#and replayed superstar saga

[formalmess]

🍥?

🍥 what's your favorite fic you've written? (from fic writer asks)

oh, certainly tangled thicket! before i even started conceptualizing it, i always thought of it as a passion project: the ol 'write what you want to read' mantra, y'know?

from a practical sense, in the past, i usually felt pressured to follow whatever current trends or fics i was writing that were getting the most attention, but in the end found myself overall unhappy with the work i was producing. with lmtt, i took my time in crafting the narrative from start to finish, and then went about at the speed i wanted when writing it.

from a creative standpoint, it just hits a lot of the points i really love! it has luigi's mansion as the focal background, and the beanbean kingdom as its setting—so i could do a lot geographically and culturally—and play around with underrated characters from superstar saga. and of course, writing peasley and luigi's adorably charming dynamic certainly incentivized me.

further, i love revenge plots, fun parallels to mess with (the day i thought of the toxic hellen/boo to the healthy luigi/peasley... art), and lots more! it also includes a lot of tropes i love, with all the drama and tension being derived from probable danger and angst... gotta love it.

i think i will always consider it my favorite project. and it is certainly my longest... and the longest in the luisley tag i think! cool little achievement. c:

[pianokantzart]

Is it just me, or did the solo-Luigi portions of the game seem a bit more puzzle heavy compared to the solo-Mario portions? 🤔

[epicawesomewin-art2]

what i think would happen if bowser jr and bowletta met

[jaydove-writes]

It's raining, I already beat Bowser's Inside Story, and I don't wanna start Dream Team until tomorrow. What do I do in the meantime? I post on Tumblr. Is anyone else on? Prioritizing fans of the Mario and Luigi RPG series so I can talk about the games. DM or ask me anything. Of course if you haven't played the games but want to learn more about them before you consider playing them, feel free to ask me anything about them.

Edited to add: I'm replaying the games, I already beat all of them. But I love the enthusiasm! I wanted to play Dream Team on its anniversary which is also my birthday but I missed the mark by a couple weeks.

[beardedhandstoadshark]

The bros got new animations across games! The little secondary movements like Mario‘s cap adjusting and Luigi‘s looking back and forth seem to be gone sadly, but the new ones are quite charming too!

[blujayonthewing]

doing a little data management on the switch and feeling tender about video games

[goldiipond]

SUPERSTAR SAGA TWENTY YEARS OLD FUCK!!!

[abombihoney]

Have you ever played Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door?

I have not but i really want to! I've played most of paper mario 64, but alas, i never finished it due to my parents divorce lmao. got stuck at bowsers castle iirc and havent gotten around to getting a copy so i can finish it lol. but i LOVED it. i thought it was great! i liked the idk visual puns/gags abt them being paper. the silly piggy bank thing. luigi's secret diary abt feeling left out. getting to sneak around as peach

ive also played a bit of origami king, but i didn't like the gameplay, most of the characters, or much of plot. I like the pencil boss tho that was cool.

going through and playing through the paper mario games is on my to do list. eventually i'll get around to it!

[delightfuldevin]

I’m playing Minion Quest again and gOD I forgot how much I adore this game and my lovely minions,, beloved lil guys,,

[retro-system]

i feel like i haven't been as insane about the mario bros as i used to be and for that i apologise profusely.

[deit-y]

Hyped for the Mario movie (minus Chris Pratt) but damn is it making these difficult times to be a Luisley shipper

[pianokantzart]

Over a week until Brothership releases and I already sped through the plot of Superstar Saga faster than I intended in my replay. All that's left is Bowser's Fortress, so here's the game plan:

Equip "Greed Wallet" so I can buy all the mushrooms my pockets can hold

Equip "Bonus Ring" for double exp on fights where I take no damage

Equip Mush Badge AA on both bros so that I'm so strong 90% of enemies die if I so much as sneak attack them

Spend most of the next week grinding

I want to see how stupid powerful these bros can get before facing Cackletta

[tristepinguino]

I replayed Mario & Luigi Superstar Saga and felt bad that I had to fight Birdo.

[istadris]

I'm suddenly overcome by the need to replay Superstar Saga if only because the vision the Bean people have of Luigi is so different from the Mushroom Kingdom, it needs to be documented.

What I mean is that in the M&L games, Luigi does get some recognition from the Toads & co, but it comes with a slightly patronizing slice of "haha silly Luigi, he did help Mario to save the day though, he's brave despite being a big coward".

Meanwhile in the Bean Bean Kingdom Luigi is the badass who stole single-handedly the Beanstar right from under Cackletta and Fawful's nose after tricking them, who went through the most dangerous ruins of the kingdom to get a cure for his brother (who foolishly ate a poison Mushroom), who rescued Prince Peasley from a curse not once but twice, who earned the favor of said Prince and clearly, anyone Peasley fancies is the coolest guy around, right??

And between Peasley and E.Gadd, who built and managed a popular cafe, Luigi's reputation gets bolstered to the point he basically becomes a memetic badass.

It's not that Bean Bean kingdom folks hate Mario or don't care about him, but if we're to believe the Hermie III scene, Luigi is a much bigger deal to meet than Mario :

And now I'm imagining Toad tourists going to the Bean Bean Kingdom and talking with locals, and then being bewildered when Mario barely gets mentionned while everyone can gush for hours about Luigi.

Mario loves this.

[galaxygermdraws]

We're nearing closer to brothership. Have you seen the new bros attacks, the Luigi logic, the new villains?

if you think I aint wanted that overview trailer several times ur insane. Im not ready. Im gonna explode. Im replaying Superstar Saga rn to emotionally prepare. Luigi Logic is so Dream Team coded also oh my god.

