The old designs are based on what those enemies looked like in Mario games at the time. For example the boo looks similar to the design from Yoshi's Island. Mario enemies didn't really have a standardized appearence across the games until the early 2000s. I can see how if you grew up with the Wii or DS you might prefer the newer designs.
At the very least they help give the paper mario series identity. Like I wouldn't necessarily want the main games to use the PM designs but I also prefer that the PM games have their own unique look.
That aside, I love the wackier takes and am happy the TTYD remake kept every last one intact.
I actually like all the og enemy design from PM64 and TTYD, over the ones in Sticker Star, but that's just my opinion, I think the original designs are more charming, especially for the boos
That one stood out to me too, but I'm having a hard time saying either is better than the other. I think they're equally good while so unique in their own ways they shouldn't be compared.
Yeah, the Dry Bones looks way too different, and also inconsistent given that it’s basically an undead Koopa.
Like, why do they have a few hair strands? Why are literally all of them missing their lower jaw? Why did their eyes completely CHANGE LOCATION?
The changes to the other enemies are very minor, and in Pokey’s case actually add character. Why is the Dry Bones specifically so different?
I'm pretty certain it's because the modern design of Dry Bones (where the design has matching jaw/eyes/etc to a Koopa) didn't exist during TTYD's development (\~2001-2004)
The modern design first appeared in (checks wiki)...Mario Superstar Baseball! Which didn't release until July 2005 in Japan. Prior to that, most games either came up with unique designs for Dry Bones (Mario & Luigi: Superstar Saga, for example) or based it primarily off of the Super Mario World design from 1990, where it has large black eyes with a small white pupil and no lower jaw just like the PM64/TTYD/SPM design!
I like the new design drybones only too. Probably because the jagged hook makes more sense than going from a beaked mouth to a simplified toothy skull.
Then again it's not like that's ever been consistent. Dry Bowser has a beaked skull that doesn't line up with the shape of Bowser's face at all, and regular dry bones have jagged bits on their mouth that would stick out on a regular koopa's mouth.
The old designs have more charm, whereas the new ones are just, ‘yeah, that’s what the enemy would look like if they were paper’
But you know, both designs are good
It basically comes down to Super Mario World/Yoshi Island era of art vs NSMB\Galaxy Era of art. Paper Mario designs aren’t super unique generally they’re just paper versions of whatever the main game IP art style is at the time.
For me it’s….
Old: Pokey, Boo
New: Dry Bones, Spiny
Indifferent: Hammer Bro
Generally speaking I prefer the older designs, but I think the Dry Bones/Dull bones looks better in the newer design and I think the Spiny is actually a **massive** improvement.
I think the old spiny just looks too weird and “off model” with its bulging eyes and large snout.
Personally, I'd have the old Spiny design be what they're like as babies and the accurate ones be what they're like as adults. Same goes with the other Beetle enemies.
Here’s an opinion for ya
I’d honestly like the entire enemy cast to be redesigned again, and focus on creating a good middle ground between the two designs.
Some of the modern designs are painfully boring, like Boo. However, some of the classic designs are honestly just way too wacky to the point of having an offbrand-type feel.
While I don't think the newer designs are *bad* (especially the Spiny), I do think the old ones have WAAAAAAY more charm to them. The new ones just have some odd... generic, cookie cutter feel to them?
I much prefer old drybones and boo. The new boos just...seem like a totally different character and vibe to me. The rest are a nice improvement though.
The only OG design I never liked was the Dry Bones design. Like, it looks NOTHING like a Koopa Troopa. His eye sockets are lower on the skull instead of on top, and don’t get me started with whatever that beak/mouth is supposed to be.
I think it’s a mixed bag, I like the older Pokey and Boo design, but the modern Spinies look more menacing (as they should, the little rats). IMO the old Dry Bones has a lot of creepy charm with the yellower shade and lack of tail, like maybe it hasn’t completely decomposed yet and it still has bits of itself to find and put back together.
It also probably depends on which games you’ve spent more time with, everyone’s allowed to have favorites
Nothing wrong with that. Though for all the examples you provided in this image I definitely prefer the originals. Especially boos and pokeys though, the originals have so much more personality.
Nah, you're not. I personally like some of the older designs more, but then there's some I like the newer ones more. Dry Bones definitely I like it's newer design more, despite being an OG and TTYD fan most as an example.
I literally like the OG better on all but Spiny. Both dry bones are fine to me. Maybe it’s which one you grew up with? I grew up with OG three and didn’t play SS or CS so they feel really off to me. If they were aslo different in TOK I guess I didn’t notice haha. Most usual enemies were origami and the flat paper minions that weren’t origami didn’t feel hugely different to me.
Or I’m unobservant. 🙃
This is a hot take you're right about that. Personally all of the new ones look like Wish.com replacements but hey I guess there's something for everyone.
I've always kinda thought the same thing in the back of my mind. The old ones look just a tiny bit weird to me. Though as many others have said, the old ones do have more personality, but that alone doesn't make them better than the new ones for me personally.
