Lord_Brand

Neither my brother nor I have yet to play through the game (even though we bought the trilogy for Wii), so I'm not really able to comment on it. I have heard though that it shifts away from exploration compared to the first two. I'd be fine even if Zelda's simply an AI companion, I just want to see Link and Zelda finally explore Hyrule together. I did have an idea for playable segments involving Zelda, but the last time I shared that idea, a big argument started and I ended up getting harassed, so I'm not going to share that idea on this forum. All I'll say is I want Link and Zelda to become more of an adventure couple. Let Zelda be our companion who tells us about stuff and maybe even talks to people. Actually, I'd suggested in the past that Zelda could have been the main playable character of BotW2 with Link as the companion, but the trailers we've gotten suggest that certainly isn't the case. However, I think there is potential for Zelda to get her own playable story parallel to Link's, or for the game to allow us to switch between Link and Zelda. For starters, yes, it is sexist. And if sexism against women is unacceptable, so is sexism against men (and no, I'm not open to discussing political matters; this isn't the place for it, and any PMs trying to start something will be reported to the mods and pointedly ignored). It's also incredibly stupid seeing as they need men from other tribes to reproduce; last thing they should be doing is discouraging men from visiting their home town. One of the Gerudo mentions that the younger vai don't mind because it gives them "an excuse to leave town". What, the sweltering heat and scarce water didn't do that already? Farore's sake, if I was a man living in BotW Hyrule, the Gerudo would be at the bottom of my list as far as prospective girlfriends go, next to the Rito (I'm not into bird people). I'd take a Hylian, Zora, or Sheikah girl any day. Then there's the fact that, yes, it's annoying having to switch into weak armor every time I want to enter the town, even if it's just to buy something. The fact that it's the only town in the game to require doing so just makes it worse. At least if the other towns for some reason required changing clothing it wouldn't make Gerudo Town stand out so much. Heck, Goron City is much more navigable with the Flamebreak Armor, yet I don't mind switching into that as much because it's actually worth a damn in a fight and it's not like the Gorons are forcing us to wear it if we want to enter their city - in fact, they made it as a courtesy to help outsiders survive the volcanic heat of their town and surrounding environment. And really, you'll want to switch into the Zora and Snowquill sets when you visit Zora's Domain and Rito Village respectively simply because they're the most practical sets of gear to wear in those areas. But for Gerudo Town, we already have a set of gear ideal for the desert: Desert Voe Armor. On top of that, I found it extremely grating that the game pushes the whole crossdressing thing down our throats. Not everyone is comfortable with crossdressing, you know? I'd have preferred if crossdressing was something players could do for fun rather than being necessary in order to access one of the Divine Beasts. Not to mention, if femboy fans got to have Link wearing the midriff-revealing belly dancer outfit, why couldn't other fans get to see Zelda wear something similar during memories set in Gerudo Desert? At least then it would make things more even! For that matter, it really chafes me when Urbosa suggests Link wear the outfit for Zelda sometime. Just...gods, Gerudo Town is my second-most hated thing about BotW after Revali (arguably moreso since we only have to put up with him in a handful of cutscenes). And as someone who waited a long time for the Gerudo to make a proper return, that makes the whole ordeal all the more bitter for me. In OoT, they were one of my favorite tribes, but in BotW, they became one of my least favorite. I really hope Nintendo's caught some major flak over the whole deal, and I hope BotW2 does something to fix the issue. If not, I think it'll be time to start a major ****storm across the net just to make sure they get the message. I've gone so far as to propose a mod to the game that removes all traces of the "no men" law, including disabling or even deleting the detection zone that causes you to get kicked out as well as altering or removing every piece of dialogue that alludes to it. Furthermore, I've thought of actually adding more content to the game such as voe husbands living with some of the Gerudo as well as maybe even a matchmaking sidequest. I also think one day I'll design my own BotW-inspired game; at least then I'll have total creative control and can do what I want with my setting and characters. "Inspired IPs" are becoming pretty commonplace nowadays, which tells me fans are growing increasingly discontent with the way the old guard have been handling their IPs.

