Mario & Luigi Superstar Saga + Bowser's Minions Impressions

At time of writing I have completed Superstar Saga and have about 90% collection.  I haven't touched Bowser's Minions yet so this pastebin will focus on the main game.  I will refer to the main game as SSDX for most of this.

TL;DR Version
Overall, I enjoyed the remake.  It did a good job modernizing the game while capturing the spirit of the original.  It's an easy recommendation for anyone who enjoyed the original or anyone who enjoys Mario RPGs and hasn't given Superstar Saga a try.  The art style isn't for everyone (as my chat made me VERY aware about), but it didn't detract from the experience for me.  The difficulty curve has been smoothed out, the combat is much more engaging, and the music in general is amazing as you would come to expect from Yoko Shimomura.

Now for more detailed thoughts.

-In General-
If you've played the original, you already know what you're in for.  The main story and flow of the story is basically unchanged except for a few minor things.  The biggest difference in the game, aside from the obvious change to the graphics and music, is the battle system.  SSDX borrows heavily from the improved battle mechanics of the later M&L games and the game is much better for it.

-Combat-
Moves now have a very satisfying "Excellent" effect for properly timing attacks and the Bros Attacks have been changed to be more accessible and a lot more fun.  Gone is the guessing game of the first game where you have to use the slow mode to figure out what the timings are.  The on screen cues are more than enough and have a satisfying impact when you execute moves properly.  It also has demo and practice modes so you can try out the moves without fear of failure.  Between modernizing the battle system, new enemy attacks, and satisfying attack animations and sound effects, I was really loving the combat.  I think one of the main strengths in the M&L is the combat and SSDX doesn't disappoint.

-Difficulty Curve-
SSDX addressed what I believe was the biggest problem with the original, the difficulty curve.

A lot of people who played the original had problems in a few predictable spots:  Border Jump, Minecart Game, Chuckolator, and Final Cackletta..  The original has a huge difficulty spike at Chuckolator because of an attack that is basically impossible to dodge on top of already hard to dodge attacks, and Cackletta 1 is no cake walk either.  Then the difficult tapers off a bit, maybe a slight bump at Joke's end, but then you get to Final Cackletta and the game has no mercy.  It was so punishing that they had to tone down the difficulty in the later released Japanese version.

Thankfully in SSDX all of these issues have been addressed.  None of the fights ever felt cheap or unfair, most of the times I died were because I failed to dodge attacks or I was being too reckless.  if you do die in a fight you can retry the fight from the beginning and not have to sit through the cutscenes again (thanks Dream Team for this feature).

The Border Jump and Minecart games have also been toned down.  There's actually been a fair number of people who have told me that these games gave them problems on their first playthrough.

-Art Style-
The most contentious part of this game for some people is the art style.  It's drastically different from the original and looks more like Dream Team and Paper Jam.  For me the art style was hit or miss.  It brought more fidelity to characters that really needed it (e.g. Starshade Bros and Bean Bean Castle Guards), but it also made some things visually confusing in some parts.  There were a couple fights where it was hard to tell who was being attacked because of how the depth perception is shown.

Some of the environments are downright gorgeous.  Joke's End went from being my least favorite place in the game into my most favorite.  It wasn't a bunch of different shades of blue and white.  It felt like a cold, foreboding, and creepy fortress.  An absolute gem of an environment rework.  Throw in the improved, more atmospheric music, and you have an experience which the original couldn't deliver.

I can understand if the art style is off putting at first, it is a very rapid departure from the original, but I think you're missing out on a good retelling of the game if you don't play it just because of that.

-Music-
When did the M&L series music become more like Kingdom Hearts?  Oh yeah, it's the same composer.  Yoko Shimomura does it again.  I loved the majority of the music.  Off the top of my head some of my favorite tracks were Joke's End, Woo Hoo Hooniversity, Teehee Valley, Final Cackletta, Peasley's Theme, and Bean Bean Castle.  I think the music really hit the mark on the creepy areas in the game.  I was ecstatic when I heard the tutorial music from Partners in Time playing too.

There were a couple songs which I didn't like as much.  Popple's Theme comes to mind, I like the original one a lot more.  I also don't like the removal of the minigame music which was replaced with... I think the Paper Jam music? It was one of the later ones.

-Closing Thoughts-
I think Superstar Saga had the most to gain from being remade.  It modernized the battle system, improved the gameplay experience, and still keeps a lot of what I think made the original special.  Will we see remakes of the other games?  Hard to say.  I'm not sure if the others absolutely need a reboot, but we'll certainly see.  If you liked the original or Mario RPGs in general it's an easy recommend.  If you haven't played it before but were curious I would highly recommend SSDX over the original first.

P.S.  I know some of you are wondering if I'm going to speedrun this game or not.  Truth be told, I would love to run this game at a marathon like Limit Break.  I don't know if I will make the time for it though.  Speedrunning has been on the backburner for a while.  I am interested in routing the game though so maybe that will turn into speedrunning it.

So to answer that question... my answer is ¯\_(ツ)_/¯