Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door – Every Special Attack, Ranked (2024)

In battle, players have an assortment of choices they can make in Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door. Mario can jump on enemies or use his hammer to pound them in, and upgrades to his boots and hammer will unlock new potentials for these weapons in battle along with unearthing new abilities.

Equipping Badges to Mario will also unlock new abilities in Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door. These Badges can literally grant Mario new moves in battle or boost stats like HP. There are other, more powerful move that players can pull off called Specials. A new one will be unlocked after a Crystal Star is collected. There are eight in total, so let’s rank them all out.

8 Showstopper

Chance Of Instakill

• Cost: Two SP

Showstopper is the seventh Special attack that Mario can learn from the Crystal Stars. The cost is relatively small, as is the benefit for ordinary battles. Players will have to follow a series of face button prompts on the controller to build up the attack’s effectiveness.

The better the score, the more likely it will instantly kill enemies on the stage so it’s not the best attack to use against a boss because it will always fail. It’s kind of like the Odin Summon in the Final Fantasy series but less flashy.

7 Sweet Treat

Heal Party’s HP And FP

• Cost: One SP

There are easy-to-find group-healing spells or group-healing items in the game, but Sweet Treat is the next best thing, and it will be the first unlockable Special for Mario. Icons containing Mario’s health, partner’s health, flowers representing Flower Points, and poison mushrooms will fall on the right side of the screen.

Players will push left on the analog stick and then flick it to try and hit as many of these icons as possible to restore HP and FP. Getting a poison mushroom won’t hurt players, but it will stun Mario for a brief time.

6 Power Lift

Increase Party’s Attack And Defense

• Cost: Three SP

Power Lift is the fourth Special in the game, and it shares similarities with Sweet Treat. Instead of restoring HP and FP, it will boost attack and defense power in a turn-based battle temporarily. Players will see a square containing blue arrows, orange arrows, and poison mushrooms.

Players have to shoot the arrows with a reticle similar to a light gun game to build up a meter, which will then either boost attack or defense for the party. Like Sweet Treat, hitting a poison mushroom will briefly stun Mario during the Special.

5 Clock Out

Throw A Giant Bomb At Enemies

• Cost: Two SP

Clock Out is like this game’s version of Hot Potato. A giant bomb will appear on the screen, and will rotate between the party, the middle, and the enemy. Players will have to rapidly mash on face buttons to build the bomb up, but they have to make sure and explode it at the right time.

If it gets too big on the player’s side, it will damage Mario and his fellow party members in Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door. The damage is nice, but the unpredictability makes it a lower-tier Special, which is the third one Mario can acquire.

4 Earth Tremor

Attack All Ground Enemies

• Cost: Two SP

Earth Tremor will have Mario and his partner jump on top of a small Crystal Star. By following button prompts, a meter will build and at the end of each round, the Crystal Star will grow. The bigger it gets, the more damage it will do to ground-based enemies.

This second Special is a decent one, but it lacks versatility, since it can only target the ground. The button prompts are easy enough to follow though, especially for players well-versed in Quick-Time Events from other games.

3 Art Attack

Target All Enemies Within A Circle

• Cost: Four SP

Art Attack feels like an early predecessor to Okami, which has no relation to the Mario franchise whatsoever. Players can freely draw circles around enemies and once the loop is closed, the circle will generate damage. If players are skilled enough, they can whip out a mass attack of circles.

If they are not good at drawing circles for this fifth Special, then it may not be worth using. For Clarity, players got to use an ethereal paint brush to draw circles and other shapes in Okami’s battle system. That’s where the connection drops, although both games do have nice cel-shading.

2 Supernova

Hit All Enemies With Massive Attack

• Cost: Six SP

Supernova is the final Special players can unlock after getting the last Crystal Star on the moon. It will summon another Crystal Star, like Earth Tremor, but the button prompt is much easier. Players just have to mash on the A button on the Switch controller for multiple meters to build strength.

Once built, the attack will damage all enemies onscreen for a huge amount of damage. Some bosses may have resistance to it in Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door but, overall, Supernova is a killer move, albeit an expensive one.

1 Sweet Feast

Heal Party’s HP And FP

• Cost: Five SP

Sweet Feast is a powered-up version of Sweet Treat and it is the sixth Special power. Instead of flicking the analog stick to hit targets, players can just lean left on the analog stick and multiple stars will shoot out. It’s like playing a mini-game version of a horizontal shooter.

The bonuses are more frequent onscreen, and they are bigger too. It’s an overall easier Special to heal the party with which is important in the latter half of Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door.

Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door (2024)

Franchise

Paper Mario

Platform(s)

Switch

Released

May 23, 2024

Developer(s)

Nintendo

Publisher(s)

Nintendo

Genre(s)

RPG

ESRB

E For Everyone Due To Mild Fantasy Violence, Mild Suggestive Themes

How Long To Beat

30 Hours