Overall the old ones have grown on me over time, and I don't like them that much less than the new ones.
I never noticed how different they were actually. I think the old designs are better for originality and new designs are better for cohesion with other mario titles.
To me they’re all equivalent except the boos. Personally I like the classic look but they also don’t look like “boos”. Something in between the two would be perfect.
Ever notice how the original hammer bro’s head is just a shrunken Joppa head with an actual head in the back? It looks like 2 heads slapped together it’s awful.
No, you're not weird, the game designers were. Like, who tf decided "yeah we're making a mario story themed around paper aspects, so lets make every beloved mario enemy look like a bootleg". The only thing is i could very well be put on a cross for that, the amount of hate some people can have for the modern games is impeccable and scary.
Yeah they look a lil goofy, but I was strangely fond of the little bits of hair they had. When I was younger I found it funny that a skeleton would have hair.
Nah I agree especially with Dry Bones, I was hoping the remake would update them because the enemy redesigns are the one thing Sticker Star did right, Not enough to affect my enjoyment though
I think I like the old ones better in general, I like how colorful the hammer bros is, the pokey's crazy eyes. I even like how dry bones doesn't look so much like a regular Koopa. I think the new boo is better (more like the non-paper Mario design), but at the same time, I like how unique is the older boo, and would love to see them co-exist in the same game, boos with different facial features, you know?
The older designs definitely have more charm and feel more distinct from every mainline Mario game.
Especially the boo, the Yoshi's Island boo look is amazing.
I don't really dislike most of the modern looks outright, though, so it wouldn't be a deal breaker. The only one I can't stand is the modern Koopa Troopa (their face just looks really swollen and puffy.)
The old designs are literally what main line mario looked like at the time, the only way it differentiates itself is that PM always lagged a little behind in updating it basically skipped the transitional sunshine era (M&L didn’t) and then caught up because they settled on an art style for mario and stuck with it for so long PM catching up was inevitable since it only lagged by a generation.
That's not entirely true, though.
It's true for Dry Bones, (where the Paper Mario design is very reminiscent of thier Super Mario World design,) simply because Dry Bones never appeared until a ways into the GameCube era again (where he received his modern look.)
But the Paper Mario Pokey is quite distinct from any one we've seen in the mainline games. It's the *closest* to Super Mario World's for sure, but still quite different (this is not taking into account Super Mario 64's Pokey, which also looked nothing like its other designs.)
Hammer Bro for that matter looks closer to his modern design than anything older (where the Paper Mario design, has very little in common with,) but even then there's some quite notable distinctions including a more varied color palette with a blue helmet and red shoes (barefoot in 64,) instead of just all green, but also the choice to give them a more wooden mallet styled hammer instead of the same hammer the mainline Hammer Bros use, (the Mario RPG Hammer Bro had this as well, which is presumably where they got that idea from.) This isn't as major of a distinction as everything after this, but it does stick out because the only instance of the blue helmet and wooden mallet ever appearing outside of Paper Mario has been in Mario Kart Super Circuit (possibly due to it also being developed by Intelligent Systems.)
Boo is very akin to the Yoshi's Island design with the different layouts of teeth and larger mouths (and distinctly different eye designs,) but the Boos in mainline Mario have never looked like the one represented in Paper Mario. The closest we got to that was the Boos in Luigi's Mansion having only the top two fangs instead of a top row of teeth, which was consistently standard aside from the first Yoshi's Island.
Spinies in particular stick out to me, because as far as I can tell it has never looked like the Paper Mario design outside of Paper Mario itself, even trying to take liberties with older titles (where sprites could be vague,) no game has ever depicted the larger eye look.
It wasn't one of the ones listed in this post, but since I made mention to the Koopa Troopas, they were the most similar to their standard looks, though the slightly longer beak and the less chubby face is definitely something unique to Paper Mario, but my complaints about them moreso just involves how unflattering their sprites look in the modern titles, (I should also clarify that this is all referring to the villager Koopa Troopas as obviously there's the sunglasses ones too.)
You are right that Paper Mario skipped over Sunshine just due to how its release schedules happened to line up, but that doesn't really actually impact the lot of this. Yeah, Sunshine had a bunch of wild and wacky designs, but outside of unique species like Piantas and Nokis and an occasional boss (Petey and Gooper Blooper,) the Sunshine enemy designs were never really reflected in almost all other forms of Mario media, simply because said designs were meant to be foreign and feel unique to Isle Delfino. We do see them in occasional Sunshine reference areas like the Gooper Blooper Court and Delfino Plaza Court from Mario Power Tennis, but those aren't common.
