Paper Mario: The Origami King introduced players to a new way to fight enemies through its ring-based puzzle battles. It added an extra layer to the typical turn-based combat system of the early days of the series. Most battles have Mario in the middle of four rings and the enemies on the outside for him to line up and pounce on.
But the boss battles added a twist to that. Most battles had the enemy in the middle while Mario had to use the rings to make his way to the boss, or at least to a panel where he can do the most damage. There were even some battles outside of the ring-based combat. Here are the five best and five worst of the bunch.
10 Scissors (Best)
The green-ribbon level has three bosses, and Scissors are the grand finale of it. The boss battle takes place over two phases. The first phase has the scissors putting a cap on its sharp part. From there, players have to keep track of where the cap is as to not break it and unleash the blades.
Players will even need to time their attack to avoid the cap altogether. Eventually, the cap will come off and Mario will need to take advantage of his Vellumental powers in order to stop the scissors from one-snip killing him.
9 Rubber Band (Worst)
The adventures that take place inside the Big Sho' Theater are some of the best experiences in any Paper Mario game to date. It comes to a head when Mario and Olivia must take on Rubber Band, a diva that looks humanoid when wrapped in hundreds of rubber bands.
Some of the battle mechanics are fun, such as using the rubber bands to snap yourself to other ring layers without changing direction, but the fight overall is rather easy once players continue to activate the 1,000-fold arms.
8 Paper Macho Gooper Blooper (Best)
Between "chapters," Mario and Bobby seek out the Princess Peach cruise ship to find a tool that could be used to rescue Olivia from beneath a boulder. It isn't easy as a Paper Macho Gooper Blooper steals the safe with this tool in it and Mario must fight it.
Like other paper mache enemies, however, there is no turn-based combat. In real-time, Mario must dodge the Blooper's tentacles and use his hammer to knock the Olly stickers off each part of its body. Once successful, Mario just needs to dodge the wave attacks and turn the squid into confetti.
7 Boss Sumo Bro (Worst)
In order to get into Bowser's Castle, Mario and his crew need to get through the Boss Sumo Bro who is resting on a storm cloud stomping lightning down. The battle itself consists of needing to kill other Sumo Bros that have stolen important panels needed to take care of the main boss.
Once the big Sumo is on the ground, it is easy to take care of him. However, getting rid of his smaller soldiers can be a tad annoying and paths to getting back the right panels from them can be challenging, to the point of counter-productivity.
6 Ice Vellumental (Best)
The Vellumental fights are incredibly fun as players get a chance to fight against certain natural elements using magic circle powers that they have learned, with Mario and Olivia learning a Vellumental power after the fight. The Ice Vellumental starts out in an iceberg that turns into a deadly ball.
Later in the battle, players need to use at least one of their moves to clear ice on top of a panel by moving the panel through the middle of the board. The fight thrives thanks to its interactivity and creativity with what players need to do.
5 Tape (Worst)
The second-to-last ribbon boss is Tape, which starts out as a dispenser but then becomes a tape roll. The dispenser is easy to get rid of after a few hits on each of the four corners. The fight gets a little more difficult in the second phase as the tape roll begins to tape up parts of the puzzle board to make it hard to spin individual rings around.
The problem is that if the board gets too taped up, a turn needs to be wasted to get rid of the tape and not attacking the enemy. This makes the fight tedious instead of just a challenge.
4 Water Vellumental (Best)
This is the second Vellumental Mario fights in the game, and it is among the more action-packed ones. This water dragon spends its time mostly airborne filling its belly up with water. If the player does not get to a high place when it finishes filling up, the player can get washed away and killed in a single move.
This boss battle is the first that has Mario using a Vellumental power, specifically the Earth one, to defeat the enemy. Players also need to watch out as water typhoons will knock out multiple rows of panels that are sitting on the rings.
3 Stapler (Worst)
This fight is just rather forgettable as Mario and Olivia are making their way up to the final boss battle with King Olly. The player must jump on the stapler enough times to clear it of staples. Once it runs out of staples, it will fall prone to Mario's attacks, where Mario can make the best of an opened stapler.
The fight only gets harder when the stapler replaces its gray staplers with red and gold ones as each color change multiplies the amount of damage Mario may take. Overall, it's a fun fight for the early game, not so much right before the final showdown.
2 King Olly (Best)
The final boss battle of the game is fun and uses all the elements that the player has used in battles over the course of the game. King Olly will start out by turning into each of the Vellumentals Mario and Olivia have run into. Players just need to beat them again in a similar way.
After that, Bowser will be turned into origami by Olivia who will begin to fight King Olly. Mario plays a support role by banging the platform using his 1,000-fold arms to knock Olly off. Then, Mario needs to solve one last puzzle and it's game over.
1 Handaconda (Worst)
Despite the excellent name, the Handaconda is frustrating as the outcome is somewhat based on chance. The battle starts out with Olivia being trapped in the Handaconda, with Mario needing to use his hammer to wiggle her out. Once she is out, the battle turns into a battle of rock, paper, scissors.
The Handaconda will use hand gestures to indicate where it may be leaning, but this is not a guarantee. Players have to hope that whichever panel they choose will get them the victory, which may be frustrating for some who would rather their skill determine the outcome.