Discussion What's your opinion on Super Mario Party?

[Yzz]

On E3 2018 Nintendo revealed the inevitable Mario Party game for the Switch, however the game that was revealed wasn't what people were expecting. The game wasn't named Mario Party 11 as everyone was expecting, instead going with just Super Mario Party, but what truly caught the attention of many was the return of the traditional gameplay. A lot of people were excited because BotW and SMO were examples of franchises going back to the drawing board and creating a great game, and although Mario Party was never going to get as ambitious as those games, it was promising the fact that the devs were listening to the complaints that arose in the last two games.

Super Mario Party was released in October of the same year, getting a relatively high Metacritic score and solid sales. However SMP true success has been the insane legs that propelled it to the best sellers of its console, rivaling sales titans like Pokemon and BotW. An outsider might look at this and think that SMP is a good game with good word of mouth that deserves its success, but despite this there is one piece of the puzzle that doesn't fit: the Internet hates this game.

SMP is arguably the most controversial game Nintendo has put this generation, the most repeated criticism being its lack of content in relation to its $60 price tag. Besides this, you can easily find entire essays and rants of why its in-game economy is broken, or why design decisions like character dices are detrimental to the experience. Among fans of the series, there is a stark contrast between the optimism for this game in its marketing cycle, and the reception it had after launch. On the other hand, some will claim that SMP critics are a small and vocal minority, and that the general audience has a mostly positive opinion of the game, which is why the product still maintains an evergreen status like a lot of Switch's greats.


The next entry to the series releases in a few hours, which will probably affect the way we look at this game, so let me ask you: Did Super Mario Party left you satisfied? What went wrong and what went right? Do you think it deserves the sales it got?

 

[totofogo]

It was a half-step in the right direction, and I’m happy for it, I didn’t buy it myself, but played it at plenty of parties and had a good time.

I hope superstars helps ndcube fully settle into what made the series great and am excited for what is to come.

 

[shoptroll]

Series vet and liked it. My only complaint was the lack of DLC but at least they supposedly improved the online play significantly (I haven’t tried it myself).

 

[Terrell]

It's by no means the best Mario Party, but Super Mario Party was a lot of fun and a welcome return to where the series needed to be. I appreciate experimentation as much as the next person, but there was a LOT of misses in that column, so something closer to a back-to-basics MP game was necessary. And while not all of it was great, it was appreciated.

That said, I agree with Polygon's review of Superstars: it's easy for it to be the best Mario Party ever when it's lifting all the greatest bits from the series' past. And that will absolutely cause people to look back on Super Mario Party unfavourably. What remains to be seen is where they go from here.

 

[Yoshifan31]

It’s marginally better than the car ones I guess. It actually brought back the kind of structure the series is known for. Still not good at all, I feel bad for the people that actually bought it

 

[GamerJM]

It was the first Mario Party I bought since 5 (I rented 6-8) and I was disappointed, but it at least seems better than the other recent games in the series. A big part of it was the lack of online play at launch, but there also just wasn't that much there.

 

[EggmaniMN]

It was fun for the one time I had a group of friends to play it with. We quickly had to ban specific characters but the minigames were fun and we played through every board.

 

[ngpdrew]

I have mostly disliked the series post N64, but SMP won me over. It helps that it is one of the games my wife really enjoys playing.

 

[Raccoon]

Super Mario Party was actually my first, and I liked it a fair bit. It was fun several times throughout college, especially during my freshman year. It's definitely flawed, though, and I have little interest in returning to it.

 

[Boyfriend]

the mario party mode is serviceable but clearly an afterthought to the brillance that is partner party

star rush was the future, and live in a darker timeline for shunning it

 

[Dark Cloud]

the worst boards of the entire series. The main mode was worse than the partner party mode. Mini games were great. Economy was crap.

 

[DecoReturns]

I really liked it.