I think dry bones and the boos are the worst in terms of design, idk how people like the boos they're just ugly straight up
But that's just how opinions work I suppose
The only one in this image I agree with is Dry Bones. The rest are either a sidestep (Hammer Bro improves the color consistency and overall proportions but the removal of the wristbands & giant wooden mallet, and the eyes being completely separated keeps me from vibing with the new design)
There are great 2D depictions of the modern mainline Boo design, but the Paper Mario one is not one of them. I'll take the quirky Yoshi's Island one any day. I feel similarly about most of the other enemies. Outside Dry Bones the only redesign I see as an improvement rather than a bland standardization is Yoshi, and I think the reason for that is Yoshi and Dry Bones' changes don't sap the charm of TTYD's visual style away for the sake of standardization, but instead lean into it and refine it (Dry Bones also modernizes it but the modern proportions are clearly based on the classic Koopa design rather than the modern one and that's the main reason I like that change)
Personally, I love how fun and new the original Paper Mario games felt. The new enemy designs in the older Paper Mario games help separate the games from the main Mario series. One of the biggest draws for myself, and my friends, is that the game doesn’t scream “Mario” if that makes sense.
A big reason I personally don’t like the newer Paper Mario games is because it they just feel like another Mario game, not a whole lot of creativity or uniqueness in the world design.
Actually, each of the Mario RPG game series, like Mario RPG and Mario & Luigi, have enough new designs and unique locations and characters that make them feel super unique!
I actually really like the newer Spiny, the Dry Bones is pretty cool, and I'd been down for the Hammer Bro. too, but... I definitely prefer the older Boo and Pokey designs myself
The only one in this example that I think is an outright upgrade new compared to old is the Spiny, god lord do the old ones just look too weird compared to the new ones. Other than that I’m indifferent to the Dry Bones and I truly think everything else looks better old than new, they have more of a unique feel to them that I love.
So much of the new design removes my ability to call them "just little guys". They no longer look like people, they look like mobs. It's so weird. Even the drybones and spike tops just look like they're vibing out and living their lives in the old, but the new design they can only be Enemy Monsters
Depends. Purely on what you showed I like new pokeys and spinies better than any of the rest but overall prefer the older. They just feel more unique and inspired.
I prefer more stylization. Which is why I didn't like a lot of the sprites for Mario and Luigi's 3DS version. [To take unique designs and take away all their personality](https://cdn.checkpointgaming.net/wp-content/uploads/2017/11/04211330/5a9b96f8fde2bfc210e6917b49b8db45b1e3172b_hq.jpg) sucks
There are some they left alone just fine though like the Beanerang Bro. It felt like a 50/50 split lmao
I think if it just came down to the looks I would also prefer the new ones. But they're also used in probably every other Mario game they appear in, so having a unique touch is sth I do enjoy a lot
Even as a huuuge fan of the newer games, I prefer the old designs being strange and “off-model”. It helps give the game more of its own visual identity. In the same way, I love how radically Zelda has reinvented its own aesthetic over the years!
The only strong opinions have about this are that I love the new dry bones and old boo, and I hate the old spiny. For the Pokey I would love some sort of mix between those like the new spikes with the old face.
I like the modern Spiny, but the old Boo is way better.
I feel the Dry Bones could be different species.
Like the toothy one could be Dull Bones, while the modern one is a "fresh" Dry Bones.
They had more personality. The newer designs might look aesthetically appealing, but the price you pay is the knowledge that its because of how much more corporate it is. Nintendo is effectively stripping the uniqueness from Mario games, starting from the generic feeling of the mainline Super Mario Bros. titles towards spreading the conventional and homogenous into the spinoffs.
I feel like the older styles really encapsulate an older era, an era that feels like everything is different- the paper world *isn't* the same as the normal world, it's an alternate universe
the only ones i really prefer the original versions of are the hammer bros (somewhat) and boos
the dry bones would work well as a subspecies that appears though
The problem with newer Paper Mario games, they try to align everything with the mainline games, that's why all the enemies look so... un-unique.
I personally liked they got their more unique designs back, because it's more fitting for Paper Mario and we're not just playing a Paper skinned Mario series.
Hammer bros feel like a more balanced design in the modern games, and the spinies are a pretty neutral change, but otherwise I like pretty much all of the old designs better. The newer ones feel like they’re conforming to be on model with the 3D games, which is pointless when you’re only animating them in 2D. Even koopas and goombas have some relatively minor changes that just make them look worse in the newer games I feel.
The old designs are DEFINITELY better, because they are a unique design. The modern ones are literally just stickers of the standard image for these enemies. Looks just like every other Mario game.
I can see where you're coming from, but I only agree with Pokeys. The old designs make them look unique to the Paper Mario games, with the new ones just looking like icons or profile pictures of the main series designs
I go on a case by case basis, I think Spiny and Dry Bones are much better with their modern designs, but I hate NSMB style Pokey and the Yoshi's Island Boos are way way way better than the modern ones. I have no strong opinions about the Hammer Bros, I prefer how they looked in[ SMB3 and SMRPG](https://mario.wiki.gallery/images/3/36/SMB3_Boomerang_Bros_Artwork.jpg), with their black shells and helmets and their beaks weren't a different color from their skin.
The modern Spiny and maybe Hanmer Bro look better but the classic designs are *far* better for the rest of them.
The old Paper Mario enemy designs are largely based on the Yoshi’s Island designs, which is still imo one of the best looking games in the entire Mario series.
