Hi, this is going to be a dumb one, but it's a question I find interesting.  So, I've been playing Fire Emblem: The Blazing Blade for my game clearing, Gaming Diary will be out whenever I finish it.  And I've been thinking a lot about the character of Lyn.  Lyn is a lord I'm very fond of, I don't think she's the most intricate character ever put to Fire Emblem, but she's a very unique lord nonetheless.  She's way more rugged and practical in comparison to the usually refined, well trained lords who adopt classical fencing techniques.  It's very fitting of her upbringing as a nomadic tribeswoman who would learn fighting for hunting and petty squabbles.

But it also made me think about Lyn in Smash Bros.  Lyn has always been a fairly popular request, being the first Fire Emblem lord the American audience was familiar with and with her style being very atypical for the often very samey potential Fire Emblem roster.  But this thought led me to another thought.  See, Lyn is a nomad and in the context of FE7, this is not so much a way of life as it is a distinctive racial or ethnic group.  Lyn is treated poorly, especially by other royals, due to her heritage, her father being a chieftan of a nomadic tribe rather than a highborn royal.  Even her own friends are kind of racist to her, noting how her "nomadic features" give her a "distinctive, unusual beauty" that they find striking.  Given the rough time period and state of European culture most Fire Emblem games are built off of, we can kind of infer that Lyn is half-Romani.  Or at least an equivalent race/ethnicity to the Romani.

Which brings me to my actual curiosity here: if Lyn were added to Smash Bros, would she be the first woman of color in the roster.  No.  The answer is no.  Of course not.  However, the actual answer is a bit more complicated than you'd expect, and has a number of possible answers.  It's a surprisingly complicated question, one whose answer is really up for interpretation.  And so I ask, dear reader...

Who was the first playable woman of color in Super Smash Bros?

Some Ground Rules

I want to first start by establishing some basic ground rules so that my intentions and understandings of the question I'm detailing are pretty clear.  They are, as follows:

1. This is not meant to be a criticism of Super Smash Bros.  I am not here to state that Super Smash Bros. has some sort of moral failing because there is a small potential roster of women of color or that this question is ambiguous in the first place.  This is genuine curiosity, and if there is any criticism present, it is moreso towards the gaming industry for both not featuring women enough and, moreover, not featuring women of color enough.  My only goal here is to go over the potential candidates and explain why they're each interesting as an answer to this question.
2. A potential candidate, in my mind, is not just a character who looks like they are a person of color.  This is an important thing to note as Smash, famously, has a number of characters who adopt an anime aesthetic in it and thus all could be considered Japanese.  However, most of the time these characters, despite their appearances, are meant to be analogous to European peoples.  Three Houses takes place in an analog of the Holy Roman Empire and thus all the characters can be considered to be German, Palutena is a Greek goddess, Samus Aran is the daughter of people named "Rodney" and "Virginia".  I'm only going to be focusing on characters who are either definitively people of color, or their place and/or people of origin are analogous to places and cultures that people of color come from.
3. Every candidate will be either human or humanoid.  The reasoning for this should be obvious but just to clear it up, this is a rule, if it's not a rule, the answer is Jigglypuff, who is a pink puffball from literal Japan.
4. If the candidate in question is related to an existing character rather than being a unique character, I will note that their technical origin date is when the character as a whole debuted but I will take into consideration whether the character debuted AFTER another character on this list as consideration on whether or not they were actually first.

With that out of the way, let's meet our candidates in order from least ambiguous to most.

Addendum 1: In the following text, I discuss the character of Corrin from Fire Emblem Fates.  It was my belief, having played Birthright and part of Conquest, that Corrin's character was a PoC, being from the Japan-inspired Hoshido by birth and only being raised in the Russian-esque Nohr.  I have come to understand that Revelations reveals that Corrin's heritage is far more complicated and that it can be brought into question whether she is a woman of color as a result, as her birth mother comes from a land that is just generally based on cultures with rich, mainstream mythologies (Greece, Norway, India, etc.)  As such, Corrin probably doesn't count and should be disregarded.

Addendum 2: Some people have asked the question of, if there could've been an earlier WoC rep in Smash, who would it be.  This is a question that actually has an answer.  Masahiro Sakurai has stated in the past that he did, at one point, wish to include Ayumi Tachibana from the Famicom Detective Club series in Melee, as he was a massive fan of the games.  If Ayumi had made it into the game, she would've been unambiguously the first woman of color in the series, being a Japanese woman from what is intended to be real Japan.

Min Min

Btw, Min Min was my ARMs main, so I'm glad she got into Smash.

This is the easiest answer, this is the safest answer, this is the least ambiguous answer, but that does not mean it's correct.  Min Min comes to us from Smash Ultimate's 6th DLC, a DLC that fulfills an empty slot on the roster that Sakurai had always intended.  Sakurai had wanted to include characters from the Switch's first year on the market, but Ultimate was already pretty far into development before said games could come out and, as such, Breath of the Wild kind of had to be the cutoff.  Three Houses only really came into the first DLC pack, which was decided around Ultimate's release date because Intelligent Systems gave Sakurai a sneak peak copy years before the game hit market.

Min Min comes from the video game "ARMS", an early Switch 1 title designed to utilize the Joy-Con's motion controls.  It was essentially attempt to take the general idea that made Splatoon work, i.e. "what if we made a competitive game with the sensibilities of a more traditional singleplayer one" and try and create a more dedicated, competitive fighter with it.  In ARMS case, rather than being a shooter that played like a platformer, it was a fighting game that played like a third person shooter.  It unfortunately did not become successful to the degree that Splatoon did, but it certainly has its audience and Min Min in particular is the game's most popular character, having won their big character tournament at the end of their support window.

So why is Min Min the easy answer?  What makes her the safe option for the first woman of color in Smash.  Well uh.  She's Chinese.  Like, Min Min is from the ARMs' universe's version of China, she speaks actual Chinese, her name is a pun on the Chinese word for noodle, her theme is heavily inspired by music meant to depict China.  Min Min is the easy answer because she is the only character on this list who is definitively from a place in the real world and is the easiest to confirm as a woman of color.  She's also a handy line to draw for what we're doing, because she's so unambiguous, any character who is in contention for this title has to be before her.

Villager

The second "easy" option is the Villager.  The first new character to be confirmed for Smash 4 and, in fact, the first character to be shown for Smash 4 at all, Villager is one of Sakurai's truly most insane characters concepts that he actually got working.  Nowadays Villager almost feels quaint, as their moveset doesn't really do anything super crazy.  Compared to people like Min Min, who have had the mechanics from their own games fully adapted into Smash, to where you really feel like you are playing an ARMs character in this game.  But Villager is truly a highlight of Sakurai's creativity, a character from a life simulation game brought into a fighting game and made to work entirely within the context of them being from a life sim.  It's superb.

