I've been a fan of this game since launch, and now that we're all talking about Paper Mario again, I'm seeing way more negativity about this game than it deserves.
Color Splash launched in October 2016, the same month the Nintendo Switch would be revealed. Consumer Switches were already in production by November if not earlier (it's not like we all took our launch consoles apart to see when they were made!) In short, the Wii U was already in the dust, and they knew Color Splash wasn't going to help sell a single console. It was the last first party game they released for it.
I've always said that Color Splash feels like going to the Wii U's afterparty. It has some of the most snarky and surprising writing I've ever seen in a Nintendo game. Color Splash will surprise you with soberingly real character interactions and jokes and references to topics that I don't think you'd see in a far-reaching first party Switch game (unless Origami King decides to surprise us!) The Thing animations are hilarious. It has one of the best OSTs on the Wii U, and it's criminal that it never had a CD release. It has built in developer commentary where they do everything from fill in ends of character storylines you didn't expect, to telling stories about how aspects of the game's creation came to be.
Color Splash was a labor of love for the last few who hung on with the Wii U, a moment for the developers to cut loose and get a bit spicy before the Switch would launch and everything would get "real" again. If Origami King is anything like it, we're going to have an excellent Paper Mario release.
by coldcaption
28 Comments
I know a lot of people didn’t like colour Splash but I thoroughly enjoyed it and liked some of its homages to the original.
I don’t think it was a thank you letter. More like a middle finger, just like all of those Wii U ports.
Yeah, everything about Color Splash other then the gameplay is actually very good. It’s very overhated, probably because it’s a Wii U sequel to the game nobody liked. Sticker Star is a thousand times more bland and agonizingly boring, so much so that I couldn’t bother to finish it *even as a kid*. And I will never understand the people that place SS over CS; SS is easily the worst in the series.
Also, Huey >>>>> Kertsi
I don’t know if you can call any video game that has “Everything great except for the gameplay” a good video game.
That don’t fly. Make a cartoon then. But Color Splash is a game you can win by fighting literally no one except the time the story forces you do and then you can spam biggest item bought with infinite coins.
I actually don’t know why people like to hate on Color Splash, but they do say it’s not like 64 or TTYD which is pretty vague if you ask me, yes, it was technically a sequel to Sticker Star, but it was still a very fun game. Gamexplain gives a good review, Color Splash is fun, funny and has beautiful graphics, it is NO WHERE near as bad as Sticker Star.
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Ah I forgot about the developer commentary. That was such a fantastic feature. More games should have it, exactly as the implemented it.
I don’t think Color Splash gets treated unfairly. I would give it a 7 out of 10, one point higher than Sticker Star and one point less than SPM. I think if you were to average people’s sentiments about Color Splash, it would average right around 7 as well, with a decent amount of spread.
The only thing that gets me is when people refuse to play it because it isn’t what they want. It was either Arlo or SnowmanGaming who did a retrospective review of each Paper Mario game as a die-hard fan, but didn’t even finish Color Splash. To me, that’s not a fair shake. It does not meet the high bar that we rightfully expect Paper Mario to hit. It isn’t even great. But it is still a good game.
i put 60 hours into it. it was a great game
“last first party game they released for it”
*Cough**breath of the wild* *Cough*
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joking aside I agree, the game is better than people give it credit for and it appears to be one of the few games that is going to stay 100% exclusive to the wii u
Color splash was great. So was sticker star. So was super paper Mario. First 2 were legendary. All good. Love the series.
Felt more like an F U to me, what a mediocre game.
If only the battle system wouldn´t be so bad it would have been a highlight for me.
Loved everything else about the game.
I give it a 7 out of 10. The boss battles were terrible, terrible, terrible but they’re a small part of the game. 4 of those stars are for how funny it was and 3 are for how I love painting the white stuff.
