Super Mario RPG Nintendo Switch Review - Is It Worth It? 

I hope this stirs the pot for a direct follow up sequel. Even the original director is down for it. This was also a refreshing game because instead of Bowser being the enemy he was now an ally helping to fight off a bigger foe.

I never played the original version so I'm really excited to try this game for the first time! Can't wait to see Mario, Bowser and Peach team up.

Was a huge fan of the original game. One of my favorite games of all time. Hopefully more people get a chance to try out this amazing game once the remake releases. Paper Mario and Mario and Luigi are good too, but Super Mario RPG is the best of Mario RPG games to me personally.

“No one wants old games to get remade with a fresh coat of paint, stop asking for ‘Banjo Redooie’ no one will *ever* play it!!!” - Tim Stamper, out of touch developer.

This game was a staple of my childhood. Can't wait to play it again!

I loved the original. Can't wait to experience this remake. Excited to experience the new extras. What a great weekend this will be!!!

Younger players who never played the SNES are about to discover one of the best RPGs ever made.

Pretty faithful. They even kept the framerate drops in the underwater portions from the SNES.

A new game + and/or hard mode are 2 things I was really hoping to see. Would’ve added some replayability to an RPG already on the shorter side. Oh well I’m still really looking forward to it!

I grew up with this game and fell in love with it the second I first played it. I cried when I saw the announcement trailer for the remake. After playing the remake for a couple of hours today, my eyes teared up again. They did such an amazing job at remaking this game! This is how the game always lived in my memories! You can tell they put a lot of care into this remake. The little details matter, and you can see that they really thought of the little details. Even when you first enter Bowser's castle and open the door to the lava area, you can see the light from the lava reflecting off the door and walls before you enter the room! Such a small detail, but it really shows how much care was put toward this game!

1:26 - I see that "Capture Taken" notification in the upper-left - and I agree with it! Can't wait to see this game in motion at home.

I used to rent this game everytime as a kid. I ADORED that game, and thanks to emulators I was able to revisit this masterpiece, but I am sooo excited to play this remake this weekend!!

The game being easier than the original is a little annoying tbh. I don't mind too much but the game was already really easy so I dunno why they made it even easier AND added an easy mode too. Surely an easy mode would be enough?

"FROG SAGE"?! "Hermit the Frog" was RIGHT THERE and it wouldve been 10/10

crazy how the essence of the game and gameplay itself still work today. talking about being ahead of its time!

I got an "Early Release Copy" and Yes its Amazing. Its almost as if its the game i imagined while playing it back in the day. You know how you replay a great game and think man this is much worse than I remember, This is the opposite of that. This is better than I remember. Thanks to the Graphics and such. The new music is done spot on. Well Done. Id love to see Chrono Trigger done like this.

Not sure whos footage is being shown here, but i love how at 1:27 , a perfectly timed capture was taken lol 😂🎉❤

Praying for a sequel as well! Absolutely loved the original, and I’m super excited to play the remake.

I'm doing a play through of the original before release and I'm having so much fun and can't WAIT to go through it again in a few days.

I was wondering when the review embargo for this would lift!

I am so looking forward to playing this on Friday! Just my copy preloaded on the Switch.

Gonna buy it immediately. This was one of my favorite games back in the 90s, and my first JRPG!

I actually played the twos Mario rpgs on the Nintendo DS first - Brothers in time and Bowsers inside story - both were brilliant games in my eyes and I was hoping for something similar to come to the switch. Let’s cross fingers for a sequel.

This game birthed the Paper Mario series and Mario & Luigi RPG games. Hell yeah, it's worth it.

Can’t wait to play this I just got done with my final exams and this is the best way to start my break

Hopefully, this is their way of testing the water for a sequel!

Any thoughts on the supposedly laggy menus?

Does anyone know if they did away with the item limit? I remember they only let you have two pages of items. I wanted to have more Kerokerokolas back in the day! (I filled mine up completely).

The cutscene's are gourgeus,im definly getting this

I am praying for a sequel,too.

Excellent review! Just subscribed! Thanks for the hard work and insightful commentary!

I gotta say. The gameplay has been improved on in some areas. But BUT why the hell they changed some of the most iconic dialogues beats me... glad this reviewer touched on this point.

will be interesting to see how this stacks up vs the 1000 year door.. wonder what new first time players will ultimately prefer

I am going to call it Nintendo Switch has had the best year ever for a video game console. Metroid Prime Remastered, Legend of Zelda Tears of the Kingdom, Super Mario Wonder, Advance Wars Reboot Camp and now this!

