Paper Mario: TTYD - Headscratchers!

[Indigo]

Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door is one of my favorite games ever, but I can't help being bugged by inconsistencies in its story - some of which are pretty glaring, really. (Obviously, spoilers abound for those who have not played the game.)

Headscratcher I: Four Heroes... but Seven Crystal Stars.
According to legend, the four Heroes each hid a Crystal Star, after which they were eternally cursed. Which would be fine if not for the fact that only the Diamond Star, the Emerald Star, the Ruby Star, and the Sapphire Star are accounted for in this story. Did the Heroes meet their fate before they could hide the other three Crystal Stars? And if they were able to hide them, then where were they hidden? Somehow, the Gold Star ended up in Glitzville after being found by Grubba, the Garnet Star was just sitting in a hidden room in Poshley Sanctum, and the Crystal Star was in Rogueport all along, according to Grodus. How did they manage to end up in these places?

As a sort of side-plot hole, how did the Goomba heroine end up in Rogueport Sewers? The Toad, the Boo, and the Koopa were all found in their respective Crystal Star hiding places, but the Goomba hid the Emerald Star in the Boggly Woods and yet she somehow ended up in the ruined city.

Headscratcher II: The Unbelievably Prophetic Magical Map.
It's explained that the map shows the location of the Crystal Stars, which makes sense. What doesn't make sense is why it's able to detect Glitzville, Poshley Sanctum, and even the X-Naut Fortress on the Moon. These places surely didn't even exist 1,000 years ago, so how did the Heroes know to have the map pinpoint these places? Also, if you notice, these three areas happen to be the hiding spots of the three Crystal Stars that aren't accounted for in the legend: Gold, Garnet, and Crystal.

Even Rogueport, the original location of the Crystal Star, hadn't been built until centuries after the first city was destroyed. Thus, the map shouldn't be able to show Rogueport, either.

And what possessed them to make a quarter of the map show the Moon, anyway? Seems ridiculously contrived. Another thought: what if one of the Crystal Stars was moved out of the territory shown in the map? Would it just not show the location of that Crystal Star?

Headscratcher III: What the Hell, Vivian?
The Shadow Sirens are arguably the true antagonists of the game, playing the X-Nauts for a bunch of clueless saps and manipulating Grodus into doing their dirty work. They were all in on it, right?

So why the heck doesn't Vivian open her mouth after joining Mario?

She could have warned Mario about the whole "Grodus needs to use Peach to revive an immortal demon" thing way back in Chapter 4, but instead, we don't learn about this plot twist until the very end of the game. Also, couldn't she at least have told Mario where the X-Naut Fortress is and where Peach is being held? If I recall correctly, she even expresses surprise when Peach's email informs you that she's on the Moon. Why should that be a surprise to her when she's been to the X-Naut's moon fortress dozens of times already?

Headscratcher IV: Grodus is a Dirty Cheater.
The game makes it pretty clear that all seven Crystal Stars are needed to break open the Thousand-Year Door and defeat the Shadow Queen inside. So why is it that Mario needs to go on an epic seven-chapter quest to find the Crystal Stars when Grodus can simply take Peach through the door without a single one? Sure, it's hinted at that the seal on the Door is weakening and may break very soon, and if this was indeed the case, then that would have been a fine explanation. The problem? Mario still needs the Crystal Stars to open the Door, meaning that the seal hadn't broken yet and that Grodus shouldn't have been able to simply waltz on in with no explanation.

There may be more, but this is all I can come up with at the top of my head for now. So yeah, discuss and stuff if you feel like you have some answers/theories., or if you have more headscratchers you feel were present in the story.

[PDoogan]

1 & 2: Just because the heroes hid the starts in certain places, doesn't mean some weren't moved around since then. 1000 years is a long time. I'm sure somebody since then how found one or hid it somewhere else or some other situation.

As for the map, It probably isn't 1000 years old. But I don't know how to explain what would happen if the stars left the area shown. I guess it was just luck that none of them ever left the country.

3. Considering how badly Bedlam treated Vivian, it's not a stretch to think that she wouldn't reveal her true intentions to the others. Possibly fearing that Vivian wouldn't accidentally reveal it to the X-nauts. After all, Bedlam was always going on about how Vivian was stupid or couldn't do anything right.

4. Eh I'm a little fuzzy on the order of events at the end. (It's been quite a few years since I last played that game)
Did Grodus show up after Mario opened the door? If so, I'd assume that once the sea is broken, anyone can pass through the doorway. Grodus just got to the Shadow Queen's room first.

[Indigo]

1. Yeah, I suppose the Crystal Stars having been moved over the course of a millennium, but I still have a problem with original hiding places of the Gold, Garnet, and Crystal Stars.

2. ...which ties into the map. The thing is that the map is 1,000 years old; in fact, it was the heroes themselves who created. So they must have created the map with the original hiding places in mind, but it instead shows the modern areas that didn't exist at the time.

3. Actually, that's a good point. Still doesn't explain why she didn't tell Mario about the Moon, though.

4. Grodus actually walks through the Door before Mario opens it with the Crystal Stars. So either I'm missing a crucial detail or he just used hax.

[Banzai Bill]

2. It could be that the map maker saw a vision, or a prophesy, of where the Crystal Stars would be when they'd be needed, and made a map. So if a Crystal Star was not located near Rogueport, the map maker would have stretched out the map as needed to record the vision? Like the moon?

3. That bugged me too. Though I thought maybe Vivian didn't know the whole story. Maybe she just followed her magical sisters along as they warped to report to their boss, not even knowing she went to the moon.

[Koopalmier]

1 - The three remaining Crystal Stars weren't hidden and ended up getting lost. Which is probably why they end up, 1000 years later, at locations that didn't exist yet at the time of the ancient city. These Crystal Stars got lost and moved around a lot. As for the side-plot, the Rogueport Sewers (or in this case the ancient city) is the only way to gain access to the woods. Notice how the first "demon chest" is very close to the pipe to Boggly Woods.

2 - It's - magic -. The point of the map is to show the Crystal Stars depending on their state and location. The map will move itself around if the Crystal Stars move to a place that isn't shown.

3 - Vivian didn't recognize the Shadow Queen, so she likely forgot about what happened a thousand years ago and didn't know about Beldam's plans. She probably didn't know Peach was being held in the X-Nauts' base either (or held at all).

4 - It's likely the seal broke while Mario was fighting with Crumps on the Moon. That, or Grodus entered the palace after Mario did and found a shorter hidden path to the Shadow Queen's throne room (and Doopliss tricked Mario to open the door for Grodus to enter after) (although it's shown Franky was being held in a room in the palace itself, so it might support the first theory).

[PDoogan]

Mar 29, 2013 14:06:36 GMT -5 kmj10 said: