HANDS-ON: Super Mario Party Jamboree could be a can't-miss shindig

I’m a Nintendo fan, which means I’m a Mario Party fan. It’s not the Nintendo franchise I’m most excited about, but I certainly enjoy my time with it. I’ve played every mainline entry and have a bunch of great memories associated with the series. (I also remember plenty of Mario Party fights and heated battles in my younger years that led to some serious familial discord, but that’s for another day!) It’s never a mind-blowing experience, but whenever a Mario Party rolls around, I know I can grab some family or friends and have a good time.

While there’s always enjoyment to get from a Mario Party game, I think we can all agree that some entries are better than others. I’d have to do some considerable soul-searching to figure out my personal hierarchy of Mario Party games, but I know there are installments that feel a bit too mundane and others that really exemplify the party fun. I don’t know what makes for that Mario Party magic, but I know it when I feel it.

This past week, I had the chance to check out Super Mario Party Jamboree. It was part of a demo session where I also spent time with The Legend of Zelda: Echoes of Wisdom. I was pumped to play both games, but most of my excitement was for Echoes of Wisdom. I figured Super Mario Party Jamboree would be a fine time, but Zelda is literally my favorite franchise ever, so it’s hard to top that. Still, when it came time to play Super Mario Party Jamboree, I’d give it my full attention.

Well, I’ll be damned if Super Mario Party Jamboree wasn’t an absolute blast. The extensive demo session was seriously an incredible amount of fun…so much so that I was shocked with just how much I enjoyed it. I attended the event with a colleague, and we both gushed about the game to each other once the demo session wrapped. It all boiled down to having a fantastic time that was filled with laughs and pure joy. Plain and simple, I haven’t enjoyed a Mario Party this much in a long time, nor have I felt so hopeful for a new installment.

We got to sample bits and pieces of Super Mario Party Jamboree, which gave us a taste of both the tried-and-true mechanics and the new features as well. It all started off with the standard board game experience in one of Super Mario Party Jamboree’s new stages, Mega Wiggler’s Tree Party. The main attraction of this board is the titular Mega Wiggler, who spends most of his time sleeping in the surrounding forest, but he can be riled up by landing on specific board spots.

Mega Wiggler’s Tree Party felt very much like a classic Mario Party board, and that’s meant as a complement. It was a straightforward experience, but with a strong design. It felt like a great beginner course that everyone could easily understand, making it welcoming for newcomers, yet still alluring for franchise fans as well. The hook of Mega Wiggler spiced things up, as once he starts wandering around the map, your paths to different parts of the board open/close. In perfect Mario Party fashion, you could block someone’s path to a star by making Mega Wiggler move at just the right time. You know how great that feeling is to throw someone off a star’s trail with the perfect roll or use of an item, and doing so through Mega Wiggler makes it that much more amusing.

Mega Wiggler’s Tree Party is quintessential Mario Party, and unfortunately it’s the only standard map I can speak to, as it’s the only one we played. (I REALLY wanted to try Rainbow Galleria, as it looks like a Nintendo version of Mall Madness, but that’ll have to wait, I guess!) Instead, Nintendo was more keen on showing us some of the new modes and methods of play in Super Mario Party Jamboree, and having come out the other side, I can certainly see why. Every Mario Party has its unique wrinkles and new modes, but I kid you not, the ones we tackled in Super Mario Party Jamboree were supremely addictive.

Nintendo ushered our group of Super Mario Party Jamboree demo players (6 press members altogether) to the brand-new Koopathlon mode, which is a 20-player online game that is utterly wild. In this mode, you’re all running together on what amounts to a marathon course, and the goal is to be the first to reach the goal after a set amount of laps, with each lap offering the same mini-games with the difficulty bumped up. In order to run through the course, you have to perform your best at various mini-games. Everyone gets whisked away to the same mini-game, but you’re all playing on your own screens. The more success you have in those mini-games, the more places you move in the marathon course.

