Mario Party tends to evoke a range of emotions. Some who grew up with this particular brand of star-starved, mini-game-driven chaos love the randomness and friction – the feeling that a comical series of mistakes can send you from first to last place or vice versa at any moment. Others think it’s crazy. I think if any party could influence hearts to some extent Super Mario Party Jamboree might have a try.
Super Mario Party Jamboree appears as the third series entry for the Switch. The first, Super Mario Partywas innovative yet divisive, and its successor, Mario Party Superstarswas nostalgic but felt a little safe, focusing on the staple boards and mini-games. The legacy of these two predecessors becomes tangible in the third: Super Mario Party Jamboree It feels like you’ve learned the good and the bad from both of them Super And Superstars.
In his board game game Super Mario Party Jamboree Keeps the core mechanics of Mario Party in focus. Players take turns rolling the dice and moving around the game board. Each round is interrupted by a mini-game. Get the most stars and you win. While each game starts slowly, it gradually escalates as more items and events are added, leading to surprise, chaos and sometimes big swings in the race to the top.
There’s a wide range of characters, from Mario classics to silly little guys like Spike, Ninji and my personal favorite, Monty Mole. In Mario’s Rainbow Castle and Western Land there are seven game boards with five new layouts and two returning game boards. Each is pretty solid, with some really great individual board mechanics.
Image: Nintendo via Polygon
Image: Nintendo via Polygon
Image: Nintendo via Polygon
Image: Nintendo via Polygon
Roll ‘Em Raceway, for example, is a race track with fantastic lap mechanics and some really fun turbo dice that make the race for the most traveled bonus star extremely competitive. Goomba Lagoon was a surprise hit in local multiplayer; The rising and falling tide can create isolated pockets on the board, forcing players to use more movement items like pipes and warp blocks if they don’t want to get stuck. And as far as the classics go, Western Land is still just as good as I remember it from my N64 days. They’re not all bangers, but the quality of the board is generally above average.
A welcome revision is the how jamboree reworks the ally system of Super Mario Party. Now when a random Mario character falls onto the board as a potential helper, all you have to do is pass through them, similar to a star. Once you do this, a mini-game to gain their loyalty begins, with the passing player getting a small advantage for getting there first.
These special mini-games are a highlight of Super Mario Party Jamboree. Speedrunning puzzle rooms to save Luigi from a spooky mansion or Waluigi’s predictably over-the-top, self-aggrandizing pinball machine are great fun against both computers and friends. Others are just a few normal mini-games strung together, but are still a fun activity with an ultimately huge reward.
Image: Nintendo via Polygon
Jamboree Buddies are strong Super Mario Party Jamboree and can radically change the balance of the game. If you have an ally, you gain their passive ability and double everything; two rewards from fields, the purchase of two items in the shop and even the chance to get two stars from one field instead of one. The mates are also fickle as hell, leaving one behind for a passer as soon as the second one runs past. It’s not surprising to get an ally and then see it stolen by a passing player.
Thanks in particular to the Double Star mechanic, your chances of winning can increase dramatically Super Mario Party Jamboree. There are comeback mechanics, whether through items or simply by a Boo stealing a few coins or a star, but I’ve had a few games where players took a very early lead and held it until the end.
However, there are some ways to mitigate the randomness. The new Pro Rules option eliminates most of the randomness and limits Mario Party to something that I think feels strategic. Items have limited stock in stores, players vote on mini-games, and random slots only have certain options that you can select, to name a few. Even the boo stealing coins only needs a set amount rather than starting a fight between the ghost and the chosen player.
It’s an interesting take on Mario Party, although I found the Pro rules more of a novelty rather than something I’d switch to all the time. While regulating chaos is interesting in its own way, and I liked some of the settings enough to transfer them to my regular Mario Party setup (the mini-game tuning is really nice), I love classic chaos just too much.
Image: Nintendo via Polygon
What is really surprising? jamboree is how much it offers outside of the motherboards. There are a few different defined mini-game options, be it the classic mini-game bay or other, sometimes strange, side activities with its own custom-made party island in the rotunda. Toad’s Item Factory is a neat little puzzle collection where players move their Joy-Cons to operate machines and ultimately build items to purchase on a Mario Party board. Playing in a group might be fun, but trust me: playing this whole section alone is like having your head patted and your stomach rubbed after a while.
Feeling ripped from a completely different game, Paratroopa Flight School allows players to extend their Joy-Cons vertically from their bodies and transform the Mario brothers into Daedalus and Icarus, flying around in either competitive or co-op modes. It’s fun, but the novelty quickly wore off. Might not be bad as an alternative arm workout Ring fit But people. And Rhythm Kitchen puts a cooking competition twist on the beat party fest, tasking you with flipping flapjacks and seasoning sauces to the rhythm. Most of them seem a bit bizarre for a Mario Party game, almost like discards 1-2 switch concepts, but they’re nice gimmicks for groups that don’t want to compete with each other.
The meatier side dishes in Super Mario Party Jamboree are the Koopathlon and Bowser Kaboom Squad. In the former, up to 20 players race around a track and complete quick mini-games to progress. Sometimes it’s really hectic and it was a lot of fun. I could imagine this being the option for someone who wants to do a quick online battle rather than a full board run.
Meanwhile, in the Bowser Kaboom Squad, players work together to load a cannon with bombs and take down a rampaging impostor Bowser. More co-op options are always welcome, and it was tons of fun dodging the angry Bowser as he rained fire and stomped around. I could imagine this working well for parties where people don’t want to worry about winning or losing and just want to work together to defeat Bowser – a cooperative feeling that Mario Party doesn’t always evoke.
Image: Nintendo via Polygon
Take a decent, if short, solo tour of the new game boards in the single-player Party Planner mode and Super Mario Party Jamboree is packed to the brim with things to do. Previous Mario Party games have sometimes felt torn between two ideas: playing the hits that made Mario Party the chaotic, exciting party game it once was, and doing something new with a decades-old concept make. jamboreeWe managed to achieve both in terms of the quality and quantity of the offering.
There is one much to do, but that doesn’t mean it takes a particularly long time to see everything. Many of these side games and solo modes can be completed in a few hours. Rather, it feels that way jamboree wants to make sure that no matter what type of party you bring it to, you’re sure to find something here that people would love to play. Get competitive with a standard Mario Party board or just play some fun mini-games in the bay. Chop up some vegetables to get everyone moving and laughing, or defeat Bowser in a cooperative PvE mission.
The expanded number of boards and modes as well as the solid roster of characters should be enough to make it through Super Mario Party Jamboree One of the better ways to play these chaotic board games on the Switch. And nothing really gets lost in the stack. Some modes may feel a little thin after half a dozen hours, but new players will still find them fun to try out every now and then. jamboree is something I’ll probably keep installed on my Switch for a while, just so I always have it on hand.
If this is the last big party for the Nintendo Switch, then it’s a fitting farewell. Super Mario Party Jamboree has plenty of ways to keep the party going while the Switch still shows up at parties.
Super Mario Party Jamboree was released on October 17th on Nintendo Switch. The game was tested on Nintendo Switch using a pre-download code provided by Nintendo. Vox Media has affiliate partnerships. These have no influence on the editorial content, although Vox Media may earn commissions for products purchased through affiliate links. More information about Polygon’s ethics policy can be found here.
