I’m in that weird camp where this is my favorite Mario and Luigi game

In the North American version of Partners in Time, Elder Princess Shroob has 3500 HP in her 1st phase and 3000 HP in her 2nd phase, making a grand total of 6500 HP. However, in the European/Japanese version, she only has 3800 HP total across both phases. That’s roughly a 71% health reduction.

AlphaDream would have been better off remaking this game as their last game on the 3DS because there is a lot of things that they could have changed to match the same standard that Bowser’s Inside Story set for the DS. When remaking Bowser’s Inside Story, there wasn’t much to change to fit the 3DS’ functionalities, hence why it didn’t sell well, here however, doing stuff like adding more touch control during the battles with stuff like Battle Cards or a Battle Spinner would’ve made a big difference.

I'm that guy whose favorite Mario & Luigi game is Partners in Time.

I love this game, but one thing I feel was a seriously missed mark was the fact that other than Peach's Castle, you don't time travel THROUGH any of the areas in this game. You should have been able to go to all these areas in the present day, and then time travel to them from there. It would not only have made the world feel larger and more interconnected, it would have actually added to the menace factor of the Shroobs by showing you what all these areas are supposed to look like, then what they'll look like forever if the Shroobs win.

I kinda do like the idea that characters in the past has a sort of classic or outdated style or humor. Like the Hammer bros L33T speak is totally buried in a certain era, but since they appear in the past, it kinda justifies it. I actually wish they leaned into this a little more qith NOC dialogue leaning more into older slang and comedy tropes. But alas its fine as is

This is A+ long-form review content. I can't wait to get the *inside story* on the next game.

Something I always liked in this game aside from the darker theme were the credits! They were less of a happy conclusion and more a waltz of memories. The music was more somber and serenading while the imagery was a bunch of artistic recreations of key events within the whole game! It really made finishing the game truly worth the trouble when we get to revisit the best moments of the game through an artistic point of view.

This is one of my absolutely favourite childhood games. First game I got on my original DS

I like that both Toadsworth and E.Gadd are in this game. They were both big in the 2000s and then largely disappeared. E.Gadd still pops up thanks to Luigi's Mansion, but he's seldom seen in other games. Toadworth has almost been forgotten, but maybe 3D All Stars and the TTYD remake will convince Nintendo to bring him back (the poor fools even cut him from the Mario Movie, which would've been a great place to see him return).

Ngl, the L33T speak gets more and more funny as the years go by lmao

To be fair, isn't the player always running the risk of running out of moves in the previous game by making the bros movies consumable in BP and only making them restorable through syrup?

The fact you bought the Mario outfit just for the gag is some dedication to the bit. Love it!

I really wish this game got remade....

Hey, just wanna say I've been binging your Mario RPG retrospectives and they're all excellent videos. That said, I feel the need to defend Partners In Time's honor a bit, as I personally enjoy it almost as much as Superstar Saga and feel it has a WAY better narrative structure than Bowser's Inside Story (which I'm about to watch your review on). I think Partners in Time gets a bad rep because people are overly fixated on its linearity, and formulaic McGuffin collecting structure, but I don't think people appreciate how free flowing and variety-filled the narrative manages to be within that structure. First of all, despite the interconnected world of Superstar Saga, it is still an incredibly linear game with essentially no reason whatsoever to backtrack anywhere, which makes the open world do very little to complement its actual design. Additionally, in addition to obvious points of narrative interest (such as each area having a unique and compelling scenario), the plot is surprisingly twisty. Early on, the Bros are forced to join forces with Bowser because both sides are being overwhelmed by the Shroobs. Then Bowser decides to make a competition out of the Cobalt Star shard hunt, even going so far as to steal the first 2 pieces from you. Then you rescue Peach weirdly early, only for a clueless Bowser to kidnap her back, and then it's revealed that wasn't even the real Peach. Then the BROS are essentially kidnapped by the Shroobs, and then it turns out that the Cobalt Star was purposely shattered by the real Peach because it was sealing away the Elder Princess Shroob. The "spirit" inside the Cobalt Star was actually this Elder all along, and has been tricking you into freeing her throughout the entire adventure. This should go without saying, but Mario RPGs haven't had narratives half this complex and involved in like 10 years, arguably more if, like me, you think that Bowser's Inside Story isn't really as well-written. BiS is a fantastic game, and it's still leagues above any of the modern Paper Mario games both narratively and mechanically, but I've always felt that its premise was much stronger than its actual plot structure. I think that just as people get negatively distracted by the Timeholes and undisguised linearity of PiT, they get positively distracted by the fact that you get to play as Bowser and Fawful is the main villain of BiS. BiS makes better use of the open world than SS does since both Bowser and the Bros explore it, but that world itself is so bland that it borders on Sticker Star levels of aesthetic design. Additionally, there essentially are no unique and interesting scenarios outside of Bowser and Peach's castles. Bowser just passes through each area - encounters like Monsieur Broque and the Wiggler aren't a fraction as interesting or compelling as the scenarios in SS or PiT in my opinion. Overall, the narrative has a couple of small surprises here and there (the shift to a quest for Star Cures, actually fighting Bowser after the Bros escape his body, the Dark Star copying Bowser's DNA), but is way less involved and interesting than the one in PiT. TLDR, PiT is almost as well written as SS and WAY better-written than BiS in my opinion, but this is a perfectly fair review. BiS has slightly more fun moment to moment gameplay imo, but the difference in narrative quality is so great that I honestly prefer PiT in a few areas despite being a gargantuan Bowser fan. Superstar Saga is still the king though

