Mario Party 6

"Let's Get This Party Started!"

Mario Party strikes again with Mari o Party 6, breaking controllers and causing ruckus across the world for yet another time. The Mario Party series doesn't change much from game to game, which some people complain about, but it's the way it should be. The game takes place on giant board game boards. Each player (up to four) chooses their favorite Mario universe character and rolls dice to make his or her way around the board. After a set number of turns, the player with the most Stars wins (and becomes the "SuperStar" or some variation of the word "star" to show that you won). Getting Stars in an interesting task -- you buy them with coins or steal them from other players (or sometimes you can win them in other interesting ways, too). There are many unique boards that all play a little differently and have slightly different rules, so it's never the same game twice.

At the end of each turn, the players all compete in what makes up the main excitement about Mario Party -- minigames! Minigames are simple, quick games in which you might have to be the last man standing or collect the most items or win a race. There are tons of minigames to play, and you can either play by yourself against the other four players, on teams of two each, or in a four-player free-for-all. Each turn is different, so you could get paired up with your enemy in a game.

After playing Mario Party 5, my friends and I all got hooked on Mario Party once again (we hadn't really played too much since the original game on the N64) and Mario Party 6 was very exciting. The game is much better than its former brothers in the series, and easily earns my vote as the best Mario Party game released to date (and this is with Mario Party 7 included, because I'm writing this review very late!)

Mario Party 6 adds another interesting variable to the gameplay -- the GameCube's microphone. Packaged with the game, this curious tool can be used to play a few mic-based minigames. One player holds the mic and commands their character to do something on-screen while the other three characters try to stop the mic character or evade the oncoming attacks (or both at once!) The mic is very responsive and usually listens to what you say very well. Of course, you must speak clearly and can't have a lot of people screaming over your voice, but when you play correctly, you will have no troubles.

Each Mario Party game has a different theme, and this game's theme is "Day & Night." With the hosts Twila and Brighton, every three turns the game changes between "Day" and "Night," which makes changes in the board, bad or good, to add a little strategy to how you should save up your coins or where you should move.

Gameplay

The gameplay and game mechanisms in Mario Party 6 are better than any past Mario Party games. The microphone makes for a fun addition to the gameplay, too.

The game runs very smoothly, and actually more quickly than previous Mario Party games. Characters now run around spaces after their dice rolls pretty swiftly, so you don't have to wait forever between turns. Buying and obtaining orbs is usually an easy process, too, and there aren't too many strange and time-consuming events with little results like some Mario Party games. The orbs (which are special items that change a regular game board's space into a space you control, doing damage by stealing or hurting your opponents when they land or pass it) can be used very quickly, and there are plenty of useful orbs to choose from. Now your players control each orb space, instead of just creating a generic event space. You can use this to steal coins from people who land on your spaces, among other things. There are also now two types of orb spaces: ones that stay for the game until removed by another orb, and ones that you don't need to land on to activate but go away as soon as they are used.

The minigames all control perfectly and can be very competitive among players who are good at them. Each board is also very well designed to where choosing your alternating paths can become strategic, and getting a star is not determined by who is lucky enough to have the Star Space pop up in front of them for that turn.

This Mario Party, just like any other, is made for four human players. While you can play with less, it's not as fun as when all four players are controlled by humans. The one-player modes and things are still just as lacking as any other Mario Party game, but it is a Party game, after all... If you do plan on buying this for only yourself to play, maybe you should consider another game. This game is designed to be played with four humans (three or two is okay, but it really is meant for four. The computers are aggravating and horrible opponents).

The boards are very unique and interesting. The rules for each board make the game even more fun -- there are now boards where the only way to get stars are riding on Chomps to steal them from your friends, or a single star space in the center of the board which

The only complaint about this game is the unlocking time. You would have to play this game nonstop with friends every day for months to unlock everything. You use the Stars you collect during the other game modes to purchase various things, including the tons and tons of pages to the "Miracle Book" which is a useless and boring pop-up book. Some things can get to cost 100 stars, and a normal game that takes a few hours could end up only giving you around 20 stars. There are way too many things to unlock with your stars, and the only useful ones cost a ton of Stars (and even useless ones can cost 100 Stars).

Mario Party also takes a long time, so if you don't have a lot of time to put into playing the games, you might want to reconsider. While you can play a 10 or 15-turn game, which might take under an hour, the most fun games are the 30- or more turn games that can take a couple hours or even many hours to finish playing.

Sound & Graphics

Mario Party 6 is the best looking game of the Mario Party series. The graphics are pretty and funny and fit the Mario universe well. The animations are smooth and never glitchy. The minigames look very nice, too.

The sound can get annoying, with only a few repetitive songs, but with four people playing together, you won't be spending much time listening to the music. Each character has many funny phrases to shout out to different events in the game, and even a "taunt" you can annoy your friends with (these can get very hilarious if used properly).

There's not much to say about the sound and graphics, but I also think that those are the two least important qualities of a game. If you're very concerned though, for what Mario Party is, the graphics and sound are perfectly fine.

Replay

If you have three or more friends who want to play this game with you, you can expect this game to very much live up to however much you pay for it. My friends and I played Mario Party 6 from the day it was released to the day Mario Party 7 came out and never got bored (and never unlocked everything, either...) So expect tons and tons of fun gameplay hours from this game if your friends like Mario Party. Mic games add even more fun to the game, and there are "Rare Minigames" which are more complex games that you play outside of the normal Party Mode -- including a 2 vs 2 basketball game! There is a lot to do, and the boards and minigames are wide enough in variety and all very fun that you can never get tired of the game unless you don't really like Mario Party games much.

There's also the addition of a mic-controlled "game show" game in which players answer questions into their microphone and try to get more points than the others. This is a very fun additional mode to play if you've played a lot of the Party Mode and want something new, or you might just want to play it first for fun!

Also, anyone can pick up and learn Mario Party, so you can always play it with your other friends and family who might not like to play games very much.

Overall

Mario Party 6 has become my favorite Mario Party game, and my favorite game to play with friends. The game is more strategic and competitive than the older Mario Party games, and it offers a lot of variety and fun ways to play. If you don't own any Mario Party games, this is the one you should buy. If you already own some or all of the Mario Party series, and you don't know if you should get this one or not, you should definitely purchase Mario Party 6 if you like Mario Party. You won't be disappointed at all; however, if you don't like Mario Party games, there really isn't a way to make Mario Party any different. It's always going to be boards, dice, and minigames. You might want to check it out anyway since it has added a lot of new gameplay variables and strategy since the old Mario Party games.

Reviewer's Score: 9/10, Originally Posted: 01/18/06