Mario Party Superstars

I've spent enough time watching a last-place player steal a win on bonus stars to know exactly what kind of game Mario Party Superstars is: controlled chaos dressed up as a board game, and completely honest about it. This is a curated greatest-hits collection pulling five remastered N64 boards and 100 classic minigames from across the series' history, rebuilt in HD and delivered on Nintendo Switch with full online support for every mode. If you bounced off the vehicle gimmicks in Mario Party 9 and 10, or felt Super Mario Party's boards were a little too safe, Superstars is the correction you were waiting for. The five boards on offer are Yoshi's Tropical Island, Space Land, Peach's Birthday Cake, Woody Woods, and Horror Land, each one a remaster of an N64 original with modern visuals, reorchestrated music, and added event spaces that keep rounds unpredictable. Horror Land's day-night cycle shifts which events trigger each turn. Woody Woods has Monty Mole flipping the board's path directions. These aren't static layouts you memorize after a few plays. The downside is obvious: five boards is a thin slate, and no additional boards have been added post-launch. For a full-price release, that limitation is fair to criticize. Customization options soften the blow somewhat. You can adjust turn counts, turn off end-game bonus stars if you hate comeback mechanics, filter the minigame pool by era (N64-only or GameCube), or switch to a skill-focused preset that dials back pure luck. The minigame roster is where Superstars earns its reputation. Pulling 100 games from across the series, with 55 of them originating from the N64 trilogy, the collection covers racing, drawing, fruit-collecting, jungle-swinging, cube-rolling, and chaotic multiplayer brawls. Classics like Face-Lift and Mushroom Mix-Up sit alongside deeper cuts, and there are genuinely very few duds in the lineup. The controversial return of Tug o' War, the stick-rotation game that left original N64 players with blistered palms, is present and comes with a warning to protect your hands. It's a strange call to bring it back, but it's also a minuscule fraction of the overall pool. Beyond the board game itself, Mt. Minigames mode lets you skip the dice entirely and play in formats including free play, 2-vs-2, 1-vs-3, Survival, and Daily Challenge without touching a board. Online play is fully functional across all modes, which was not the case in Super Mario Party, and represents a genuine quality-of-life leap for the series. Up to three players can share a single Switch system in online sessions, and missing slots are filled by CPU opponents. The Pro Controller is supported throughout, something the previous Switch entry locked out entirely. The result is a game that finally works for people who want to play remotely with friends or family without compromising on the core experience. Solo players aren't left out either, with single-player options against CPU opponents at adjustable difficulty and the ability to grind out achievements, unlock music tracks, and fill out an in-game encyclopedia. Who is this for? Families with a Nintendo Switch and a rotating cast of players who need a game everyone can jump into within seconds. Nostalgic players who grew up on N64-era Mario Party and want those boards back with a visual upgrade. Online groups who want something that isn't a shooter or a battle royale. It is not for players expecting fresh design work or a substantial content slate. The board count will feel stingy if you're coming in solo expecting long-term progression. But if the table has three other people around it, physical or online, this game does the one thing it sets out to do extremely well: produce equal parts cheering and swearing in the span of a single turn.

Alex · Scout Team

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