I'm indifferent on MP4. I like the soundtracks of MP1 and 2, but Dread's scratching my Metroid itch for now. I'm more excited about BotW 2, though also a little apprehensive about things like the possibility that Zelda's going to be sidelined for most of the game again and the probable return of Gerudo Town and its "no men allowed" law, which I absolutely despised.

Chocobo GP, one of the worst racing games I've ever played. For starters, there's of course the menu screen that you can't change, though that's far from the most egregious offense on my list. The story cutscenes take far too freaking long to play out, and most of the characters are really annoying or otherwise unlikeable. Especially Atla. Seriously, who thought a greedy, lazy, cowardly, manipulative, disrespectful, self-absorbed Moogle with the voice of a 12-year old was a good idea? Trying to replay story missions is a pain thanks to the lack of a very intuitive "Retry" button. If you want to restart the race - say, because you tried and failed yet again to place first on lap 1 - you can only "Go back to story select" or "Quit", which forces you to sit through a bunch more screens to replay the race with the same character/vehicle configuration you were already using. Many of the tracks are far too short, which gives you hardly any time to catch up with your opponents if they get ahead. Even worse is when there are short versions of tracks, which take up space that really should have gone to additional tracks for the sake of variety. The items are horribly imbalanced, with virtually no tiering based on position. Some are borderline useless, like Quake (except when they're being used against you, of course), others are ridiculously overpowered (like the aforementioned Bahamut and warp). Even worse are the character specials, which likewise range from useless (like Claire's invisibility) to infuriating (like Shiva's Diamond Dust). I'm exceptionally disappointed. This looked like Mario Kart 8 just with Final Fantasy characters, but it turned out to be far, far less than that. Team Sonic Racing looks better than this, and I'm not even interested in that one with the vastly superior MK8D and CTRNF available. Worst game we ever bought for Switch. Do not recommend.

I'll acknowledge that ALttP is rather simplistic compared to, say, Ocean's Heart, but I still have fond memories of it and played through it a while back. What are some of ALttP's shortcomings, in your opinion? Metroid Dread does build off of Samus Returns' gameplay. Same developers, I believe. That said, I liked Returns' gameplay and have thus far enjoyed how Dread plays. Much tighter and more responsive than Super Metroid's rather floaty controls.

I recommend The Legend of Zelda: A Link Between Worlds and Metroid: Samus Returns. The former for being a faithful yet modernized followup to one of the most classic Zelda titles, the latter for being Samus' return to form with a remake of one of her most oft-overlooked entries that revamps the mechanics and layout.

Which tells me it shouldn't have been a sequel in the first place. It should have just been its own thing. Earlier today, I had an idea for a completely different plot for Chrono Cross that involves Lynx - as an ordinary demi-human cat man, mind you - simply trying to eradicate humanity in the El Nido Archipelago with help from the six Dragon Gods. No Chronopolis, no FATE, none of that surrealist BS that ruins many a great RPG. Instead of Harle, Lynx would be aided by his daughter, a younger female cat person who wields daggers much like Kid (or maybe whips?), and who takes a liking to Serge despite her father's enmity towards humans. If the game has to push a message of anti-racism and environmentalism, I'd weave those themes into the plot much better. The game would give you chances to choose a more benign path as opposed to an a-hole path, and if you perform six great deeds (which generally involve improving human-demi relationships and helping the environment, and one of which could involve convincing Lynx to relinquish his grudge against humans), you're taught a certain song that you're told to perform before the Dragon God.

