I’ve been a fan of the Mario Party series dating all the way back to the game’s debut on Nintendo 64 in 1999. Many hours spent bashing buttons, waggling controllers, rolling dice and yelling at so-called friends as they steal my precious Stars. Any time a new entry pops up, it’s always an exciting time, another great excuse to gather friends and family for some light-hearted (but competitive) times and if my initial hands-on with Super Mario Party Jamboree is anything to go by, then plenty more fun and laughs await.
My hands-on with Jamboree starting with a good ‘ol traditional Party session on one of the game’s seven boards (consisting of five new and two returning favourites). Mega Wiggler’s Tree Party was a pretty typical Mario Party board, its main highlight being a giant Wiggler at its centre that when triggered would wonder a few steps redirecting the direction players would move when crossing. We all did the usual taking turns to roll dice and running along spaces with each round capping off in a minigame. The latter included tilting the Joy-Con to direct a golf ball toward a hole, waggling it like a manic to overpower the other team in a giant arm-wrestling match and timing the release of a penguin towing you on a sled so as to slide as close to the edge of a cliff as possible among others.
While this mode will be immediately familiar to anyone who has played previous Mario Party games, there were a few subtler changes I did notice. Items for example have been expanded one new entry allowing players to summon a shop wherever they are. The ally system from Super Mario Party is also back once more although their implementation has changed quite significantly. Rather than accumulating a small squad by landing on special spaces, one popped up during the final five turns of the game (Daisy in this case) with players then needing to compete in a series of Fall Guys-style obstacle courses collecting as many coins as possible, the winner seeing them join their character. The player would then benefit from half-price items at the shop not to mention events triggering twice as opposed to just the once. That ally would only stand by you for three turns however or until another player passed you on the board leaving plenty of chance for others to swipe them away.
Our game for example saw me win the ally which initially sounded great, only to then land on a Bowser space and suffer its consequences not once but twice (thankfully both times everyone had to give up a handful of coins). A couple of turns later another player passed me and stole Daisy, then passing a Boo space and not only choosing to steal coins from me but my one and only Star sending me from first to fourth place. Normally this sort of table-turning screw job would leave me cursing at the sky, but in Mario Party it’s all part of the fun!
Next, I had the chance to check out a few minigames presented in sets of three with each themed around some sort of subject. One we played focused on food, its minigames seeing us moving about as we tried to avoid falling sandwiches, timing button presses to stamp cookie cutters and working in twos to cut delicious-looking steaks perfectly in half. Short, sweet and a great way to dip in for a quick couple of rounds.
Koopathlon is one of two major new modes shown so far for Jamboree and proved my favourite of the two. In it, 20 players would all race around a circuit by competing in minigames, each round consisting of three focused on collecting coins (the more coins you collect, the more spaces you move) and the last an elimination-style minigame against Bowser. The unique twist for this mode (beside having 20 of you in it) was players competed individually when it came to the coin minigames with a portion of the screen showing in realtime the board and everyone’s movement. The Bowser minigame meanwhile would see all compete together, those eliminated in the early goings getting sent back spaces on the board.
Kaboom Squad meanwhile was a co-operative mode this time for eight players. In it, everyone would dash about a small arena collecting and throwing bombs inside a cannon to fire at a giant stampeding Bowser. When enough bombs were loaded, they’d fire at the villain dealing damage. With a timer in place and Bowser posing a constant threat, we all had to keep on our toes avoiding his attacks. Minigames would offer a moment of respite, these team-based efforts awarding items based on our performance. Unfortunately, we didn’t do very well at the ski-walking minigame (shown in the initial trailer) and as a result won nothing so unfortunately we didn’t get a chance to see the sorts of perks any items may have.
My short time with Super Mario Party Jamboree proved a lot of fun. While the traditional Party mode looks to deliver another reliable slice of heated and hilarious fun-for-all entertainment, I’ve high hopes for Koopathlon and its unique method of introducing more players to the mix. Between the single-player adventures of Echoes of Wisdom and Brothership, Jamboree should be a nice change of pace when it releases next month.
Super Mario Party Jamboree will be released at retail and digitally on the Nintendo eShop for Nintendo Switch worldwide on 17 October 2024.