Mario is a sex object in Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door. A verified ladies' magnet walking around getting kissed by busty ghosts, thief rats, and other funny little creatures that make up the wonderfully bizarre roster that you'll meet in this game. And that's before we've even gotten to Princess Peach… That should immediately give you a taste of what kind of storytelling you should expect in this Switch remake of the 2004 GameCube classic, and it's made me lament how family-friendly Nintendo's narratives have gotten of late.
Aside from the Paper Mario series itself, I struggle to recall the overall beats of the Mario series' stories. Super Mario Odyssey boils down to a magic hat and a quest to, once again, save the princess and stop Bowser. Super Mario Wonder is again a tale of putting a stop to Bowser's antics. It's really only the remake of Super Mario RPG and the most recent Paper Mario: The Origami King that have injected some spice into Mario's otherwise pretty standard tales. To be fair, the same can be said for modern Zelda games too. Although there is a compelling narrative in games like Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom, it takes a backseat to the exploration and experimentation that forms the core gameplay experience.