Villager hails from the Animal Crossing series, designed to represent the player character of Animal Crossing which is a player insert character.  An Animal Crossing character was actually in demand as early as Brawl, I remember a lot of speculation around Tom Nook being a character, or KK Slider mayhaps.  Instead, Sakurai decided that the customizable player character is instead the best way to represent the Animal Crossing series, having them utilize their various tools and items to fight.  In a way, Villager, and by extension the very similar but not quite a clone character Isabelle, kind of fight by just doing things randomly and the opponent sort of runs into them.  Being a player character though, the Smash team decided to include various alternate skins that represent the level of player customization present in the Animal Crossing series.

Which brings us to the question at hand.  As of Super Smash Bros. Ultimate, the Villager's 8th skin is a dark-skinned woman, meant to represent skin tone customization, a feature I don't think was in Animal Crossing when Ultimate came out but was very likely planned for the then upcoming next entry, Animal Crossing New Horizons, which was famously in development for a long time.  And, with this character being before Min Min, both Villager as a whole and this particular skin, Villager has a strong case for being the first woman of color in Smash.  Especially when you consider that Villager is, like Min Min, meant to be human, not some sort of hybrid, not a fantasy race with dark skin, just an actual human that is a woman of color that was on the roster before Min Min.

However, I feel of the candidates we'll be talking about today, Villager actually has the worst claim to the title.  For starters, Villager 8 is not the earliest character we're going to be talking about on this list, though she's the earliest revealed character I think that is decidedly "human" we will be talking about technically.  There are at least two characters that debuted before original villager, and many more that debuted before this Smash Ultimate skin of Villager.  But also, this feels a bit weird, doesn't it?  Like Villager 8 is really who we're going with, a singular alternate skin of a character, and not even one that appeared in every game the character in question has been in?  I don't feel comfortable saying "the first woman of color in the Super Smash Bros. roster is the last skin of a character whose entire visual ideology is being customizable".  It'd be like if Dovakhiin were on the roster and we called them the first woman of color who was playable because Dovakhiin 6 is the Arabic-inspired Khajit skin, it just feels weird!

Leaf (Pokemon Trainer)

So how about, instead, a character who occupies half the skin slots of a character.  Pokemon Trainer appeared originally in Super Smash Bros. Brawl in the form of Red, the original Generation 1 Pokemon protagonist, albeit in his FireRed and LeafGreen incarnation.  Pokemon was always a prominent part of the Smash Bros. roster, Pikachu is literally one of the original 8, Jigglypuff is one of the only secret characters in Smash 64, Melee's new character roster included multiple new Pokemon, and several Pokemon were planned and/or shopped at various stages of development.  But Pokemon Trainer is the character that represents the series the best, a character that sends out his Pokemon, represented by the Gen 1 starters at various stages of evolution, into battle and has them fight for him.  It's also a very clever way of doing a stance change character.  Unfortunately, Pokemon Trainer would have to be cut in Smash 4 as the 3DS couldn't handle him.  But when he returned in Ultimate, he brought a friend.

Leaf, or the female Pokemon trainer, hails from Pokemon FireRed and LeafGreen.  She is not the first playable female Pokemon trainer in the series, that distinction goes to Krys from Pokemon Crystal, but Leaf is the first female Pokemon trainer that was likely designed to market the game to girls.  As was found in a recently translated old interview, FRLG made numerous design decisions to market to girls.  Leaf, and by extension, the concept of a female Pokemon Trainer, would make their way into the series with Ultimate, which marked the triumphant return of the Pokemon Trainer, with Leaf occupying the even numbered slots of Pokemon Trainer's alternate costumes, although she would end up representing the odd numbered Generations.  After the first two skins, which are default Red and default Leaf, they have costumes representing each Generation, up to VII, the most recent one out at the time, but because Leaf offsets it by one, Red gets the even numbers and Leaf gets the odd.

Leaf is a pretty strong contender for this crown.  Pokemon Trainer, as a character, was introduced to Smash much earlier than either Min Min or Villager, and is one of the earliest characters I will be talking about in general.  And while Leaf is locked to alternate skins, much like Villager 8, she occupies a more prominent role within those skins, making up 4 out of the 8 available.  Leaf is clearly a feature of the character, rather than just a one-off skin.  Most importantly though is that Leaf is Japanese.  The Pokemon world is not 1:1 with the real world, there are various geographical inconsistencies (like the UK being upside down) and the world is much more untamed than ours, but Leaf's region is probably THE Pokemon region that is the most analogous to a real world location, being basically a deurbanized Tokyo.  It's literally called "the Kanto region", which is literally a place in Japan.

However, Leaf runs into the problem that Villager 8 ultimately runs into.  While she definitely occupies more of a presence on the roster, Leaf is still just an alternate skin at the end of the day.  She's an other to her male counterpart, a set of slightly different character models to add some variety to the Pokemon Trainer.  As well, while Pokemon Trainer is an older character in the grand scheme of Smash, Leaf is new, being added into the character's DNA as of Smash Ultimate.  It still puts her in front of Min Min, but she's unlikely to be the first.  Still, I don't think she's a bad option by any means and if you want to consider her, then go for it.  There's not exactly a right answer here.

Corrin

This will be the only time I talk about Corrin as being interesting, so you better enjoy this.  Corrin is the oddball of the Fire Emblem lords in Smash.  Corrin was the penultimate character in Smash 4's DLC, coming between Cloud and Bayonetta.  A lot of people criticize Corrin's inclusion within Smash as a cynical business move, because it probably is, but I do think Sakurai kind of cooked with Corrin.  She's like the easiest cut from the roster if they make another game but Corrin has a super unique and very fun moveset, utilizing their bizarre half-dragon form to do a lot of wild stuff in combat.  Corrin is also the only Fire Emblem lord that I feel truly belongs in this conversation.  Whereas other lords are just intended to be European with a distinctly anime aesthetic, Corrin's race/ethnicity is much more complicated than that.  Why?  Well, let's get into it.

