MAJOR SPOILERS FOR THE ENDINGS OF ORIGAMI KING, COLOR SPLASH, AND STICKER STAR (latter two barely have a story though)
I enjoyed my time with Origami King immensely. After disliking what had become of the series, it felt like they perfected the puzzle adventure direction they were so desperately trying to achieve with the last two games by actually crafting rich, interconnected worlds full of things to unravel. Presentation is once again on point and the soundtrack is an all around banger. Writing felt improved and battles finally felt fun again thanks to a strong refresh in formula that emphasizes puzzle solving. That's all besides the point I want to discuss though...
One thing stuck out to me right away as I rolled credits: they recycled the same plot beats for the ending again. What do I mean by this? Well, the last 3 PM games all introduce companions that relate to the central theme of the game. In Sticker Star, your partner was a sticker fairy. In Color Splash, your partner was a paint bucket. And finally in Origami King, your partner was well... an origami. At the end of each respective game, these characters sacrifice themselves for the greater good. At first I was just slightly annoyed that they decided to repeat this same story beat again. The good outweighed the bad for me at the time though since for the first time I actually got misty-eyed towards a companion dying. This is in due part to Olivia feeling like an actual character instead of an exposition machine that spouts out one-liners on occasion. Her naivete and joy in seeing the world and all its wonders for the first time was so amusing. Her positivity was infectious. I got incredibly wrapped up in the dynamic between her and her brother and by the time she does the deed I found it all quite bittersweet.
I have come to the realization though that it makes no sense at all why she would sacrifice herself and that someone on the Paper Mario development team, whether a writer or producer, thinks this grand character moment is so genius that they insist it must be done over and over again. The previous two times at least had more sound reasoning. Now it's clear they are hellbent on companions' dying no matter the cost. Olivia's sacrifice makes absolutely no sense. Let's walk through what happened. By the end of the game, she was granted a wish that would give her anything she desires. She chooses to use this wish to erase everything Olly created. Since she was created by Olly, she also was erased. Makes sense right? It all seems to fall in line perfectly until you realize she could have worded her sentences better to avoid dying entirely. She could have stated "I wish to undue all of Olly's creations except for myself" and lived. Why didn't she? This entire decision made by Olivia and their desire to have an emotional moment that is completely unearned feels manipulative. It feels evident they did not think things through. The few explanations that I thought of can easily be countered.
The first is she wanted to die. Either she couldn't handle losing her brother and her failure to save him or she felt like she lived a fulfilling life and wanted to move on. This explanation is not only incredibly dark but also completely out of character for someone like Olivia. Even in the worst of moments she was able to eventually cope as seen in how she deals with Bobby's death. She is portrayed as incredibly optimistic and easygoing so it just does not make sense for her to act this way.
The second explanation is that she wants to go along with her brother. So this explanation is kind of an extension of the previous explanation but further elaborated upon in terms of her motivation. This falls apart too. If she wanted her brother back, she could have just wished him back. He expressed regret and admitted what he did was wrong. She could have brought him back and asked him to undo his creations. Afterwards, the two of them could have used the power of origami for good and create a world where paper and origami folk peacefully coexist.
The last explanation is she's impulsive. She is trying to do a selfless act so she can save everyone without realizing she will die in the process. The fact she is impulsive is proven and shown in chapter 5 where she is wrong every time regarding what route to take to reach the spa. The key thing to note though is that Olivia is never driven by emotions to act irrationally. When the situation deals with serious matters, she is shown to have a strong willingness to reflect. This is seen when she takes a moment to grieve for Bobby. She doesn't storm off in a quest for retribution. Additionally, it is shown that Olivia does not make the decision right away. She takes a couple of seconds and her wish is given pause in effort to build up what is about to happen for maximum emotional impact. So clearly she was not acting impulsively. Finally, characterizing her act as selfless makes it seem like Olivia's life was meaningless which is very much not the case.
