Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door is coming to the Nintendo Switch

The beloved turn-based RPG, Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door, is coming to the Nintendo Switch in 2024. Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door is often celebrated as the best installment in the popular Paper Mario franchise, but it was trapped on the Nintendo GameCube for nearly two decades.

Since Nintendo began reviving popular GameCube classics on the Switch, there has always been hope within the community that Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door would be part of this movement. Many Nintendo Directs came and went without any announcement of Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door, leading some fans to lose hope of ever being able to play the game on Nintendo's latest console. The rising prices of used copies of the GameCube version have made this loss even more painful, but now there is light at the end of the tunnel.

To conclude its latest Nintendo Direct presentation, Nintendo officially announced Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door for the Switch, with plans to release the game sometime in 2024. Based on what was shown in the trailer, the Switch version of The Thousand-Year Door appears to be authentic to the GameCube original, even retaining its more controversial elements, such as the "sluggers" seen in one area of the game. The only real difference will be the enhanced graphics, as the Switch version of The Thousand-Year Door will be presented in HD.

Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door has a vague release date in 2024, but it's likely to come out within the first half of the year. After all, Nintendo stated that the Nintendo Direct would mainly focus on new Switch games coming out this winter. It's possible that Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door will be released for the Switch in early 2024, but a launch in spring or summer seems more likely.

It is expected that Nintendo will unveil the successor to the Switch next year and possibly launch the new system in 2024. If that's the case, one can imagine that Nintendo will gradually shift its focus to the new platform. Considering this, it is quite possible that Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door will be one of the last major releases for the Switch.

In the meantime, Paper Mario fans on the Switch have some other games to choose from while they wait to get their hands on The Thousand-Year Door. The original Paper Mario is playable through the Nintendo Switch Online Expansion Pack, while the latest installment in the series, Paper Mario: The Origami King, is readily available on the Switch.

Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door will be released for the Nintendo Switch in 2024.