Super Mario Party Jamboree review – Thank your lucky stars

Super Mario Party Jamboree is out, and it’s certainly a mouthful. But, like all Mario Party entries before it, the most recent game serves as the definitive way to play Mario Party – meaning we’re going to stop all this Super Jamboree nonsense early. This is Mario Party – the final entry of the Switch-era games, proving itself a worthy swansong for the series’ as Nintendo readies the firing squad for the now eight-year-old console.

Mario Party is about as feature-filled as we could have hoped, a welcome breath of fresh air for the series after Mario Party Superstars reimagined the series’ more iconic boards and minigames – which served as the perfect answer to whatever the hell Super Mario Party is. Sure, Jamboree occasionally reminds you of its storied history along the way, but it’s overflowing with so many new ideas that culminate in something wholly new.

Rewriting the basics

Mario Party isn’t short of content. Right as your eyes begin to adjust from the blast of colour when you boot up the game, you’ll be introduced to the boards and asked to pick a character. Unlike Super Mario Party, this won’t affect any gameplay – but there is some strategy required that we’ll get to later. Just pick a character, explain to the surrounding group that it’s been years since you last played, and get going.

Then it comes time to choose what’s on the menu. There’s the classic party mode you know and love, but Nintendo’s thrown in a couple of other ‘modes’ that simply aren’t Mario Party. These are Paratroopa Flight School, Toad’s Item Factory, and Rhythm Kitchen – motion games that take between 5-20 minutes to complete, utterly struggling to hold our attention for longer than four minutes a piece.

Stick to the classics and Mario Party won’t disappoint. There are a total of seven boards. Most unique, some returning. Four of those are unlocked from the word go; Mega Wiggler’s Tree Party, Rainbow Galleria, Goomba Lagoon, and Roll ’em Raceway. These include a range of difficulties – with the more intricate boards containing multiple levels and the best gameplay loops, while the rest offer a more simplistic approach with easier routes.

Mega Wiggler’s Tree Party and Roll ’em Raceway fit the latter, while the remaining two take things to a whole other level. It’s these that’ll see the most hilarity and replayability and are easily the best choice for a first game –whether that pertains to this game or the larger series as a whole. Three more boards will unlock as gameplay progresses, but be warned – they require a fair few games under your belt before MP is ready to hand them over.

Mom watch this, I’m going Pro

If you’re new to Mario Party, the aim is simple: get as many stars as possible, with a bunch of minigames scattered in between. If that means ripping off your friends along the way, whether it be reaching the star’s location ahead of them or sacrificing 50 of those valuable coins to steal it directly, it doesn’t matter. There’s a whole bunch of Mario Party-isms and board-specific gimmicks that become second nature in absolutely no time at all.

At least, that’s the Mario Party schema we’ve known and loved for decades now. Don’t get us wrong – that’s all still here and better than ever – but Jamboree steps up its game with ‘Pro Mode’. Gone is the randomness of classic mode, replaced with a more cohesive, rule-bound experience for the veterans looking to mix it up a little. ‘Pro Mode’ is easily the best addition to the Mario Party formula we’ve seen for quite some time.

Whack on Pro rules and a couple of things will happen. Turns are locked in at 12 – a change from the regular intervals that five classic modes allow – bringing a game’s playtime up to 80 minutes, depending on the skill level of your party. Randomness is thrown out the window in favour of a strict ruleset – disallowing even random minigames and leaving the decision up to the players. Items are fewer and further between, and the likelihood of losing a star – whether to a player or Bowser – shoots up. It’s… amazing.

But it’s also not Mario Party. The chance for something to go horribly, inexplicably wrong is almost the entire point. Fortunately, Nintendo leaves the choice entirely up to the players, for which we are grateful. We’ve found Pro Mode to come in handy when time is short – or we’re simply looking to mix it up – while Classic continues to deliver those iconic moments surrounded by a group of friends with hours to kill.

Bow to the minigame King

We’re not going to delve into the specifics of all 110 minigames, for obvious reasons. What we can tell you is that Nintendo is, for lack of a better word, cooking. We were genuinely surprised to see some of the big hitters from the Mario Party games of yore make a return, but we’re not complaining. There are only so many times Nintendo can reinvent the Domination minigame from Mario Party 4, right?

But it is mostly a new affair on offer here. Nintendo doesn’t restrict anyone looking to play with a Pro, regular, or even singular joy-con controller, with a swathe of games afforded to players sitting in both camps. You do have to make the tough choice to turn off motion minigames entirely at the beginning of a round if anyone isn’t using a joy-con controller, but that’s okay. There are only around ten, anyway.

Apart from a very few minigames that feel nigh impossible to beat as the singular player against three (lookin’ at you, Snow Brawl), the rest are… balanced. They’re not easy, mind you, especially if you’re going up against the CPU. There’s a definite skill issue here that can only be rectified by playing the game regularly. That, combined with a whole bunch of boards, makes Mario Party Jamboree an easy game to revisit regularly.

Accountabilabuddies are a problem

Mario Party has never been afraid of gimmicks, and Jamboree delivers one of the most controversial of all: Jamboree buddies. We’ll admit – they’re not our favourite. Jamboree buddies randomly appear every couple of turns at a random location – selected from a pool of players not chosen to participate in the actual game. Crossing their path will trigger an entire series of minigames to determine who’ll get to take the lucky CPU home.

Whoever that is will see their buddy stick to them like glue for a couple of turns, providing the player with the ability to do two of everything, including rolls, steals, items, and even buying stars. On top of that, each buddy features unique special abilities. That’s where the strategy of choosing your character comes in. Peach, for example, offers up half-price stars when she’s with you, meaning you’d rather avoid playing as her.

The player that triggers the Jamboree minigames is also granted a fairly large advantage, often cementing their place at the top of the leaderboard. It doesn’t help that the longer-than-average minigames bring the game’s pacing to a grinding halt (even if they are kinda fun), nor that they can immediately sway the game in a few turns. There is a counter – walking past someone’s Jamboree buddy to “steal” them – but pulling this off is tricky.

It’s not that the buddy system is a flawed one. In fact, given some serious nerfing, they might even become one of Mario Party’s best assets. We’ll admit scoring a sweet six stars in a single turn was, well, awesome (buying four stars and stealing two). But it immediately shrugs off what was previously a fun game and hands the win to whichever player had the fortune of crossing their paths. There’s no option to turn them off either – in Pro or Classic mode – so it’s just something we’ll have to get used to.

Super Mario Party Jamboree verdict

Players who missed out on the previous two Mario Party entries on the Switch can rest easy knowing that Jamboree is easily the best of the bunch. It costs just as much as its far older siblings on the Switch, so the decision is an easy one – get Jamboree, especially if you can assemble the right group of friends to put Mario Party at the top of the party game pool where it rightfully belongs.