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I want a new Super Mario Bros game. Switch 2 The game is like everyone else’s, but almost a year into the console’s first year, that still hasn’t happened. Mario Kart? mario tennis? Mario Party? Yes. New Yoshi game? This will happen soon too. And now, we have the next thing closer: the wonderful 2023 Super Mario Bros Wonder It has a Switch 2 downloadable content pack for $20, which is sort of a new Mario game, just a week before Super Mario Galaxy movie It arrives in theaters.
I’ve been playing it for the past week, and it’s worth the upgrade if you like Mario multiplayer. If not, well, you might consider it anyway.
The strangely named “Super Mario Bros. Wonder – Nintendo Switch 2 Edition + Meetup in Bellabel Park” is a plus for Wonder, but it’s really just focused on building out a full suite of multiplayer party modes. New course variants and minigame challenges, while welcome, require online multiplayer or local multiplayer to work. For most of the new Switch 2 update, you can’t play offline on your own.
The multiplayer games cover dozens of challenges and themes – some turn everyone into bouncy balls, others have everyone scrambling to collect the most coins. Throw in up to four players locally on the Switch 2 at home or up to 12 players online at once, and it gets busy quickly. I can see the screaming erupting with the children.
I played for an hour or so of multiplayer sessions, and it was fun. But I haven’t been able to play with a lot of others online yet otherwise. However, it feels like a sort of Mario Party Super Mario Style game, as opposed to the Super Mario Bros. game extensions.
The DLC has some extras that you can still enjoy for yourself. Seven new mini-boss stages have been added to the game, featuring all the Koopalings you’ll encounter. They’re the expansive universe of Mario’s enemies, and in each level the mini-boss uses a strange new power to melt the world in clever ways.
The new Toad Brigade Training Camp mode also offers dozens of challenging mini-stages to overcome, all of which are remixes of existing Wonder levels. Some of them involve surviving without touching enemies or coins; Sometimes you have to defeat all the enemies or collect all the coins before time runs out. They’re addictive and challenging, and I’m glad I have them.
The attractions at Bellabel Park are designed somewhat like a small amusement park.
Nintendo also tried to add some fun additions: Bellabel’s garden has a lot of flowers that you can collect by watering the plants with the “Bellabel Water” that you collect by completing quests. You can decorate parts of the garden. It’s neither here nor there for me, because I come to the core Mario games to play fun levels, not to decorate the gardens. Pokemon Bucopia It’s the right place for that.
Rosalina and Luma Star are two additional playable characters, but Rosalina doesn’t really do anything new and Luma Star is a co-op option. There’s also a strange flower power-up that now turns you into a walking flower pot, throwing flowers upwards to attack enemies or hit blocks. It was fine. They’re not my favorite new additions.
I love the new stages and challenges. I just wish there was more to the single player modes.
Maybe that’s what seems to be missing here: Wonder has thrown all kinds of wildcards into the game, from new enemies to exotic Wonder Seeds that transform the levels. Bellabel Park feels more like a remix focused on multiplayer than a collection of new single-player games.
I like point-and-click multiplayer games more than the Switch 2 addition of Mario Party Jamboree. It’s probably worth it if you’re a Switch 2 owner and have a large family or a lot of friends who want to play.
And while I appreciate the graphics fidelity boost, the Switch 2’s graphics upgrade is harder to spot since the game’s “older” graphics have a retro look that still looked great before the upgrade (to me, at least).
What I really want, of course, is a really new Mario game. Who doesn’t? This is not on the table yet. But maybe, just maybe, Wonder’s Switch 2 bundle will serve as a small appetizer before that news finally comes. But as remastered Switch 2 game releases go, Wonder’s additions are the best of the best and turn this game into a truly rich bundle of multiplayer fun.