Here are the key differences: Fire Emblem is built around having a large army of characters. Chrono Cross is not. In Fire Emblem, you can use upwards of ten characters at a time, giving you access to a fifth of the game's roster in most battles. In Chrono Cross, you only ever get to use three at a time, and one of those is fixed the first time through, giving you access to less than a tenth of the game's roster at any one time. With the exception of leads, Fire Emblem characters generally don't have dozens of dialogue boxes outside of personalized support conversations. And the support convos themselves are, with certain exceptions, unique to specific pairs of characters (the exceptions generally being stuff like the Awakening kids' convos with their fathers, which use the same basic dialogue regardless of who their father is save for a few little easter eggs like Virion admitting to Inigo that he's a skirt chaser himself). Meanwhile, in Chrono Cross, 90% of your party members have to share 90% of the dialogue boxes. Even Kid herself isn't immune to this. The bloated roster is very much the reason we didn't get more backstory for the likes of Guile, because the developers chose to focus their time on programming in a talking turnip rather than giving Guile more scenes to tie him in to the game's story. They had to structure the dialogue such that virtually any two characters could be in the party along with the lead (which, along with the small number of unique techniques for each character, reminds one of how FFVII and FFVIII's player characters were practically interchangeable as well, only it's much more exacerbated here). Large rosters work for a series like Fire Emblem because they're designed with such large rosters in mind. You're leading an army, after all. In Chrono Cross, you're leading a small band of adventurers into the wilds of El Nido; not exactly the kind of setup that warrants a huge roster of interchangeable characters. But the developers evidently went "yeah, sure, throw it in" and didn't bother to think of how that would impact the final product. And that sadly is very in-keeping with how Square developed RPGs at the time; if a team member had an idea, they'd use it no matter how well or ill it fit the project. There are a few concepts that didn't make it in, like a party member who was going to be the son of two characters from Trigger (Crono and Marle, perhaps?), but somehow the devs decided Poshul was more important that actual decent tie-ins to Trigger. (I don't think I've ever seen another video game that fascinates me and frustrates me at the same time like Chrono Cross does.) My suggested pathing system would allow for a large number of potential playable characters with the caveat that only a handful will join your party in a given run through the game, which in turn makes the game highly replayable. The game could be designed around that pathing system, ensuring that you pick up a diverse array of playable characters without giving the player too many to manage at once. In a game like Chrono Cross, a roster of 12-18 by the end of the game is plenty, enough to give you at least 2-3 choices for each innate. That's how you manage a large potential roster in a game with a small party size: by limiting how much of the roster the player gets access to in a given playthrough, and doing your darnedest to make sure each path offers something compelling that makes experiencing it worthwhile.

Likewise. I have shared mine on Discord, so I might start a topic for it here at some point.

Well, I know of Rogue Heroes, which is great for co-op while still being enjoyable as a solo outing, and of the upcoming Mina the Hollower which looks to be a combination of the Oracle Zeldas and Castlevania with a cute mouse as the protagonist. You also have other retro top-downs like the classic Metal Gear series and Mystery of Murasame Castle. If you really want to stretch, you can even count titles like Star Tropics, Blaster Master, Secret of Mana, Trials of Mana, Bomberman, Harvest Moon Story of Seasons, and the Hamtaro games for GBC and GBA, though those really are more general top-down as opposed to Zelda-esque per se. Zelda-esques are a genre, they just never got a term as snappy as "Metroidvania". Incidentally, I'm planning at least one Zelda-esque game myself.

Started playing Ocean's Heart recently, and am liking it so far. Top-down Zelda-esque games are one of my two favorite genres alongside platformers.