There's just no reason for her to do what she did at the end. Her wish makes no sense either. She asks for Olly's creations to be undone. What are the implications of this? This makes it so the castle turns back at the end but gives no explanation for how the castle, which was on top of a fucking volcano, somehow magically teleported back to Toad Town. Next, all this wish seemed to do is save time. Olly was defeated so the threat of all the Toads dying is gone. They could have unfolded everything with Olivia's help. I mean who folded and unfolded Bowser? Mario is also shown to have the ability to unfold Toads that got turned into origami. They treat Olivia as if she stopped this huge catastrophe from happening but all she did was destroy the job market for janitors. Also, no one talks about what wish to make. Characters in this game usually won't shut up but now all of a sudden everyone has duct tape on their mouths when an integral decision is being made. All of these are nitpicks and I hate delving into such minutiae because these small notes alone aren't actual criticism. My main sticking point builds off of these small quibbles though and it's that they insisted on inserting a square peg into a round hole.
Olivia's actions feel at odds with her character. This isn't a case of me trying to fish for a plot hole such as when people act smart and question why villains don't just kill the hero when they have them trapped instead of waiting for them to wake up and monologuing.It becomes increasingly clear that they went into the story with the intention to kill off Olivia without ironing out the details and seeing whether it actually fit with the narrative. The only reason why they added in the idea that Olivia was made by Olly is so she could be erased. It barely adds any interesting wrinkles to the brother and sister relationship. At some point in the process they should have realized that they shouldn't kill Olivia because it didn't fit anymore with the narrative.
So why is this happening? Why do companions have to die? The implication that is clear is that these games have a framework that they build off of now. Every game revolves around a gimmick and by the end they have to shuffle out the companion because they are too intrinsically tied to what that game is all about. This is disappointing. What's the point of every game having the same overarching plot structure? Tanabe claims they want to keep things fresh and interesting but apparently this does not apply to the plot at all because they are fine doing doing the same thing over and over again. And this time it was too much. Yes, they've improved on the self-contained stories found in each chapter. However, they still need to rethink their philosophy when it comes to the overall conflict. Olivia did not deserve such a sloppily written death. She deserved to live. Maybe even reoccur in future games. Wouldn't it be neat if PM had reoccurring characters outside of the mainstays of the Mario universe? They can't do the same thing for a fourth time. At this point it's already beyond comical and doing a disservice to the new characters.
#OliviaDeservedBetter
I enjoyed my time with Origami King immensely. After disliking what had become of the series, it felt like they perfected the puzzle adventure direction they were so desperately trying to achieve with the last two games by actually crafting rich, interconnected worlds full of things to unravel. Presentation is once again on point and the soundtrack is an all around banger. Writing felt improved and battles finally felt fun again thanks to a strong refresh in formula that emphasizes puzzle solving. That's all besides the point I want to discuss though...
One thing stuck out to me right away as I rolled credits: they recycled the same plot beats for the ending again. What do I mean by this? Well, the last 3 PM games all introduce companions that relate to the central theme of the game. In Sticker Star, your partner was a sticker fairy. In Color Splash, your partner was a paint bucket. And finally in Origami King, your partner was well... an origami. At the end of each respective game, these characters sacrifice themselves for the greater good. At first I was just slightly annoyed that they decided to repeat this same story beat again. The good outweighed the bad for me at the time though since for the first time I actually got misty-eyed towards a companion dying. This is in due part to Olivia feeling like an actual character instead of an exposition machine that spouts out one-liners on occasion. Her naivete and joy in seeing the world and all its wonders for the first time was so amusing. Her positivity was infectious. I got incredibly wrapped up in the dynamic between her and her brother and by the time she does the deed I found it all quite bittersweet.
I have come to the realization though that it makes no sense at all why she would sacrifice herself and that someone on the Paper Mario development team, whether a writer or producer, thinks this grand character moment is so genius that they insist it must be done over and over again. The previous two times at least had more sound reasoning. Now it's clear they are hellbent on companions' dying no matter the cost. Olivia's sacrifice makes absolutely no sense. Let's walk through what happened. By the end of the game, she was granted a wish that would give her anything she desires. She chooses to use this wish to erase everything Olly created. Since she was created by Olly, she also was erased. Makes sense right? It all seems to fall in line perfectly until you realize she could have worded her sentences better to avoid dying entirely. She could have stated "I wish to undue all of Olly's creations except for myself" and lived. Why didn't she? This entire decision made by Olivia and their desire to have an emotional moment that is completely unearned feels manipulative. It feels evident they did not think things through. The few explanations that I thought of can easily be countered.
