Mario & Luigi: Partners in Time

System: DS
Release Date: 2005
Published By: Nintendo
Reviewed by: Darien
Rating:

This curious little extension of the Mario RPG franchise places you in control of Mario and Luigi and Baby Mario and Baby Luigi all at the same time. By which I mean each character is mapped to one of the DS's face buttons, and pressing that button makes that character act. Fortunately they all follow each other while moving or this would be some kind of crazy control adventure.

The game's story is the absolutely standard "save the princess" routine, which shouldn't come as a surprise to anyone. If you're a serious story fanatic, you'll probably want to stay away from this one, but, then, you shouldn't be playing Mario games anyhow. The specifics of the princess-saving are rather cute; somehow, it seems she got lost in the past, and Mario and Luigi have to go back into the past to save her. Evidently, the Mushroom Kingdom of the past was totally conquered and wiped out by some evil alien dudes, which makes me wonder how heroes from the future Mushroom Kingdom can actually exist to go back and save it. I never do seem to understand video game time travel.

Of course, be all that as it may, the story's really just a justification for getting Mario to jump on turtles anyhow. And the turtle-jumping parts are a lot of fun; much like the original Mario & Luigi, Partners in Time takes the traditional Mario RPG concept of attack timing and expands upon it; you need to learn very quickly to defend with the right timing or you won't last long - bosses in the late-game can kill any character in one attack turn if you foul up your defense, and the special items you need to do any meaningful damage all require timing as well. The "Bros. Items" here are a sizable improvement over the "Bros. Attacks" from the first Mario & Luigi; I distinctly recall developing Bros. Attacks being the worst part of that game.

The game world is quite large and features a good many different mobs to fight; also, due to the nature of the combat system, the mobs are all substantially different from one another, which helps to keep the game fresh as you progress. Graphically, the game doesn't really take advantage of the DS, and looks as though it would be more at home on the GBA. Considering that the game basically ignore the stylus completely and doesn't use the second screen for very much, it feels rather like a GBA game also. In fact, I would suspect it of being a port of a GBA game that wasn't quite finished in time if not for the heavy reliance on four face buttons. The game is written brilliantly, and has many moments that are highly entertaining, with the Hammer Bros. encounter being one of the funniest things I've seen in a game in a long time (WE R0X0R U AND THEN ROFL). The evil aliens are mostly funny, but have a small amount of brow-furrowing seriousness that seems totally out of place in a Mario game.

The Mario RPG series is not huge on the secrets in general, and this is perhaps the barest of the lot. There is absolutely nothing optional in the whole game - not one boss or area or ending or anything. There's a "secret" shop, but it's ridiculously easy to find, and the game even explicitly shows you how to get there if you don't figure it out on your own. There are a few hidden items, but generally they're not a gigantic deal. Also there are a few minigames with rewards, but they tend to be somewhat annoying and the rewards are pretty bland, so I can't really say much for them. Basically this all boils down to a game that's fun once, but low on the replay value, as tends to be the case with the franchise. But still, it's a fun game for the one play, and I suggest you check it out if only for the Hammer Bros.

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