What happened is that they wanted to force in 20 more characters than the game needed, and so his characterization had to be sacrificed to make room for the likes of Poshul, Mojo, and Turnip. Oh, sure, we could have gotten a satisfying conclusion to his search for Schala, but wouldn't you rather have Funguy in your party? Or Sneff? Yeah, all those extras that nobody cares about are the reason Magil was replaced with Guile. Honestly, getting to recruit all seven of the CT heroes would have been vastly preferable to the chaff we got in the final game. Forget Turnip, gimme Frog. Never mind Leah, just give me Ayla. Reassembling Skelly? How about reassembling Robo? And heck yeah to getting Lucca, Marle, and Crono back! If the game needed any bonus party members, they were the perfect candidates. But no, we just get "Mon Game rejects" and random should-have-been-NPCs to pad out that roster instead. And we don't even get to recruit some of the game's more interesting actual NPCs like Dario and Rosetta that could have made for good compliments to the likes of Glenn and Razzly. Even better, they could have been Lynx's counterparts! Kinda like Miki is for Nikki, come to think of it. It's like the devs had a vendetta against conventionally cool characters, wanted to shove as much weird, goofy junk in there as they could get away with, and only included the actual cool party members we got because they had to. I recall having to change discs when you enter the Sea of Eden. So, CC was originally a 3-disc game, and that last disc doesn't hold a whole lot on it. I wonder if that's why the game doesn't let you get most of your old party members back as Lynx? Maybe the reason the third disc is so light on story content is because it has to make room for all your party members between disc one and disc two? Even so, doesn't excuse the stupidity of not getting to recruit Luccia or Greco a second time since they're available to Lynx anyway. If the sheer character count caused memory issues that kept them from doing more interesting things with the good half of the roster, well then that's another reason the not-so-good half should have been removed from the roster in the first place. I think we can all agree that 20-odd fully-baked playable characters would have been preferable to 40-odd barely-baked characters.

It's more that you can create interesting scenarios and make it so that each playable character matters in the stories where they appear. Instead of randomly inserting turnips, talking flowers, and pink dogs with zero bearing on the plot whatsoever, you can write interesting characters who fit into the game's world. A game with numerous story paths and unique party combinations is loads more replayable than a game that gives us half-meaningful choices exactly twice (and in both those cases, the outcome is ultimately the same anyway). Yes, that reason being Kato felt like pushing messages that we were seeing all over the place at the time anyway. Racism = bad, environmentalism = good. We get it. What we didn't get was a fully-baked game with a fully-fleshed out cast and a plot that was enjoyable to follow. Ah, forgot Water Dragon Isle being all dried up in Another World yet overflowing with water in Home World. Given that the difference is ten years, there's only so much they could change about locations like Mt. Pyre or Isle of the Damned. Another issue I've discovered:

Two examples come to my mind: The first is Mr. Sandman in Punch-Out!! for Wii. I had so much trouble with his pattern in the simulation that I started sneaking in jabs and baiting his attacks, and amazingly enough, that worked. The second was Demise in The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword. Took me multiple tries to beat that fight, and again, I got fed up and started fighting more aggressively, getting in hits and perfect guarding as necessary.

Hmm, that's a good question! My instinct says yes they would, though it'd be interesting if there was a rival for each of the "classes". But then there's the question of which types each would pick. I guess one would pick the same as you? Or maybe the series gives us a choice of more than two protagonists for the first time. Maybe you pick your trainer's "class" and your starter evolves to match them? Then your rivals are pulled from the remaining two class pools. Or, if we want to go even further beyond, there are always three boys and three girls, one of whom you're playing, and so their respective types and classes are determined by which Trainer and Starter you pick. For example... You pick the male Fighter Trainer. You choose the Fire Starter. The Male Mage picks the Water starter. The Male Thief picks the Grass Starter. The Female Fighter picks the Water starter. The Female Mage picks the Grass starter. The Female Thief picks the Fire starter.

