Yeah, that’s more or less the sum of it. After more than 20 years of waiting (I hate that I’m able to say that), Nintendo has finally remembered that Super Mario RPG exists and is bringing us full and true remake later this year! I don’t know about you, but I absolutely didn’t see that coming! I thought for sure that we’d never see anything having to do with that game ever again, yet here we are! It’s really happening, and perhaps this could at long last open the door to more!

I’m not sure how much I have or haven’t talked about the game on ere before, but Super Mario RPG: Legend of the Seven Stars is one of my favorite games of all time! I love everything about it! The simple-yet-satisfying battle system, the unusual art style, the writing and the music (oh man the music!!) all occupy a special place in my heart and have ever since I spotted the game in the K-Mart game case all those years ago. Discovering this game was a magical experience, and I’m super excited for a new generation of players to have the chance to experience it for the first time!

As I get older my memories of my earliest gaming days get hazier, so I can’t be 100% sure, but I think Super Mario RPG: Legend of the Seven Stars was my very first RPG. I’ve played the likes of Chrono Trigger and Final Fantasy VI, but I’m almost certain that I didn’t get around to the former until the mid-2000’s and the latter wasn’t until college. I know I didn’t play any of the other famous SNES RPGs until way later, so Mario RPG has to be the first one. This is all to say that it does indeed occupy a fairly unique place in my gamer heart.

People now complain that the game is too easy, and sure it’s definitely easy by modern standards. However, I distinctly remember having trouble with a number of Super Mario RPG’s bosses and optional fights back when I was 7 or 8 years old. Sure, it’s not the hardest RPG out there, but then it wasn’t meant to be, was it?

This game was and is supposed to be a fun, easily accessible way to enjoy Mario outside of his usual platformer context. Of course it’s going to be simple enough for a young kid to figure out and finish, and I really hope that doesn’t change. Now, I’d wouldn’t at all mind some sort of “veteran” difficulty or something in the remake, but I still think it should remain the simple, relatively easy game it always was so that all those young Switch gamers out there can have the chance to enjoy and come to love it too.

Back to the topic at hand, can you believe it? We finally get to see Geno again, and there’s even a good chance that we’ll get to learn a smidge more about him since Nintendo is adding real cutscenes to the game! At least one of the ones shown in the trailer shows the gang surfing along Star Road (something we never saw in the original), so there’s a decent chance we’re going to see something new! The battle system also seems to have gotten some kind of update; there’s now a meter that fills via “chain” attacks and options called “speed” and “boost.” I’m not sure what either of these functions are, but it is some sort of changeup to the old battle system we know and love, and I’m down for it!

I think I’m most looking forward to seeing all the different locations, attack animations, sounds and music updated to modern standards. It’ll all be somewhat different sure, but after years and years of seeing the game as it originally was, I’m psyched to see a new take on it! I mean, how cool would it bee to see new versions of Static E!, Will 0′ The Wisp, or Star Blast? Or what about the battle themes for “Fight Monsters” or “Fight Against Smithy”? I don’t know about you, but I can’t wait to see it all!

Super Mario RPG: Legend of the Seven Stars is finally coming back! We get to see a brand new version of a beloved classic, and newer fans all over have a wonderful opportunity to experience it fresh for the first time! Will it resonate like with them like it did for us? Probably not. The gaming landscape now is nothing like what it was then, but who knows? Maybe they’ll remember it as just an “okay” adventure, or maybe we’ll see a renaissance of fan content the likes of which we could only dream of as kids. I mean, how awesome would it be to see this decade’s version of “Rawest Forest”? We can only hope, eh?

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How do you feel about this remake? Have you played Super Mario RPG? What are your feelings about it?

Image from the Nintendo eShop page