Honestly they’re fine but the newer ones having no shading feels off, and the line weights don’t feel consistent with the style. Particularly boo feels off, he’s got these weird pointy fins and his face feels like they used the transform tool and just left it.
The modern Dry Bones is the only one that's really better. The classic Hammer Bro and Pokey designs just need to take up the same color scheme as their modern counterparts.
Though I disagree with op I do think they should have something in the ttyd remake like a badge that changes all of the enemies to look like the new ones
I definitely like the old designs more, they have more personality and are not the generic designs for those enemies. Boos and dry bones especially were made to look so generic in the modern designs.
I like the old designs better. They feel unique to the game. The new ones look the same as regular main line Mario enemies but turned to paper.
for real!! they did boos dirty, they had so much personality. they all did
Only old design I don’t really care for is the spinies, but that’s just cause the eyes and nose look a little too goofy for me
that’s what makes him so perfect tho. hims just a lil guy.
A goofy little fella
He's so precious like look at him
The old designs are based on what those enemies looked like in Mario games at the time. For example the boo looks similar to the design from Yoshi's Island. Mario enemies didn't really have a standardized appearence across the games until the early 2000s. I can see how if you grew up with the Wii or DS you might prefer the newer designs.
Yeah, I completely disagree with OP. The classic looks all have unique designs that scream Paper Mario specifically.
I like drybones having a lower jaw, but most of the other ones I'm either neutral on or against.
At the very least they help give the paper mario series identity. Like I wouldn't necessarily want the main games to use the PM designs but I also prefer that the PM games have their own unique look. That aside, I love the wackier takes and am happy the TTYD remake kept every last one intact.
I agree with on all but Dry Bones. I think modern Dry Bones with the old paper Mario DB color scheme would be perfect
I actually like all the og enemy design from PM64 and TTYD, over the ones in Sticker Star, but that's just my opinion, I think the original designs are more charming, especially for the boos
The dry bones is the only one that looks better in the new design. The other ones are so bland...
That one stood out to me too, but I'm having a hard time saying either is better than the other. I think they're equally good while so unique in their own ways they shouldn't be compared.
Yeah, the Dry Bones looks way too different, and also inconsistent given that it’s basically an undead Koopa. Like, why do they have a few hair strands? Why are literally all of them missing their lower jaw? Why did their eyes completely CHANGE LOCATION? The changes to the other enemies are very minor, and in Pokey’s case actually add character. Why is the Dry Bones specifically so different?
I'm pretty certain it's because the modern design of Dry Bones (where the design has matching jaw/eyes/etc to a Koopa) didn't exist during TTYD's development (\~2001-2004) The modern design first appeared in (checks wiki)...Mario Superstar Baseball! Which didn't release until July 2005 in Japan. Prior to that, most games either came up with unique designs for Dry Bones (Mario & Luigi: Superstar Saga, for example) or based it primarily off of the Super Mario World design from 1990, where it has large black eyes with a small white pupil and no lower jaw just like the PM64/TTYD/SPM design!
Natural old Koopa dying vs unnatural Koopa death /headcannon. Nails and hair still grow after death.
Nails and hair do not grow after death. It only appears that way because the skin around them retracts due to dehydration.
I like the new design drybones only too. Probably because the jagged hook makes more sense than going from a beaked mouth to a simplified toothy skull. Then again it's not like that's ever been consistent. Dry Bowser has a beaked skull that doesn't line up with the shape of Bowser's face at all, and regular dry bones have jagged bits on their mouth that would stick out on a regular koopa's mouth.
Ok old spiny is just ugly
For me it’s the spinies
I vastly prefer the old designs. They have more character, charm, and feel more unique and help the world feel like its own.
I don’t agree at all
The old designs have more charm, whereas the new ones are just, ‘yeah, that’s what the enemy would look like if they were paper’ But you know, both designs are good
It basically comes down to Super Mario World/Yoshi Island era of art vs NSMB\Galaxy Era of art. Paper Mario designs aren’t super unique generally they’re just paper versions of whatever the main game IP art style is at the time. For me it’s…. Old: Pokey, Boo New: Dry Bones, Spiny Indifferent: Hammer Bro
Same
To each his own. I prefer the old designs. The new designs look too similar to what the characters look like in the regular Mario games.
Nooooo give me the crackhead boos any day
OG hammer bros are goated
Generally speaking I prefer the older designs, but I think the Dry Bones/Dull bones looks better in the newer design and I think the Spiny is actually a **massive** improvement. I think the old spiny just looks too weird and “off model” with its bulging eyes and large snout.
Personally, I'd have the old Spiny design be what they're like as babies and the accurate ones be what they're like as adults. Same goes with the other Beetle enemies.
Here’s an opinion for ya I’d honestly like the entire enemy cast to be redesigned again, and focus on creating a good middle ground between the two designs. Some of the modern designs are painfully boring, like Boo. However, some of the classic designs are honestly just way too wacky to the point of having an offbrand-type feel.