Koopathlon is a really cool experience, as you get to see both your mini-game screen and the marathon map at the same time. The marathon map gets squeezed into one third of the screen while the rest is dedicated to where you’re playing the mini-game. This way you can see how far ahead or behind you are of the competition in real-time. You can even snag items within the mini-games that can be used to hinder the competition in their games, much like the item boxes you grab in Mario Kart. To say that the Koopathlon session was intense is a vast understatement. The pressure to really do your best is cranked up to 11, and it makes the already fun-yet-stressful atmosphere of Mario Party that much more palpable.

I really cannot express enough just how lively and entertaining Koopathlon was. Getting into this game online is going to make for some hotly-contested battles, and I can’t wait to do just that. Seeing everyone jockey for position during gameplay makes everything way more exciting, and it could even give you the boost you need to “lock in” and start pushing your Mario Party skills to the limit. I can easily see Koopathlon being a mode I return to time and time again, as the mix of players and mini-games you get will mean every single outing will be a unique challenge.

If you’re more for the camaraderie than competition, you’ll want to turn your attention to Bowser Kaboom Squad, which is an 8-player online setup. In this mode, the goal is to take down a giant Imposter Bowser that is running rampant through town. You do this by wandering around a map in real-time to collect bombs and load them into a cannon. Imposter Bowser has a massive health bar, and it’s going to take multiple rounds of play to rock him with enough bombs to take him out of commission.

You definitely have to work together with your fellow partiers in Bowser Kaboom Squad, as there’s no other way to achieve victory. In the map, there are plenty of bombs to grab, but they are in boxes you have to break open to get them. You have to wallop these boxes quite a bit to crack them, but if your friends come over and help, you can bust them more quickly. When the bombs do spill out, you’ll need everyone in your party to snag a few and rush them to the cannon to stand a chance. Unfortunately for the party-goers, Imposter Bowser is constantly stomping through the map to crush you under his feet, or burn your bits with his fire breath. There’s a lot of scurrying around and frantic action, which is what makes it so satisfying to come together with everyone else for the common goal.

There are a set amount of rounds in Bowser Kaboom Squad, and each round ends with one massive cooperative mini-game. Depending on how good everyone does in the mini-game, you’ll start the next round with some sort of helpful item. These could be dash pads to put on the ground for faster travel, items to help you break bomb boxes more quickly, an extended health meter so you can take more of a beating from Imposter Bowser and so-on. Doing well in these co-op mini-games can really make or break your chances of destroying Imposter Bowser, so you better hope everyone is on the same page!

One example of these 8-player co-op games is a challenge where there’s a bunch of volleyball nets set up. Each player is in-between two nets, and you all have to bump the ball to the player behind you. The goal is to get the ball from all the way on the left to the far right, and each player only gets one chance to bump the ball to the next player. You can move up-and-down in the space between the nets, so you have to align yourself with the spot where the set ball is coming, and then bump it to the next player in line. If just one person messes up, the ball drops and you have to start all over again. If it sounds like a lot of pressure, that’s because it is! The feeling of not wanting to be the one who screws everything up is strong, but man does it make things fun when you all work together perfectly and pass a ball between all 8 players perfectly.

The back-and-forth of bomb prep and mini-games kept Bowser Kaboom Squad extremely fresh, and the element of cooperation only became more fulfilling as the game went on. Our room was filled with groans when we made a mistake and cheers when we managed to land some serious blows on Imposter Bowser. This was an absolutely bonkers game mode that had me smiling from ear to ear. As I mentioned, every Mario Party has its hits and misses when it comes to the new options, but there’s no doubt Bowser Kaboom Squad is one of the series’ biggest hits.

There’s much more to do and see in Super Mario Party Jamboree, but if the hands-on I had is any indication, this is an installment to keep an eye on. It’s no hyperbole to say that I haven’t had this much fun with a Mario Party in years. I don’t know what made the stars align this time around, but Nintendo clearly has cooked up something magical with this one. If the rest of the traditional boards hold up and the mini-games we didn’t play are up to snuff, Super Mario Party Jamboree could easily end up being a favorite among fans, and a reason people will keep returning to their Switch for years to come. Fingers crossed that the complete package is firing on all cylinders, because everything seen so far is top-notch.