Most Underrated Mario Game

[Ultima Shadow]

We all have our favourites from the many Mario games over the years, but as far as widespread acclaim goes, there are always a few that slip under the radar. So, Fungi Forumers, I ask you this: which Mario games do you think are far better than what people would suggest?

My picks;
Yoshi's Story- very kiddy in terms of graphics and such, but all in all a fun (if easy) platformer that stands up well on its own merits. I think it suffers a lot from comparisons to Yoshi's Island when in reality it is quite a decent game.

Mario Kart Super Circuit- with less of the memorability of SMK and MK64, and the fancy graphics of those that followed it, it's not unfair to say that MKSC is the black sheep of the series, when in actuality it combines the gameplay of its two predecessors brilliantly over 40 tracks (half of them recycled but still...) and sports addictive and fast-paced gameplay for the GBA. I always feel nostalgic when I see a MKSC track pop up in a retro cup on MKDS/MKWii.

[PaperLuigi]

Mario Strikers. It's underrated insofar as it isn't as popular as other Mario sports titles (Mario Tennis and Mario Kart come to mind). It's only outstanding attribute (aside from being a Mario title) is its quality of being fun. Seriously, I could play this game all day against my friends and never be bored with it.

EDIT: Also, Mario is Missing. trollface

[coolkid]

Yoshi's Story and Super Mario Sunshine.

[The Chef]

-Wrecking Crew
-Yoshi's Story
-Mario Party 1, 2 and 3
-Yoshi Touch & Go
-Mario Golf, Tennis and Baseball (people used to rip on these all the time just for being spin-offs)
-Mario Hoops
-Mario Strikers
-Super Mario Sunshine
-Super Mario Galaxy 2 (surprisingly)
-Super Mario Bros. (seriously, everybody touts SMB3, SMW or SM64 as the greatest game in the series but nobody ever acknowledges the originator)
-Mario Bros. (same here, except this one's been demoted to a multiplayer mode)
-Super Mario Bros. 2 (people seem to rip on this one just for being based on an unrelated game)
-Mario Kart: Super Circuit
-Tetris Attack (nobody ever seems to talk about it and it's one of my favorite puzzle games ever)
-Yoshi (same with this one)
-Game & Watch Gallery (I was playing these long before retro became cool and Mr. G&W was created)

[jugglechainsaws]

Dr. Mario.  It's right there with Super Puzzle Fighter II Turbo as my favorite puzzle game ever.

[CrossEyed7]

I wanna say Yoshi's Story, though it seems that it, like SMB2(USA), is starting to come into its own, as all the people who criticized it back when it came out for looking too "kiddy" are now thirteen years older and are becoming more secure in their maturity, and now that we have an actual sequel to Yoshi's Island. I will argue, though, that it's a much harder game than people give it credit for. With six to eight lives at most, and only a single 1-up, hidden rather well, in each level, it's a far cry from the standard Nintendo lives-fest, especially with the prominence of insta-kill obstacles on the last few pages. And it gets really hard if you go for a perfect 30-melon score on all 24 levels (Trial Mode, not Story Mode, is where the game really shines).

Paper Mario is a great game, better in some ways than its sequels (for one, while not as funny of a game, it makes fewer gameplay sacrifices for humor, making it overall a more replayable game than TTYD or SPM), but almost always gets overlooked in favor of its successors. It also gets unfairly panned by SMRPG fans for not being the SMRPG2 they wanted, when it really is. Sure, there's no Geno or Mallow, but if you can get over that and the graphical shift (from 2D 3D on a 2D console to 3D 2D on a 3D console), it works very well as a direct sequel to SMRPG. Bowser forcibly joins Mario's party to get his castle back, they successfully get it back and protect the world from future invasions by Smithy's weapons, Bowser leaves and goes to fix up his castle, Bowser goes to the Star Road intending to discover and possibly steal the Stars' wish-granting power, he gets it and surprises everyone in the Mushroom Kingdom in the middle of a party while they're still celebrating Smithy being defeated. Just assume that the Star Spirits and Star Pieces are the same thing, as are Twink and ♥♪!?, and the two fit together just as well as SML1&2 or SMG1&2. That's not to say I wouldn't still love to see Square make another Mario RPG, of course (seriously, why haven't they gotten on this yet? Nintendo and Square have been friendly for five years now).