I can vouch for this being a great entry RPG. The SNES original was my introduction to the genre, and it's been my favorite genre to this day. Not to say veteran players won't like it, it's fun and colorful and wonderful, but especially younger fans or people that are new it's a great place to start.

For whatever reason, the original Super Mario RPG was one game I never played when I was a teenager, despite being a big SNES RPG fan. I recently bought the $99 game voucher and used it on Super Mario Bros. Wonder, which I'm really enjoying, and the new Super Mario RPG. Needless to say my Switch will be getting a lot of attention for the foreseeable future. 🙂

Does the secret Toad code still work?

My game of the year for 2023 is still gonna be *The Legend of Heroes: Trails into Reverie.* HOWEVER, in terms of *2nd place,* it's gonna be a toss-up between *Super Mario RPG* and *Sea of Stars,* so I'm curious which game will come out on top for me at the end! :D

Can't wait for paper mario the thousand year door remaster remake

Can't wait for the game to be delivered. I did not own SNES back then (going the SEGA route) and my nephew who owns SNES didn't buy it. I'm a JRPG player so I really wanna experience this beloved masterpiece!

So happy they remade this. never played the original and was always exciited to play it.

I never played the original but as a Paper Mario fan this looks right up my alley so I’m getting it release day.

My god I'm so excited to play this ~1000 times, if this is as faithful a remake of the original as the consensus seems to be, the original will be replaced for my routine playthroughs of my favourite game.

I had no idea this game existed until the remake was revealed. I was only 2 when the original came out. SO excited to try this for the first time!

HELL YES. And my copy hasn't even arrived yet. So excited to dive into it this weekend. Will probably beat it by weekend's end! Gonna try to do it from memory...I wonder how much has changed...or added on,

This is how you do a remake. Faithful to the original game yet it looks gorgeous by today's standards!

Only thing I would hope to see is a Hard mode after completing it the first time. Maybe some additional secret bosses. If this sells enough I’m sure it will push for a Mario Rpg 2

Now there's absolutely no reason to not bring the original to NSO. LET US HAVE BOTH

Snap is this out already? I played this game ages ago but it was at my buddy's house. I didn't have any game systems and he had a super Nintendo. I remember liking it but obviously I was a bit young to understand much of it and was confused as to why this didn't play like every other Mario I'm excited to give it another shot because I have heard that it and the first couple of paper Mario games are actually really quirky and enjoyable RPGs I'm also excited that they are going to bring 1,000 year door to switch as well cuz I missed that one on the GameCube

Another great video adapted review Felix - you've really hit your stride here at Nintendo Life. Awesome stuff as always 👍

I just finished star ocean 2 r and man when i tell you this year has been so damn consistent i swear man absolutely excited to pick it up

I'll catch this on sale, I own 3 different ways to play the original and its not different enough to buy at full price to me. I can wait, plenty of other games in the backlog. But I REALLY appreciate what they've done to the game. It's beautiful

Never played the original but really looking forward to checking it out at some point!

Why are they so short?

I never played the original Mario RPG, so it’s gonna be absolutely exciting for me to play it for the first time, especially as we in the UK didn’t receive it when it first came out on the SNES back in 1996.

Huh, playing the original half a hundred times, I never realized that Mack had a dude pogoo-ing the sword. Thought it was just a sword with a spring. Now it all makes sense why they are all hopping around.

Will you be doing a video review of Astral Ascent which launched on Switch yesterday? It really deserves the attention! :)

I never got to play the original so I am SO looking forward to it's release :)

I was torn between this & Star Ocean.. The great VA on the one sealed the deal.. But I’ll probably play this later on

i cant wait for tomorrow! Midnight launch baby!!! Loved this game growing up and now i get to play it amazing graphics!!! 😍

Thanks for mentioning the frame rate dipping in water and 4:17 still easy (and it's about 10 hours despite the high score). The buffed enemies aren't much though you said manageable. Just wish it had new content.

7:50 the hell is that flicker?!

I never played the original game and I have no idea what to expect as I never was a huge fan of Mario but I loved RPGs ever since Pokemon Blue and so I ended up pre-ordering it. Glad it seems like it wasn't a mistake.

I've never played Super Mario RPG, I can't wait to play it. I feel like getting this when Paper Mario TTYD Remaster releases and I'll just no-life both games until I finish both. I CAN NOT believe we're even getting TTYD i love that game so much. It's gonna be a frigen blast!

The graphics are honestly gorgeous.