Hailing from the trilogy of Fire Emblem Fates, Corrin is the fully customizable main character of those games.  Corrin was raised as a prince/princess of the Kingdom of Nohr, a cold, harsh, very Eastern European style kingdom that encompasses the vast majority of the land on the continent that Nohr is located on.  Shortly after the game starts, however, it is quickly discovered the Corrin is actually the lost member of the royal family of Nohr's neighboring kingdom and long-time enemy, Hoshido.  The two kingdoms have been at war for a very long time, and any time there is a treaty between the two, it is only a matter of time before said treaty is broken.  As such, war ignites in the midst of Corrin's reunion with their birth family and they are forced to choose a side: either side with the family who raised them, knowing they stole them, or side with the family they were born to, even though they do not know them.  Or maybe they can forge their own path.  Or join Smash!

So why is Corrin in discussion for the first woman of color in the roster.  After all, as previously stated, most Fire Emblem lords look Japanese, but their Kingdoms are analogs for the numerous European kingdoms.  Well, Corrin is a bit unique because her heritage is distinctly inspired by East Asian culture.  Hoshido is a country that, as you could imagine from the name, carries a distinctive Japanese lean.  Their lord and heir apparent to the throne is designed after a samurai, the names all have that lean (Ryoma, Takumi, Hinoka, Sakura), and geographically it is a smaller country on the east coast of a continent that is on a peninsula with an island chain.  With all of this evidence, it can be easily surmised that Corrin is either Japanese or, given the geography, Korean, and that Nohr is actually Russia.  This would definitely put her in the running as the first woman of color on the roster, appearing an entire game before the others listed.

However, once again, there are issues.  Like with Villager and with Leaf, female Corrin is not the default, she is a series of alternate skins on a character who is, in Smash, traditionally depicted as male.  Which is actually kind of a rarity for Corrin, mind, as a lot of other sources tend to depict Corrin as canon female, but I digress.  There is, also, the issue with Corrin being an FE lord.  Fire Emblem takes place in a high fantasy world and while there are analogs to the real world given in its history and geography, it's also not uncommon for Fire Emblem to blur those lines.  There are a lot of ninjas in Europe in the FE world, I'm just saying.  There is also just the fact that Corrin isn't quite human.  Corrin is a dragon, a half-dragon mind you, but a dragon nonetheless.  The half-blood daughter of a truly ancient race of dragons that is now all but extinct.  So while I don't think a convincing argument could be made that she shouldn't count because she is "not actually human", I could understand why some people would go that way.  That being said, I think Corrin has the strongest claim to the title we've seen thus far, at least of the ones that are a little ambiguous.  

Inkling

I know, I know, I literally made a rule about this.  And I literally just brought it up as a counterargument that could be leveled at Corrin.  Hear me out though.  The Inklings were the very first characters revealed for Super Smash Bros. Ultimate, being revealed in the game's reveal trailer.  If you are keeping track, that means the majority of the potential answers to this question have technically debuted in Smash Ultimate.  That's certainly interesting, don't you think?  I promised I wasn't going to criticize, I know.  Anyways, Inkling is one of the only newcomers in Super Smash Bros. Ultimate's base roster that doesn't come from a fairly old game, Splatoon being a game that came out during Smash 4's content cycle and very quickly became one of Nintendo's tentpoles.  And I think, given how Splatoon is, they become a very interesting answer to this question.

Splatoon is a franchise that takes place on a post-apocalyptic Earth, long after the extinction of humans.  Since the disappearance of the dominant race, squids have evolved into humanoids and have become obsessed with the pillars of human culture.  Things like fashion, music, sports, etc.  This new race of shapeshifting humanoid squids, called the Inklings, would inherit the Earth and recreate essentially the best of human culture, heavily influenced by Japanese idol culture.  In fact, the area that the Inklings occupy and from which they host their primary sport, Turf Wars, is heavily implied to have once been Japan and has now just been warped by whatever changes the Earth has gone through in the intermittent millions of years.  As such, the Inklings are themselves are something of a parrot of present day urban Japanese culture, and are noteworthy as such.

The Inklings have a bit of a leg up on the previous character's we've discussed in that, unlike with Villager 8, Leaf, and femme Corrin, the female Inklings ARE the default skin in Smash.  The Inkling's default skin is the platonic ideal of an Inkling, a young Japanese girl with orange hair and a white t-shirt with a brand logo on it.  I believe this is the design of the Inkling that we even first saw, appearing in the original Splatoon trailer which Smash Ultimate parrots for its reveal.  Not only that but Inkling, representing a game with loads of customization options, has skins of varying looks and, indeed, skin tones.  I feel like, outside of Min Min, the argument could be made that Inkling is the least ambiguous character in this lineup, not only is she a woman of color by default, but she is also represented by multiple women of color.

On the other hand, the Inkling is a squid.  That's a little reductive I realize, but the point is still valid.  Inklings are shapeshifters, they are not only able to switch between their squid and humanoid forms at will, but also change most things about their appearance on a whim.  This has been a very positive feature of the Splatoon series, as the games have been lauded for their inclusivity.  You can switch up your appearance and gender at basically any point.  But also, it makes this a little messy.  Can we consider Inklings PoC when they're actually humanoid squids shapeshifting into facsimiles of the culture that existed before them?  It also runs into the villager question, in that the reason why the Inkling is so varied in their alternate costumes is as a representation of player customization.  Splatoon is a series where you play as an Inkling you created, not any specific Inkling.  As such, the Inkling costumes are all designed to show the wide range of customization options present in the game.  The Inkling is very ambiguous despite in many ways being more concrete than any option previously listed despite Min Min.  They're probably the biggest question marks on this list.

Sheik

This is, to some people, the "correct" answer.  And this is, to other people, heresy.  I honestly just feel kind of gross even putting Sheik on here, to be honest.  Sheik is the earliest character on this list by far, being one of the first newcomers ever shown for Super Smash Bros. Melee.  Amusingly, because of how they're shown in the intro, Sheik is actually considered to be on the roster BEFORE Zelda, despite being the secondary transformation of her in Melee and Brawl.  Sheik is one of the very few Zelda characters on the roster and one of the only ones that has a unique moveset, as most Zelda characters are based on other characters in the roster as they were inserted as a means to buff the roster while not adding too much development time.  Sheik is very popular, despite the fact that they were included in a singular game from 1998, it's almost difficult to imagine the roster without them at this point.  Sheik is also complicated for this question for a couple very specific reasons.  We'll get into them.