[faffreux]

can you tell us about when you fell in love with fawful? :)

Yep. In fact, I'll write a whole mini essay for you so I can add it to the FAQ section of my website coming up shortly LMAO (SINCE I NEED TO FULLY ANSWER THIS QUESTION FOR THERE ANYWAY, RIGHT???) CLICK UNDER THE READ MORE TO SEE IT BECAUSE THIS IS GOING TO BE THE LONGEST THING I'VE EVER POSTED HERE, LMAO.

To preface, I have been a fan of the M&L games going back to the early-mid 2000s when I was a kid. I had no involvement with fandom or anything of the sort back then but I used to hop on my mom's bulky computer and look up fanart and other related content as early as 2004/5 and as a result, ended up captivated by the characters long before I knew who they actually were. (As a result of this, I have the names and art styles of various old M&L fandom creators permanently ingrained in my head and often wonder where they are today since a good deal of them vanished..!) It wasn't until 2006 that I got my first handheld console (DS Lite) and of course, what did I do? Immediately begged my mom to order me a used GBA copy of Superstar Saga. 

When I finally had the game in my hands it was like coming home to a colorful world that I'd been captivated by for so long but never gotten the chance to actually explore until now. The characters felt like old friends and the Beanbean Kingdom as a location felt familiar and comforting to me. (As a side note, Popple quickly became my favorite. Shocker, right?)

I used to sketch various beans in my notebooks as well as on printer paper we had lying around the house. Long story short, I finished Superstar Saga and then a few years later in 2010 I picked up Bowser’s Inside Story and THAT’S WHEN THINGS SHIFTED–

BIS brought Fawful and his personality to life in a way that captivated my imagination like nothing else had prior. He quickly overtook Popple as my favorite character from then on forward… and that’s where it ends! Or.. is it?

Nah, that’s where it gets funky. Life got a little chaotic after that and not only did I stop playing video games altogether for many years, but I also almost completely gave up on art - the one thing I was most passionate about above all and thought I would make a career out of someday. A series of depressing events caused me to lose all hope and motivation for anything I created and the spark I’d kept inside of me for so long all but died out as a result.

We’re going to timeskip again, this time to late 2019. I’d just moved away from home permanently for the first time and had been getting settled in and no matter what I did to make my new apartment a cozy place it always felt like something was missing. My mind would keep wandering to the fact that I never made art anymore despite it having been such a key part of my life when I was younger. I so desperately wanted to change this and over the next few months the frustration only kept growing until on January 1st, 2020, I sat down in the living room with a pencil and paper in my hand and shut my eyes tightly before saying under my breath:

“I do not care what it is, I don’t care how it comes. Just please… PLEASE send me something to bring my art back. Anything… anything at all. I don’t care what I draw, I just want to be drawing again.” And with that, I placed the lead onto the paper and began to sketch…

And from there… a familiar face appeared!

(Now I could ramble to you about how much I do NOT like this drawing and how off model it is from how Fawful actually looks… but I’ll forgive myself since I hadn’t touched the M&L games in over a decade at this point and had forgotten most of Fawful’s character. And yet?? Here he was.)

How else can I explain it except that in that moment it felt like the pencil in my hand had suddenly become one of these:

A joy that I hadn’t felt in SO long suddenly filled my entire being and without wasting another second, I immediately went online and ordered both Superstar Saga and Bowser’s Inside Story to replay again. In the time waiting for the games to arrive I had started drawing daily again - sketching out various old characters of mine with dozens of doodles of the bean man stacked in between them all.

There he was… always smiling, always happy to see me, and oftentimes with his arms outstretched as if to give an encouraging hug. When the games arrived I worked through them quicker than I ever had prior - finishing up Superstar Saga in less than a week and subsequently moving onto Bowser’s Inside Story with a LOT of excitement built up for it. 

It was my first day playing and I was having the time of my life! The way Fawful looked in his little grey cloak with that enormous, charming grin of his as he bamboozled Bowser into eating the Vaccuum Shroom had me giggling with joy while words repeated in my brain over and over of: “I need to draw this later, I NEED to draw this later!!!” I WAS EXCITED ABOUT ART AGAIN… AFTER ALL THESE YEARS. I was practically hopping in my seat from the happiness I felt in my heart and chest every time Fawful appeared at this point!

This was how it felt until the moment I arrived at the Fawful Theatre and watched as he began dancing on the stage floor. THIS time.. something different came over me. If you’ve felt it before, then you’ll know what I mean when I say that it was like my entire body turned warm all at once, like some sort of flame had been lit inside. I’d never felt it for anything or anyone prior to then, and that's partly why it hit me as hard as it did. I was practically sweating.

Heck, I was so absorbed in my feelings that I had forgotten there was anyone else in the room with me! That is.. Until my roommate at the time spoke up: 

Her: Are you alright? Me: Uhhh… yeah, why? Her: You’re red as a beet. Are you sure you’re okay?

By this time I had realized what was really going on so I reassured her I was fine, grabbed my 3DS, and ran to my room to finish the playthrough on my own so I wouldn’t embarrass myself any further, hahaha.

In the days, weeks, and months following that moment I became dedicated to drawing the best art of Fawful I could possibly create! What started as a challenge to myself to ‘give back’ to the person who’d given me back the ability to create again turned into someone I genuinely could not stop drawing for how much fun I was having doing it. The desire to make better and better art in order to honor him drove me to improve at a speed I never had prior, and soon thereafter I created Jolligig as a way for me to be in this colorful world with him and to express the deepening affection I was feeling for him with every day that passed by.

By some miracle, my prayer had been answered and here it was in the form of a grinning lima bean.

[End of Part 1. Interested in the rest? Yes… there’s more, I’m sorry. Please let me know in the comments. This took a while to write so I thought splitting it up would be best if folks are interested, LOL.]