Speaking of Super Mario Land 1 and 2, neither of them gets enough love. SML1 is a great spin on SMB, with lots of little twists on classic enemies, all perfectly tuned to a pocket-sized experience (not to mention some nice music), while SML2 is a platforming work of art, with levels that still feel fresh nineteen years later.

The Game & Watch Gallery series really deserves another entry -- and no, the Club Nintendo Collection titles don't count. As I said before, the 3DS would be great for this, using the 3D to subtly simulate the multiple layers inside a G&W screen (backgrounds, foregrounds, liquid crystals in between) and using the camera to simulate a Crystal Screen game.

Mario Hoops is a lot of fun (though I'm still a bit annoyed that they didn't include Geno). Coins, items, and dribbling with the touch screen all work very well. Haven't played it in a while because my DS shoulder buttons always crap out (apparently you're not supposed to put these things in your pockets anymore? Come on, Nintendo. I'm out of college, I'm not going to buy a messenger bag now.).

More later if I remember them.

[WarpRattler]

-Super Mario Bros. ... nobody ever acknowledges the originator

Because there's no reason to consider the original when the sequels were as big of improvements as they were. Like going from Street Fighter to Street Fighter II, though at least SMB1 is still a playable game.

-Super Mario Bros. 2
-Tetris Attack

I really like both of these games, but at the end of the day they're just ROM hacks. Official ROM hacks, sure, but neither is really a Mario game, though SMB2 at least has the fact that a massive amount of stuff from it has ended up in other Mario games going for it.

I definitely agree about Super Mario Land 2 (the original is a bit weak, though I like the superball and Marine/Sky Pop), Super Mario Sunshine, and Mario Hoops.

[BP]

SMB's fun and all but I believe it's OVERrated simply for being so close to first, and for being so old. It's good, but truly, 3, World, Yoshi's Island, and NSMBW knock it all down. Hard.

Lately I've been... not exactly worried, more like sadly expecting that this will happen to NSMBW and SMG2. That they'll be forgotten... that nothing in them will ever become iconic. Neither would indicate that they're bad games, but you know what I mean

[CoconutMikeNIke]

I'd say, more than Dr. Mario, Wario's Woods is underrated. I enjoyed that it was more than just 'match the pieces' kind of puzzles, and it hasn't had the same luck in remakes and re releases that Dr. Mario has enjoyed. I was quite surprised when it showed up on Animal Crossing,

[The Chef]

Come to think of it, Super Mario Land 3: Wario Land is pretty underrated, as are its sequels to some degree. Nobody seems to remember that there was a time when Wario based blocks and used power-ups just the same as Mario did.

[Weegee]

SMB's fun and all but I believe it's OVERrated simply for being so close to first, and for being so old. It's good, but truly, 3, World, Yoshi's Island, and NSMBW knock it all down. Hard.

Too true. Likening SMB to its successors is like comparing early Mesopotamian civilization to that of Ancient Greece or Rome.

[Toad]

I agree that the Mario Land series (Including the first Wario Land game) and Wario's Woods need more recognition. They are all great games. Where are the remakes/rereleases of these?

(apparently you're not supposed to put these things in your pockets anymore? Come on, Nintendo. I'm out of college, I'm not going to buy a messenger bag now.).

You're not supposed to put them in your pockets? Really? But it's a portable system. I thought the idea was for gaming on the go..