Sheik originates from the iconic and critically acclaimed video game The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time.  Entering the story after its game-defining time skip, Sheik appears as a helpful but mysterious figure in the darker and ravaged version of Hyrule that Link awakens in.  They are of the Sheikah tribe, a race of dark-skinned peoples who have loyally served the royal family for centuries and for whom Kakariko Village, a small farming town at the foot of Death Mountain, is home.  Sheik aids Link on his quest by nudging him in the right direction on his quest and teaching him the sacred songs which will allow him to more easily navigate Hyrule.  This all culminates in the plot twist that Smash likely spoiled for you if you weren't old enough to Zelda in 1998, the Sheik has actually been the missing Princess Zelda the entire time, having used the Triforce of Wisdom to transform themselves into a young Sheikah so they could hide from Ganondorf's eye.  Sheik was also planned to make an appearance in Twilight Princess, which is what their design from Brawl onward is based on, but this was ultimately scrapped.  Good thing too, Twilight Princess already has too many balls in the air.

There are two main problems with Sheik being the first woman of color on the roster.  One that's more based in canon and the other which is more based in fanon.  The former issue is that an argument could be made that Sheik is not truly a woman of color.  She is simply a magical disguise put on by Zelda, a means to hide herself as she awaits Link's return.  She is not necessarily a character to her own, just a costume put on by a woman whose appearance is more in line with European royalty.  But I could also easily see the argument that Sheik's popularity, her legend as it were, has made her a character in her own right.  And that Smash in particular is evidence of this fact, as the two characters have evolved in completely separate ways, with Sheik not even maintaining the very few elements that she shared with Zelda by the time Ultimate was released, i.e. losing the Light Arrow as a final smash.

The other problem is that Sheik is typically depicted as a man by the fandom.  Not only is Sheik a man to the fandom, but Sheik is a pretty important symbol of transmasc gamers, I distinctly remember the outcry that happened around Smash 4 when Sakurai confirmed Sheik in the game was female and people called for erasure.  Sheik being a guy is the first thing most people know about him, and the twist that Sheik is Zelda hits harder as a result.  It's why I feel uncomfortable with putting Sheik in this running, it feels a bit like stepping on the toes of a community I am not a part of.  Sheik's gender identity being masculine is very important to people, both in a narrative sense and in a representation sense.

So why is Sheik here at all?  Because, according to Nintendo, THIS is the correct answer to the question.  Or at least the closest thing to a correct answer that we'll be given without asking them directly, at which point I imagine they'll say like Min Min just to be safe.  Sheik has almost always been understood internally to be a woman.  The idea that Sheik is a man mostly arose about from the fandom, as previously stated, namely due to the fact that Sheik's gender is very ambiguous.  They don't lean too heavily into masculine or feminine character design and, to a lot of people, that immediately equates to masculine because most of our characters are male.  Especially in the context of video games in 1998.  I don't really like it either, to be clear.  Again, I feel like I'm stepping on people's toes by even suggesting this as an option.  I just want any trans readers to know I love them, I'm sorry Sheik is here, but I couldn't justify not putting them on here, especially since they're probably the "correct" answer.  It's an answer I really wish wasn't here and I don't blame anyone for disregarding Sheik as a possible contender, as this question is super ambiguous anyways.

Daisy

I bet when you clicked on this, you never thought it would end with Princess Daisy.  One of the very first characters to be shown off in Super Smash Bros. Ultimate, the first "newcomer" revealed in the first Smash Ultimate direct actually, Daisy was introduced as an "Echo Fighter".  Basically how Smash now contextualizes clone characters, rather than them having their own individual spots on the roster, they now share one with another character.  So Daisy isn't character 67, she's character 13E.  For the record you are only an Echo Fighter apparently if you debuted in Smash 4 or Ultimate, the Melee and Brawl clone characters got to keep their numberings.  Here's the thing, when I started thinking about this question, it was just something I was like "well here's the list of possible candidates but this one doesn't work for this reason or this one is ambiguous for that reason", stuff like that.  When I got to Daisy though, that's when I wanted to turn it into a blog post.  So let's do this.

Daisy hails from the original Game Boy launch title "Super Mario Land".  Created as a way to make the Game Boy game feel distinctive from the console Mario games, so as not to feel like just an inferior port, Daisy has become a fan favorite character over the years, in particular due to her portrayals in the Mario sports games, especially Mario Strikers.  Compared to her counterpart, Peach, she's tougher, more energetic, and just a bit psychotic.  It's honestly shocking how long it took Daisy to reappear in the mainline series with how beloved she is, she was literally in Smash Bros before she made another mainline Mario game reappearance.  However, it is from her origins of that our question comes into play.  And with Daisy in particular, it is exceptionally complicated.

So, Daisy's place of origin is Sarasaland, an empire ruled by Daisy's royal family.  Daisy is an empress.  Sarasaland is comprised of four Kingdoms; the Birabuto Kingdom, a vast desert kingdom which contains ancient ruins, namely large pyramids, the Muda Kingdom, an kingdom set on a large island chain in the ocean where weird occurrences happen, the Easton Kingdom, a mountainous kingdom high in the sky where the people have built large statues of men, and the Chai Kingdom, a forested kingdom covered in primarily bamboo.  Sarasaland, in a departure from most other Mario games before or since, has its kingdoms representing real world locations, spanning Egypt, China, Rapa Nui and Bermuda, though the last one could be the mythical continent of Mu, which was believed to be in the middle of the Pacific Ocean.  Aside from the fact that this empire would be comically massive if it were in the real world, stretching from North Africa all the way to the coast of the Americas, this also raises a very interesting question about Daisy: is Daisy a WoC?

Now, I don't think Nintendo has ever or will ever weigh in on this debate one way or another.  I think in their mind, Daisy is the princess of a fictionalized kingdom and while that kingdom has real world analogs, it's not a place.  Daisy isn't Egyptian just because her kingdom is Egyptian, it's a fantasy world.  Daisy is very likely a generic European royal that just so happens to have a kingdom made up of cool iconography that the team working on Super Mario Land thought would be cool.  Except I don't think that's actually true.

See, the answer of "is Daisy a WoC" seems to change based on the game.  Daisy is typically depicted next to Peach and, as a rule, always has darker skin than her.  Even the most pale Daisy appearances are slightly tanned.  But again, it's not enough to where you could look and go "yes, Daisy is a person of color".  But sometimes, Daisy has fairly dark skin.  Her first appearance in color, Mario Tennis, is one such case, having Daisy's official art have pretty dark skin.  And this is also true of Mario Party 3, Daisy again has dark skin in that game.  But then in Mario Party 4, she is much paler.  And it keeps going back and forth like that.  Daisy sometimes has pale skin, sometimes has tanned skin, sometimes has dark skin.  There are some Daisies where it seems like the art team was implying that Daisy was a woman of color and other Daisies where she just definitively isn't.  It's shockingly complicated and I think it is only fitting that the surprisingly ambiguous question of "who was the first playable woman of color in Super Smash Bros." ends with a character who, herself, is really ambiguous.

