Mario Party DS

Great Mario game like all the others must buy. kinda hard to use if you are not used to using the control pad though...i am a stylus girl myself...but finally got used to it...but it is a must buy.

The last Mario Party I played thoroughly was MP2 for the N64. Now, don't let my hiatus mislead you; I adore this series of games, but just have not had the opportunity to play one since the N64 days. So I was thrilled to find a version for my new DS. The mini-games really quenched my Mario Party thirst, but it still left me wanting a little more.

The game contains several modes, the most important being Story and Party. In Story mode, you play as one character through all five boards and beating bosses at the end of each board. For such an important mode, it's severely flawed. There is no option to alter the difficulty setting in this mode, and all of the CPU controlled characters are annoyingly easy to beat in minigames. On the other hand, they somehow manage the intelligence to cheat you of every star on the board. So you end up being the guy with hundreds of coins and not a star to your name.

Party Mode, therefore, is much preferable. You can choose between three (and later four) difficulty modes; most experienced players will be comfortably challenged in Hard difficulty. In Party Mode you can choose a game length from 10 to 30 rounds, and you may also turn on Bonus Stars, which are awarded to players at the end of the game based on hidden variables. These stars can often give a dark horse an upset victory. Most importantly, you can play Party Mode with friends using only one game cartridge, which significantly adds to the fun as alliances are formed and betrayed.

The mini-games are fantastic. There is a great balance of stylus and non-stylus games. There are very few games based entirely on luck, which is nice. I like being tested on my skill. There are some creative games here, like using the stylus to wind up a toy car. The stylus really allows for new innovation in the MP franchise. I only found one game downright impossible: Get The Lead Out. Even against the easy opponents I couldn't win. How do you hit the A button that fast?

What I find to be the game's biggest flaw is that the mini-game system isn't cruel enough. Unlike in previous installations, you cannot lose coins in a mini-game. Stealing coins in 1 vs. 3 and 2 vs. 2 games used to be a great way to prevent an opponent from purchasing an upcoming star. There is also no Boo in this game, so you cannot steal stars or coins (There are coin and star hexes, but the opponent has to land on them to trigger them). Now there are too many coins in play, and you watch futilely as your opponents buy star after star, and then buy items to get them to the stars faster. This difficulty is artificial and cheap. In one game (DK Stone Statue with Bowser's 5 Coin Star rule, what a nightmare) I found myself forfeiting 2 vs. 2 games just because I didn't want my teammate to get any more coins. That's bad.

The only other real problems with the game are that the boards and mini-games are too few. Other than that it's an enjoyable package, but one that left me wanting more. I can only pray that someday they'll make a new edition or--better yet--port the original MP to the DS, replacing analog stick rotations with stylus controls. That would be a very gratifying experience. Until then, this game will have to satisfy my MP fix, and for the next month or so it'll do just fine.

(P.S. -- If you couldn't tell, I'm a big fan of mini-games. If you have any DS games in mind that are heavily based on short mini-games like those in MP, please let me know in the comments! I'm always looking to expand my game library.)

My entire family has this game and we all enjoy it. It's great, It's fun, It's enjoyable

I don't know what I was thinking when I bought this game. I guess I didn't realize exactly what it was. It is like playing a board game with yourself and against the computer (who I feel cheats). I am trading this in to earn credit towards something else.

I've always enjoyed the mario party games. So when I heard that a mario party ds game was coming out I was a little more than excited. However this mario party game wasn't the party that I thought it was.

STORY=6
Mario party games don't need a story so I don't even know why they bothered. The story is that which ever character you picked finds a star piece that fell out of the sky and its up to you to find the other 5 pieces and put them back together. You do this by competing on all 5 mario party maps and finishing in first place. The one thing I will say is that the computers difficulity does go up on the different maps.

CONTROLS=9
This is one of the few DS games that hardly use the touch screen or mic. In fact you probably use the touch screen maybe 5% of the time in this game. So must of the game is played with the D-pad and buttons. When you do use the touch screen its only in a hand full of mini games. So the controls are pretty simple and quick to get use to.

CHALLENGE=7
like I said before the computer characters won't get to difficult until the very last map and even then they are still pretty easy. The mini games you should easily master as long as you don't get careless.

GRAPHICS=8
Graphics look really good in this game. Sometimes I felt like I was playing the original mario party game way back on the N64.

OVERALL=7
The game is pretty good for mario party standards and it does keep you busy. Some of the mini games are pretty stupid and simple. There is a lot to do in this game such as story mode, party mode, mini game mode, and puzzle mode. The badges and trophies don't serve any real purpose, there just like acheivements on xbox 360 or the trophies on ps3. If you are a mario party fan than this game is just for you, you won't be disappointed!