[penguinwizard]

Any games I may have nominated for being underrated have already been said. Loved Tetris Attack (the only way you'd get me to play Panel de Pon in any form. If videogames had slap-on skin packs to replace a set of characters with another, I'd use Yoshi characters every time). Wario's Woods was a favorite back in the day for how crazy things would get later on, and the first game where I had a crush on Birdo (and hey, Toad got some recognition). And of course the first Wario Land. The later Wario Lands may be tighter and feel better, but the first game had more adventure and a sense of whimsy that the later games seem to throw out.

For a few games I didn't see in my quick scan of the thread:

- Mario and Wario: Decent puzzler, released only in Japan yet is perfectly understandable.
- Yoshi's Cookie: I loved this game for the Yoshi focus. Might not be as enjoyable as Tetris Attack, but still a good time.
- Mario's Picross: Love love love it. Picross is awesome. Why on earth didn't people pick up on it sooner? Screw Sudoku, screw it to heck - I want Picross.

Also, while I enjoyed Yoshi's Story and consider the "Tower Climb" stage to be the closest I've been to Yoshi nirvana (lovely music, Yoshi gliding on a leaf, particularly easy to run a lot in this stage to have Yoshi breathe heavily), it's the incredibly annoying between-worlds music and overall heavy kid slant and Yoshi humming ALL THE TIME which scares me away. I bought it because I was a Yoshi supporter. I later gave it away.

[toadettesthewinner]

Both have already been mentioned, but my two picks are

Wario's Woods
This game was one of my absolute favorites as a kid. It was my favorite puzzle game of all time (until I started really getting in to the new Tetris), and it was an opportunity for Toad to star! I'd love to see a remake/sequel.

Mario Golf
This game was popular enough that they made versions for N64, Gameboy Color, and Gameboy Advance, and Gamecube. But it was apparently underrated enough that they didn't see fit to make one for the Wii, which would have been AWESOME with the motion sensitive controllers.

[Dark Jaguar]

Hi, new to this forum.  I wanted to make this it's own thread but I can only respond just yet.

I nominate Super Mario Bros. 2 as most underrated, along with maybe Mario Land 2.  I don't understand why there's all the recent hate over it, across so many reviews.  I think if people were honest a lot of people would recall loving it as a kid.  Who cares if it was "just a ROM hack" or however one might put it?

That said...

I've got a pretty big recent discovery thanks to wired and ars technica, the reason I decided to post to begin with.

http://arstechnica.com/gaming/news/2011/04/the-secret-history-of-super-mario-bros-2.ars
This is from an interview with the game's designer, Kensuke Tanabe.

It seems that before Doki Doki Panic, the game started out as a prototype for a new Mario game.  The original prototype, designed by Kensuke Tanabe, was going to focus on vertical scrolling levels and throwing blocks around (at enemies, to use as platforms, you know the drill).  Further, in something I would have loved to have seen finished, the prototype had two player simultaneous multi player, allowing Mario and Luigi to toss each other around.  It later was cancelled because there just weren't enough fun elements according to Miyamoto.  The prototype got life in it when Tanabe was asked to put the mascots for the upcoming "Dream Factory" fair into a game.  The prototype was greatly fleshed out with side scrolling as well as replacing the "ally tossing" with "enemy tossing" and Doki Doki was born.  That, as we all know, was later changed to Mario 2.  (For the record, it wasn't a NOA hack but Tanabe himself that handled the second upgrade into a Mario game.)

When you look at Doki Doki Panic, on this site for example, the differences between it and Mario 2 are well known.  One thing that's important to note however are all the similarities Doki Doki Panic already had with Mario games, from the stars to "warp pipes" to some mushroom houses here and there to vines you can climb.  This information suggests that these similarities are probably inherited from it's origins as a Mario game prototype.

With this new knowledge, I think it's safe to say that rather than Mario 2 not being a "true" Mario game but just a repaint of Doki Doki, it's more accurate to say that it has always been a true Mario game, and if anything it's time as "Doki Doki Panic" is the paint job.

