Paper Mario and its 2004 sequel, The Thousand-Year Door, are two of my favorite RPGs of all time. These games exude an undeniably charming, cute style and tone that I find completely bewitching. The gameplay of these titles is also excellent, and presents a unique, action-based approach to turn-based RPGs, where the player is given slightly more agency over the combat. Fans have clamored for more RPGs like these for decades, and while Nintendo has continued the Paper Mario franchise, they have totally departed from the gameplay style of the first two games in the series. As a result, this sub-genre of RPG has largely gone dormant save for the rare indie game homage like 2019's Bug Fables: The Everlasting Sapling.
I'm happy to report that we just received a brand new "Paper Mario-like" in Escape from Ever After. This game began as a Kickstarter project that quickly found success, as it looked like another faithful spiritual successor to those beloved early Paper Mario titles. Upon finally getting the chance to play Escape from Ever After, I can wholeheartedly say that this game does in fact faithfully recapture that Paper Mario spirit, both in overall tone and gameplay. While I have some minor complaints, I was quite pleased with the game as a whole.
Escape from Ever After takes place in a fantasy world where all of our favorite generic fairy tale and storybook characters have been seized by a greedy corporation from the real world called Ever After Inc. This villainous company has found an untapped, nearly limitless reservoir of free labor through exploiting all of these characters. Instead of the colorful, exciting worlds that they once lived in, they're now stuck in dull, stodgy offices, pushing papers and attending mind-numbing HR meetings. Our protagonist, Flynt Buckler, discovers that his own storybook has been completely overtaken by Ever After Inc. and he is coerced into working for the corporation. He is sent to various storybook worlds to solve mysteries and further the interests of Ever After Inc., while he covertly schemes to undermine and topple the company from within.
Through the course of his journey, Flynt encounters a handful of characters who have also been victimized by Ever After Inc. and they join him on his mission. Your first partner is a dragon named Tinder, who is from Flynt's own story. Wolfgang is a kind, yet dim-witted wolf who is also a bard. Then, there's Eva, a skeletal mage who actually willingly works for Ever After Inc. And lastly, there's Patches, a damaged teddy bear with a bizarre connection to the wider machinations of Ever After Inc. The partner characters are one of my very favorite aspects of the Paper Mario games. The party is such a critical component of any good role-playing game, and in these types of games, your partners are heavily involved in the way that you navigate and explore the game's world, so you're interacting with them beyond just cutscenes and battle sequences.
Unfortunately, I just didn't care for these characters. They're almost instantly forgettable, and none of them are particularly likeable beyond Wolfgang, who is sweet, though is leaned on for comic relief too often. Tinder is supposed to be a bit of a sourpuss who wants to be left alone, but she has been dragged into this adventure. Obviously we've seen characters in some form of this archetype before, but something about Tinder lacked any real charm, and I found her more annoying than anything. Eva just isn't very interesting, though she has a cool design. I'm always a sucker for skeletons. And Patches is completely unremarkable, and his "deeper" connection to the plot (and Ever After Inc.) that they keep teasing ends up falling flat.
Dull personalities aside, I think the bigger sin here is that they should've picked more fairy tale and storybook characters, given the unique theme of this game. It feels like they botched some great opportunities to pick characters relevant to the myriad worlds that you explore. Tinder and Wolfgang both make sense as fairy tale-esque characters; especially because Wolfgang comes from a "Three Little Pigs" themed story. But Eva and Patches aren't at all relevant to the stories where you find them. Eva joins your party in an H.P. Lovecraft themed story, where I think they could've easily given you a more unique, eldritch and monstrous character that actually fits the world. Meanwhile, Patches joins your team in a vaguely Treasure Island themed story, while there's an actual pirate character who is much more interesting and is a literal perfect fit for your party. I came away feeling disappointed with the lackluster partner choices in this game, and the missed opportunities to give us characters who actually had connections to the storybooks that you spend time in.
I don't want to spoil anymore of the plot, but I do want to offer another piece of criticism with two specific chapters of the story. The Treasure Island-themed chapter has beautiful visuals and it's a fun setting, but the actual layout of this act is an enormous drag on the flow of the game. You're confined to a ship, traveling from checkpoint to checkpoint for probably an hour, and just forced into battle after battle. While I enjoy the combat of Escape from Ever After, it sucked a lot of the fun out of it to be forced into several battles in a row. My other complaint about the story is that a later chapter takes place on a random, generic sci-fi themed ice planet. From what I gather, this setting was not themed around any fairy tale or storybook at all. The visuals were cool and felt distinct, but again, this felt like an odd decision and a missed opportunity to not center this around an actual storybook, instead of some run-of-the-mill alien world.
Escape from Ever After's gameplay is probably its strongest trait. Again pulling inspiration from the Paper Mario games, you'll encounter myriad environmental puzzles, as well as some light platforming in each chapter. Each partner character possesses a unique ability that can be used to assist in exploring or finding hidden items. Flynt himself can throw his shield to flip switches or get a surprise strike on enemies, which grants you an advantage in battle. Tinder can burn some obstacles, or light fires to let you see better. Wolfgang has probably the most diverse set of abilities, all of them themed around his musical abilities, almost like a Link's ocarina in Ocarina of Time. His songs have amazing powers like making plants grow or blowing powerful gusts of wind. Eva can turn Flynt into a seal to navigate aquatic areas, and Patches is able to punch through fragile walls and floors. There's a great balance to how often you're utilizing each partner's abilities. It never feels like any one party member gets more use. You can also freely and quickly swap between characters while you're out in the world. Some of the puzzles you'll encounter are genuine brain-busters and you'll have to really know the capabilities of each partner to be able to solve these challenges.
As you'd expect from a "Paper Mario-like," the combat in Escape from Ever After is wonderful, though familiar. Similar to the Badge system from Paper Mario, you have access to Trinkets, which are equippable items that boost your stats. These are critically important to dole out to your characters and make them as capable as possible for battle. You have control over two characters at a time, and you don't have to keep Flynt out, which is helpful when you encounter enemies that he can't damage. Enemies have various characteristics that you'll have to plan around in order to succeed. The enemies can potentially fly, hold shields or change their attack stance to protect themselves from a front facing or aerial attack. You'll have to swap characters regularly to meet the demands of battle.
There are also incredibly helpful "Synergy" abilities where characters can team up to use special moves to either heal, create status effects like buffs or boons, or inflict larger damage. My only complaint regarding the combat is just that towards the end of the game, you face some annoying "damage sponge" enemies, and it feels like you should've been able to make your characters much more powerful by that point in the game. The combat loses some of its charm when you're fighting a single boss for nearly ten minutes.
Escape from Ever After is truly a delightful game, and a worthy successor to the Paper Mario franchise, at least until Nintendo hopefully brings the series back to its original RPG roots. While I had complaints with aspects of the game, mostly in the writing, the general soul of Paper Mario remained intact, and it was great playing what felt like a new entry in that iconic series. I hope the game is successful and that this is the start of its own franchise, as I think Escape from Ever After has laid a solid foundation to forge its own unique identity and legacy. With a greater focus on different storybooks and fairy tales, a potential sequel is set up for a home run. Even if this ends up being a one off game, I definitely recommend it.
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