20 years later, Paper Mario: The Thousand Year door is calling Switch players out for cheating in the RPG's lottery, just like the original GameCube version
May. 28, 2024You can’t just turn back the clock
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All these years later, players tempted to cheat the Happy Lucky Lottery inPaper Mario: The Thousand-Year Doorby changing their system’s clock are still being met with an explosive end.
If you try and set your Nintendo Switch system’s clock ahead to snag prizes that otherwise require days, months, and even years of waiting, Lucky will immediately call you out. You’ll read that the lottery “has been suspended” and hear from the bob-omb that this is due to “foul play.” He’ll then question you, asking if you tampered with the clock. You can either succumb to Lucky’s guilt-tripping dialogue and admit to changing the time or you can refuse to tell the truth. The former option will leave you with a scene straight out of one of those anti-piracy screen creepypastas.
The bob-omb begins to mentally unravel, repeating his words in disbelief and frantically exclaiming that he’ll never trust another person again. Following his brief descent into madness, Lucky’s body glows red as though he’ll explode - and then he does, sort of. After blacking your screen out and convincing you that he’s crashed the RPG for good, Lucky returns to say that he didn’t end the game but will if you cheat again. You’ll then have to pay a 500 coin fine to continue the lottery. If you choose to lie to Lucky rather than admit to any tampering, this fine will sadly still apply.
Lucky’s sequence would probably leave me sobbing as a child, but it’s an undeniably creative ode to the RPG’s past. It’s reminiscent of an earlier Nintendo era overall that I look back on fondly - one that saw Animal Crossing’s cranky mole Resetti scare me into never changing my system’s clock again. I’m happy to see the Paper Mario remake remain faithful to its quirky original with features like the Happy Lucky Lottery and its unstable host, even if it means waiting hundreds of days to hit the jackpot.
Do you love Nintendo? Check out theseupcoming Switch gamesfor more to play.
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After spending years with her head in various fantastical realms' clouds, Anna studied English Literature and then Medieval History at the University of Edinburgh, going on to specialize in narrative design and video game journalism as a writer. She has written for various publications since her postgraduate studies, including Dexerto, Fanbyte, GameSpot, IGN, PCGamesN, and more. When she’s not frantically trying to form words into coherent sentences, she’s probably daydreaming about becoming a fairy druid and befriending every animal or she’s spending a thousand (more) hours traversing the Underdark in Baldur’s Gate 3. If you spot her away from her PC, you’ll always find Anna with a fantasy book, a handheld video game console of some sort, and a Tamagotchi or two on hand.
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