Mario & Luigi: Brothership

Developer: Acquire
Publisher: Nintendo
Platform: Switch
Release Date: Available Now
Price: $59.99 USD – Available Here $79.95 AUD – Available Here

Overview

There have been many different spin-offs featuring Mario and his various allies throughout the years but one that has always remained fairly consistent are the Mario & Luigi RPGs. Or at least they were, until the series vanished for nearly nine years and its original developer, AlphaDream, was shuttered. Now Nintendo has teamed up with a new development team to bring the brothers back together for their first RPG on an actual home console. Well, console/handheld hybrid, with Mario & Luigi: Brothership arriving for the Switch. With a new team behind the wheel and plenty of time between releases, will this latest Mario & Luigi game live up to expectations?

Story

Out of nowhere a number of mysterious portals appear in the Mushroom Kingdom and not only are Mario and Luigi sucked into the vortex but Peach, Bowser, and a large number of Bowser’s subjects are as well. After a brief period of separation, Mario and Luigi find themselves reunited on an island that is capable of traveling the ocean they find themselves on, Shipshape Island. The Mario Brothers soon meet up with a resident from the island named Connie that explains that the world they find themselves in now is called Concordia and that the lands used to be united by the powerful Uni-tree that connected everyone. That is until an unknown and malevolent force destroyed the Uni-tree and split the lands apart, isolating villages from one another. 

With Connie, who happens to be a “Wattanist” planting a new Uni-tree on Shipshape island, it is up to The Mario Bros. to launch themselves, literally out of a cannon, at the islands they pass by and reconnect them to the Uni-tree in an effort to reunite the world. Along the way they’ll encounter not only a number of different kinds of residents and those seeking to rejoin the grander world, but also discover the truth behind what destroyed the Uni-tree to begin with and the sinister plot behind it all.

Mario & Luigi: Brothership tells a fairly simple and easy to understand story that isn’t afraid to take a few twists and turns with big reveals, especially past the halfway point. The primary focuses are of course on uniting with one another and creating bonds, especially the bonds of family and rising to meet expectations. There is some drama mixed in here and there but for the most part the story is light and has plenty of little bits of comedy mixed in, nevermind the fact that nearly every aspect of the Concordian world, be it names or objects, are electrical puns or designs. There are even a solid number of side-quests and bits of optional story content to take part, albeit with minimal actual developments.

Unfortunately, despite finding a great balance between comedic moments and some more dramatic twists here and there with big reveals, Mario & Luigi: Brothership manages to suffer quite a bit from two very specific issues, which is rather surprising since the two rarely coincide with one another. The first issue is the fact that the story is incredibly slow to get going, with some of the first major and important reveals taking far too long to actually happen and kickstart the pace. This is then combined with the fact that the game feels rather padded to try and stretch the runtime far longer than it should. This is usually not a problem with an RPG, however Brothership manages to repeat certain plot elements and even character interactions can have some of them explaining the same piece of information multiple times over. This latter issue may be due to the game targeting a younger audience, to try and make sure they catch what the writers are going for and want them to do next, but it grows to be rather tiresome, often dragging the pace of the game’s plot.

Gameplay

The gameplay loop for Mario & Luigi: Brothership is fairly straightforward but quite interesting simply thanks to the amount of variety on offer when it comes to the places players will be exploring. Mario and Luigi will be shooting themselves out of a cannon to different lands and meeting the people there, battling their way through and figuring out the problems of that current location before finally making it to the land’s lighthouse and connecting it back to Shipshape.Shipshape itself serves as the main hub for players to use and any islands that the players connect to it can instantly be fast-traveled back to, which is helpful since many different side-quests and new pathways only open up after the island has been reconnected to the freshly planted Uni-tree. Perhaps one of the strangest mechanics in the game at Shipshape is one that the developers can’t even end up sticking with, as initially players will find that they will need to wait a specific amount of real world time when charting a course to a new island, having to spend this time either going back to old islands to do side-quests or simply kill enemies, Eventually the speed  of the island can be increased, sharply reducing travel time which brings up the question as to why include it in the first place.

Anyways, once out in the field and exploring, players will be able to control Mario with Luigi following behind and while it is possible to have Mario jump with A and Luigi B, Luigi will usually stick close by without any need for extra commands as he does have some mind of his own in this entry. In fact, this mind of his can goa  bit into overdrive at times and help players solve certain environmental puzzles and target a boss’ weak points for massive damage. These moments are called “Luigi Logic” and appear fairly frequently when Luigi is seen pondering a possible solution. Simply tapping L will then send Luigi off to head out and put his ideas to good use and it is an entertaining mechanic, especially with how fun the celebration and Luigi’s actions tend to be during these sequences. 