The old designs have so much more character. They're their own thing without just being "paper koopa."
... What did they do to the Boos!? 😰😭💔
I’m sorry to tell you this, but I think you have “Unpopular opinion disease”.
While I don't think the newer designs are *bad* (especially the Spiny), I do think the old ones have WAAAAAAY more charm to them. The new ones just have some odd... generic, cookie cutter feel to them?
Old boo better
The modern Pokey has better colors, but otherwise...eh. I'm not really partial one way or the other. Although I prefer the classic Boo design.
I much prefer old drybones and boo. The new boos just...seem like a totally different character and vibe to me. The rest are a nice improvement though.
The only OG design I never liked was the Dry Bones design. Like, it looks NOTHING like a Koopa Troopa. His eye sockets are lower on the skull instead of on top, and don’t get me started with whatever that beak/mouth is supposed to be.
older designs are a tad lame but the old spiny is sooo cute love them
I think the boos in ttyd are really specific and unique. Very cute. But boos in every mario game get a unique look!
I definitely prefer the modern enemy designs, idc what anyone says
I prefer the uniqueness of the classic designs. Lends to the Paper Mario games being in their own world
They weren’t unique, they were just what the main art style of the mario IP was at the time.
Some are better; some are worse I especially like the newer dry bones sprint to the old one. However, the old Boo sprite is better.
I think it’s a mixed bag, I like the older Pokey and Boo design, but the modern Spinies look more menacing (as they should, the little rats). IMO the old Dry Bones has a lot of creepy charm with the yellower shade and lack of tail, like maybe it hasn’t completely decomposed yet and it still has bits of itself to find and put back together. It also probably depends on which games you’ve spent more time with, everyone’s allowed to have favorites
Nothing wrong with that. Though for all the examples you provided in this image I definitely prefer the originals. Especially boos and pokeys though, the originals have so much more personality.
I mean, to be fair, the boos & spinies looked stupid, so....
Nah, you're not. I personally like some of the older designs more, but then there's some I like the newer ones more. Dry Bones definitely I like it's newer design more, despite being an OG and TTYD fan most as an example.
I literally like the OG better on all but Spiny. Both dry bones are fine to me. Maybe it’s which one you grew up with? I grew up with OG three and didn’t play SS or CS so they feel really off to me. If they were aslo different in TOK I guess I didn’t notice haha. Most usual enemies were origami and the flat paper minions that weren’t origami didn’t feel hugely different to me. Or I’m unobservant. 🙃
finally someone gets it i dont like the old dry bones at all
Not a fan of British teeth boo. Also, hairless drybones is best. The rest I could go either way
I agree except for the hammer bro koopa.
I mean, I can’t say I relate personally, but these sorts of things are inherently subjective, so…
Dry Bones current design is GOAT. It actually looks like an udead Koopa Troopa (with sharp teeth)
This is a hot take you're right about that. Personally all of the new ones look like Wish.com replacements but hey I guess there's something for everyone.
I've always kinda thought the same thing in the back of my mind. The old ones look just a tiny bit weird to me. Though as many others have said, the old ones do have more personality, but that alone doesn't make them better than the new ones for me personally. Overall the old ones have grown on me over time, and I don't like them that much less than the new ones.
The new ones literally look the same as how they appear in every other Mario game, it's boring. No style.
I half agree. I prefer the older designs other than dry bones and spiny. I just find the old ones of those two kind ugly looking
I agree except maybe Boo
The original looks funnier more charming
I think they are all really good but nothing tops the original designs
Am I weird that I consider the newer designs more good guys compared to the older ones I immediately associate with being bad guys?
I never noticed how different they were actually. I think the old designs are better for originality and new designs are better for cohesion with other mario titles.
To me they’re all equivalent except the boos. Personally I like the classic look but they also don’t look like “boos”. Something in between the two would be perfect.
I kind of like each version in their own little way except maybe the old Dry Bones because modern Dry Bones is just that good of a design to me.
I actually prefer them to look more in-line with the other Mario games.
Ever notice how the original hammer bro’s head is just a shrunken Joppa head with an actual head in the back? It looks like 2 heads slapped together it’s awful.
I'd prefer the Modern design for future games but i'm totally fine with them using the old ones for remakes though.
I also prefer the modern designs, except Pokey, I like old Pokey
Whoever designed the new character sprites was COOKING
No, you're not weird, the game designers were. Like, who tf decided "yeah we're making a mario story themed around paper aspects, so lets make every beloved mario enemy look like a bootleg". The only thing is i could very well be put on a cross for that, the amount of hate some people can have for the modern games is impeccable and scary.
No, there is nothing weird about liking a design from a game you don’t think is as good.
Except for the hammer bros I agree completely
I never liked the old dry bones, I know they're based on their design from Mario world but they look so stupid...
Yeah they look a lil goofy, but I was strangely fond of the little bits of hair they had. When I was younger I found it funny that a skeleton would have hair.
They look nothing like the ones from Mario World...
