Great sober, even better otherwise
Written: Jul 06 '01
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Product Rating:
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Pros: Great for groups, high replay value, many improvements over the first one.
Cons: Computer players very annoying. Try not to play with less than 4 people.
The Bottom Line: If you have 3 friends and 4 controllers, rent this game some night. You won't be let down. Just be sure to avoid playing with computer players!
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| fallenjesusboy's Full Review: Mario Party 2 for Nintendo 64 |
Mario Party 2 for the N64 is a great game for get-togethers. It's best played with 4 people, because the computer-controlled characters become very annoying very quickly. Here's a run-down before I get into my likes and dislikes of the game.
A board game on the N64? This can't be fun
Hearing anyone talk about this game, you might think as much. How can a board game be fun on a console? Play this game once, and you won't question it again. When you start the game, you first select which mapset you want to play on. Not all of them are unlocked when you first play the game; nevertheless, there are many fun levels to choose from right away, among which are Western, Haunted, and Pirate levels. After deciding on the board, you tell the game how many players will be taking part, then each player chooses one of the 6 characters to control. These are Mario, Luigi, Peach (Princess Toadstool for you old-timers), Yoshi, Wario, and Donkey Kong. You then decide the number of rounds the game will run for (each player having 1 turn in a round): 20, 35, or 50. (Just some friendly advice: try 20 before anything else. You might find, as have I, that 20 makes the game long enough, and anything else would be excessive.) Finally, you choose whether bonuses will be awarded at the end of the game or not (this is explained below). After this, you're ready to begin.
The whole point of the game is to see who gets the most stars. This is pretty much just an excuse to play a bunch of fun mini-games, and screw over the other players, but it serves it's purpose. To do this, you must guide your character to where Toad waits on the board, then pay him 20 coins to receive a star. Coins are acquired in many ways: you start the game with 10; you get 3 for landing on blue spaces; you get them for winning mini-games; you can steal them from other players, under special circumstances; etc. etc. Coins can also be lost by: landing on red spaces (loose 3); landing on the Bowser spaces; passing Baby Bowser; losing duels; etc. Coins also help decide who wins, in the [rare, especially with bonuses turned on] case of a tie for stars at the end of the game.
Play starts with each character jumping up and hitting spinning dice blocks to see who gets to go first. After play order is established, round 1 begins. Every round is the same: the players take their turns in order, then a 4-player mini-game happens, then the next round begins. On your turn, you can either jump and hit the die right away to move, or you can look at the map (either by scrolling around or zooming all the way out), or use an item, if you have one (items explained later). After hitting the die, you move around the board, always in specifc directions, but sometimes being allowed to choose which path you want to take. When you come across such a fork in the road, you will have the choice of looking at the map before deciding which way to go. Sometimes good things will happen (like getting to Toad with 20 coins), sometimes bad things will happen (like landing on Bowser), and sometimes nothing much will happen (like gaining or losing 3 coins). Then the round ends, and things get interesting.
As I mentioned earlier, at the end of every round, a 4-player mini-game takes place. Depending on the colors of the spaces that the players currently occupy, this will be 3-on-1, 2-on-2, or free-for-all. These games are the most frequent opportunity in the game to get a lot of coins, as the winner(s) will typically receive at least 10. When you enter the game, you will be given directions every time, and offered the chance to practice before playing for real, so newcomers needn't fear being disadvantaged. After the mini-game is over, the next round starts. So on and so on, until the game is finished. Things change a little in the last 5 rounds, but that's the basic formula.
When the game is over, bonus stars are awarded, if you selected that option when you began. Stars are awarded based on things that happened during the game, such as whoever grossed the most coins, and whoever landed the most on certain spaces. Most of the time, this won't change the outcome of the game, but I've seen it happen. It doesn't really matter who wins the game anyway, because the true fun is playing the game itself (mostly due to the mini-games).
