Super Mario RPG: Legend of the Seven Stars is
Exactly What It Says On The Tin; It was the first
Mario game to be a
Role Playing Game. It was developed by Nintendo and
Square and released in 1996 for the Super Nintendo.
During a routine
princess-saving by Mario, a giant sword with a face on the hilt crashes into Bowser's Keep, sending Mario, the Princess, and Bowser flying. Soon afterwards, a messenger from the stars named Geno (or rather, "
Heart-musical note-exclamation point-question mark") informs Mario that the sword also destroyed the Star Road, which grants the wishes of Mario's world. Unless the seven
Star Pieces can be obtained and reassembled, no wishes will ever come true again. With the help of his companions (including, for the first time, Bowser), Mario sets off to smash the Smithy Gang and save the world.
Lacked a lot of the trademark quirkiness that characterized the later Mario
RPGs, being more like a Square RPG with Mario characters painted on. Not that games like
Final Fantasy or
Chrono Trigger are bad or anything, but they're not really what you're looking for when you play a Mario game. (This didn't stop it from being hugely popular — it
is still a Square RPG, after all, when Square was at the height of its 2-D
RPG prowess, just before the transition to 3-D with
Final Fantasy VII.) Deserves credit for innovating
Action Commands and the hybrid
platformer / RPG gameplay.
Due to licensing problems, very few of the characters that made their debut in this game have recurred in later Mario games, including fan-favorite Geno. But worry not! The game has appeared on the Wii's
Virtual Console for download!
Tropes include:
- Action Commands
- Amazing Technicolor Battlefield
- Anyone You Know
- Arm Cannon (Geno's weapons)
- Armor Piercing Slap (Some of Peach's glove weapons)
- Baleful Polymorph (Mushrooms and scarecrows)
- Beaming Grin (Breaker Beam)
- Behind The Black
- Bonus Boss (Culex)
- Boss Rush
- Breather Level (Star Hill)
- Broken Bridge
- Bubbly Clouds (Nimbus Land)
- But Thou Must (or else Mallow will cry)
- Chest Monster
- Climax Boss
- Cognizant Limbs
- Cool And Unusual Punishment (Yaridovich's tickling torture)
- Cowboys And Indians (toys of Mario and Bowser)
- Crying Wolf (Gaz)
- Debug Room
- Defeat Means Friendship (Jonathan Jones, although he doesn't join the party.)
- Degraded Boss (Clones of Bowyer and Mac, among others, are churned out by Smithy's factory)
- Distressed Damsel (Peach in the first half of the game)
- Dual Boss (Loads)
- Duel Boss (Jonathan Jones and Dodo)
- Enemy Mine (Bowser)
- Enemy Scan (Mallow's Psychopath ability)
- Ensemble Darkhorse (Geno)
- Exactly What It Says On The Tin
- Face Fault
- Fake King
- Fastball Special
- Fetch Quest
- Flunky Boss (several)
- Foe Yay (the one Mario game in which you can get Bowser to kiss Mario!)
- Gainaxing (Valentina)
- Giant Space Flea From Nowhere
- Glass Cannon (Geno)
- Goldfish Poop Gang (Croco)
- He Knows About Timed Hits (Trope Namer)
- Heroic Mime (Mario, literally. Parodied, in that Mario never talks, but he pantomines everthing.)
- Improbable Weapon User (Princess Peach, user of the Parasol Of Pain and Frying Pan Of Doom. Also Bowser, who throws Mario or swings a Chain Chomp.)
- Infinity Plus One Sword (Lazy Shell)
- Inn Security
- Invisible Monsters (Mokura, who starts out as the invisible Formless)
- Jungle Japes (Yoshi's Island)
- Kleptomaniac Hero
- Lost Forever
- Maximum Fun Chamber
- Minecart Madness
- Mini Game (Buttloads of them)
- Monster Town (Monstro Town)
- Name That Tune (Mario whistling in the shower)
- No Indoor Voice Queen Valentina
- Mallow mentioned that her voice can be heard in a 10 mile radius.
- Oblivious Adoption (Mallow)
- One Of These Doors Is Not Like The Other
- One Size Fits All (Work Pants)
- One Thousand Needles (Geno Whirl)
- One Winged Angel (Smithy)
- Only Idiots May Pass
- Party In My Pocket (played with repeatedly)
- Perverse Puppet (Remo Con and Puppox)
- Pirate: Pirate sharks, actually. Surprisingly logical combination, actually...
- Plot Coupon (Star Pieces)
- Pop Quiz (Dr. Topper's Quiz)
- Psychopathic Manchild (Booster is a comedic version.)
- Quirky Miniboss Squad (Axem Rangers)
- Ragtag Bunch Of Misfits
- Random Encounters (Subverted. Every enemy can be seen wandering around the area. Don't want to fight it? Then don't touch it!)
- Rebellious Princess (Peach)
- Recurring Boss (Belome)
- Revive Kills Zombie
- Rocket Punch (Geno)
- Save The Princess
- Scrolling Text
- Sequential Boss
- Shout Out (Pipe Vault)
- Smooch Of Victory (used straight or subverted)
- Or, if you move quickly enough in one instance, both.
- Snot Bubble (the "sleep" status effect)
- Some Call Me Tim (Geno)
- Spiritual Successor (Paper Mario and Mario And Luigi Superstar Saga)
- Squishy Wizard - "Mallow", who is made of living cloudstuff as well as having poor defenses but strong attack magic, pretty much exemplifies this. That is, if his name didn't give it away immediately.
- Stupidity Is The Only Option
- The Maze (Forest Maze)
- The Medic (Princess Peach, Mallow early on)
- The Psycho Rangers (Axem Rangers)
- The Unpronounceable (Geno's real name)
- This Cannot Be (Axem Rangers and Smithy)
- Too Awesome To Use
- Trick Boss (Czar Dragon)
- Turns Red (Johnny Jones)
- Underground Level (Mole Mines)
- Unexpected Genre Change (The minigames, and even those have you alternating genres as well.)
- Vendor Trash (Goodie Bag)
- Verbal Tic (Bowyer)
- Violation Of Common Sense (Giving the Star Piece to one of the bad guys)
- Warmup Boss (Hammer Brothers)
- Wave Motion Gun
- Woolseyism
- Work Off The Debt
- Your Money Is No Good Here (Tadpole Pond)
