REVIEW: Mario Party 2 1999/2000, Nintendo 64
	By: Nintendo/Hudson Type: Board game Players: 1-4 Difficulty: Medium

There are always two things you can count on with Nintendo: ridiculous delays, and Mario popping up every now and then. Just to over-state the fact that they hate Europeans to the point of exaggeration, Ninty waited for a whopping ten months before releasing Mario Party 2 here. Wonder what we've done this time? In any case, the original Mario Party seems to have had quite some commercial success (to such a point that spinoff plushies and keychains made it into Japanese UFO catcher machines), hence this sequel has been produced to reel in some more money, and hopefully provide us with a second helping of mini-game filled multiplayer thrills.

 
(left) Toad has seen one Love Boat re-run too many, (right) The winner gets the last parking spot

.It certainly looks a lot more pretty than it's prequel, for one thing. The level of detail and color on the boards and most of the mini-game screens has been cranked up quite a bit, and a larger number of genuine 3-D polygon bits have been thrown in. Extra eye-candy comes in the shape of a rather amusing intro scene and fetching costumes for the characters that match the theme of the board you're playing on (a résidu of Koopa's dress-up fixation from the suspicious Mario cartoons, perhaps?). It's solid-looking, and even quite lovely in some parts. However, the music is quite a hindrance to this game's presentation. The whole thing is stuffed with tunes that are just a bit too plinkety-plonky for comfort. At worst, the game can't go for two minutes without throwing in a mess of clattering xylophones and high-pitched flutes. Sort of like nursery rhyme tunes on LSD. While there are a few tracks in there that are perfectly stomachable, the music is overall pretty annoying (and keep in mind that this comes from a severe cutesy-holic. The more macho among you will scream in agony). Granted, the first Mario Party had it's share of such irritating tunes as well, but it never went overboard as much as it does in the sequel.

Fashion tip; don't wear spandex if you're too fat

But beauty is only skin deep, the real issue is the gameplay itself. The formula is still almost exactly the same; roll a dice, move some squares with the odd special happening and then compete in a mini-game for big bucks. There have been some attempts at throwing in genuinely new stuff, however. It's possible to buy or win certain items that will give you a nasty advantage while scampering around on the boards, for instance. The boards themselves are also filled with a much larger number of special happenings. Doors that need to be opened with a special key item, familiar Mario nasties that will usually give you a slight advantage or hinder another player for a fee of a few coins, or menacing vehicles that suddenly try to flatten you, forcing you to move back a few squares. All in all, there's lots more going on on the boards, with far more opportunities for unpredictable happenings. This, however works as a bit of a two-edged sword. On one hand, the high rate of unpredictability gives the underdog a chance to tip the scales in his favor after all, and adds some degree of suspense to playing. On the other hand, it's extremely irritating to see your hard efforts and the stash of stars and coins you've built up with determined mini-game victories be reduced to dust by a simple lucky dice throw from another player. It would somehow be more fitting if skill was rewarded more solidly than dumb luck.

The biggest attraction of the whole Mario Party shebang are the mini-games, of course. And that's where Mario Party 2 takes a bit of a nose dive. The box may proudly claim that there are loads more mini-games in here than in the first game, but it certainly -feels- as if there are much less of them. First off, a large dose of the mini-games in there are simple re-hashes of mini-games from the first Mario Party. Worse yet, there are quite a few games in here that are -exactly- the same as in volume one, except that they are now coated in a slightly different set of graphics. The Shy-Guy Says mini-game (some kind of macabre take on Flagman) now takes place in the sky rather than at sea, but it plays just like it did before. Another example is a game called Hexagon Heat, which is just a thinly-disguised direct clone of the original's Mushroom Mix-up game. There are still several other exact copies of older mini-games in there. A few of the re-used mini-games have truly been altered a little (there are new and tweaked versions of Platform Peril and Skateboard Scamper in there). The changes usually come in the shape of a different graphical theme and a more taxing set of obstacles. However, since these mini-games are essentially very simple affairs, just a few slight tweaks hardly make a difference, and it doesn't -feel- as if you're playing a radically new or even very different mini-game than you did in the first Mario Party. Such a lack of initiative and sense of lazy cash-ins is not what we expect from Nintendo.