[The Chef]

To be fair, the Starman and the POW Block were already in the game, so it practically was an honorary Mario game even before being turned into SMB2. Still, that explanation certainly explains why they chose Doki Doki as the subject of our SMB2 replacement so easily, and why they continue to accept it on the same level as the rest of the Mario "trilogy".

Edit: For the record, the canned multiplayer aspect sound suspiciously similar to New Super Mario Bros. Wii., what with throwing your buddies around.

[Dark Jaguar]

Agreed, I mentioned a few other similarities Doki Doki already had to make the same point above.  I forgot to mention the POW block though.

I also agree that the tossing your pal around mechanic reminded me of New Super Mario Bros. Wii.  Apparently the mechanic didn't work too well back then but after 20 or so years they managed to work it out :D.

[BP]

I was playing SMAS-SMB2 earlier

There are many things I don't like about it, mostly having to do with the physics. They're not as tight as SMB's and not as polished as SMB3's and especially SMW's. So I end up dying a lot, and when I'm not dying, I am screaming forever

It's a unique experience to say the least

[Dark Jaguar]

If I understand you right, I think you're talking about how controlling the characters feels more "slippery" than in other Mario games, and I will agree on that account.  I've accidentally shot myself off a few vines myself.  Overall it didn't interfere with things too much for me though.

[CrossEyed7]

Yeah, the vine-climbing physics have always felt very wrong to me. Still, it's a step up over SMB1's vine physics.

[ShadowBrain]

Though I realize it's by no means underrated, I'd just like to say that Mario & Luigi: Superstar Saga is one of my favorite games. As in, ever.

Also, I get the feeling there was a disproportionate amount of people who didn't care for Super Paper Mario, and that's an opinion I strongly oppose.

[jmdblazer]

Super Mario Sunshine is my favorite 3d Mario game, and I believe it's highly underrated. I much prefer the open worlds of Sunshine to the linearity of the Galaxies.

[jdaster64]

Personally, I think that both SMB2s are a bit underrated.  I feel like the Japanese one is unknown to a good portion of the Mario fanbase, in spite of its recent ports and such; although it's not as original as SMB3 or SMW, it has unadulterated difficulty that at least rivals that of every Mario platformer since (save for the Perfect Run and such), and I love it for that.  On the flip side, the stateside SMB2 catches a lot of flak for being a rip-off and such, but then, you guys have pretty much said all that should be said in favor of it already, and I'm in full accord with it (Heck, I'd never even considered the fact that the POW Block was around before DDP).

And I have to agree with jmd as well; although I didn't particularly care for FLUDD's gimmicks and the controls and such, Sunshine did manage a seriously great sense of aesthetics, a fair amount of variety despite the constant overarching "tropical island theme", and above all, more exploration potential than either of the SMG games.

[Dark Jaguar]

The thing I like about Lost Levels is how it more or less forces you to complete every single level if you want to truly beat the game.  As with most fans, I first played it in Super Mario All-Stars, and I found it pretty brutal.  That game took me a few months to complete, and I remember finally doing it and wishing I had a camera so I could take a picture of the screen for a Nintendo Power "reward" for doing it.

When they finally released the Famicom version on Virtual Console I snatched it right up.  Yeah it's incredibly similar to SMB1, but that's part of why I liked it.  I will say that SMB2 (USA) does feel more like a sequel than Lost Levels, which always felt more like an extra "challenge pack" for the first game.

One thing I have noted is that it's thanks to SMB2 (USA) that the Mario series has all the throwing it has.  SMB2 really emphasized it, but all the major Mario games since that one have had it, though usually in the form of tossing shells and so on.  Heck even Yoshi's eating and spitting mechanic can be viewed as a deviation of SMB2 enemy throwing, and who can forget tossing around the Bob-omb King in SM64?

Sunshine...  I remember being a bit disappointed in it, but later on I appreciated it more.  I still love the Galaxy games, but it's true that Sunshine has more exploration.  My biggest disappointment with that game is the limited acrobatics when compared to Mario 64.  I never felt that FLUDD added as much as was taken away in that sense.  I personally still rate Mario 64 as the better of the two, but Sunshine certainly deserves more credit than some give.

