I’m not sure what’s harder to believe: the fact that there hasn’t been a fresh Mario & Luigi game in almost a decade, or the series never getting a full console game. Whichever fact you find more shocking, Mario and Luigi: Brotherhood it’s a huge deal. Not only is this a great comeback for a beloved RPG series that was on the brink of being lost, but it’s also a chance for Nintendo to prove that it’s not just a handheld game. I wouldn’t call it a winning moment, but it’s still the type of game where it’s vital to play the game well.
Fortunately, it looks like Nintendo is taking this task very seriously. I played for over an hour during the preview event Brotherhood. This segment would reintroduce me to the familiar time-based combat and some fresh animations that give the series a up-to-date, cartoonish refresh. But Brotherhood it’s not just the elderly Mushroom Kingdom adventure with a fresh look; features a brilliant fresh combat system that could redefine the series on its maiden journey to console.
Sail away
Mario and Luigi: Brotherhood has Italian paisanos sailing on a ship and going to various islands in search of adventures. The basic flow of the game is for players to locate an island from the bow of their ship, shoot it with a cannon, and find a plug on it to tie it to the ship. This not only allows the brothers to quickly travel back at any time, but also creates routes between other islands connected to the ship. If you return to the island after connecting to another one, you may encounter fresh guests there with side quests to share.
As a result, the adventure is not completely linear. The first 30-minute portion of my demo dropped me on Twistee Island, which is the second or third island that players can explore depending on their choices. There are also smaller islands to visit that may contain mini-games or other minor challenges. It’s kind of like The Legend of Zelda: The Windwakeralthough players do not directly control the ship. Instead, they can set a course somewhere in the ocean and explore the ship’s node in real time as it moves (those who don’t want to wait can speed this up by talking to Toad).
While it’s all fresh, things get a little more familiar when I hop onto Twistee Island for my first mission. Here I am introduced to the classically silly story of Mario and Luigi. It’s an island full of dancers, but the boss doesn’t feel up to it because his handsome cap has fallen off. Unfortunately, his dancing powers are needed to grow a tree in the center of the island, the leaves of which form a path to the plug needed to connect the island to my ship. I go on a uncomplicated quest to find some hair wax and fight a few enemies along the way.
The RPG combat is immediately familiar, although with a bit more life. I have to press buttons at the right moment to attack and dodge. The A button controls Mario’s jump and the X button controls his sword. Luigi is controlled with B and Y. When I attack with one, I don’t have to just press the button once at the right moment. Instead, I have to complete a miniature sequence of alternating commands while Mario and Luigi work together. For example, if I jump as Mario, I hit A to dash at the enemy, B to bounce off Luigi’s feet, and then A again to finish the attack. This is all just a little more lively than previous entries.
What really sells this change is Brotherhoodfresh art style. Like Super Mario Bros. Miraclethis RPG features much more expressive animations that make Mario feel more like a cartoon character. This is not only evident in cutscenes, as the brothers crash-land on the island in slapstick fashion; details are everywhere. At one point I exploit the right stick to activate a power that briefly turns Mario and Luigi into UFOs to travel faster for a moment. When in this form, they trot in a tango-like form and even jump together with a synchronized flourish. When I press the button to transform them into a human UFO, my eyes are met with a colorful sight as they both spin around each other.
While it looks great in motion, there are a few moments where I may be sensing the age of the Switch. Character models can look scratchy when standing still, and colors aren’t always as energetic as you might think. I imagine this is more of a foundation for a fresh art style that the series may adopt in the future, rather than a final draft. If that’s the case, it’s a great start to a series that needed a bit of visual flourish to make it feel more distinct in a sea of Mushroom Kingdom spin-offs.
Connecting
The second part of my demo took me a few hours forward, to the circus-inspired island of Merrygo. Here I was tasked with finding Princess Peach. To do this, I would have to go through a rotating maze while also fighting some irate birds and spiny creatures, which would require me to think carefully about when to exploit hammers and when to exploit boots. More importantly, this segment of the game also revealed more of Brotherhood’s fresh battle layers. It started with some early Brothers moves where I alternated between kicking A and B missiles at enemies.
However, what is completely fresh is the addition of combat plug-ins. While playing, players can collect currency which they exploit to unlock passive perks that can be activated in battle. These are represented on screen as plugs that plug into an outlet (I had two to work with in the demo, but more will become available throughout the adventure). I could change the plug-ins I had as a free action at any point during battle (or outside of battle). The only catch is that the plugs burn out after a certain number of turns and must be recharged before you can exploit them again.
Plugins can have all sorts of effects. One made it easier for me to time my counterattacks and dodges. Another had me automatically using Mushroom when a character’s health was too low. However, the funniest ones have combat effects that work with other plug-ins. When I got into a battle with a bird, I switched plug-ins to ones that always dealt critical damage to flying enemies, and ones that dropped a spiked metal ball on them when they made a perfectly timed move. When I jumped on the bird, I did a lot of damage from both a critical hit and being hit by a stray ball.
This idea adds a whole fresh layer of strategy to the button timing system, which can become repetitive in this type of RPG game. Each turn I thought strategically before unloading my attack so I could figure out how to maximize my turn. Let’s say I fought three enemies, with one spiky one in the middle. I could equip a plug-in that increases hammer damage to spiked enemies, but also one that causes additional damage to both sides of the enemy I’m attacking. This allowed me to maximize my damage to the medium enemy while still dealing damage to surrounding enemies. When I switched to Luigi, perhaps I could have predicted that difficult-to-dodge attacks would come my way. I could plug in a power that would make counters easier, as well as another that would augment the damage of successful counters. Even more thoughtful combinations can be found; combining a plug that causes burns with one that dizzy the enemy creates a fire tornado when the brothers attack.
Not only is it the most inventive system I’ve seen in a Mario RPG in over a decade, but it’s also an inventive RPG battle system even outside of the series. And while some players may bemoan the loading system that limits players from relying on one failed build, it encourages players to experiment and discover fresh synergies. More plug-ins are unlocked depending on the number of players, so you’ll be able to discover fresh combinations as you adventure. I’m especially curious what will be possible after unlocking additional plug slots.
The final piece of the RPG puzzle comes when the brothers level up. Each level gains stat upgrades to everything you’d expect from the series (including the critical-boosting Stache stat), but there’s one extra customization element. Every few levels, players can choose one perk from a list. Once I reach level 15, I will be able to augment EXP gains, give my brother more health, unlock additional accessory slots, and much more. While players cannot minimize Mario or Luigi’s stats, they do allow them to slightly tweak them to their liking.
All of these ideas breathed fresh life into a series that really needed an upgrade. Nintendo’s best franchises are rarely the ones that remain stagnant. Just look at The Legend of Zelda, which has reinvented itself Tears of the Kingdom and again, just a year later, with Echoes of Wisdom. If Mario and Luigi debuted on the home console, it would be another highly anticipated adventure with exactly the same look and feel as those from 2013 Dream teamI think fans would feel a bit disappointed. Everything here, from sailing to plug-ins, feels like fresh territory and I can’t wait to see where the adventure goes.
Mario and Luigi: Brotherhood will be released on November 7 on Nintendo Switch.
