Top Ten Best Things About Modern Mario Party

It's 2007. The last few Mario Party games have just been released: Mario Party 8 and Mario Party DS. Both of them received very little praise, if any at all. They were generally forgotten.

There were now a total of nine Mario Party games, all of which used the same type of gameplay. At this point, Hudson Soft had run completely out of ideas for new games, so they just stopped. When there are nine games with the same formula, you are bound to run out of ideas at some point.

However, hope was not lost, not yet. Some of the workers of Hudson Soft founded Nd Cube and developed a brand-new Mario Party game, revolutionizing the entire franchise: Mario Party 9. The gameplay was similar to Mario Party Advance but improved in every possible way. Boss battles appeared like in Mario Party DS, but they added more and improved them to perfection.

This is one of the reasons Mario Party 9 is one of my favorite video games of all time. Each game after that offered lots of new things and new gameplay mechanics, and it's great. While sadly, Super Mario Party betrayed originality with its stale and bland gameplay, which is a disgrace to classic Mario Party, the other games luckily didn't.

I talked a bit about this on the "It's Striving for Originality" item, and this item is somewhat similar, but not really. That item was about originality, while this is about the differences between each game.

I mentioned how Mario Party 9 revolutionized the series with its fresh gameplay, where you drive a car from point A to point B on a big map. Not everyone likes this, but I certainly do.

It was brought back in Mario Party 10, which added new elements to the formula. Now you can play "Bowser Party," where you are constantly chased by Bowser after each round, and you must survive him. It's a lot of fun. Mario Party 10 also added amiibo party, which is essentially the older games but with amiibo. While the boards were barebones compared to the classics, it's original and makes this game stand out.

Mario Party: Island Tour is unique because it blends the classic formula and car gameplay into one, and it's awesome. Even more excellent is that each board in this game has its own goals and gameplay styles, making it super great. There are seven boards, so you have seven original ideas that are all great, at least in my opinion.

Mario Party: Star Rush is definitely the most unique of the bunch. There are seven game modes, and the main one, Toad Scramble, is unlike anything we've seen before. You control a Toad that walks around a map to get as many coins, stars, allies, and beat as many bosses as possible. It's awesome. The other game modes are fun as well, excluding Balloon Bash and Rhythm Recital. Also, this game introduced a hub world.

Mario Party: The Top 100 is a collection of 100 minigames from previous console Mario Party games, and it has a few game modes that come with it. It's pretty cool, in my opinion. Super Mario Party goes back to the classic formula. While it's not original, it stands out from the other games in the series. The hub world is back from Star Rush but improved in every way, with lots of new game modes,... more

I personally appreciate this feature as it makes these games feel like real Mario Party games, not just random video games with Mario characters in them. When the boards and settings are based around real Mario places, it becomes a lot more fun for me.

Mario Party 9 has a lot of New Super Mario Bros. Wii influence on its boards. Toad Road is based on World 1, Boo's Horror Castle on the ghost house levels, Blooper Beach on World 4, and Magma Mine is a bit based on World 8 while keeping original ideas. Bowser Station is a bit of a Super Mario Galaxy-based level, and Donkey Kong's Jungle Ruins is definitely inspired by Donkey Kong Returns.

Mario Party 10 had more original ideas for their boards while still being inspired mainly by New Super Mario Bros. U. With the exception of Mushroom Park, which was based on Mario Super Sluggers, the rest are from the other game. Haunted Trail is the ghost part of World 5, Whimsical Waters is definitely Sparkling Waters, Airship Central is a bit of Meringue Clouds, and Chaos Castle is based on Peach's Castle.

Island Tour and Star Rush had some exceptions, as Island Tour picked many original ideas instead of being inspired. However, I'll admit that Banzai Bill's Mad Mountain is inspired by World 6 in New Super Mario Bros. Wii, and Rocket Road is Super Mario Galaxy influenced. Star-Crossed Skyway is based on Mario Party 9, but that's only three out of seven. Even the Bowser level seems completely unrelated to a normal Bowser stage in a typical Mario game.

As for Star Rush, there isn't much to say. It has five worlds, each containing three levels, and they are basic. World 0 is grasslands, World 1 is a beach, World 2 is a ghost house, World 3 is candyland, and World 4 is Bowser's Castle.

Super Mario Party was like the older entries and kept only original ideas with no influence from other games (although King Bob-Omb's Powderkeg Mine was a bit similar to World 4-3 from Mario Party: Star... more

Oh boy, this is controversial. But in all seriousness, I thought this gimmick was great. Everyone hates this gimmick found in Mario Party 9 and Mario Party 10 because it takes away the freedom to go where you want, and it's linear and made the boards shorter. Funny enough, I disliked the classic formula because the games took too long and it was hard at times figuring out where everyone was, although I liked the freedom to roam where you wanted.

Personally, I liked the car a lot because it required a lot of teamwork. Everyone had to work together to get to the goal and decide paths. It's fun, in my opinion.

Can't wait for radical classic fanboys to shout, "YOU ARE SO WRONG, STOP LOVING MODERN MARIO PARTY!"

Now, before people shout "Life isn't fair, get used to it," I get it. However, that doesn't mean you shouldn't strive to make life as fair as possible. An example of fairness in these games is when you complete minigames. Even if someone won, the rest would get rewards too. First place gets the best reward, then second, third, and lastly, fourth.

I don't want to compare too much to the classics so that I don't sound like a whiny classic hater, but for instance, when a minigame was completed, only one person could get rewards, and that was the one who came first. It was a bit unfair if the second person had worked really hard to get their reward. Oh well, I liked how they did it here.

In classic Mario Party games, there was something called Chance Time. I haven't played a lot of classic Mario Party, but I have played Mario Party 5, and these things infuriated me. The classic Mario Party games were mostly about skill and working your way to the top. When this luck-based gimmick occurred, it was completely random if you'd win or not.

You might say that modern Mario Party is very luck-based overall, but to be honest, would you rather work hard to get your earnings and then go down to fourth place, or have a lot of luck and skill already blended into the gameplay? The modern entries were naturally luck-based, and it didn't really matter if you lost a lot because getting back to first place would be easy. Someone else on the team might lose everything on the next turn due to luck. There was also a lot of skill in the modern games at times, so I feel like it's more balanced.

Again, this is more of a subjective reason, but personally, the soundtracks are really good. Mario Party: Star Rush didn't really have a strong soundtrack, I'll admit, and Super Mario Party's soundtrack is pretty bland overall. But the others, in my opinion, had great soundtracks.

Mario Party 9 and Island Tour are the big winners. In 9, all the soundtracks sound so happy yet so adventurous, and I really appreciate them so much.

Island Tour is the nostalgia-kicker here, so I'm a bit biased, but it just has epic songs for me personally. 10 was another relatively decent soundtrack-bringer. However, the other two games bring this item down a little.