In recent years, though, there's been more of an acceptance among the community that Daisy is indeed a woman of color, or at least she should be.  It seems a bit obvious to many of them, Daisy's massive globe spanning empire she is the singular monarch of would cover North Africa, the Middle East, East Asia, the Pacific Islands, Central America, before finally landing in the Caribbean and coastal America.  It's comically large, as previously stated, but it is a diverse swath of people and it would imply Daisy is part of them.  Granted, the British Empire also was comically large, to the point where the sun never set on Britain, but I imagine Nintendo doesn't want to imply that one of the biggest characters from their cartoony mascot platformer is a ruthless colonialist who violently conquered this land.  If Daisy is not officially a woman of color currently, which again is complicated, she probably should be going forward.  It'd be nice for Nintendo's biggest franchise to prominently feature a woman of color.

So what is the answer?

Min Min probably.  Look, I don't know what the actual answer is, and I don't really think there is one singular answer.  There are many asterisks to basically any candidate that is not Min Min, and the other answers can be seen as unsatisfying.  Like I said, what is probably the "correct" answer is one that feels a little icky because of how much that character means to transmascs.  Everyone is going to interpret this question differently and, honestly, even if it were something Nintendo was interested in answering, I don't think we'd like their answer, because it'd probably be Min Min.  I will say though, it is infinitely disappointing to me that every eligible character besides one debuted within the last two Smash games.  Smash is a series that has been around for almost 30 years now and not only is this question ambiguous, it's a depressingly small sample pool.  I think even the characters after Min Min, there's like A Steve skin that is a black woman, and then that's every woman of color on the roster period.  And that's honestly the other reason why I don't like just saying Min Min, because it means that in the 30 years we've had Super Smash Bros, the 6th to last character introduced in the game about having EVERY Smash character is the first WoC.  Feels just a bit wrong, doesn't it?  Maybe the answer should be Jigglypuff.

Random Thoughts and Feelings on Paper Mario: The Thousand Year Door

 Recently, as part of my foolish attempt to decrease my monstrous backlog, I decided to play one of my oldest hanging threads in it, Paper Mario: The Thousand Year Door.  One of the most beloved games of all time, I acquired it many years ago after watching several of my at the time favorite content creators tackle the game.  At a certain point in time, although I had never finished it myself, I would've even gone so far as to say TTYD is one of my favorite games of all time as, regretfully, much of my own thoughts and opinions were parroting those of people whose content I enjoyed playing games I never thought I would be able to play myself.  Over the years however, my own opinions on gaming and especially TTYD have evolved and now, as an adult, I decided to finally tackle the game in its entirety.  The following are various thoughts and opinions I privately shared with various friends and friend groups but initially I did not wish to share with the masses, due to my own knowledge on, a, how beloved this game is, 2, how passionate its audience tends to be, and lastly, how my own opinions on the game I knew were already and/or going to be pretty mixed.  However, for posterity, I wanted to collect these thoughts and here we are.

11/06/2024

So like, I get the whole philosophy behind having incredibly low damage values and in some way I respect it.  But tbh, it's like the thing I dislike about how Paper Mario handles stats.  Like I get the idea of like "1 damage and 2 damage feel so substantial this way" but I've always felt like it doesn't work as much in practice because it eventually just kinda ends up at "it always feels like I'm not doing enough damage" after a certain point.

Finished Chapter 1.  I'm liking TTYD more than I expected to from previous attempts to play it and from watching other people play it, but I'm not like wowed yet.  Messed up and accidentally upgraded HP, RIP.

11/09/2024

Finished Chapter 2 of TTYD.  Boggly Woods is an absolute vibe, just on vibes this is possibly my favorite chapter in any Paper Mario game I've played so far.  Actually playing it?  It's alright.  I think a thing about TTYD I'm realizing is that areas just feel really small?  Like I don't know if they're actually any smaller than the areas in 64 or Super but the way they're laid out makes them feel so much smaller.

I'm liking the combat more than I have in the past but I think that's mostly because I'm going into it already knowing I gotta do something funny with my build so that battles don't last forever.  We're doing Danger/Peril strats bby, hell yeah.

I'm now a few party members into the game and like, idk if this is just how I'm playing or what, but it kind of feels like Goombella is still the only party member I want to have in combat like 90% of the time?  Like Koops is useful situationally so far and Flurrie's whole gimmick of being a board clear only seems to work on enemies I don't find especially annoying to deal with and doesn't work on like, say, a board of Piranha Plants.  Partner balancing could be better, lol.

I am still liking it way more than I thought I was going to from previous experiences but like, I'm still mostly like "this is fine".

The attack point upgrade in Chapter 2 is decently well timed but an issue I have with like Paper Mario in general, as I've mentioned previously, is that it still always feels like I'm not doing enough damage in this series?  Like it always feels like by the time they give me the option to do 2 damage instead of just 1, you should already be doing 3 damage on your normal attack.  I think I would've just put an attack point on every x amount of levels myself.

(In reply to a friend on the nature of the badge system) I actually feel like I need to grind more with badges so that I have more room for badges to strategize with. Like to me this system is way more dependent on grinding than a traditional stat system because in order to have room to strategize you need to have levels to get the badge points.  Like to me it's very frustrating how quickly it becomes where regular enemy fights are functionally worthless in the chapter.  It's like the game is telling me "okay, you're too strong for this now" but idk.  I don't have traditional stats, I don't really feel stronger, this room full of enemies is going to take me as much time to beat at level 8 as it does at level 7, but now I just get half the EXP for doing so.

11/10/24

Anyways, I'm like halfway through the Glitz Pit and uh.  Fuck this.  Fuck this actually.  This is horrible.

So basically what happened is that I got to the ranked 7th match, the Shellshockers, right?  The Shellshockers legitimately took an hour by themselves because I kept getting bad objective rolls, stuff like "take damage five times" or "don't attack for three turns".  The issue is that the Shellshockers are a team of really strong enemies where, even if I guard, I am still taking 4 damage per hit, so four hits and I'm out.

Now admittedly, part of the reason these objectives were so bad is because I haven't been upgrading HP as up until this point exactly, haven't felt like I've needed it and I like the additional attack points I get from being in Danger/Peril.  That being said, I don't have an option really to rectify this problem because of how Paper Mario handles EXP.  Like I can't go somewhere and grind because I'm now high enough level to where every other area I can access to do said grinding nets me 1 exp per fight.  And also, I don't want to do that, because I don't want to have my spell to double EXP triggering on random fights I'm not getting anything out of, wasting uses.