Of all the Mario RPG games, my personal favorite is still the one that started it all, Super Mario RPG.  I have always just loved how "alive" the world is with all the details programmed into it.  I loved all the little things the programmers thought of, and all the changed dialog if you decide to keep going back to old towns as the game goes along.  When I got it into my head to try jumping on the head of some NPC running in circles, succeeded, and then after a few laps Mario just jumps off, gets dizzy and collapses, I just kept laughing at the idea that the programmers had actually thought of details like that.  I also liked the original characters created for the game.  Geno is still, to me, the coolest character in the Mario universe.

On other Mario 2 USA details, here's another commonality it already had.  Those Trouters are basically a different kind of flying fish that let you jump on them, often appearing in similar sorts of places.

Funnily enough, as a kid (I didn't have the manual for it at the time) I didn't realize those mushroom blocks were supposed to be mushrooms.  I imagined they were big acorns.  Also, I never saw it as simply "it's all just a dream".  I interpreted it as "Mario isn't just dreaming, he and 3 of his friends are trapped in the world of dreams itself and need to defeat Wart so that all people everywhere can have good dreams again".

[The Chef]

The game being "just a dream" is a common misconception anyway. BS Super Mario USA has a plot that's entirely hinged on the idea that SMB2 actually happened.

[Dark Jaguar]

A sequel to Super Mario USA?  That's cool.  That BS Satellite thing sure had a lot of BS going on...  That didn't come out right....

[Toad]

People seem to overlook the fact that SMB2 did happen. The opening credits of the game told us that.

"Mario woke up from his dream and later went on a picnic with his friends. They found a cave, and once inside, found a door. Upon opening the door, the land that Mario described in his dream spread out before them." (I'm paraphrasing since I haven't actually seen the opening of the game in a while..)

[Kimimaru]

My biggest disappointment with that game is the limited acrobatics when compared to Mario 64.

There are even more combinations than in Super Mario 64 if you use F.L.U.D.D efficiently. Unlike Super Mario 64, Super Mario Sunshine always gives you a variety of ways to cross any pit or jump over a wall. You can string jumps together in a huge number of ways. Mario is easier to control and doesn't feel heavy at all. Besides, those random punch-kick moves in Super Mario 64 were almost completely useless. The only move I miss from Super Mario 64 is the Long Jump, but at least the Hover Nozzle is an alternative in Sunshine.

[Dark Jaguar]

Ya know after beating it and seeing Mario asleep, there are two things I assumed as a kid.  First I assumed the Princess, Toad, and Luigi all just woke up from their dreams too.  Second, I assumed that it meant that when Mario thought he woke up, he was still dreaming and was in one of those endless "false awakenings".  Reading the manual, I now see there's a weird cryptic remark the Subconians (subconscious?) make when talking to Mario about how he has to beat Wart to break some "curse" on Mario.  They never actually say how Mario is cursed, but I like to think Wart somehow cursed Mario and the rest of his friends into eternal slumber, so Mario and friends have to save Subcon (again, subconscious?) and beat Wart to save Dreamland (not Kirby's) and wake everyone up.  So it both was all a dream and "really happened".  Considering how "wonderlandy" the Mario universe is, it isn't much of a stretch to say that the dream world is "real" in a sense there.

In other words, I interpret his adventure there as mattering just as much as saving the dream world in Nights Into Dreams.

My 1080 block Gamecube memory card failed some time ago (apparently there's some incompatibility with that one and the Wii), so I've been rebuilding save files for my various Gamecube games.  I just recently rebuilt a perfect Super Smash Bros Melee save (nearly so, I don't have the bonus messages for a million vs matches yet).  With what you've said I think I'll give Mario Sunshine a go again soon.  I think you may be right.  I just missed the long jump so much it probably overshadowed everything else.  I do miss being able to punch though.  I actually did use that often enough in Mario 64 when I didn't feel safe jumping, and the squirting baddies with a hose just wasn't quite the same.  Still, I gotta admit the controls were pretty tight in that game.