What would be really neat is if they introduced some new spin on the starters mechanically, like branching evolution paths that give your starters access to different secondary types. Say, that fighter/mage/thief model I've suggested before. Grass Fighter: Grass/Rock Mage: Grass/Fairy Thief: Grass/Poison Fire Fighter: Fire/Steel Mage: Fire/Ghost Thief: Fire/Flying Water Fighter: Water/Fighting Mage: Water/Psychic Thief: Water/Dark

But doesn't that still make them doubly weak to their default weakness? XD At least it gives them a chance to fight back, though, since Ground > Rock > Ice > Ground. An interesting setup, to be sure! @Shanty Pete's 1st Mate What if they had a new cycle of starters who are dual-type from the get-go? Yes, they'd still be Grass/Fire/Water, but they could also represent a new cycle, and maybe ease players into the concept of Starter cycles that aren't Grass/Fire/Water? Just to drive the point further, the other types could be their primary types.

Grass/Ice, Fire/Rock, and Water/Ground would be neat. Probably not gonna happen for Gen IX, but they'd be novel combinations for starters.

Only problem is, that would disrupt the cycle by making it so none of the three are weak to each other anymore.

Sprigatito, simply because I love kitties.

A re-release of TTYD would help. They did bring the original Paper Mario back on the NSOEP (for what that's worth), so that's a start.

Granted, one of those temporarily replaces the lead white innate and later becomes unavailable for the rest of the game, while the other permanently leaves the party unless you exploit a little trick with the Chrono Cross. At least Korcha has the fishing and boatman jobs to tie him to water. Doesn't change the fact he's one of the game's worst characters that isn't a walking plant or a skeleton, but his innate does make sense. I agree that some characters feel like they should have been a different innate. I feel Norris could have been white, Viper could have been black, and Karsh could have been red.

There's also the fact "blue blood" is a term associated with royalty. Considering blue innates in Chrono Cross include girl next door Leena, wannabe hero Pierre, rock star Nikki, and bratty girl Marcy, you've got some legitimate arguments (though at least Nikki and Marcy's cases can be justified by their parentage). I've changed Marth, Lucina, K. Rool, and for that matter Duck Hunt over to blue. I also moved Sonic to green.

It mainly has to do with what elements feel natural for each character. In Chrono Cross, white is the color of light and cosmic matter such as meteors, black is the color of gravity and death, red is the color of fire and lava, blue is the color of water and ice, yellow is the color of stone and electricity, and green is the color of plants and wind. Marth and Lucina have a strong tie to "holy" concepts such as Naga, while Mega Man's default weapon is powered by solar energy, thus I chose white as their innates. Unfortunately, Smash is currently light on fighters who are associated with water or ice and therefore blue by default. Trust me, I'd love for there to be more of them. Ruto or Mipha would be great candidates, as Smash is still sorely lacking in fish waifus anyway (not to mention if Spirits return, one of them would be a great choice of Spirit Fighter for Irenes). Truth be told, Sonic being blue innate is mostly a matter of him not having many better colors to pick, though his association with wind could make him green I suppose. Not every CC character is colored the same as their innate, after all. In fact, most aren't. Though some have a rather nebulous connection to their innate (What exactly is green about a painter? Especially one who wants money?). The current green fighters are: Yoshi Luigi Peach (originally white, but my bro convinced me to change her to green) Daisy (originally yellow, but my bro convinced me to change her to green) Young Link Ivysaur Olimar Toon Link Villager King K. Rool (originally black, but my bro convinced me to change him to green) Piranha Plant The current yellow fighters are: Donkey Kong Samus Pikachu Pichu Zero Suit Samus Wario Mii Gunner Pac-Man Duck Hunt Isabelle Banjo & Kazooie Min Min Odd that the green and yellow circles aren't showing up on your device. Have you tried checking whatemoji.org? That's where I got the colored circles. Maybe you can install an update that will allow you to see them?