My other option is to derank, but the problem we're facing there is that because the objectives are, in effect, "let yourself die", I can't derank even if I wanted to without throwing, and I don't want to throw because I know I can beat this stupid fight where I'm at if the game would just stop being horrible to me!  Like I could derank, fight the lower tiers over and over, get more HP, get back to the Shellshockers and then have an objective that would make the grind feel like I wasted my time and actively hurt me longterm because now I just have more HP I need to burn through to get to Danger.  I hate this, I hate this chapter's stupid gimmick so much.

My Yoshi is Orange, btw.  Getting past the Yoshi means I'm probably further now than I ever was in the past?  I don't remember exactly where I stopped in the past and forgot to check before I wiped the save file since I wasn't going to return to it to finish it but I distinctly remember forcing myself to spend the max time to get the white Yoshi to feel special.

If they do another Paper Mario game like the original 2 after TTYD, they gotta do something about the Koopa party member because man.  Kooper and Koops are very clearly like the worst party members in their respective games.

Koops' entire purpose in the party is currently being rendered obsolete by a newborn, I don't believe there is a worse party member than that.  And if there is, holy shit.  Like people have been saying this game is a masterpiece for 20 years but almost half the party members are awful?

11/11/24

Finished Chapter 3 last night.  I didn't like it.  Combat focused chapter, not doing it for me ever.  I already think the combat is the weakest part of this game and boy howdy did this chapter really highlight all my issues.  Like half the required fights are just complete wastes of time but also you can't just easily deal with them because despite the fact that the game is telling you you're too strong for this fight by giving you no EXP, you never feel any stronger because your attack point increases are determined by specific story beats and not by leveling up, meaning a room full of enemies you fight at level 1 can still take as much time to beat as that same room full of enemies at level 11.

And then on top of that, there's a massive difficulty spike halfway through the chapter where fights go from "wastes of time" to "way too rough", where suddenly enemies have an unheard of amount of like attack and defense for this part of the game, with a lot of times them being able to 3HKO me despite blocking.  Again, this is partially my fault, I haven't been upgrading HP and as such I am super squishy.  That being said, I don't know how I'm meant to rectify this when every place I had access to besides the Glitz Pit nets me no exp, it feels like I am simply being punished for my build.

The chapter gimmick also really hurt it for me.  Like I get the flavor, it's wrestling, you're putting on a show, but in practice it just kind made already difficult fights just entirely unreasonable.  Like most of my time spent in this chapter was redoing fights because the clear condition for the fight was causing me to lose.  I understand now why younger me never made it out of this chapter, it's rough, it's really rough.

Because of all of this I ended up not caring about the story, for the record, I was over this chapter before it even really got going.  The Grubba fight was really fun but otherwise the story was like a C.

11/13/24

Twilight Town's back and forth is honestly less annoying to me than Boggly Woods' or Glitzville's and I think it's because you're not like trapped in a single structure for majority of the chapter so it doesn't feel as small as those two did?  Like I think really the reason why TTYD's backtracking tends to be a problem is not because backtracking is a problem, but because of how TTYD, likely in an attempt to get this entire thing on a GameCube disc, tries to get a lot out of very little.  Like Paper Mario 1 has this problem with Shy Guy's Toybox.  Shy Guy's Toybox is a really annoying area full of a bunch of back and forth busywork, but really, you're not actually doing any less back and forth than you would in any other area.  The problem is Shy Guy's Toybox feels so much smaller than all the other areas in the game, so the back and forth becomes way more noticeable.  Also Vivian is just like so good?  Like she's really strong!  Really really strong!  Which I guess makes sense why she would be, given she's the only party member you can use in this chapter.  Like Vivian I've always been told is the opposite end of the partner balancing issue in this game, where she's like way too strong vs. the other party members, but it totally makes sense why they would make her super overpowered as well as she is literally the only party member available for like 50% of Chapter 4.

I still have yet to really find a point where Koops is especially useful.  Like idk, I feel like in most situations where I'd want to use Koops, it's just better to use Yoshi?  Even if I'm not hitting every enemy with Gulp, Gulp deals 5 to 2 enemies instead of 3 to 3+?

I think honestly what Koops needed is an aggro drawing attack, imo.  Like him being able to tank hits better is super helpful, don't get me wrong, but the game being designed around jumping means it's never a guarantee that they're going to hit Koops if he's out front.  I really think I'd use Koops way more if I knew the damage was going to go to him to tank with his defense.

11/14/24

Chapter 4 done.  This was the high point of the playthrough so far.  The atmosphere of the Twilight Woods is just so good, a perfect spooky chapter imo.  And also it' has been the high point of this game's humor so far, the crows that talk about like the burst of the dot com bubble and the depletion of fossil fuels and stuff are such a great bit.  And Doopliss is a perfect Mario RPG villain, as funny as he is threatening.  Big fan of this.

This story also hits really hard.  I think this is what I actually enjoy about TTYD, like, I concur this game's strong point is that it is willing to tell stories Mario never would, but I think that whereas many people point to the Glitz Pit as being an obvious high point in that respect because it's so un-Mario, I think TTYD is actually better off when it is doing stories Mario wouldn't normally but also still don't feel too out there?  Like the Twilight Woods are darker than a normal Mario story but its fairy tale connections still make it not feel like it's out of place, which I kinda feel like the Glitz Pit does?

Also surprisingly this chapter's backtracking didn't bother me that much, despite the fact that you have to cover what is essentially a hallway like five times.  I think that TTYD is trying to make effective use of incredibly limited space, there are bread loaves with more storage than a GameCube disc, and I commend them for getting a game this grand on such a tiny format.  Personally though I wish there were less areas like the Great Tree and more areas like Twilight Town, where, despite the area being small, it doesn't feel it nearly as much because it's still out in the open rather than a very enclosed and claustrophobic dungeon.

I have finally moved away from trying to make Danger strats happen, mostly, I still have a Danger badge equipped as a safety net, but I'm focused more on building around permanent attack buffs.  Here's hoping I don't almost die as much now, lol.  Still ain't upgrading HP tho.

Oh also I got Ms. Mowz.  She doesn't seem very good but at least now I can get all the badges I keep seeing in battle?  I'm a little surprised how easy it is to get her?  Like I figured she'd have a whole sidequest you had to go through where she hid badges in all the locations you spotted her (Hooktail Castle, The Great Tree, Glitzville) and then you'd recruit her after doing that.  Her attack also doesn't work like I expected it to.  I guess when I saw it was flicking I assumed it was going to be like Bow's where it hits for x amount of damage a number of times but instead it just hits once and ignores defense?

