Paper Mario Remake Has Made The W Emblem Even More Expensive

Summary

Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door’sSwitchremake has made the W Emblem more expensive than it was in the original game, for some unknown reason. I guess inflation exists in the world of Mario too.

Just like with Super Mario RPG at the end of 2023, Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door’s Switch remake is surprisingly faithful to the original game (yes, the noose is still in Rogueport), while alsotweaking the gameplay and making small but appreciated quality-of-life changes. While most of the changes are positive, there are a few that don’t make a lot of sense.

We’ve already discussed one of the more controversial changes in the Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door’s remakewith the chat log being removed, but there’s another strange tweak that fans have spotted early on in the game.As highlighted by Twitter user AustinJohnPlays, Charlieton has weirdly increased the price of the W Emblem.

Even Paper Mario Can’t Escape Inflation

For those that don’t know, the W Emblem is a badge that’s sold by Charlieton in Rogueport that essentially lets Mario wear Wario’s colour scheme and cosplay as the garlic-eating anti-hero. There’s also an L Emblem later in the game that lets him dress up as Luigi, but we’ll focus on the wah-man for now.

You can also dress up like Waluigi by wearing the W and L Emblems at the same time, which is a neat little bonus.

In the original release of Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door, the W Emblem cost 360 coins, which was already a pretty expensive purchase at that point in the game. In the remake, though, the price has been increased to 432 coins, a random increase of 72 coins that isn’t really explained anywhere. At least the remake makes coins easier to get this time around, but it’s still noticeable.

It’s not clear why Nintendo has raised the price of an item that was already pretty hefty for a costume change, but a lot of fans have joked that it’s anexample of inflation and costs rising since the original game’s release in 2004. Perhaps my favourite reaction to the increasecomes from Twitter user DurationIII, who said, “Wario is a luxury not something you are owed”. Truer words have never been spoken.