I don’t know if you knew this but when you use the fire and ice flowers you can use the x and y buttons to throw the balls at airborne enemies with the babies. I figured it out during the Petey Piranha boss fight. Personally I wish more of the items did that, had extra effects when all 4 brothers were in battle together.

Great video! I wanted to comment briefly on my theory for why there were lot of changes with Superstar Saga stuff, like the area dungeon structure, hub area, bros items vs moves, even things like villain group vs specific villains, etc etc. I think, since this game was made relatively close in time (ha!) to Superstar Saga, I think that Alphadream was experimenting with what worked better overall for the series. In BiS you can see what they took from that, and it was larger Superstar Saga stuff, like Bros Attacks, more minigames, more connected worlds, specific villain etc. I think Partners in Time was an experiment, and while a lot of stuff didn't pan out, it still is a very unique game in the series worth playing. Also just saying, if you didn't like the tutorials in this game... you are NOT gonna like how Dream Team handles it, I just hope you'll be able to see past that very big flaw when you cover that game, it's probably my favorite personally. One bad experience I did have with the game near the end tho was with Elder Princess Shroob one time. When I was first playing through the game I was having a TON of trouble beating her last phase. So on one run, I beat Young princess shroob, and elder phase 1, was doing well on phase 2, then I dropped my DS. The ds was fine. However, the game itself? Frozen. I had to redo the younger and elder phase 1 again cuz of th

One problem partners in time has is that the american/NTSC version is balanced... not balanced, actually. Enemies have way too much HP. The european(PAL) and JP versions are actually very different. Bosses can have as little as half the HP of their NTSC counterparts, but they usually gain new gimmicks. PAL is the better version overall.

I love partners in time, most underrated in the series in my opinion. Such a good game

I really liked your review! One thing I feel compelled to note is that enemy HP in this game is different between the NA and PAL/JP versions of the game. Glaringly, most of the Boss HP is inflated in the NA release. For example, none of the phases in the final boss went *above* 2000 HP overseas, while none of the phases went *below* 3000 in the US. I have no idea why they did this.

this is my favorite ds game

I ran through all of your retrospectives so quickly. I appreciate the hard work you put into all of these!

This was the first game in the series I played and while I have a lot of nostalgia for it, I still admit it's one of the weaker entries. The biggest issue I have and one that is very rarely brought up is that it doesn't actually feel like a time travel story. Take away the younger versions of the characters you meet and you really just visit the invaded areas, do stuff there and leave. None of them look like they take place in the past since we don't know how different they look in the present. Shroob castle could easily be just on the other side of Toad Town and you could even avoid Peach's castle having to have the same size and layout.

I actually thounght the hammer Bros we're talking like robots

23:39 the fact that thwomps are built into this area makes me feel uneasy... Makes me realize Thowmp King from 64 was right. We DO step all over them :O

Nice! Dude, I just subscribed to you after binging all of your Paper Mario reviews! Your content is top-notch, keep it up.

For some reason the algorithm doesn’t like to recommend your videos, so I had no idea this video and the bowser’s inside story video were out yet. So excited to binge these

I never ran out of Attack Items when I played this game as a kid, since I bought a ton of them in the shop. From what I remember, the game throws a TON of coins at you.

Here I was going to say that I didnt run in the "running out of bro items" issue and the stalemate in the final battle when I beat the game when I was, like 13-14? But, as many other people pointed out, the final bass has almost double the hp in the us than in europe/japan (european here). So... If I recall a long and hard battle, I cannot imagine what it must have been for you.

That game is one of my favorite DS games, it's the darkest Mario game, very underrated.