The most obvious tell would be showcasing the partners that fans have long missed. In a prospective trailer, they could also show off Badges, Cooking, and the various Star Patrol robots who each have a star theme, making it loud and clear that this is the "true" sequel to TTYD. Everything you loved from the first two Paper Mario games is back, and better than ever! Additionally, the game could take digs at the "bad" Paper Mario games; for example, the nondescript Toads accompanying Mario and Luigi at the start of the game are a shot at Sticker Star and Color Splash for replacing the diverse cast of NPCs from the first two games with a bunch of generic, boring Toads. I was also thinking there could be collectible stickers that the game assures us aren't necessary for combat or to complete the game. Maybe a Toad NPC at one point grumbles about having to constantly color things and clean up confetti. Things could make cameos as objects in trash cans. If nothing else, the fact that the subtitle isn't referencing some kind of paper gimmick should be a sign that this isn't one of those Paper Mario games. A Paper Zelda does also sound quite fun, though Nintendo doesn't seem the sort to apply a particular theme to more than one of their series. The closest we've gotten is Kirby's Epic Yarn and Yoshi's Woolly World both having an "arts and crafts" aesthetic. But for what it's worth, I have suggested elsewhere a Zelda game themed on storybook fairy tales like Cinderella and Rapunzel, which could have a similar kind of aesthetic.