It also took me like way too long to realize Vivian doesn't have any restrictions on her attack?  Like I intuitively assumed that Vivian had to hit the front opponent because her attack is on the ground but no, she just goes anywhere.  Insane.  It makes sense, as she has to function as the entire party for a chapter, but still.  Like I've heard that criticism towards the game before, that on top of existing party balancing issues where Goombella is pretty clearly the best party member for the first few chapters, Vivian is just ridiculous and changes the balance even more, but also I fully get it.  She literally has to cover the entire party, who were probably all upgraded by this point, for at least 50% of Chapter 4.

11/15/24

Bobbery get!  Funny thing about at least the original release of TTYD, if you go into the menus to heal between you talking to Bobbery in Keelhaul Key and returning with the Chuckola Cola, you can already select Bobbery as a party member to use items on.  There would be no reason to do this, as he has full HP.  But still.

Oh another thing I'm realizing is that Goombella is actually going to lag for me for a specific reason: Multibonk is effectively useless for me because of the input lag of playing a game designed for CRTs on a modern TV!  It's something I've noticed being a problem trying to do Power Bounce too, when the timing gets to its maximum tightness, there's just no shot for me anymore, I'm done.  Superguard is also just a nonstarter for me, I've stopped trying.

It's good though, I have 3 extra BP to play around with that I wouldn't if I were playing this game on a CRT where I would absolutely rock Power Bounce, it's the strongest move in the game.  But because of how timing goes, I'm honestly just not seeing enough benefit off Power Bounce to really warrant trying to run it.  I can do like 10-12 off it but I do 8 with a normal attack due to my build so like.  What's the point.  I'm thankful that, outside of certain difficulty spikes due to chapter gimmicks, I'm not actually feeling like the timing being off is hurting me in any way.  Standard action command timing is very generous, you have like a 20-30 frame window it feels.  I think Vivian's might be even longer, actually, which contributes to her being so good.

I'm curious if Keelhaul Key and Twilight Town were, at one point, swapped during development of TTYD, because I think it's really interesting that like, at the end of Twilight Town you unlock two sidequests which take you back to previous areas of the game but then there's not really a lot to do in them with your newfound abilities, but there would be if you had Bobbery already.  And of course Bobbery, like.  I like him, it is not controversial to say he's a pretty underwhelming final party member though.  But like having a villain join the team, that would've made for an excellent final party member.

Them using Shine Sprites is so weird in hindsight.  Like I get why, it's just so weird how much synergy there was with the brand in regards to Sunshine for a few years when now it's such a clear outlier.

Wandering through the Rogueport Sewers post-chapter 5, Ms. Mowz is surprisingly helpful.  She's just a guarantee to handle the damage I need to stomp out Koopatrols, don't have to worry about their crazy defense complicating things.

Chapter 5 done.  Just like a solid chapter, I liked this one.  Cortez was a really cool fight, the dungeon was fun, just very solid overall.  I think this chapter really follows up well on Chapter 4 too, giving what is a very unusual Mario story but not one that ever feels out of place, further highlighting what I like and appreciate about TTYD.  It seems like the Glitz Pit is going to be the only standout "bad part" for me in this game at this rate. 

I am struck off this chapter, and I know this is heresy to say, by how much I think I'd honestly really adore TTYD if it was more of an adventure game like the series' later entries.  I find that I largely enjoy the game the most when I'm mostly puzzle solving and wandering around collecting stuff, and I tend to enjoy it much less when I'm fighting a bunch of enemies.  Like I think when it comes to boss fights, the combat is very fun and very creative, but during regular enemy fights I find combat pretty simple and kind of lacking.

I haven't commented on this before I don't think but man the music in this game is spectacular.  It felt like a good time to mention it because the Cortez Battle theme is such a standout track but on the whole the music has been a high point.  I am such a massive fan of the Twilight Town tune, y'all don't even know. 

I am super glad the mid game picks up so much because coming off the Glitz Pit I was definitely worried this was going to be another instance of "oh no, I hate one of the greatest games of all time" but nah, this game is good, I may not agree on how good but game is good.

11/16/24

Chapter 6 done.  I'm pretty mixed on this chapter.  On the one hand, like it's a mystery on a train, how can you not love that.  On the other hand this chapter is just super dull gameplay wise, literally being stuck in a claustrophobic hallway running back and forth.  It's a chapter I wish I could love more than I actually do. 

I'm glad to finally have another upgrade to Mario's stats, I feel like if I hadn't been building around power then I would've felt like another attack boost was overdue, it being three chapters since the last one.  I have also ended up back at Danger strats, lol, Sweet Feast makes them just really safe so I'm like "yeah, why not, lol".  Bad time to be doing it because this chapter is kind of a drain on SP due to the Paraspike Tops, but you know!

Having now done most of the game I gotta say, I don't think the Peach and Bowser segments are good.  Like the Peach segments are narratively interesting but I find them to be fairly dull to actually play and I would probably have a much bigger issue with them if they weren't all like 10 minutes max.  And the Bowser segments while at times humorous feel largely pointless, it kinda feels like Bowser is only this game because it's a Mario game, you gotta have Bowser.

Glad this chapter had you jump in a painting though, always a stamp of a quality Mario when you get to jump in paintings.  End game is on the horizon, just gotta do Chapter 7, surely nothing infamously bad happens in Chapter 7, amirite?

11/19/2024

Chapter 7 done.  Guess who finally found the "weak enemies die without you having to fight them" badge 7 chapters in!  The hunt for General White is pretty bad, ngl, while the game does give you a somewhat robust fast travel system, it has one of two big blindspots that still ultimately make this part annoying.  But I also  sympathize with why they wanted the final like main chapter be a world tour chapter, it's a good way to close out your adventure, it's just not executed the best.

Thankfully the Chapter picks up greatly in the second half.  X-Naut Fortress is an absolute jam and it being small works to its advantage after so much of this chapter was giving the players the run around.  And it has Resident Evil keys, who doesn't love Resident Evil keys.  And the ending surprisingly got to me, insofar as a sad moment in a Mario game could get to me.

I take back what I said about Ms. Mowz, her Defense piercing is incredibly helpful.  Like if the enemy only has 1 Defense point, it's not worth it but if you get to 2 or more, Mowz is like THE party member to get in there for damage, it's really handy.  I know that like Koops' big attack and a couple others also do that and are probably more effective in the long run but Ms. Mowz does it for free and that's usually enough, I find myself switching between her and Vivian.