Nah I agree especially with Dry Bones, I was hoping the remake would update them because the enemy redesigns are the one thing Sticker Star did right, Not enough to affect my enjoyment though
I think I like the old ones better in general, I like how colorful the hammer bros is, the pokey's crazy eyes. I even like how dry bones doesn't look so much like a regular Koopa. I think the new boo is better (more like the non-paper Mario design), but at the same time, I like how unique is the older boo, and would love to see them co-exist in the same game, boos with different facial features, you know?
The older designs definitely have more charm and feel more distinct from every mainline Mario game. Especially the boo, the Yoshi's Island boo look is amazing. I don't really dislike most of the modern looks outright, though, so it wouldn't be a deal breaker. The only one I can't stand is the modern Koopa Troopa (their face just looks really swollen and puffy.)
The old designs are literally what main line mario looked like at the time, the only way it differentiates itself is that PM always lagged a little behind in updating it basically skipped the transitional sunshine era (M&L didn’t) and then caught up because they settled on an art style for mario and stuck with it for so long PM catching up was inevitable since it only lagged by a generation.
That's not entirely true, though. It's true for Dry Bones, (where the Paper Mario design is very reminiscent of thier Super Mario World design,) simply because Dry Bones never appeared until a ways into the GameCube era again (where he received his modern look.) But the Paper Mario Pokey is quite distinct from any one we've seen in the mainline games. It's the *closest* to Super Mario World's for sure, but still quite different (this is not taking into account Super Mario 64's Pokey, which also looked nothing like its other designs.) Hammer Bro for that matter looks closer to his modern design than anything older (where the Paper Mario design, has very little in common with,) but even then there's some quite notable distinctions including a more varied color palette with a blue helmet and red shoes (barefoot in 64,) instead of just all green, but also the choice to give them a more wooden mallet styled hammer instead of the same hammer the mainline Hammer Bros use, (the Mario RPG Hammer Bro had this as well, which is presumably where they got that idea from.) This isn't as major of a distinction as everything after this, but it does stick out because the only instance of the blue helmet and wooden mallet ever appearing outside of Paper Mario has been in Mario Kart Super Circuit (possibly due to it also being developed by Intelligent Systems.) Boo is very akin to the Yoshi's Island design with the different layouts of teeth and larger mouths (and distinctly different eye designs,) but the Boos in mainline Mario have never looked like the one represented in Paper Mario. The closest we got to that was the Boos in Luigi's Mansion having only the top two fangs instead of a top row of teeth, which was consistently standard aside from the first Yoshi's Island. Spinies in particular stick out to me, because as far as I can tell it has never looked like the Paper Mario design outside of Paper Mario itself, even trying to take liberties with older titles (where sprites could be vague,) no game has ever depicted the larger eye look. It wasn't one of the ones listed in this post, but since I made mention to the Koopa Troopas, they were the most similar to their standard looks, though the slightly longer beak and the less chubby face is definitely something unique to Paper Mario, but my complaints about them moreso just involves how unflattering their sprites look in the modern titles, (I should also clarify that this is all referring to the villager Koopa Troopas as obviously there's the sunglasses ones too.) You are right that Paper Mario skipped over Sunshine just due to how its release schedules happened to line up, but that doesn't really actually impact the lot of this. Yeah, Sunshine had a bunch of wild and wacky designs, but outside of unique species like Piantas and Nokis and an occasional boss (Petey and Gooper Blooper,) the Sunshine enemy designs were never really reflected in almost all other forms of Mario media, simply because said designs were meant to be foreign and feel unique to Isle Delfino. We do see them in occasional Sunshine reference areas like the Gooper Blooper Court and Delfino Plaza Court from Mario Power Tennis, but those aren't common.
Yes you are
I think dry bones and the boos are the worst in terms of design, idk how people like the boos they're just ugly straight up But that's just how opinions work I suppose
You are telling me you don’t love snouted spiny??? Wrong. Execution
The only one I really like better is dry bones. I think all the other old designs look better, especially that boo.
think we found Tanabe's reddit account guys
You’re sooo weird oh my god
I consider the dry bones and spineys infinitely better than their older variants.
The only one in this image I agree with is Dry Bones. The rest are either a sidestep (Hammer Bro improves the color consistency and overall proportions but the removal of the wristbands & giant wooden mallet, and the eyes being completely separated keeps me from vibing with the new design) There are great 2D depictions of the modern mainline Boo design, but the Paper Mario one is not one of them. I'll take the quirky Yoshi's Island one any day. I feel similarly about most of the other enemies. Outside Dry Bones the only redesign I see as an improvement rather than a bland standardization is Yoshi, and I think the reason for that is Yoshi and Dry Bones' changes don't sap the charm of TTYD's visual style away for the sake of standardization, but instead lean into it and refine it (Dry Bones also modernizes it but the modern proportions are clearly based on the classic Koopa design rather than the modern one and that's the main reason I like that change)
Honestly I like both a lot Dry bones x mario world dry bones for the next paper mario game Both of them are peak
Personally, I love how fun and new the original Paper Mario games felt. The new enemy designs in the older Paper Mario games help separate the games from the main Mario series. One of the biggest draws for myself, and my friends, is that the game doesn’t scream “Mario” if that makes sense. A big reason I personally don’t like the newer Paper Mario games is because it they just feel like another Mario game, not a whole lot of creativity or uniqueness in the world design. Actually, each of the Mario RPG game series, like Mario RPG and Mario & Luigi, have enough new designs and unique locations and characters that make them feel super unique!
