While I am a fan of family gaming, in particular the Mario Party franchise which I have every installment of since the Nintendo 64 era of consoles, I don’t personally see as much competitive value by playing on the small screen rather than the big screen. However after some rather bland Mario Party games on earlier portable consoles, Nintendo of Australia are trying their luck again with Mario Party: Island Tour on the 3DS. To be released tomorrow at retail stores and through the Nintendo eShop, the game is set to contain 7 new boards, 80 mini-games and a variety of other modes to play through. More importantly you don’t require four cartridges to play which would have been a very expensive limitation otherwise, just one cartridge and a 3DS console for each player.
Classic Super Mario characters are set to take part in worlds including Banzai Bill’s Mad Mountain where you “play chicken” with Banzai Bill where you try your luck to see whether risky moves get you to the finish line first. Another example is Rocket Road where players collect boosters to tune up their rocket and race to the finish. Honestly I am hoping they at least throw in a classic gameplay mode without all the fluff, something they failed to include in the last installment.
Many features can also be enjoyed solo, from playing against computer controlled characters across many of the game boards to the brand new single player Bowser’s Tower mode, which challenges you to reach the top as you try your hand at minigames of ever-increasing difficulty: succeed to advance up one floor, else it’s game over.
Do note that Mario Party: Island Tour is EXCLUSIVE to the Nintendo 3DS console, and if you have younger siblings, parents or friends with the original DS consoles they WILL NOT be able to use them.