Square Enix is knocking it out of the park with Star Ocean Second Story R and now this. Hopefully other studios will see this and follow suit!

But why would you use the Super Hammer when the Masher has a higher attack stat?

I loved the original game. I played the heck out of it as a kid and remember everything. I just loved even having Bowser as a playable character too. I hope this game can deliver the charm and flavor the original has. Nintendo rarely makes stinkers so I expect this to be good.

I've been waiting sooooooo long for this!! I'm gonna buy it and I don't even own a Switch (waiting for Switch 2 which should be launching this year).

I can’t wait to play this on Friday

i never played the original. my parents never really let me have any consoles from nintendo for whatever reason and once i was able to afford my own stuff i always went with the xbox or playstation and now i’m on pc, have a switch but i barely use it. but for some reason this has given me a mario bug and i’ve now played super mario wonder and i’m playing through mario kart 8 at my own pace, got mario + rabbids on sale and everything. i’ve preordered this game and will 100% be playing it come thursday night

I’d love for this to have the original game in it too. I know that may not happen but that would be amazing to have both together.

I remember watching you play Mr. Blue Sky on 22 different instruments as well as a lot of other songs lmao

I think introducing an awesome classic to younger gamers makes it worth it. Especially since it makes a sequel more likely. I love the look and quality of life improvements.

I hope the success of this game convinces Nintendo to finally continue the Mario and Luigi series using square as the developer

how many hours to complete the game?

Can't wait to try this for the first time

I can appreciate that this game knows what it wants to do and be, and evidently does that really well. So when I say that I'm personally passing, it's just because it doesn't hook me personally, not because it necessarily does anything wrong. I think I would've just liked something a bit more "new", myself. "Faithful" doesn't draw me in when I'm not really interested in revisiting the original game in the first place. Too bad for me, I suppose.

Mallow is my boy

the most interesting part of this remake as some have observed is the switching mid-battle mechanic is pretty broken since when all 3 party members die you don't get a game over but the members that aren't mario get swapped in. you can also swap dead char to a still alive one, but it feels like you should have to revive them first before you can swap, considering its like FF10's swap, tot be better balanced. this is actually good and bad. bad because it means the main story might become a bit too easy since you'll likely never get a game over starting from the moment you get your 4th party member however there's a very valid reason why switching's so broken and it has to do with the post-game. the switching mechanics are specifically balanced for post-game, which's very neat

Would be crazy if Nintendo Life didn't recommend a Nintendo game.

I would have given ONLY Geno a voice, idea being that since he is from an alternate dimension there are aspect of him that characters of that dimension cannot notice, like a voice...

I can't wait, two days away and I'm getting up early to get my copy

Yes it is they gave it a 9/10 6:39

👍 Nintendo did a great job on this remake. I hope they do more remakes of Super Nintendo games for the Switch. I'd love to see remakes like this for Donkey Kong Country 1 & 2.

First experience (playing with classic soundtrack) and I am BLOWN TF AWAY!

I think I'm gonna have to buy it.

As much as I love this remake, I do hope they put the original snes game on NSO one day

I didn’t enjoy the original Super Mario RPG back when I played it; more of a Paper Mario fan. That said, Nintendo made the right call remaking both RPGs to appeal to two different generations. It’s a good way to test the waters on what new things they should try with Mario.

The visuals are very nice but honestly the original on a good CRT is still great imo. The music tho, damn the new renditions are in a league of their own.

The writing for humor in Mario RPGs have evolved since this installment, so I hope the humor holds up or doesn't feel aged. Also, this is reaching, but I would love if this release means that a sequel could be in development

Really looking forward to this one

Wish we could get faithful remakes of the Donkey Kong Country trilogy.

Wonder and Tears are my favorite recent games but I also love Hades and of course Odyssey and Mario Kart is the best one ever with so many tracks and 200 level finally difficulty

I started playing the original rom for this in anticipation for the release. Next paycheck, this is mine!

I can't wait to play the Super Mario RPG remake this Friday 😊.

even for the original. you practically needed the strategy guide to get everything. so count on spending quite a bit of time looking up Walkthroughs and FAQs for all this goodies in this.

Nintendo out there showing Disney how a franchise should be managed.

The game has a steep price these days for something as short as this But as a fan of the original during my childhood, I have to buy this and I have to experience it organically. I also hope Square will use the sales from this to FINALLY encourage a true faithful sequel to this, or maybe at least some expansion DLC.

I wish they made Luigi playable. I remember as a kid expecting to see him at any moment, and it was a huge turn down when I realized he was "in charge" of the instruction booklet...