Mario Party

Release Date - December 18, 1998 (JP)

Developer - Hudson Soft

Publisher - Nintendo

Platform - Nintendo 64

Mario is a notoriously versatile character, beginning his video game journey as a carpenter in Donkey Kong (1981), he is most well known for being a plumber in the mainline Mario Bros games.

Beyond his usual occupation, he had taken up Golf in the NES and Game Boy game Golf (1984), and swung a racquet in the Virtual Boy’s Mario Tennis (1995). In 1998 he tried his hand at yet another gameplay formula and launched a wildly successful spin-off series with Mario Party.

The different boards each have their own theme, it makes for some nice variety.

(All screenshots via https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ssFl99A5wCI)

Mario Party, as the name implies, is a multiplayer focused casual title. At it’s core, Mario Party is a board game, with players selecting one of six Nintendo characters and make their way across one of several themed ‘boards’. Each board has it’s own theme and set of obstacles, along with some differing mechanics such as branching paths, the ability to set traps, or even having to pay a toll to cross certain segments. Depending on how long you want to play, the game can consist of 20, 35 or 50 ‘turns’. After each turn, a mini game is selected for everyone to participate in. These can be every man for himself, or variations of 1 v 3 or 2 v 2, depending on where each player is situated on the board at the end of the turn.

The games are basic but very varied. A helpful explanation before each makes sure everyone is on the same page before it devolves into madness.

Players are all battling to have the most stars by the end of the game, and these are earned via coins being spent, or by winning mini-games. There’s a loose storyline in here, but the real draw of the game is getting a group of friends together and battling it out over a variety of wild mini-games. These will see players passing a ticking time bomb between them to avoid getting blown up, sumo styled battles to stay inside a floating ring, and even slot car racing! For the two on two games there are bob-sled races, half-court basketball and more. Finally, the cruel three versus one mini games will see one unlucky player trying to walk a tightrope while the others shoot bombs at them. They can get revenge in a different game, where one lucky player gets to go bowling, with the other three players making up some of the pins. The pins have to bounce around to avoid the ball, and stop the bowler winning those precious stars! The mini games are truly imaginative and this is just a brief example of the over 50 games that can be encountered. Some games definitely have the scope to single out one player from the group, so it’s not always good to be in the lead, as you’ll make a prime target for the other players’ wrath.

Along the way, you’ll find some characters that will sabotage your opponents… for a price.

Beyond the main game, there is the Mushroom Village options menu, which provides the usual, essential options with a fun presentation and also houses the game’s store where you can unlock additional bonuses with coins collected in the main game. 

Conductor mini-games? Sure, why not!

Finally, Mario Party is notable as being the only game I can think of that was eventually issued a form of ‘protective clothing’. Some of the mini games in Mario Party require players to rapidly rotate the analogue stick, and many players seemingly used the palm of their hands to get the fastest possible speeds. Due to the unforgiving plastic of the Nintendo 64 controller’s analogue stick, this resulted in players suffering cuts, blisters and various other maladies. Enough complaints were received in the USA that the New York Attorney General’s office launched an investigation into the game, which was eventually settled by Nintendo with a $75,000 payout. Not only that, in an effort to protect the player’s hands from further injury (and their bank account from further settlements), Nintendo agreed to provide up to four protective, fingerless and padded gloves to each household of consumers that owned Mario Party. Perhaps due to this controversy, Mario Party has never been re-released!

Just promise you won’t get into a fight IRL, that’s more of a Monopoly thing.