Mario + Rabbids Sparks of Hope tips: 9 things to know before starting

Mario + Rabbids Sparks of Hope may look sweet as a peach, but your circumstances can turn sour on a dime. Developed by Ubisoft’s Milan and Paris and now available for Nintendo Switch, the turn-based tactics game is often as tough as the genre’s titans – not exactly what you’d expect from one XCOM– like talking rabbits with a wry smile. Here are nine tips and tricks to know beforehand (wow! hey! Hooray!) jump in.

You don’t have to defeat every enemy

Sometimes your goal is to defeat every enemy in a mission, but not always. A mission may task you with reaching a specific area. (Bonus tip: you only need one character to complete the objective.) Another might require you to survive five rounds a la into the breach, or eliminate a number of Darkmess nodes scattered across the battlefield. Focus on the goal, not on clearing the field, and you’re set.

Don’t worry about running out of health

It’s a natural assumption for those steeped in turn-based games: a character must complete a battle to earn XP. Not with me Mario + Rabbids Sparks of Hope. In this sequel, all your characters level up at the same rate, regardless of whether they participated in a battle or survived it. Yes, if a character goes down for the count then any fight you find yourself in becomes significantly more difficult. (You don’t unlock a revive ability until far into the game.) But don’t worry about it putting this character behind the rest of your party.

Also my condolences to genre purists, but there is no such thing as permadeath.

Be careful when restarting

Fact of life: In tactical games, sometimes you screw up. Even though Mario + Rabbids Sparks of Hope doesn’t give you the ability to reset a single round, you can start battles from scratch. However, if you find yourself in one of the game’s multi-battle missions, be careful. Make sure you select the Restart Target option instead of the Restart Combat option. Otherwise you will repeat the mission from the beginning in the first battle.

stay close together

It can be tempting to divide and conquer, sending your party all over the board to take down enemies. Resist this temptation. Otherwise, you could let a party member down.

in the Mario + Rabbids Sparks of Hope, each character can team jump once per turn – literally bouncing off an ally’s head (later abilities may increase this number for certain characters). A team jump allows a party member to glide for a few seconds, greatly increasing their range of movement. This ability is key for getting the enemy team out of sight, but it’s far more helpful for getting a wounded ally out of an enemy’s line of sight. And to keep that option open, you need to at least have your trio relatively close together.

Use your sparks and skills first

Each character can spend two action points per turn, allowing them to use a standard attack, special ability, item, or spark. (Movement abilities like sprints, stomps, and team jumps don’t count towards this total, although most characters can only perform these once per turn.) Many sparks grant stat buffs to every character in your party, as long as they’re in range of the character using it activated. In most cases it is advantageous to use these effects before

Image: Ubisoft/Nintendo

Customize your loadout at the start of each battle

At the start of each battle, you can click the left stick to get a bird’s-eye view of the battlefield. You take control of Beep-O, your sturdy if somewhat unnerving drone companion, and can zoom around the map and view detailed info on enemy resistances and weaknesses by tapping the A button. (You can also do this in the middle of a fight, but then you won’t have the option to change your gear.) Take the time to plan before you start the fight and equip any elemental sparks that do are giving you the advantage.

Plus, there are a handful of moments when new characters – like Bowser and Rabbid Rosalina – join your team. Before getting into these fights, open your character menu (Y key). You can assign Sparks to new allies (although their skill trees are locked until after the fight), giving you an advantage you might otherwise miss out on.

Don’t use your star potions

There are two ways to level Sparks. You can spend Starbits, a currency you earn by defeating enemies and completing missions. Or you could use a Star Potion that automatically increases a Spark’s level by one. Sparks increase exponentially; Jumping to level two requires 100 Star Bits, reaching level three requires 200 Star Bits, level four requires 350 Star Bits, and so on. It’s better to hold on to your Star Potions until the higher tiers – Sparks max out at level five – when it costs more to level up.

Image: Nintendo/Ubisoft via Polygon

Know what to look for when exploring

Mario + Rabbids Sparks of Hope game does not fully explain how to use the various traversal methods available to you, nor what you can get for them. You can spin like a top while standing on swirl shaped symbols to reveal hidden treasures. Use Beep-O’s Wave ability (ZR key) to smash cracked walls to open secret paths. In the middle of the game, you can use Beep-O’s (ZL key) scan ability to uncover all kinds of invisible secrets, shortcuts, and bonus items. Here’s a complete list of what to look out for.

Complete (most) side quests

Most side quests will reward you with a planet coin upon completion. You can spend planetary coins on cosmetics like weapon skins, but you can also save a good deal for something far more important: a key to that planet’s “secret zone.” Secret zones are indicated (and also marked on your map) by a semi-circular, rainbow-colored door. Usually little more than a rudimentary environmental puzzle with the occasional fight, you get a new spark for each completed zone. If you want to get all 30 sparks, you’ll need to complete most of the game’s side quests.