The first is she wanted to die. Either she couldn't handle losing her brother and her failure to save him or she felt like she lived a fulfilling life and wanted to move on. This explanation is not only incredibly dark but also completely out of character for someone like Olivia. Even in the worst of moments she was able to eventually cope as seen in how she deals with Bobby's death. She is portrayed as incredibly optimistic and easygoing so it just does not make sense for her to act this way.
The second explanation is that she wants to go along with her brother. So this explanation is kind of an extension of the previous explanation but further elaborated upon in terms of her motivation. This falls apart too. If she wanted her brother back, she could have just wished him back. He expressed regret and admitted what he did was wrong. She could have brought him back and asked him to undo his creations. Afterwards, the two of them could have used the power of origami for good and create a world where paper and origami folk peacefully coexist.
The last explanation is she's impulsive. She is trying to do a selfless act so she can save everyone without realizing she will die in the process. The fact she is impulsive is proven and shown in chapter 5 where she is wrong every time regarding what route to take to reach the spa. The key thing to note though is that Olivia is never driven by emotions to act irrationally. When the situation deals with serious matters, she is shown to have a strong willingness to reflect. This is seen when she takes a moment to grieve for Bobby. She doesn't storm off in a quest for retribution. Additionally, it is shown that Olivia does not make the decision right away. She takes a couple of seconds and her wish is given pause in effort to build up what is about to happen for maximum emotional impact. So clearly she was not acting impulsively. Finally, characterizing her act as selfless makes it seem like Olivia's life was meaningless which is very much not the case.
There's just no reason for her to do what she did at the end. Her wish makes no sense either. She asks for Olly's creations to be undone. What are the implications of this? This makes it so the castle turns back at the end but gives no explanation for how the castle, which was on top of a fucking volcano, somehow magically teleported back to Toad Town. Next, all this wish seemed to do is save time. Olly was defeated so the threat of all the Toads dying is gone. They could have unfolded everything with Olivia's help. I mean who folded and unfolded Bowser? Mario is also shown to have the ability to unfold Toads that got turned into origami. They treat Olivia as if she stopped this huge catastrophe from happening but all she did was destroy the job market for janitors. Also, no one talks about what wish to make. Characters in this game usually won't shut up but now all of a sudden everyone has duct tape on their mouths when an integral decision is being made. All of these are nitpicks and I hate delving into such minutiae because these small notes alone aren't actual criticism. My main sticking point builds off of these small quibbles though and it's that they insisted on inserting a square peg into a round hole.
Olivia's actions feel at odds with her character. This isn't a case of me trying to fish for a plot hole such as when people act smart and question why villains don't just kill the hero when they have them trapped instead of waiting for them to wake up and monologuing.It becomes increasingly clear that they went into the story with the intention to kill off Olivia without ironing out the details and seeing whether it actually fit with the narrative. The only reason why they added in the idea that Olivia was made by Olly is so she could be erased. It barely adds any interesting wrinkles to the brother and sister relationship. At some point in the process they should have realized that they shouldn't kill Olivia because it didn't fit anymore with the narrative.
So why is this happening? Why do companions have to die? The implication that is clear is that these games have a framework that they build off of now. Every game revolves around a gimmick and by the end they have to shuffle out the companion because they are too intrinsically tied to what that game is all about. This is disappointing. What's the point of every game having the same overarching plot structure? Tanabe claims they want to keep things fresh and interesting but apparently this does not apply to the plot at all because they are fine doing doing the same thing over and over again. And this time it was too much. Yes, they've improved on the self-contained stories found in each chapter. However, they still need to rethink their philosophy when it comes to the overall conflict. Olivia did not deserve such a sloppily written death. She deserved to live. Maybe even reoccur in future games. Wouldn't it be neat if PM had reoccurring characters outside of the mainstays of the Mario universe? They can't do the same thing for a fourth time. At this point it's already beyond comical and doing a disservice to the new characters.
#OliviaDeservedBetter
