I have realized that the SP Combos in the journey towards Baten Kaitos completion are something I have never even attempted in the original version because I have no memory of the nonsense I have to do here. It's like I'm playing a different game all of a sudden. Here's my personal highlight so far:

One combo requires the card "Good Fortune" with two other items. The fortune cards rotate through various forms, the Good variant stays that way for a whopping seven seconds. And I learned the hard way that cards can indeed change in combat. So I make sure I have all the cards I need in my hand and cycle through everyone's turns, hoping the right character's turn comes up during the seven-second window the fortune lines up.

"But surely the reward for such a combo is amazing!", I hear you say. The combo results in the card "Pretty Flowers", which is pretty worthless. And even if it wasn't, you can just put four flowers together to get the same result. And after ten hours, the flowers rot away anyway.

I don't alyways complete games. I'll usually try, but stop when things get too stupid. But there's stupid-stupid and there's funny-stupid. And it simply fascinates me how nonsensical this game is beneath the surface, in that dark place a normal playthrough would never touch. I'm now ~50% through the SP Combos, but the pace varies on the cards needed. Every now and then, I have to grind one from an enemy and this game has a stronger desire sensor than even Monster Hunter, I swear.

But aside from the wall of text, I did complete Mario Bros. Wonder. What a delightful final boss and a challenging special world to round it off. I said I wasn't going to start another B-game, but then I remembered I paused We Love Katamari Reroll for the sake of playing Mario, so I got back to that. I'm sorry for forgetting you, King of All Cosmos. I do love Katamari, I swear!