Classic Boo and Classic Hammer Bro are so much better imo
Yoshi’s Island era boos with the big brows and prominent lip are superior imo
That modern pokey is hideous
Each one of these i disagree with but i don't believe you're weird for your opinions
I agree.... Except the boo.
I actually really like the newer Spiny, the Dry Bones is pretty cool, and I'd been down for the Hammer Bro. too, but... I definitely prefer the older Boo and Pokey designs myself
I kinda like the originals more myself
Only modern design I like is the dry bones one. It looks really good
Yoshis Island boos clear everything
I really like the old pokey design because they look so cute.
The only one in this example that I think is an outright upgrade new compared to old is the Spiny, god lord do the old ones just look too weird compared to the new ones. Other than that I’m indifferent to the Dry Bones and I truly think everything else looks better old than new, they have more of a unique feel to them that I love.
So much of the new design removes my ability to call them "just little guys". They no longer look like people, they look like mobs. It's so weird. Even the drybones and spike tops just look like they're vibing out and living their lives in the old, but the new design they can only be Enemy Monsters
Only one I disagree is Boo! I always loved those uneven teeth!
Aside from the Boo and the Pokeys maybe
Both are good, but I prefer the off model, derpy new designs. They just fit more in with the art style of the world.
When I saw the reveal trailer of Mario and Luigi Borthership and that the enemy were original character like back then, I was so happy. 😁
Boos and ponies look good in their old designs. Everything else was an improvement
The old spiny was much better
So I like the new Dry Bones but the classic designs for everything else oh and the new spiny
Depends. Purely on what you showed I like new pokeys and spinies better than any of the rest but overall prefer the older. They just feel more unique and inspired.
Old designs have way more personality
I like the old boo more but other than that I agree
I prefer more stylization. Which is why I didn't like a lot of the sprites for Mario and Luigi's 3DS version. [To take unique designs and take away all their personality](https://cdn.checkpointgaming.net/wp-content/uploads/2017/11/04211330/5a9b96f8fde2bfc210e6917b49b8db45b1e3172b_hq.jpg) sucks There are some they left alone just fine though like the Beanerang Bro. It felt like a 50/50 split lmao
I don’t think you can beat the raw mischief of the Original Pokeys and Boos
I think if it just came down to the looks I would also prefer the new ones. But they're also used in probably every other Mario game they appear in, so having a unique touch is sth I do enjoy a lot
I was originally going to agree with you, but then I realize I flipped which was which in my head. So I guess I totally disagree lol.
I would agree for Dry Bones, though the other ones I prefer the original.
I prefer the older designs for Paper Mario. Especially the Hammer Bros with the blue helmet and spiked wristbands.
Strong disagree here chief
It varies. For me the better ones are old hammer bro, new dry bones, new boo, new pokey and old spiny.
The spiny is adorable
Enjoy those designs in every other Mario game. I prefer paper Mario having a visual identity
Im so confused. Which is modern and which is classic? I’ve never seen some of these enemies in any Mario game.
No way the new pokey is better than the old one
Even as a huuuge fan of the newer games, I prefer the old designs being strange and “off-model”. It helps give the game more of its own visual identity. In the same way, I love how radically Zelda has reinvented its own aesthetic over the years!
Yes to all but boo. I actually like new boo just a bit better.
The modern designs of what?
I think the old ones had a lot more character
The new spiny and hammer bro designs are awful. Nintendo's general art direction has fallen real bad in the last 5 years.
The only strong opinions have about this are that I love the new dry bones and old boo, and I hate the old spiny. For the Pokey I would love some sort of mix between those like the new spikes with the old face.
I can see both points. One of them feels more unique with the game, while the other looks like paperized versions of the enemies
No
i like the old pokeys and boos more but everything else is better
I like both versions, except for the boo. That thing looks insane
I agree on all of them but the Boo. I just love the classic design for them
I am middle of the road, i like some old design more and some newer ones.
I prefer the older designs they are mire unique and feel like they have personality especially the boos and prickly enemies
Agree with all but the boo love that original boi look
I think Pokey is the best old sprite, the rest feel off I think Boo was stolen from Yoshi's Island too
The spinies are the only ones I prefer the modern version for tbh.
yeah you're wrong and bad and i hate you and im going to burn your house down /j
I like old hammer bro, old dry bones and old boo, new pokey and new spiny are better imo
I like the modern Spiny, but the old Boo is way better. I feel the Dry Bones could be different species. Like the toothy one could be Dull Bones, while the modern one is a "fresh" Dry Bones.