[BP]

I get the feeling there was a disproportionate amount of people who didn't care for Super Paper Mario

Tru. Dat. Was it Paper Mario 3? Well no. Was Paper Mario 2 spectacular enough that most who played it wanted Paper Mario 3? Yes.

Do those things completely ruin Super Paper Mario as its own thing? No!

The game woulda been tons better without Flipping though

[Turtlekid1]

Or rather, it would've been better if all the playable characters were able to flip.

[BP]

Yeah that woulda been okay I GUESS. But the 3-D controls were clunky anyway and the timer was retarded so I pretty much hated Flipping altogether.

[The Chef]

Ya know after beating it and seeing Mario asleep, there are two things I assumed as a kid.  First I assumed the Princess, Toad, and Luigi all just woke up from their dreams too.  Second, I assumed that it meant that when Mario thought he woke up, he was still dreaming and was in one of those endless "false awakenings".  Reading the manual, I now see there's a weird cryptic remark the Subconians (subconscious?) make when talking to Mario about how he has to beat Wart to break some "curse" on Mario.  They never actually say how Mario is cursed, but I like to think Wart somehow cursed Mario and the rest of his friends into eternal slumber, so Mario and friends have to save Subcon (again, subconscious?) and beat Wart to save Dreamland (not Kirby's) and wake everyone up.  So it both was all a dream and "really happened".  Considering how "wonderlandy" the Mario universe is, it isn't much of a stretch to say that the dream world is "real" in a sense there.

Uh...the Subconians said that they were cursed, not Mario himself.

[Dark Jaguar]

Huh, I see.  I guess being stuffed in a jar is close enough to a curse.  All the same I still interpret the ending that way.

[Dark Jaguar]

Uh...the Subconians said that they were cursed, not Mario himself.

So I found the old manual for SMB2 and as it turns out, we're both right!

"Welcome to 'Subcon', the land of dreams.  We have been cursed by Wart and we are completely under his evil spell.  We have been awaiting your arrival.  Please defeat Wart and return Subcon to its natural state.  The curse Wart has put on you in the real world will not have any effect upon you here."

Not really sure what curses they are talking about since the manual doesn't explain what the curses actually are, so I just had to use my imagination there.  Hmm, so maybe the "subconians" are cursed in that many of them were all turned into those flying Beezo enemies?  I always thought they looked pretty similar...  As for Mario, yeah I still think he was cursed with eternal sleep or something.

[The Chef]

It's probably worth noting that the line about Mario being cursed was taken out in both the All-Stars manual and the SMA manual. I always figured if they remove something, the new release of the game supercedes the old one, such as the line about Mario and Luigi being "twins" being changed to "brothers" in SMA3.

[Dark Jaguar]

That's interesting, though I still like my interpretation.  I also still like the idea of Birdo being a gender confused whatever-it-is.

Mario and Luigi are called brothers instead of twins in that one?  Huh, well can't they be both?  :D  Besides, that game makes it a little hard for them not to be twins considering they're being carried at the same time by the same stork.  I suppose it doesn't matter too much.

http://translate.google.com/translate?hl=en&ie=UTF-8&sl=ja&tl=en&u=http://www.geocities.jp/frnyanko/setsumei/disk/yumekoujoudokidokipanic/yumekoujoudokidokipanic.html

I found a page with a transcript of the Doki Doki Panic manual and ran it through google translate.  So apparently, if I'm interpreting the garbled translation there right, even in that version it's all taking place in dream world too, and the book they are sucked into is just telling them a story about the dream world.  That does make sense, since it's actually "Dream Factory: Doki Doki Panic" and all.  I also noticed the enemy descriptions are very similar to the ones in the SMB2 manual I was reading earlier, with things like the Snifits shooting "nightmare bullets" and all of them being bad dreams created by Wart/Mamu.

