That's right. I'm not only reviewing movies and TV shows. I'm also reviewing... video games! Well, this is my first review on a video game. One of my favorite video games is... you guessed it! Mario Party 7!
I remember being introduced to the game at 12 years old, and guess what: It's still one of my personal favs... (aside from LarryBoy- yeah, he has a game too). But now that I'm an adult, I'm starting to think about this game in another way. I mean, I still like the game, but what draws me to it that I would spend hours on it?
Well, let's uncover the mystery with Mario Party 7.
Introduction:
The game starts off with Mario on a walk. Then Toadsworth, Princess Peach's steward, walks by and offers Mario and his friends a cruise vacation for all their hard work in fighting evil and rescuing people. Mario accepts the offer and rushes to tell his friends.
-Wow, that was subtle. How would you feel if you were offered a vacation? Would you react the same way?
Then we cut to some time later, and the Mario gang are setting sail to... whatever place they're going to.
But then we cut to Bowser seeing the friends go on this trip.
-Now, I got to admit as a kid, this part used to scare me to the point where I wanted to piss my pants.
Bowser sees all this, and... as you can imagine, he gets mad. He roars and stomps, while his Koopa Kid plays peek-a-boo behind his back.
-This big guy is so mad, that you can definitely tell that the narrating dialogue box is being afraid of him by the second. Just look at the (...) in one sentence....
...and then how they still manage to describe Bowser's anger in full detail.
-And plus, what am I even looking at? Is he in hell? I don't know; but he is associated with fire, because in some of the games, he breathes fire.
Bowser then swears revenge against the Mario for... (get a load of this) for not inviting him to their cruise.
-Get over it, Bowser! It's no big deal!!
-WHOA! That zoom was totally unnecessary. Even though you want to show just how angry this guy is... why zoom in on his mouth?! What, did he want to take a bite out of the camera?!
-Another thing: Is he nuts?! There's a reason why they were given this vacation! Because they worked so hard trying to defeat you. So, give them some slack!
-And plus, what do you mean: "And after ALL I've done for them!"? All you did was kidnap Peach a zillion times, threaten to take over the Mushroom Kingdom, lie, steal, and destroy things! You think all of that gives you a free pass to going on the vacation?!
Now the scene with Bowser took like 30 seconds. That's 30 seconds of hell if you watch the introduction. I mean, think about it:
The introduction would go like this:
Happy
Excited
Hell
Hell
Hell
Thank God we're at the start menu.
Start Menu:
The menu just shows the Mario gang running away from Bowser on top of the world (literally).
Main Menu:
Then we have the main menu on which activities to do. You can play against a human or computer in any of these activities.
Board Menu:
Geez! This game has so many menus! You know what! Let's just skip to the actual. Most of you know what to do on the menus.
Pick a board
but wouldn't it be cool if they spoofed places like SeaWorld or Jurassic Park...
but then again, this is supposed to be a vacation getaway for the heroes.
Set up the game rules
Choose your character
Then play.
-Wow. So many things to set up before you can actually play the game. How pointless is that?
Beginning:
Whether you're playing twosome or foursome or more, you'll have to roll a dice block to see who goes first.
And then the game starts from there... after the rules are explained (There are different rules based on boards).
The players will roll a dice and then move the number of spaces it indicates.
Again, you can play in a twosome...
...or in fours... or partnering up to build teams.
During the game, you get to buy orbs that'll either help you or make you mess...
...and you'll come across surprises.
-Riveting.
After everyone takes a turn, there's a minigame.
Before each minigame, they give you the rules and what controls to use, and they even give you a chance to do some practice runs before doing the games for real.
-It's best to tell you that the minigames are more fun than the actual game...
There's so many minigames to choose from... in the Free mode... in the actual game, a minigame is selected randomly.
-So it's best to practice some of these, or you'll be wishing you had.
Some minigames are 2 vs. 2...
1 vs. 3...
and everyone against each other.
-Still practice if you haven't mastered a minigame yet.
And some minigames are freebies: free coins.
-But still practice if you want the free coins...
Oh, yeah. And there are certain games that require the mic.
-Yes. You gotta practice your skills and speech for those games too. Wow, you gotta practice for everything for this video game. It's basically a game of intellect and strategy.
At the end, you're supposed to get the most stars,
or at least, the most coins (depending on the rules).
Now, not to give anything away here, but during the game, you'll be confronted by Bowser, whether it's if he's only putting you in the spotlight, or he just wanted to stay on set and annoyed everyone.
-It's like picking at a hornet's net and then staying behind to see if the hornets will attack you or not.
Or, if Bowser himself doesn't want to annoy people, then he'll send Koopa Kid to prey on the innocent.
Speaking of Bowser, he also has minigames of his own: some are single-player,
while some are multiplayer.
What's worse is that before the last few turns, Bowser will give an update on the current scores.
He'll then have the person in last place spin a wheel, and whatever the wheel lands on will change the game rules entirely.
-I gotta address something: What the heck am I even looking at?
It's like a hellish version of CandyLand! I mean, look at it! Torches that attack players?!
The platforms prone to sinking either every time someone makes a wrong move, or every 5 turns?!
Now... if that ain't the worse thing from Bowser...
Whenever you've worked your way through all the game boards, and then managed to get through Bowser's Enchanted Inferno, then it's the final showdown with Bowser. So, what would Bowser have in store for you? A minigame called "Bowser's Lovely Lift."
All you do is hit the dice blocks at each corner and avoid the fireballs and missiles that Bowser shoots at you. You have to hit the dice blocks all the way to 100.
-Piece of cake, huh? No way! It took me six or seven tries to master this minigame.
What's worse is that at the 50th floor, Bowser will have Koopia Kid help him try to take you down.
-Really? 2 against 1?! Bowser is sadist!
Hopefully, when you give Bowser what for, he'll end up strayed on an island as punishment.
-Wow. That's like sending him to his room, and then telling him to think about what he did... like a friggin' four or five-year-old...
After playing, you'll earn points, souvenirs from the Duty-Free Shop, and unlockables.
-Sounds all fine and dandy, but wouldn't you want to win some of the stuff in real-life?
And that was Mario Party 7. So, does it still hold up as a classic video game?
Granted, the video game requires some skills, knowledge, and strategy. This is good for older people, but kids may or may not catch on, unless they're obsessive with games like this.
Plus, the storyline was just too cheesy... no, wait. Some of it was a cliché: the villain gets mad whenever the hero(es) have a great time without him, and it's that over-the-top scheming for revenge throughout the game. In addition, it takes a while to set up a game if you were planning a game for any number of players- I mean, why waste your playing time setting it up? Wouldn't you want to spend the time actually playing?
However, the creativity was obvious. The graphics are pretty good to look at. Most of the rules were helpful. And Bowser, for the most part, was pretty cool to take on, despite his over-the-top anger and scheming and making our lives miserable during the game.
I call it a classic, because I played this game since I was 12. And to this day, I still play the game.
Amateur Critic
Source: Mario Party 7
All rights go to Nintendo.
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