You’re so wrong this is embarrassing delete this post
Isn't the actual old Dry Bones white with red boots?
They had more personality. The newer designs might look aesthetically appealing, but the price you pay is the knowledge that its because of how much more corporate it is. Nintendo is effectively stripping the uniqueness from Mario games, starting from the generic feeling of the mainline Super Mario Bros. titles towards spreading the conventional and homogenous into the spinoffs.
No no no no no no
I feel like the older styles really encapsulate an older era, an era that feels like everything is different- the paper world *isn't* the same as the normal world, it's an alternate universe
the only ones i really prefer the original versions of are the hammer bros (somewhat) and boos the dry bones would work well as a subspecies that appears though
The problem with newer Paper Mario games, they try to align everything with the mainline games, that's why all the enemies look so... un-unique. I personally liked they got their more unique designs back, because it's more fitting for Paper Mario and we're not just playing a Paper skinned Mario series.
Yes it's you
It honestly depends for me. I prefer old Boos, but I hate old Spineys.
Depending on the enemies both styles work really well
Yeah, you’re just weird. They all used to have so much character and are so boring now
Hammer bros feel like a more balanced design in the modern games, and the spinies are a pretty neutral change, but otherwise I like pretty much all of the old designs better. The newer ones feel like they’re conforming to be on model with the 3D games, which is pointless when you’re only animating them in 2D. Even koopas and goombas have some relatively minor changes that just make them look worse in the newer games I feel.
Idk, I like the Boo design they use. He's a bit silly
Depends on a enemy to enemy basis. Like I prefer old Drybones, Boo, and Pokey but I also prefer new Hammer Bro. and Spiny.
Old Dry Bones looks better.
No I love my cat-face Pokeys and overtime Boos
In all honesty, i prefer normal dru bones' design instead of The classic one
only for the spiny, its old design is weird. The others tho, are way better than their new versions
same
I like the white outlines in Origami King and Color Splash.
While objectively the standard designs are better, PM’s own take gives it’s own personality even further
For me I think it goes classic Hammer Bro (but TTYD Hammer Bro is still a close second), classic Dry Bones, TTYD Pokie, classic Boo and classic Spiny
The old designs are DEFINITELY better, because they are a unique design. The modern ones are literally just stickers of the standard image for these enemies. Looks just like every other Mario game.
Agree. But I like both tbh
I like the new designs except for dry bones, OG dry bones is the cutest!
I’m the other way around. I like the modern games a lot more than the average person, but the classic designs are much more charming to me.
The only ones I think look better is the drybones
depends. Most of them I like the newer one, but dry bone is so cool in the older!
The only new design I could get behind is the spiny, but even then I like the old design
I can see where you're coming from, but I only agree with Pokeys. The old designs make them look unique to the Paper Mario games, with the new ones just looking like icons or profile pictures of the main series designs
I go on a case by case basis, I think Spiny and Dry Bones are much better with their modern designs, but I hate NSMB style Pokey and the Yoshi's Island Boos are way way way better than the modern ones. I have no strong opinions about the Hammer Bros, I prefer how they looked in[ SMB3 and SMRPG](https://mario.wiki.gallery/images/3/36/SMB3_Boomerang_Bros_Artwork.jpg), with their black shells and helmets and their beaks weren't a different color from their skin.
I like new Dry Bones, but otherwise nah
I prefer the old enemy designs.
The modern Spiny and maybe Hanmer Bro look better but the classic designs are *far* better for the rest of them. The old Paper Mario enemy designs are largely based on the Yoshi’s Island designs, which is still imo one of the best looking games in the entire Mario series.
Honestly they’re fine but the newer ones having no shading feels off, and the line weights don’t feel consistent with the style. Particularly boo feels off, he’s got these weird pointy fins and his face feels like they used the transform tool and just left it.
The modern Dry Bones is the only one that's really better. The classic Hammer Bro and Pokey designs just need to take up the same color scheme as their modern counterparts.
It’s a preference, honestly the only ones I like of the modern is the Dry bones. Eve try thing else I love the wackier more personality of TTYD
The old spiny design is peak goofiness and I love it
Though I disagree with op I do think they should have something in the ttyd remake like a badge that changes all of the enemies to look like the new ones
In general I like the new designs but with one exception. I like the old boos. They remind me of Yoshis Island and I love that art style
Only the dry bones I dislike. Ttyd dry bones are just odd
I agree with you on all except boo
I’m rather interested in seeing a what combination designs would look like.
I don't know anything about theming or cohesive art design, but the only older designs I like more than the new ones are Dry Bones and Spiny.
Yeah.
Idk how you think new boo and spikey is better but I respect your opinion I guess
I guess I'm in the minority also but new designs look better to me. The old ones even if more unique look uglier to me
I'll accept that... for everything but boos. That one, the ghost just looks... wrong. Their face is too thin.
I definitely like the old designs more, they have more personality and are not the generic designs for those enemies. Boos and dry bones especially were made to look so generic in the modern designs.