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Instead, Mario teamed up with friendly versions of his enemies, including Bombette, a pink Bob-omb who could blow up walls, and Parakarry, a mail-delivering Paratroopa who could fly Mario across gaps. The partners in Paper Mario were in stark contrast to the cast of main characters and made-up sidekicks in Super Mario RPG. Outside of combat, players would have to make use of Mario and his partners to solve various environmental puzzles and interact with a flamboyant cast of NPCs. Timed button presses still ruled the day, but it was a significantly different system than what was present in Mario's past RPG adventure. The plumber retained his ability to jump and swing his hammer, and his partners each had their own special abilities. Instead of the typical three-member party system in Super Mario RPG, Paper Mario boiled down the turn-based combat into controlling Mario and a partner. Dubbed Paper Mario (Mario Story in Japan), the 2001 Nintendo 64 release took ideas from Super Mario RPG and simplified them into a simpler yet still effective combat system. Over time, the sequel soon became its own series, shedding any reference to Square's SNES title. Still, the concept of a Mario RPG proved it could work, and Nintendo first-party team Intelligent Systems began work on Super Mario RPG 2 in the late '90s.
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Mario's Face (lost Nintendo DS tech demo 2004).Mario Demo (lost Virtual Boy tech demo 1994).Mario's Castle (lost build of cancelled game on Nintendo's "Project Atlantis" handheld console existence unconfirmed 1995-1998).Mario Artist (lost builds of unreleased Nintendo 64DD games 1999-2000).BS Super Mario Collection (partially lost Satellaview broadcast versions of compilation platformer 1997-1998).Nintendo 64 Disk Drive (partially found unreleased video games for Nintendo 64 add-on late 1990s-early 2000s).A screenshot of Nintendo Power issue 104, where a reader asks a question about sequels to Super Mario RPG, Super Mario 64, and Donkey Kong Country for the Nintendo 64.
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