Ancient indian tribes must really like gormless eyes...

There are quite a few genuinely brand new mini-games in there. Alas, they're a very mixed bag, with a few too many utterly rubbish ones for comfort. There's hardly any of that simple, frantic and very enjoyable Game'n Watch-style sheen to the mini-games of volume 2. The whole affair is overall too tedious and lacks the spark of the original's mini-games. Another pretty big mistake is that the designers have decided to cut down on the number of proper mini-games in order to squeeze in some new kinds of special games such as battle mini-games (where each player risks losing some coins) or small games where you play to obtain an item. However, these type of special games occur only very rarely. There are some great ideas in the battle mini-games, but you'll hardly ever get to enjoy them. As for the item games, they're pretty much the pinnacle of gaming simplicity; each item mini-game is more or less a case of pressing a button to stop a random counter. The result is that they only very poorly compensate the smaller number of proper 4-player games in there. Indeed, the 4-player games are the ones that you'll be playing nine out of ten times, but because most of them are really rather uninspired, the whole thing becomes pretty dull. Especially when the CPU displays a tendency to randomly pick the same mini-game time and time again. Granted, there are some great games in the 2-vs-2 category, but these are among the rarest games to befall you on the boards, and you'll hardly ever see them. Even playing the games you've "bought" (from a rather spooky talking tree in this volume) is only moderately enjoyable, as most of them are simply dull and won't have you urging for yet another go. Most likely, you'll play one or two rounds on one of the better mini-games, decide that it's pretty nice and then switch off the console for lack of anything better to do. Also note a few mini-games that are truly complete and utter travesties. The Honeycomb Havoc and Toad-in-the-box games, who are totally random and terribly boring spring to mind here.

 
(left) No getting lucky puns, -please-, (right) And no puns on playing with blow-up dolls either, thank you

After these major flaws, there still are a few small pinpricks that need to be pointed out for the sake of completeness: there's no more objective of collecting 100 stars, making playing on the boards a bit pointless, with the "it doesn't matter who wins" syndrome running wild. One-player fun is strictly zero, but that's to be expected from the Mario Party formula. The original's mini-game island feature has been replaced by a "mini-game coaster", which gets everything completely wrong by imposing one rigid route on you and throwing the most unfair and frustrating mini-games in your face right at the very beginning. There are no special board-altering items to buy from a shop, the option to play up to seven of your favorite mini-games in a row with no interruptions is sadly lacking, and moving around the few menus, who take on the shape of some 3-D locations is sometimes annoyingly slow. And finally, the typically Mario feel of the original is somewhat missing, with most mini-games favoring a more Laura Ashley look to their screens instead of throwing in some beloved Mario settings or characters.

By now, you'd think Mario Party 2 is an utterly loathsome game. However, it's not. With four players thrown in, it still becomes great fun, to the point that you might even forget about the game's flaws a little. The many gameplay enhancements on the boards do add a little extra spark, and the basic Mario Party concept is still a clever example of novelty game design. Quite some fun -can- be squeezed out of this cartridge if you try, which warrants it a reasonable enough score. However, if you'd rather do your bank account a favor and avoid the risk of being sourly disappointed, the original Mario Party is a better buy overall. And those who already own the first game in the series are advised to stick with that, as the sequel's lack of truly new and original elements is bound to disappoint. So, Mario Party 2 is not too bad in a nutshell, but the whole lazy, re-hashed cash-in nature of the whole thing hurts. We have every right to expect much more from Nintendo (what with the prices we pay them). Roll on Mario Party 3, then. Oh, and Nintendo? Next time, -don't- delay it's Euro release for ten months, would you? - Toasty 77%

[Key to the reviewing system]