Nintendo have again deviated from usual Mario sports developer Camelot, choosing to run with Next Level Games, a new production team who just happens to be made up of alumni from the popular party title Sega Soccer Slam. As a result, the game plays a lot like Sega’s football title – matches are fast paced, high scoring affairs. That and the single player portions of both games are almost utterly useless.
Somewhere in amongst all that flashing light is a ball. No, really!
Mario Smash Footbal subscribes heavily to the arcade football formula. Players pick a team captain, who is one of the main Mushroom Kingdom crew; Mario, Luigi, Peach, Daisy, Yoshi and so on. You then select which smaller character will take on the roll of your 3 supporting players; Toad, Hammer Bros. or Koopa are the sort of guys you get here. A Kremling takes on the role of goal keeper, regardless of your previous selections. Depending on your game mode, you’ll then be able to pick a field, though this is a purely aesthetic choice (though the hidden field seems to suffer frame rate drops).
The game of soccer featured within Smash Football is reasonably simplistic, though there are a few special moves which can be learned quite quickly. On offence, there are the one timer shots and the Smash techniques, which are unique to your player. Simply hold the B button, and let go at the right point on the meter and you’re off – two goals if you get the shot in, too. Unfortunately, players will find that many matches breakdown into who can execute these special moves the fastest – but there are mechanisms in the game for preventing, namely the defensive techniques; the slide tackle, and the shoulder charge. Hit a player who’s too close to the edge of the field and they’ll receive a friendly jolt of electricity. This doesn’t work on the goalkeepers – they have a tendency to send you into the fence, thanks to their invulnerability.
One of the Hammer Brothers receives an educational shock
On top of manoeuvres you can execute at the drop of a hat, Mario Smash Football has a number of Mario-themed powerups, the types we’ve come to expect in these sports titles – green shells, red shells and Bob-ombs are helpful for disrupting the offence, while the mushroom will give you that extra bit of speed for making a quick break. At random intervals in a match, players will get a random visit from Bowser, who’ll wreak havoc upon all competitors on the field, regardless of their alignment. It’s pretty good the first few times it happens, but can become upsetting (to wiener players) in tight matches. Bowser can be turned off when setting up the match options if you so wish.
That’s really all there is to Mario Smash Football. It’s not a terrible game by any means - in fact, it’s quite fun at times, but it would really have been nice to have a bit of depth to the squad selection process as previously seen in Mario Superstar Baseball. In fact, that would have helped to extend the life of the game’s single player mode, which are essentially two sets of 4 round robin tournaments plagued by ridiculously easy AI. So easy, in fact, that even the most skill-challenged player will need to put the difficulty setting to hard after 3 matches to get the slightest bit of challenge, and even then, score spreads of 7-10 goals are not uncommon. There are a few unlockables, mainly linked to the games achievements (such as getting 50 smash goals, and such) and winning the cups, but those only amounts to a new stadium, extra team and a few cheats. The game is best enjoyed with 3 friends, but even then, the game’s lack of depth and choice when compared to other arcade soccer titles may result in little play time at multiplayer gatherings. It’s still fun while it lasts, though.
Spontaneous combustion is a bit of a problem in the modern game
Mario Smash Football features a graphical style not unlike the other Mario sports titles – you can see pretty easily that the art assets used are fairly standard stuff for a game featuring Mario & friends. The on-field characters do look reasonably good and have pretty smooth animation, even if they are a little recycled. The stadiums are also reasonable well constructed, each following a theme appropriate to at least one Mario universe character, though the spectators are nothing to write home about – the typical ”five steamrolled guys repeated ad nauseum” rule applies. The flow of play is solid thanks to the game running at 60 frames per second, though it can drop when too many special effects are active at one time. Play will also slow down for one-timers and Smash goals, but this is a typical Matrix-inspired effect. The soundtrack consists mainly of guitar riffs with a few nods to classic Mario music, and the usual crew of voice actors such as Charles Martinet and Jennifer Hale return to voice Mario, Peach and the gang. Mario Smash Football has support for widescreen displays, as well as Dolby Pro Logic II.
We really expected more of Mario’s foray into soccer, considering how many soccer games in the past have pulled off a balance between accessibility and depth, not to mention the standard of quality in previous Mario sports titles. It’s a real surprise that the single player portion of the game is so under baked, despite the wealth of content featured in the baseball, tennis and golf games – it’s almost like the game is worthless without a few friends. Nevertheless, Mario Smash Football is a fun game while it’s fresh, but it doesn’t take too long to wear thin.
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