6.8 KiB
| title | date | score | game_release_year | howlongtobeat_id | howlongtobeat_hrs | game_name | game_developer | game_genre | tags | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Mario Party Superstars: Rehashed Previous Party Parade | 2022-10-19 | 3 | 2021 | 94077 | 8.7 | Mario Party Superstars | Nintendo | Partygame |
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Although I'm not against the concept, I've never been keen on buying virtual party games. It's always more involving to get together a group of friends than just one friend, and once we're together, we usually prefer pulling out a real board game. Yet during the Christmas holiday period last year, we thought it would be fun to roll a few virtual dice in true Mario fashion, and we bought the latest Mario Party incarnation, confusingly named Superstars, while the previous Nintendo Switch entry was called Super Mario Party---which, according to my friend who is unlucky enough to own it, sucks. Rest assured, Superstars does what it says on the tin: it brings together previous "superstars" in a neat package with improved graphics, guaranteeing evenings full of teasing, and hopefully, fun.
The back of the box says:
Enjoy fully renewed versions of Nintendo 64 game boards, win minigames, experience various surprises, and become the superstar! Contains 100 minigames from the entire series, all playable with button controls!
The first Mario Party game dates from 1998 and was indeed released on the Nintendo 64, as were v2 and v3. Party 4--7 targeted the GameCube, and 8--9 the Wii, while the Wii U had to be content with only one release, v10. Mario Party Superstars, the 2021 version that is, lends minigames of all these previous games (of which 55 from the first 3 games), but is clearly a throwback to the first four games, as the board come from the N64 era:
- Yoshi's Tropical Island (MP1);
- Space Land (MP2);
- Peach's Birthday Cake (MP1);
- Woody Woods (MP3);
- Horror Land (MP2)
The question then is: does Superstars add anything new? Yes and no. Yes: there's plenty of statistics, unlockable stickers and achievements, and leaderboards to marvel at. Yes: there's an online multiplayer version, which is kind of a big deal, but also isn't at all. Mario Party is about playing with friends on the same couch, not about playing with strangers. I don't care for that feature and haven't bothered trying it out (it requires a Nintendo Switch Online membership). No: there are no new minigames nor board designs to be found here: it's all a rehash of previous entries---which is perhaps for the better, considering the attempt to bring something new to the genre with Super Mario Party failed miserably.
I can vaguely remember owning one or two GameCube iterations of Mario Party, so I'm not biased with N64 nostalgia for this one. The boards are fun to play and very thematic, but in the end, it's still a very simple affair of throw-a-die-and-move-spots-further. You can get very unlucky with a game of Mario Party: Bowser suddenly steals your star, the AI controlling other characters---you always play with 4---suddenly have lucky streaks, ... But that's part of the game and perhaps charm. We enjoyed almost all minigames, and everyone has their favorites, but none of them stood out as particularly bad: Nintendo did an excellent job at cherry-picking from their rich past.
Superstars comes with a few nice quality of life improvements over the older versions that are welcome but not necessary such as faster AI turns, and of course nicer graphics to accommodate for a modern audience. The game does wear its nostalgic roots on its sleeve: every start of a game, the mechanics of a specific board are explained with the help of retro screenshots from the original---a lovely touch.
Power-ups that can be bought when passing a certain spot on the board also make an expected return, with a few ones like the Golden Pipe (for 25 coins) being particularly nasty as they allow anyone to take a shortcut directly to the star---the one with the most stars at the end of the game is the winner. During the last few rounds, the game tries to spice up things a bit by upping the coin gaining/losing rate and introducing 1vs1 "duels" if you land on the same spot as someone else. I never really felt that tension and feel like a bit more unconventional quirks from these boards besides Bowser or Boos stealing all your money, sudden direction changes, or various forms of teleports might have been welcome.
The biggest pain points of Mario Party games are laid bare when lacking a proper party: when I play with just my wife or a friend, two AI players still make it in the game because everything is based on 4 players. Even though the animation can be sped up, it's never fun to loose from an AI, and this being a bit of a luck-based game, it's certainly possible. You can also skip the boards entirely and focus on just the minigames, but without something that holds it together, playing minigame after minigame grows stale pretty quickly.
Another problem that becomes apparent after hour 10 or so is the lack of board variation. There are only five present in the game. For a full-priced €60 Nintendo game, it could be argued that more boards packed into the released base game would have been welcome. MP2 contains 5 boards (+1 later in the game) and 65 minigames, MP3 5 boards and 70 games, MP4 6 boards and 60 games, while this one comes with 5 boards and 100 games---not that far off the average, but none of them are new, so why not include at least 6 or even 7? Even the amount of playable characters is quite limited.
What's even more surprising: one year later, there is currently still no DLC content available, and people are speculating as to why---and hoping this will change in the near future. Perhaps this month, since it'll be a year old? I doubt it'll be released as free content.
Well then, is Superstars a stinker akin to Super Mario Party? No! Is it as mediocre as most post-N64 Mario Party releases? No! What we have here is one of the best releases in years, simply because the best of the previous ones were put together in a box. We like playing it now and then, preferably with three or four, but if money is tight or you're tired of the ol' Italian plumber, I'd suggest to look for a sale or one of the Jackbox Party games instead.