Damn you deserve more views. The quality is wild and great voice

yeesh, if you think those tutorials are annoying, wait till dream team, its weird cus otherwise the game is just as good as bis, but MAN they treat you like youre stupid.

11:46 Having been born in 1997, I was more of a 2000’s kid, but even I think the “LEET” speech is, while not terrible, is whatever.

2:41 - I imagine the main reason was because BIS was their best selling game at that point. So they probably figured it'd be the best chance to save themselves by remaking that instead.

due to dreamteam being a retread of the prvious game and how souless paper jam is i feel people now look at partners in time more fondly.

M&L 2 was genuinly scary.... and I loved that! And yes: the story only makes sense if it is an entirely different timeline/world. Otherwise, they would know about the Shroobs in the past obviously. Don't get why Nintendo did not realize that plothole xD I love how Shroom-Bowser's stats are basically infinite, infinite DEF infinite HP infinite speed, except for his damage. Imagine he would one shot everyone^^

Was listening to this while making lunch for work, and was enjoying it greatly. Then I looked down and saw the Player Pin mark in the background. As a TWEWY fan who uses that design for so much stuff in other games.. you have my respect. XD Seriously though, great video. I'm hitting subscribe.

Alright i am here because Nintendo announced super Mario rpg aka the rumored beloved snes remake. How do you feel?

Watched this whole video and man this felt like classic KZfaq Nintendo videos, can’t wait to see more

The worst thing this game did was give me a crush on the younger Princess Shroob, who still has so little fanart due to the game's relative obscurity.

We need more of this

Great video!

I’m actually let’s playing this game right now I love your videos

It was my first Mario and Luigi game I have SO many great memories about this game

Lore of Growing Pains | Mario & Luigi: Partners in Time Retrospective - ScionVyse momentum 100

great video man

This was my first Mario RPG I ever played. I had no idea about RPG mechanics so always struggled with this game. Especially that final boss

Don't have to wait long to figure out how a Mario and Luigi game would play/designed for switch LOL

My headcanon is that this takes place not long after the end of the first Yoshi's Island. After being rescued the babies are taken to the castle for a playdate...

30:33 I've grinded my way to level 47 in Superstar Saga, 55 in Bowser's Inside Story, 50 in Dream Team, and 60 in Paper Jam. I've also grinded in this game, and I have to say that at least from my experience I had the most fun grinding here. The battle system sure isn't perfect, but the snappy and consistent action commands combined with a wide variety of enemies in Shroob Castle provide the best grinding experience out of the series.

this game is my favorite one

I beat the 3 Princess Shroob fights in a row easily. Lucky Badge A, Rough Badge, Red Pepper, Mix Flower. I beat each form in 4-5 hits, and took me about 20 minutes total. I don't know how some people spent over an hour on the final battle lol. It makes sense why the HP pools were expanded because Princess Shroob would have easily gone down in 2-3 hits.

After playing through partners in time, I realised why it wasn't remade. It would've been a bitch to not just remake the game but also retrofit it with the mechanics that were introduced in bowser's inside story and used in following games, including the superstar saga remake.

While I do not share a lot of the criticism that you have with the game (but I might be blinded with a lot of nostalgia here), I really appreciate you talking about this game and the entire Mario & Luigi franchise a lot. This series doesn't get enough love and I'm so happy everytime a video about this (maybe forgotten) series comes out. Thank you!

We never get to see Toadsworth worry at 11, but then again, he spends most of the game worrying

This one is the best of the series.

This one’s my favorite

Holy shit i just realized something: The Mario and luigi games are just brighter turn based soulslites

still my favorite Nintendo game

For anyone willing to play this game, I recomment the European version because they owered the bosses HP significantly because they realised they fucked it up

If I had to hazard a guess as to why PiT didn't sell so well, it might be the inclusion of the Baby characters. I can't emphasize enough that Baby Mario was one of the least liked, most despised things that Nintendo ever created, being one of the few things people didn't like about Yoshi's Island and how irritating his crying was in that game. Now imagine an RPG with not just him, but also Baby Luigi and Baby Peach in it. Throw in a grossly incompetent dickhead like Toadsworth + E Gadd and you have a game that is painfully dated to its time. There's a reason why they stopped putting those characters in games aside from E Gadd in the Luigi's Mansion sequels. Not even including things like the Hammer Bros' L33T speak or anything like that. And I say this as someone who loved Partners in Time, liked it more than either Superstar Saga or Inside Story.

