, we were no longer able to graphically represent individual characteristics, such as age, gender etc., in the Toad NPCs (non-playable characters), and so it has become that much more important to convey their personalities simply through text," Kensuke Tanabe explained. "Our writer, Mr Taro Kudo, has been grappling with this difficult challenge since Paper Mario: Sticker Star, but has managed to achieve giving all the texts a sense of humour. In this instalment, Paper Mario: The Origami King, we were able to include some Toads wearing an outfit to match their role, and also created original origami characters."

In those previous comments to VGC, all the fervor around why Paper Mario: Sticker Star and Paper Mario: Color Splash ended up being so different from what came before make sense, even if it is upsetting for fans of the first two games in the series.

"Since Paper Mario: Sticker Star, it's no longer possible to modify Mario characters or to create original characters that touch on the Mario universe," he said. "That means that if we aren't using Mario characters for bosses, we need to create original characters with designs that don't involve the Mario universe at all, like we've done with Olly and the stationary bosses."

"Whether a character becomes an all-time hit or not isn't up to us on the development side; I think it's more the case that characters that fans truly accept naturally end up that way. I hope that the origami siblings in Paper Mario: The Origami King will stay in players' memories, even if they do only end up appearing in this title," Tanabe added.

Do you like Origami King? Would you welcome a return to the Thousand-Year Door template? Let us know down in the comments!