Paper Mario: The Origami King is an action-adventure, turn-based
role-playing game and the sixth installment in the
Paper Mario series, released on the
Nintendo Switch worldwide on July 17, 2020. The game follows
Mario and a new companion,
Olivia, opposing the villainous
King Olly and his army of familiar characters turned into origami soldiers, which have taken over the
Mushroom Kingdom. The title follows the gameplay style of its two predecessors,
Paper Mario: Sticker Star, and
Paper Mario: Color Splash, in which role-playing elements are deemphasized in favor of action-adventure mechanics, which focus on exploration and puzzle-solving instead of character-driven plotlines and
experience-based stat optimization. Also similar to those predecessors is the focus on specific arts and crafts; while the story of
The Origami King is centered around
origami itself, comparable to stickers from
Sticker Star and paint from
Color Splash, other materials such as
confetti and
papier-mâché feature in the gameplay. Conversely, this game abandons the format of self-contained levels used by the later installments, using an interconnected world akin to the first two
Paper Mario games. In terms of combat,
Paper Mario: The Origami King does not feature a battle system which uses finite items like
Sticker Star and
Color Splash, as it instead uses an original ring-based system that prioritizes puzzle-solving instead of strategy, and also introduces real-time combat to the series in the form of the
Paper Macho Soldiers.