This is funny...

http://translate.google.com/translate?hl=en&sl=ja&tl=en&u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.geocities.jp%2Ffrnyanko%2Fsetsumei%2Ffamicom%2Fsupermariousa%2Fsupermariousa.html

Apparently in "Super Mario USA" their manual also calls Birdo "Ostro".  It also seems to call Kinopio Toad, and has a little explanation that that's his USA name.

[The Chef]

Western localization tends to influence future Japanese releases. It happened with the Koopalings' names after all.

As for the "twins" thing, I kinda figured that the reason Mario is older than Luigi is because he was released from the Stork's mailbag at the beginning of the game, while Luigi didn't show his face until the end. How long the events of Yoshi's Island actually transpired for is a mystery though. Could be around a day. Maybe even two or three days.

[BP]

But they were delivered at the same time. What happens with twins before that moment doesn't change their twinhood.

Especially if the whole game is actually an allegory for Doctor Yoshi having trouble safely delivering one or both of the brothers

[Toad]

I am going to go with that theory. Being a father of twins, the only reason one is "older" than the other is because they can't come out (or be taken out) at the exact same time.

Luigi came out (or was taken out) first, and Mario came X hours/days later.

Sorry if that was possibly too.. disgusting.. (that's not the word I'm looking for..)

[Weegee]

Luigi came out (or was taken out) first, and Mario came X hours/days later.

...Except Mario is the older one.

Luigi came out

Not that it was a surprise to anyone, of course. His coy nature and penchant for housekeeping made it glaringly obvious.

[BP]

Does this mean Peasley will make a comeback

[Turtlekid1]

And prod Luigi some more with his weapon sword rapier [synonym for sword that isn't also a euphemism]?

[The Chef]

Yeah Toad, you have it reversed. It was Mario first, Luigi second. :P

[Toad]

Very funny Weegee. :p
I guess I could have said something other than came out..

Hmm. I guess I do have it reveresed. I don't know what I was thinking.

In other news, Wart should make a comeback. He would be a great alternate boss to use instead of Bowser, and he could be a heavy character in the spinoffs.

[The Chef]

I know BP's gonna disagree with that.

I'd like to see Wart turn up in one of the RPGs, be it Paper Mario or Mario & Luigi. I would imagine him having water or poison-based attacks.

[Dark Jaguar]

Here's an idea!  Wart shows up in Bowser's dream and they decide to team up to take out Mario.  He can't get any rest whether awake or asleep!  I imagine gameplay mechanics where Mario gets tired and slips into the dream world, where levels are changed and he's got to find "dream stars" which I imagine will look like classic alarm clocks and also wake him up.  The final fight will be shifting between fighting Bowser in the waking world and Wart in the dream world.

[BP]

BP doesn't care anymore

[The Chef]

Another friend of mine came up with this idea for a Mario & Luigi sequel years ago where Wart and Tatanga team up to conquer the Mushroom Kingdom with a giant robot called "The Dream Pagosu". Would make a decent plot for Mario & Luigi 4.

[ShadowBrain]

Yeah, there was this one site at some point that was running a series on awesome hypothetical installments for certain games. I remember they recommended a Super Mario RPG 2 that would take place in Sarasaland, or maybe a combination of many other Mario kingdoms.

[The Chef]

Does the site still exist? Can you remember the name at all?

[ShadowBrain]

Well, shoot, uh... I could Google some keywords, at least. Truth be told, I was looking to review it myself.

[BP]

Turns out ShadowBrain is actually a time traveler. Time travel has the side-effect of blotting out memories of the future, leaving dark shadows on the brain--the dark unknowns of events yet to come. The light of memory trickles through gaps in the shadows, so he can remember faint details about the site in question, but doesn't remember...

...it was Chef's blog, written in 2016

[ShadowBrain]

Thank you, K.I. Simpson, but here's the link.