I am ready for this game to be over.  Like I've definitely enjoyed this game more than I ever thought I was going to, but like.  I've put 33 hours into this game so far and while I don't regret finally sitting down and finishing it, I feel a bit like it was a lot of time to end up at the assessment of TTYD I had before I did this: this game is fine.  I used to say it's a 7/10, my final rating will probably be a 7.5 or 8/10, it is fine.  I guess now that assessment is at least fully informed?

Btw I was doing all the Troubles for some reason, I don't think I mentioned that, I'm not finishing that, you can't make me watch the Blimp boarding cutscene another time.

For the first time in the entire game, now, in chapter 8, I am finally feeling like I need HP.  Mostly because I know the bosses coming up are brutal in terms of damage.  Like I have 15 HP, the Shadow Queen basically 1 shots me.

11/20/2024

 I made it to the Shadow Queen last night and I did two attempts and like.  Man I don't want to have to watch all those cutscenes again.

Also don't ask the Internet for strategy tips on how to beat the Shadow Queen if you're playing the original on modern TVs!  Their advice is literally just "use Power Bounce 4head" and that doesn't work!

I think my next play is going to be rearranging my badges so that I can equip the other Power Plus P badge, that way Koops, Yoshi and Vivian's attacks that hit all opponents will deal 8 damage and take out the Shadow Hands. I'm surprised there's not a pipe right before the final boss room, tbh?  Like that seems like it should be a thing, so players can restock, swap out items, etc.

I think the other thing for me is like.  You can't skip cutscenes, whatever, it's a game from 2004, it was still a 50/50 shot if any game would let you do that, but also the cutscenes don't autoplay.  You have to mash through.

I haven't beaten the final boss yet but I figured since like I should probably do an end of game summary once I do that, I'm just gonna post Chapter 8 reflections.  So uh.  Chapter 8.

The Palace of Shadow is almost the perfect final dungeon for this game, and possibly in Mario RPG history, tbh.  Its dark, spooky, surreal atmosphere is the perfect culmination of the Thousand Year Door's style and themes, being inherently unsettling without pushing it too far and making it un-Mario.  And there are some truly great setpieces in it, the endless hallway that warps you back to the start if you choose a wrong door, the puzzle tower where you have to solve a series of riddles, the clockwork depths, it's all good stuff.

And on top of all of that, it's a dungeon that makes use of every party member and ability you've gained thus far for puzzle solving and I like that a whole lot.  Like it legitimately is almost my favorite chapter in the game because of how on a thematic level and even mostly in a gameplay level it really ties together the entirety of Thousand Year Door.

But there are two things I think kind of weaken it.  One is that it, at times, plays it too safe.  Like this dungeon, for all of its uniqueness, at times just kind of resorts to doing Bowser's Castle stuff, jumping over firebars, dodging long hallways with bullet bills, etc.  I feel like it makes this dungeon just a touch less cool when it reuses traditional Mario set pieces like this.  Speaking of reused set pieces, I like that it chooses to call back to previous dungeons in the game, I'm not as big of a fan that it only has two callbacks and they're both to Hooktail.  I think honestly I would've welcomed just fully reusing entire rooms from previous dungeons, it'd be a nice "look how far we've come" moment and shifting through so many dissonant rooms would really help the atmosphere, imo.

Overall though, still really positive on this chapter, probably my second favorite in the game, tbh.

The final boss is giving me problems.  I've done two attempts, made some decent headway, the issue is that if I lose I don't feel super plussed to immediately jump back in because it means having to go through all the cutscenes.

Alright, I have finished Paper Mario: The Thousand Year Door!  Overall, game is good, I enjoyed it, I'm glad I finally sat down and beat it.  It was a very interesting experience, it's always a bit of a crapshoot when I play these games people love, I have a habit of not liking them, I've even joked about it several times on my Twitter the "list of the greatest games of all time that I think aren't as good as Ecco the Dolphin, the bad Genesis game" but this one was good.

I previously stated that it feels a bit like I spent a lot of time just to end up at "this game is fine", an assessment I had before I did this playthrough, I don't necessarily agree with that.  Like, on the whole, I am not as into this game as most people, that much is true, it's not making any "best games of all time" lists for me, but like.  My general assessment of the Paper Mario series has always been "they're all okay, they're all perfectly fine games" but like, having now played at least the original trilogy I'm now more like "TTYD is obviously better than the rest of the ones I played and while I may not be putting as highly as others, I would be dishonest saying it is of the same exact quality as 64 or Super".

I will however hold to my previous assessment that I wish this game was more of an adventure game.  Like, while I ultimately did enjoy some of the RPG elements by the end, I found the badge juggling and build strategizing to be very fun and the boss design is really strong in this game, I mostly didn't care for the actual combat, feeling it very slow and very simple.  Admittedly, the like most in-depth mechanic, Super guarding, didn't work with how I was playing it so that was part of the problem but like, the entire time I was doing combat I was like "man, I wish I were just playing Mario & Luigi now".

I haven't really commented on the story overall, other than praising like Chapter 4, and honestly like.  It's good, it's a good Mario story, but with how people talk about this game I was absolutely expecting more?  Like the story is always talked about like a really high point of this game, people always talk about how amazing it is, and like.  For a Mario game, this is definitely leaps and bounds over what I'm expecting, don't get me wrong.  But I feel like that clause is often left out of the discussion, as if it is meant to be understood people are talking about this in context of it being a Mario game, and like.  It's difficult not to be a bit disappointed in it.  It's okay.  It's fine.

Actually on that note, I kind of hate the ending?  I actually kind of hate the weirdly saccharine note this game ends on where you go through where your party members are post adventure and all their lives are just going great, tonally it feels kind of off for how TTYD's tone and atmosphere typically goes, but also like.  Some of these stories' happy endings aren't that happy?  Like oh boy, Vivian returns to her transphobic family who used her as a pawn in a plot to awaken a centuries old god that was sealed away and then attempted to murder her when she for splitting off.  I'm not even necessarily sure if I hate this overall, I mean the Vivian part will never sit well with me absolutely, but just like.  It doesn't feel good being posted up at the end of TTYD, this is kind of the thing I would see appearing in a later entry in the series.

Overall though, some high highs, some low lows, it is a game I'm glad I've played.  A much younger version of me would probably love this game, I genuinely think that if I had played it when I had bought it and I was more into RPGs, more willing to excuse sometimes unfun gameplay for story, then this would probably make my favorites list.  As it stands, it's making my top 20 this year right now, there's still a month left in the year so whose to say what happens between then but like.  This moment?  It's the 18th best game I've played this year!