But I only played it a few times as I didn’t realize it didn’t allow handheld play and I’m mostly a handheld only player. Pretty bum there. And it in the end was a waste of a 60 dollars digitally.

 

[Roger Rabbit]

I don't like playing on the Switch unless I'm using the Pro controller, so that was annoying. Apart from that, the game was quite good.

 

[Jahranimo]

I liked it, but it kinda hit me in the head that being older it wasn't hitting the same highs as it used to when I was a kid.

I mostly got it to get that green/yellow joycon pair with my last $25 off from Best Buy's GCU.

 

[Cara]

For me and my friends it was a huge disappointment. I never really bothered to think why, it was just boring and unexciting.

 

[Zalman]

A solid return to form. A bit rough around the edges, but it was the first Mario Party I enjoyed in over a decade. The side modes were quite fun as well, such as the rhythm game.

 

[Hocot8]

Series vet and I like it. I played the heck out of it. I liked the ally gimmick and the side modes. The minigames were fun.

I share the same issues as everyone else. Boards needed to be bigger and there needed to be more. Stars being 10 coins and the game economy being broken took away from winning minigames a bit though.

 

[winstein]

That game is generally great, with the only gripe I have is how it mandates single joy-cons, which is my least preferred controller because of my misfortune with the side rails, as they tend to stop functioning (I presume it's a rare issue?).

Thank you for reading.

 

[Pokemaniac]

It was a step in the right direction, but not overly satisfying.

 

[Glio]

I had a ton of fun with my friends but the boards are too little

 

[Miraj]

I thought it was quite fun, and it was a blast to play with family and friends. The main issues for me were the lack of online play (which was added later) and Birdo not being playable (which was amended with Superstars).

 

[Kattbuss]

I’ve had a lot of fun playing it with my daughter and she sometimes set up games with herself playing all four players for fun. Personally I would have liked at least a few unlocks and some sense of progression but she didn’t mind at all.
The new one is downloaded at home so it will be a surprise for her this evening after school.

 

[Jersh]

It's good enough. My sister and I adore Mario Party, and we've played a ton of this since it came out. Had it not been by far the most convenient Mario Party to play (I brought my N64 to leave at her house once only to discover her TV couldn't process a 240p input), it likely wouldn't have been the one we played the most; but it definitely would've been in the rotation.

It might be the best bunch of original minigames, honestly.

 

[Kingpin Rogers]

Fun mini games more but I didn't like the boards. Not enough of them and too small/simple.
Still fun to play from time to time though.
The golden era of Mario Party for me are definitely the gamecube ones, specifically 4 and 5. Those are easily my favourites.

 

[Obsonet]

I liked it a lot, it was a lot of fun with a few friends.
But 4 boards wasn’t enough especially since all the boards were pretty small.

 

[Mandos]

My family had a blast with it and my sister still has my copy. Some of the best minigames yet and some awesome side modes

 

[Clix]

So the pros first:

It has some of the best mini games in the series. They were excellent and a blast to play.

Partner Party was a great mode that added actual strategic gameplay akin to actual board games in regards to rolls, route planning, etc.

The boards are great for partner party!

Shy Guy as a playable character!

The cons:

The small boards are not great for standard mario party.

Only four boards.

Stars were given out like candy, so even if you did everything better, you can still lose because someone landed on more event spaces, had most dice rolls, took the most bathroom breaks, lost their virginity at 16, served prison time for double murder

Character dice was a cool concept that was very unbalanced.

Too easy to golden pipe exploit.

 

[Ninjadom]

I only put 3 hours into it when I first bought it at launch.

Can hardly remember it now. And is it true that it's TV only? No handheld? I'll have to boot it back up again.

Just bought Mario Party Superstars, I'm mainly a solo player so the new online options really help seal the deal.

 

[Rick Bruiser]

it had so much good stuff going on but ultimately fell short in too many important areas...not enough maps, game design issues, online play

that baseball mini game was fucking amazing though

wish i could vote "i'm meh on mario party and this game was meh for me"