I love this game despite it being considered the 'meh' title in the franchise. The story was dark, the music was amazing, the dialogue was stop drawer. I personally actually really loved Stuffwell and always thought he was a funny and had a cute design. The gameplay was amazingly refined. It's just that some of the puzzles are serious bs. All that aside, I'd still say that this is one of the best DS games out there and definitely my 2nd favorite Mario RPG - bested only by Superstar Saga

This Game is the best of the series- only a notch before the First. The later ones are Fine but Not nearly as good ;D

About time travel since your actively changing what’s going n in the past here it is technically possible the Shroobs could succeed since Adult Mario and Luigi got involved and start altering the events. There is a chance that ripples forward into the present

Not really agree but i can see the points in this. To be truthful i much prefer this story even if the gameplay ended up being a little repetitive compared to sleeping through 3/4 of the game like i did in Superstar Saga. I don’t really understand the final boss thing…. I mean, i played this like 10 times and arrived at the end with more than needed items without buying any, though you said you had problems using some to their full potential so it might have been that. Overall this was a nice review, good job!

To be fair, pretty much every JRPG’s opening segment is a slog to get through. One of the main reasons I don’t want to replay some of my favorite final fantasy games

honestly the only reason i didn’t enjoy this game as much as other entries was the final boss (never could beat it due to the insane amount of hp and time it takes) and also some of the puzzles being needlessly stupid

Partners in Time is the only game I haven’t played and it annoys me because I played the others The eshop are down, finding the game are pricey and I don’t know how to emulate games nor have a computer or the right equipment to mod my 3DS/DS

Unlike Superstar Saga which I've replayed countless times, I only played through Partners in Time once in 2006 and never again, but don't really know why. Something about it just made me uninterested, but I feel like many of the flaws you pointed out are the same things I noticed about it. At some point I may give it another go all these years later.

Can you do super smash Bros

That was a great review! I forgot to comment in the last video but in my opinion the gap between Superstar Saga to Partners in Time for me is very big. Superstar Saga is my 2nd favorite Mario Rpg and Partners in Time was my 2nd least favorite. This is mainly because I never played any games or remakes that released on the 3ds and Wii U since I don't own those consoles. But Partners in Time flaws for me really outweighs the positives like you said; the battles as a whole are a massive downgrade, the bros items leave a lot to be desired and they can be very monotonous, since almost all of them are infinite plus they are so basic, I liked to master all the button combinations for the Bros Attacks in Superstar Saga and another thing that Partners in Time that feel so monotonous are the items, they nerfed so much of the items and its healing properties just for no reason, there is like no Max Nut substitute. Also did you noticed how rushed the game feel in its story? When you are at Star Hill, the third to last area of the game you only have 3 shards but when you finish Star Shrine the second to last area, you have *5 shards* ! Like, this has to be the worst mac-guffin in any Mario Rpg, the first shard is not even guarded by a boss, everything involving this stupid star is a mess. Also the worlds feel dull, with almost no characters in it, what happened to the fun, loveable cast of the previous game? Its almost like the game is like the the latter Paper Mario games with only generic Toads for the Npcs. Yeah there is Kylie Koopa, the 3 Unique Toads (Iko, Bert and Toadsworth), E. Gadd and Fawful but thats about it. The game tone sure is dark, but dark doesn't mean restricting the amount of npcs and having no sidequests at all. I don't hate this game, but I can't shake off this feeling that this game is very shallow and I would want to play Superstar Saga again any day over this game.

Sadly Alphadream went BROKE BEFORE IT COULD get its 3DS remake.

why do you sound so much like antdude lmao

Worst part about the game is the constant screaming and crying of the babies. I had to mute the game at some points.

Honestly, my biggest problem with this game is taking away Bros Moves and replacing them with a system that is just two of my most disliked design ideas in RPGs: item spamming and your relative power being how much money you have to spend in said items. I just cannot understand why remove the Bros Moves, something that wasn't just a great take on your usual "magic" system in RPGs, but also was greatly woven into the characters by being acrobatic actions between two characters that required a level of connection between them. Just imagine what they could have done with four characters, but nope, item abuse is much better... The worst part is that this particular thing stuck with the series, and the original Bro Moves idea never came truly back. I don't dislike Partners in Time overall, but what a letdown of a mechanic...

Elder Princess Shroob is one of the worst final bosses I have ever fought, and is the main reason why I hate Partners in Time. Not only is it unfair, but Elder Princess Shroob has way too much HP, you don't get to heal for her second phase right after beating her first phase, and she is almost impossible to beat if you don't have the Trampoline, Copy Flower, or Mix Flower. This is especially bad if you are underleveled.