What it has over Mario Party 1
In the original Mario Party, many of the mini games required you to rotate the analog stick as fast as you possibly could. You can imagine what this does to your controllers. In Mario Party 2, you never have to perform this inane controller-breaking action -- games of speed are done with rapid button-pushing, which is much easier on your controllers (and on the palms of your hands). For this reason alone, I would avoid playing the original Mario Party at all costs -- at least, on your own system, that is. ;-)
The other major improvement over Mario Party 1 is the item system. You can buy, steal, or even (if you're lucky) land on a space that lets you play a solo mini-game in order to get an item. On your turn, you can use them before moving (or while moving, in special cases, such as the key), with a variety of effects. I have found the most useful ones to be the mushroom and the golden mushroom, which let you hit the die twice and three times (respectively) instead of once on your current turn. This is great if reaching Toad is around 10-12 spaces away, especially if someone else is closer than you are. The absolute best item is a magic lamp that takes you immediately to Toad -- but these are expensive.
The one thing that Mario Party 1 has over this game
Random boxes!!! Sometimes, when your character stops moving, it will find a box hidden in the air. Sometimes it gives you coins, which is ok, but sometimes it gives out stars. Stars! The most important thing in the game, the thing you work so hard for, and then they just go and give them away. It's beyond retarded. And if you can't tell, I've lost several games before due to this. But even when I haven't lost and this has happened, it's still just absolute idiocy.
Computer players
For the love of God, don't use them if you don't have to! If you have less than 4 players, you are forced to play with computer opponents. The game will still be fun, but the computer players will annoy you for the duration. First of all, it seems like their die rolls aren't quite random. From my experience, the computer players average 6 or 7 on their die rolls. But I've only played against them on the Easy AI (Medium and Hard are the other options for the normal game), so perhaps this is to compensate for their stupidity. Or perhaps it's all in my head. But should you play the game for yourself, you'll no doubt notice this going on.
Computer players are also bad in the mini-games. If you play with one on Easy, and they are your partner, you will get screwed over. To make them "easy", they have to mess up a certain amount of the time, and this will be more than most players will mess up. On the other hand, if you have one or more computer players set to Hard, they would (I speculate) do extremely well in the mini-games, probably near-perfect, and this would be almost as bad as them doing horribly. Perhaps the best option would then be Medium, but like I said, I haven't checked that one out, and I won't bullsh*t you and pretend that I have. You'd just have to find out for yourself. Regardless of the issue of performance, it is extremely annoying to have a computer player end up winning the game. It just takes something out of it... and it will leave you wondering if the computer does in fact help itself out in some way, especially if the player was set to Easy.
Graphics and sound
The graphics of this game are nothing special, but they're not eye-sores either -- nothing seems to clash with anything else. The game boards are pre-rendered, and the characters are made of polygons. It's pretty typical fare for an N64 game.
The sounds is pretty standard as well. If you've played Mario Kart 64 or Mario 64, you will be very familiar with the voice styles of the characters. The speaking samples are not grainy or hard to understand, and aren't too loud or too quiet in comparision with the music. The music itself is rather nice. The tunes are simplistic, happy/frenzied during the mini-games, and fitting when moving around the game board (i.e. creepyish on the Haunted level).
Playing under the influence
Being the college kid that I am, I would estimate that I've been drinking or drunk at least 50% of the time when I've played this game (don't worry, there have been sober times, so you don't have to disregard this entire review ;-) ). Playing whilst inebriated makes this good game even better, assuming that people aren't near-passing-out-drunk. Trying to perform your best in the mini-games under these conditions makes the game even more humorous. If you're into drinking, I'd recommend checking this game out while doing so. It's not called Mario Party for no reason.
Play this game!!
If you couldn't tell from everything I've said, I'd recommend this game to anyone with two hands and functioning eyes. Just be forewarned, if you don't play with 4 people, you will hate the computer players. Outside of that, the game is awesome. If you've never played it, check it (or one of the other Mario Party games) out as soon as you can. It's guaranteed to entertain, and to provide some laughs.
Recommended:
Yes
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Epinions.com ID:
fallenjesusboy
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Member: Mark Pulver
Location: Michigan, U.S.
Reviews written: 24
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Fallen Jesus-Boy has left the building (with profile page still messed up -- thanks guys!).
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