The idea is that Mario now operates with a team of three at a time: himself, the S.P.R., and whichever traditional Partner is active at the moment. In battle, the S.P.R. hovers above and between Mario and his other partner, forming a triangle of sorts. Yes, the other Star Patrol Robots are this game's equivalent of Star Spirits or Crystal Stars, complete with super moves being unlocked each time you acquire one. Originally, they were simply different parts of the one robot's armor, and each contained a Star Crystal (no, not a Crystal Star; the game would poke fun at the confusion), but I later decided to turn the armor parts into other robots, revisiting the original Paper Mario's concept of the seven stars having sentience. Thus, they combine Voltron-style. The traditional Tattle role of the Goomba would be moved to the S.P.R., yes, but that doesn't mean there couldn't still be a Goomba partner. Admittedly, it is tempting to give the majority of the utility roles to the S.P.R., but my intention is that she'd only gain four through her torso, arms, legs, and wings. The reason I shifted the Tattle ability and some others onto her is to spare players the annoyance of having to constantly switch partners to Tattle things, cross gaps, find hidden objects, etc. The Tattle ability is the biggest improvement, as you no longer have to switch to the Goomba partner every time you want to tattle something; now your Tattler is a full-time member of the party. I still intend for the field partners to have utility functions of their own. One example is the junior chef Sweet T., who is a playable counterpart to past chefs Tayce T. and Zess T. Upon attaining her Cooking License, Sweet T. can cook items anytime, anywhere outside of battle. The Goomba partner this time could function as a springboard of sorts, allowing Mario to jump higher. The Koopa Troopa partner could use her shell to protect Mario from hazards. There's a cloaking partner in the vein of Bow and Vivian, perhaps a Ninji or just another Boo. UPDATE: I fleshed out a good number of partner ideas in the first post. Here's the general plot outline I have in mind: At the start of the game, Mario and Luigi are wrapping up yet another of their "save Peach from Bowser" adventures. During their journey, they just so happened to have met some nondescript Toads along the way who joined them as partners (yes, this game takes jabs at SS, CS, and even TOK). While they fight their way through Bowser's lair, a different battle rages in the stars above as the Star Patrol, combined into a singular mech, engage the Empress' forces, including her space station which is preparing to fire upon the planet. While the Mario Bros. and their nameless Toad companions give Bowser his usual beatdown, the Star Patrol narrowly stop the space station from firing, causing it to explode and sending its Star Crystals falling down towards the planet below. Unfortunately, the Star Patrol are also broken apart by the blast, and they too fall to the planet. Mario, Luigi, and Toads defeat Bowser and save Princess Peach. They prepare to go home while the credits roll and shooting stars fall from the sky. But, the space station crashes through the credits and lands right on Bowser's castle, demolishing it and sending our heroes flying to distant lands. When Mario recovers from his own trip, he finds the head of a female robot partly buried in the ground, and after inspecting her, she regains consciousness and takes stock of her situation. After briefly freaking out over the loss of her comrades and body parts, she explains the situation to Mario, and learns from him that the space station's crash landing scattered him and his friends. She proposes that the two of them work together to find their friends, her missing parts, and to bring the Empress to justice before she can rebuild her space station. Mario can handle the fighting while the S.P.R. provides intel using her database. Mario agrees, and a new friendship forms. Meanwhile, Bowser regains consciousness and discovers his castle has been crushed to rubble by the space station, and angrily demands to know who's responsible. After interrogating a few of the Empress' henchmen, he meets the boss lady herself, who apologizes for the damage and explains to Bowser that her plans were thwarted by some goody-two shoes meddlers, causing her space station to crash onto his magnificent castle. She in turn proposes a partnership to Bowser; they can work together to find the Star Crystals that have been scattered across the planet and rebuild her space station as well as his castle. Bowser accepts the Empress' offer and they deploy their respective elites, the Koopalings and the Star Knights, to seek the Star Crystals. If they happen to encounter Mario or the Star Patrol, their orders are to eliminate them at all costs. Between chapters, the Koopalings and the Star Knights get little skits showing off their personality quirks as they seek the Star Crystals in a comedic parallel to Mario and the S.P.R.'s quest. Over the course of the game, the Empress develops a crush on Bowser, mirroring his own crush on Princess Peach. This proves to be the loose thread that leads to their partnership ultimately unraveling by story's end, as not only does Bowser basically friendzone the Empress when he finds out about her feelings for him (making her extremely envious of Peach), he outright calls off their alliance when he finds out the Empress intends to destroy his home planet with her space station (even though she's offering to let him govern one of the many other planets under her rule as a reward for his services to her). So, Bowser does end up turning against the main villain, just not right away. Heck, he might even end up lending a hand in the final battle. In the meantime though, I think it'd be neat if the Empress had a co-villain to bounce off of. I even just brainstormed a little exchange where she's having tea with Bowser and telling him a story about one of her more memorable moments... Empress: "...and then I told her 'No, I am your mother.' Oh, you should have seen the look on her face! Priceless! Of course, she quickly figured out that was impossible, but her reaction was SO worth it!" Bowser: "GAHAHAH! Classic!" Side quest would be more ideal. Perhaps something you can do between chapters? Say you recruit Sweet T. in Chapter 1; after clearing Chapter 3, the second part of her arc becomes available, allowing you to unlock her second combat skill (and perhaps the ability to mix two items together, assuming she doesn't learn that sooner). Then once Chapter 5 is complete, you can play through the final part of her story, allowing you to unlock her fourth and final skill. By the time Chapter 7 concludes, all of the partners' arc finales will be available. Much like the Koopalings and Star Knights, Luigi and Peach get their own vignettes in the game where the player takes control of them, and oftentimes they end up helping Mario out, either intentionally (mostly on Peach's part) or by complete accident (mostly Luigi, of course). Peach contacts Mario using her Mushroom smartphone and feeds him info on the location of the other members of the Star Patrol (as well as the movements of Bowser and the Empress' forces), though of course she gets captured again after Chapter 7 (but manages to help out during the finale, similar to Paper Mario 64). Luigi wanders into one misadventure after another, usually while just trying to find some food or a ride. His Mushroom phone broke thanks to his crash landing, so he's unable to contact Mario directly for most of the adventure (though he does perhaps get to send him mail delivered by a rather familiar Paratroopa postman). He finally gets a replacement and reunites with Mario between Chapters 7 and 8. As an aside, I was considering giving the extraterrestrial beings like the Star Patrol, the Empress, and the Star Knights 3D forms in contrast to the 2D planetary natives like Mario, Luigi, and Peach, to emphasize the former as otherworldly. Not unlike how the origami beings are 3D in TOK, but more in the cel-shaded style of TTYD like in the case of Hooktail, Magnus Von Grapple, and Cortez.