"A decent battle-system ruined by a bad storyline, bad humour, a repetitive overworld, washed out graphics and overly "meh" sound"

I'd like to start this review not with the normal pleasantries but instead at the conclusion; This game is very mediocre, and though there are some fun moments they are few and far between with the large gaps being filled with highly repetitive gameplay and a storyline which is a complete and utter mess whilst being devoid of the typical Mario RPG humour.

I give this game a 5/10 and advise you don't bother buying it.

For those wondering about the abrupt start, that was mainly to get across the point that the story of this game is a complete and utter mess. That said, I would probably have demonstrated the point far more accurately by typing in a seemingly random combination of letters for three paragraphs. It seems to be a problem when you get a game that has a story based on time-travel that it turns into an un-understandable smelly pile of mess on the floor. It doesn't help the situation that M+L is an RPG, a genre that relies on its storytelling. Suffice to say spending a quarter of the game in long cutscenes that you end up neither liking nor following isn't a good use of your gaming time. Mario RPGs are normally quite humorous or charming and you'd hope this would be a saving grace. Unfortunately not. The humour seems lost in this game. Yes there will be a few moments that might prompt a smile, but don't expect to be laughing out loud or anything. The charm seems completely lost in this game due partially to the aforementioned bad, confusing plot and lack of great humour.

The storyline goes something like this…E. Gadd has made a time machine and Princess Peach decides to test it out. Whilst in the past she gets kidnapped by Princess Shroob. You then proceed to go back in time to rescue her and whilst there you see a race called the Shroobs attacking the Mushroom Kingdom of the past. Then you proceed to meet your past selves (the babies). It turns out you must rebuild a Cobalt Star in order to go rescue Princess Peach which requires you to collect 5 shards. And so begins an adventure full of rubbish slapstick, bad dialogue, irritating characters and plot twists that serve only to make you wonder what on Earth just happened.

I will give this game its dues. The battle system is good. And when I say good I mean damn good. The battle system is turn based, HOWEVER you're constantly involved in the battle. When it's your turn to attack you select your attack and time up to 2 button presses in order to inflect bonus pain on the poor little Goombas/Shroobs/&c. When it's your opponents turn the game throws away the JRPG convention of making you wait and instead gives you the option to time jumps and hammer blows in order to avoid or counter attack your enemies. In order to counter/avoid your enemies you will need to pay close attention to their sprites as there will often be a subtle movement to indicate who the enemy will attack – this works VERY well and often you'll have to look really closely to see the difference.

The first game gave you 2 Mario Bros to control thus meaning you only needed to focus on two buttons during the battle. This game however gives you 2 pairs of Mario Bros to control. The result is that you have to focus a lot and generally results in more interesting battles.

However when I say “more interesting” I'm forced to wonder if this status will reside for very long. This is due to the problem of there being FAR too many similar battles in this game. Some areas will pit you against 2 enemies which you'll then have to face over and over again for 15 or so battles. This is NOT fun.

You also have various items you can use in battle varying from Healing Mushrooms to Chilli Peppers that power up your stats – Unfortunately a decent supply of the former makes you near invincible whilst a decent supply of the latter will remain unused due to its uselessness. Indeed this is one of the problems with the items. Some are game-breakingly powerful whilst others you'll use once and then once you know they're useless they'll serve purely to flood your inventory. That said almost everything will flood your inventory as this game gives you FAR too many items. An average gamer could complete the game easily without buying any more items than the game gives you naturally. Add to this fact the abundance of coins you're given and you will quite literally be wasting money just for the hell of it by the end of the game.

In this game the Bros Attacks of the first Mario and Luigi have been replaced by Bros. items. This is both good and bad. The good is that, in theory, this should be a better system as it makes you take part in the thing we know as item management. The bad is that, in actuality, you're given so many items and so much money that you needn't worry about you stock of Copy Flowers being depleted. However despite the bad implementation, the effects of Bros items are generally better than the first game. This is due to having to focus on 4 characters which adds a whole new level of skill to the attacks.

The overworld is, quite simply, dull. This is for three reasons. First of all is the graphics (more on that later). Second of all is the design department's ridiculous idea that everything that appears should take up as much of the screen as possible. Third of all the design department's lack of ideas as far as level design goes – You will face the same few “puzzles” over and over and over and over…

The idea of using moves to get past overworld puzzles returns with hammers, the ability to turn Mario and Luigi into a ball, the ability for letting Baby Mario and Baby Luigi dig underground &c. These ideas are actually quite good. The implementation of these ideas into puzzles is mediocre at best, horrific at worst. Rarely will a puzzle take more than one second to figure out and be prepared to face a lot of repetition in this game.

The graphics are quite bad. This is for three reasons. First of all it doesn't take advantage of the DS's power as you will see nothing in this game that couldn't be done on the Gameboy Advance. This would be all right if the graphics were nice and lush, but this brings me onto point number two…they aren't lush. In fact the graphics are ridiculously washed out. Even the main character designs can't save this game as Mario and Luigi's faces – particularly their eyes – look horrible.

The sound is very meh. The music has tons of “classic” tunes from previous Mario games, but they just don't make this game feel like an RPG but instead like some congealed old mess – this is mainly due to the music sounding suspiciously washed out. The sound effects are nothing impressive though I suppose they serve their purpose.

The game lasts about 15-20 hours and is not worth even half of that. Some people may enjoy it, though those with sanity and taste will most likely quickly bore of it.

Story/Humour = 2/10
Gameplay (Battle System) = 9/10
Gameplay (Everything Else) = 3/10
Graphics/Graphical Style = 4/10
Sound = 5.5/10
Length = 15-20 hours

Final Score = 5/10

Reviewer's Score: 5/10, Originally Posted: 12/14/07

Game Release: Mario & Luigi: Partners in Time (EU, 02/10/06)