Eventually, players will also gain a number of special abilities called Bros. Moves and these allow for special open world traversal options that can be used to solve puzzles or reach previously unreachable items or platforms. While we won’t spoil just how ridiculous some of the Bros. Moves can look like in exploration, it must be noted that not only are there a number of new moves but also a few returning ones from past entries that fans will love. Bros. Moves aren’t only usable during exploration however, there are also certain moves that are only available for use in the game’s combat system.

Speaking of which, Mario & Luigi: Brothership makes use of the same turn-based style that fans are familiar with but it has been modified slightly. Yes, once again players will have Mario attack with A and Luigi B, but they act far more in sync with one another. Standard attacks will allow the brothers to back each other up through well-timed prompts that allow for players to deal maximum damage to an enemy with alternating timing depending on which character is the primary attacker. Similarly, the game puts a lot of emphasis on dodging and counter attacking enemies. There is an emergency guard button should players feel like using it, but the best way to take on combat is to figure out each enemy’s attack pattern and properly time their dodging jump so that either Mario or Luigi will land on them, dealing extra counter attack damage. This helps keep fights interesting and dynamic, always making sure to keep players on their toes as long as they aren’t too overpowered and simply demolishing their enemies after certain points. The flashy Bros. Moves are also impressive in combat, offering some truly spectacular looking attacks. The game is far from challenging, but players will need to make the most out of these mechanics to actually survive certain fights, especially those that we can’t talk about as they’ll be in for a world of hurt otherwise. That being said, players can make use of multiple save slots and even just retry the battle if they happen to fall in combat.

Outside of standard equipment that players can equip onto Mario and Luigi, which is honestly rather disappointing in nature as it offers zero cosmetic change outside of swapping weapon types, the primary equipment players will be using happens to be the brand new “Battle Plugs.” Initially Mario and Luigi can only have a couple of plugs equipped at a time but eventually will gain the ability to have more usable at once. These Battle Plugs serve as various boosts to the brothers’ skills, sometimes offering something as simple as making every attack an “excellent” one or triggering an AoE effect when landing a perfect move. There are also augment plugs that boost certain stats or make attacking or defending far easier and what makes things interesting is that these Battle Plugs can be swapped out at any time during combat. 

The downside to them is that they only have so many charges before they need to be recharged over the course of many turns. Oddly enough, players cannot “charge” a Battle Plug unless they drain it entirely, forcing players to drain their favorite resource if they want to make use of it properly after a period of time, rather than laying off of using it for a bit.Late game Battle Plugs offer a large amount of variety and ways to really customize the way that players want to take on certain challenges. There are even certain plugs that augment other ones, really making it so players can try to minmax if they wish. That being said, there is a bit of an issue here as once players find what works for them, there is very little reason to branch out to new plugs which is quite a shame as some offer some truly powerful abilities that need a bit of experimentation to work right, though we can’t say what they are here. This gives Mario & Luigi: Brothership’s combat a surprising level of depth even if it does start to feel a bit “samey” after a while as the brothers only have so many little upgrades that they can gain and the amount of combat in the game is surprisingly high for modern RPG standards..

Audio & Visuals

Thanks to the fact that Mario & Luigi: Brothership is the first game to actually be released on a console, the developers were able to pull a lot more emotion and expressions out of Mario and Luigi here. The expressions the two make throughout the game, including some actual cutscenes, are incredibly emotive and quite humorous at times. There is also an impressive amount of variety when it comes to the places players will be exploring and the enemies that they will be facing down in these locations. That being said, the Switch does have some issues handling some of the busier areas in the game, often experiencing a bit of slowdown, and this can also happen during some of the flashier attacks which can be problematic given how important timing is for most moves.

As for the voice work, there really isn’t much unfortunately. While Mario and Luigi will spend plenty of time yelling each other’s name and there are also small voice barks from other characters, the game’s dialogue is simply presented as gibberish which is unfortunate. The soundtrack is as catchy and enjoyable as one would hope for a Mario game and there are a number of great tracks to go with the wide variety of biomes players will venture through.

Overall

Mario & Luigi: Brothership manages to be a mostly successful return to form for a beloved spin-off RPG series that sees everyone’s favorite plumbers in a brand new adventure all while working together to pull through. Once the story finally gets going it delivers a fairly satisfying, albeit padded, tale with some positive themes and a few worthwhile twists to keep players on their toes. Combine that with a wonderful combat system that has plenty of customization depth and Brothership looks to be a solid offering for fans of the franchise or even Mario in general, but it is far from smooth sailing for this returning spin-off series.

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