Just beat it for the first time tonight. I think at the time the game was not what was needed in a time of great Nintendo drought. I bought it last year but never finished it due to Fire Emblem being released which then was followed by Astral Chain, and so on and so on. I was THROUGHLY enjoying the game and I was laughing out loud at the script. It was hilarious, the music amazing, you can tell the amount of work was put into everything. The built in game guide alone is just a pleasure to look through.
Of course this announcement finally pushed me to finish since I only had a few more levels to go and I have no regrets.
it wasn’t the last 1st party game, there was Breath of the Wild as well
There was developer commentary? Where was it?
Shame the core mechanic wasn’t any fun. I put quite a free hours into it but I got stuck a lot and spent a lot of time wandering about revisiting levels trying to make progress. Maybe that paint bucket guy could have dropped me a few useful hints but he never did.
So basically my criticism of Color Splash is that it’s too hard. Rediculous I know.
As a complete coincidence timing-wise I started playing it in April after owning it for years and I find the game absolutely delightful . The writing is delightful and I’ve been slightly less lost than my last two paper Mario outings.
I mildly enjoyed it until the last fight. If I remember correctly you had to perfect dodge an attack from Bowser 3 times in a row. If you get hit then he refills his health and you start over. I don’t have the timing or the patience for it. Instead of getting mad at it I just turned it off and never looked back.
I never played TTYD or sticker star, my first paper Mario game was super paper Mario. Even if it was a labor of love the core mechanic of coloring in cards made the game just feel SO sluggish. Yes, the other qualities are good, but the thought of getting into random battles in that game fills me with dread! (painfully slow and boring) Still a 7/10 game.
Even OP and the people who are praising Color Splash aren’t usually saying the battles were fun or interesting boss or otherwise. Color splash reminds me very much of Star Fox Zero “it is a good game except for this one GIANT problem” in Star Fox’s case it was the controls though.
Would rather had Galaxy remake or Galaxy 2. Something much larger in scale and scope.
I’m not going to thank Nintendo for publishing exactly one Wii U game between the release of Mario & Sonic (June 2016) and the launch of the Switch (March 2017). I think Nintendo absolutely made the correct decision to abandon the Wii U, but it still sucked to go through that especially when the Wii U also had a pathetic drought following its launch until the following fall.
You must have 6G if you’re able to post this from your cave
unpopular option coming here but color splash was just not a good game at all,
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the writing feels pretty weak I know alot of people show a few highlights but for the most part it’s very bland and don’t even get me started on the combat. music is meh
Because of the community’s reactions to it, and the comparisons to Sticker Star, I didn’t touch Color Splash until very, very recently. Like, the day Origami King was revealed, recently.
I have to say; I do not understand the hate this game gets. Would I prefer a “true” Paper Mario 3? Of course. But Color Splash is witty, ridiculous, and so unbelievably charming. Not to mention the music…
Battles feel less important than TTYD or 64 but for the most part the mechanics are there. Cards effectively act as badge attacks (single use is annoying but I can live with it given how many cards and coins the game just dumps on you) and paint is a more plentiful FP. The game is a good blend of the original game’s wittiness and the charm of 3D World.
And OP is definitely right about the games release timing giving it some wiggle room- I highly doubt we will be retrieving the clothes of a Toad while he waits naked in a bush in Origami King.
There a challenge involving a massive Chain Chomp Head rolling around smashing through stuff and you have to run away from it.
Before all of that though, there is a very, very long chit chat between NPC’s.
Guess where the game decides to save your progress? At the start of the challenge or at the start of the lengthy ***unskippable*** cutscene immediately preceding the challenge?
If you guessed the latter than congratulations! You understand awful game design!
As a WiiU owner at the time, I felt that game was one final “f*ck you” before the console died. It was the last exclusive to the WiiU, and its gameplay was trash. Nintendo knew that the sticker system was disliked, and they moved forward with a game they knew was unwanted.
I agree, it’s a 10/10 game. It’s also a long game with a lot of hidden objectives.