Mario & Luigi: Brothership is Nintendo’s big game for the Nintendo Switch this holiday season. How is the platforming duo’s latest RPG spin-off adventure shaping up? According to a new string of previews, it’s about as delightful as you’d expect, though perhaps missing that spark that might take it to the next level or make it feel like a true evolution of the long-running handheld series.
Out November 7, Mario & Luigi: Brothership sees the titular brothers explore a new tropical region of islands called Concordia where they meet old friends and new enemies on their turn-based combat-fueled journey. Its the first entry in the series that originated on the Game Boy Advance to arrive on more powerful hardware and the 3D makeover looks great while still preserving the vibrant, cartoony-look of the earlier games. But how does it play?
The game revolves around connecting separate islands to the main hub of Shipsale. Mario and Luigi’s hammer and jump attacks are still controlled with their respective A and B buttons, but a new feature called Luigi Logic lets the taller brother roam off on his own to fetch things or automatically shadow Mario across the game’s more varied terrain. The series’ rhythm-infused turn-based combat, meanwhile, is augmented by new items called Battle Plugs that players craft that grant special bonuses to critical hit rates and other stats.
Andy Robinson at VGC writes that the game “feels like the triumphant final flourish in Mario’s RPG comeback year.” He added that the game ran smoothly during his demo, despite all the visual flourishes (unlike the recent frame rate stuttering in The Legend of Zelda: Echoes of Wisdom), leading the experience overall to feel “vibrant and dynamic, just like the classic games which spawned it.”
Eric Francisco at GamesRadar was similarly impressed, not necessarily by the underlying gameplay so much as the overall vibes. “It’s clear that there’s little in the way of mechanical innovation in this successor,” he writes. “Yet, the little things, the dressings and accoutrements to this mushroom dish, have left me thinking about it for days. They’re enough to justify this brotherly reunion entirely.”
Tom Phillips at Eurogamer thought the game was similarly pleasing despite the familiar formula and repetitive battles thanks in large part to all the little touches and quirky characters that fill out its world. “Seeing the brothers turn into a spaceship, getting caught out by a tricksy enemy’s attack pattern in combat, going on a quest to recover hair wax for a faded Concordian pop star—I found plenty in Mario & Luigi: Brothership that raised a smile,” he writes.
Michael McWhertor at Polygon lauded some of the new ideas in the game even though if he found the hands-on demo a bit more uneven. “The most enticing aspects of it are the depth of combat, a branching narrative, and a cast of colorful electrical outlet-themed characters,” he writes. “I have some reservations about how it plays—the game’s performance was a little chunky and battles didn’t feel as snappy as past handheld Mario & Luigis did—but I’m still excited about a new entry in the Mario & Luigi franchise nonetheless.”
Steve Watts at GameSpot had a more specific criticism that I could see being unnecessarily frustrating without an option to swap controls in the settings. “I was, however, slightly disoriented by the way the menu confirmation works,” he writes. “Mario’s button prompts are always mapped to A and Luigi’s are always mapped to B, as usual for the series. But when selecting an attack from the menu, A is confirm and B is cancel regardless of which brother you’re selecting. That means remembering that when choosing a Mario attack, you use A to confirm and then A to perform the timing prompts, but when choosing a Luigi attack, you use A to confirm and then immediately switch to B for the timing prompts. I’m sure it would come to me with practice, but during the short preview session, I got my wires crossed and flubbed the timing on more than one occasion.”
Leanne Butkovic at IGN was cautious about making any grand pronouncements based on the limited demo time, but came away hopeful the newest Mario & Luigi has enough gas in the tank for its entire adventure. “There’s a chance that Brothership fizzles out as the story chugs along, or that using Battle Plugs becomes rote,” she writes. “But, given that so many other facets of the gameplay immediately struck me as so well thought-out, I’m holding out hope that the franchise has learned plenty of lessons over the course of five games and two remakes to create something that feels fresh and whole.”
Mario & Luigi: Brothership is one of the last chances for the Switch to go out with a bang, although people have been predicting that for years even as Nintendo keeps stretching out the life of its handheld hybrid to be the longest in its console-making history. At the very least it seems destined to be a joy-sparking crowd-pleaser heading into the end of the year.