Nintendo's "Ultimate Fantasy"

Remember Paper Mario? Then you know what to expect from Mario and Luigi. The game is clearly a spiritual successor to the acclaimed N64 title, sharing several gameplay similarities, although being developed by a completely different company. Alpha Dream Corporation, the name behind this wacky RPG, has a fairly ambiguous record. All I can dig up is "Tomato Adventure", a GBA title that was never released in America, and their name is on an upcoming Hamtaro GBA game. While prejudging Mario and Luigi based upon the developer's lack of a stellar backlog would be all too easy, it'd be a damn shame to overlook a game that could easily put these guys on the map. Mario and Luigi is looking to be a very solid game, overflowing with lighthearted and hilarious style.

The game starts out in the Mushroom Kingdom, with a goodwill ambassador from the neighboring Beanbean Kingdom arriving to speak with Princess Peach. Goodwill is hardly on this ambassador's agenda, however, as the visitor turns out to be an evil witch named Cackletta. Cackletta promptly dishes out the evil, stealing the Princess's fair voice and replacing it with an "explosive vocabulary", as Toad later calls it. Toad runs to get Mario, and the two arrive at the castle just in time to battle with Bowser, who has come to kidnap the Princess. After a brief skirmish, Mario is made quite aware of Peach's affliction. Any words she attempts to say result in devastating explosions. Bowser is quite miffed, since kidnapping the Princess now would only result in her inadvertently blowing up his castle. As such, he and Mario head off for the Beanbean Kingdom to return the Princess's voice, dragging a resistant Luigi along for the ride.

Now the first thing you'll notice in this game is the immense amount of humor that's injected into every single event. Toad walks in on Mario while he's in the shower, Mario accidentally drags Luigi to the castle while he's tangled up in a clothesline, and Bowser plans on retrieving the Princess's voice just so he can safely kidnap her. And most notable here is the fantastic animation for each and every character. Sprites stretch and spin and bounce all over the place, not confined to any set number of animations. Whatever the situation calls for, Mario and Luigi will do. Luigi is especially entertaining, since he's the brunt of pretty much all the physical comedy in the game. They really do a great job of portraying him as the reluctant brother, always dragged into the fray when he really wants nothing to do with it.

So I can guarantee you, from a presentation standpoint, this game is phenomenal. Everything is injected with the flair of the Mario universe, even though the majority of the game takes place in a brand new kingdom. But how does the game play? Refreshingly... fresh, as it turns out. Pretty much all of the actions in Mario and Luigi, be they in battles, dungeons, or the overworld, are based upon timed presses of the A and B buttons. They're integral in powering up your attacks, making your way through minigames, and navigating hazard-filled dungeons.

The overworld and dungeon areas, basically anywhere that isn't in a battle, all control the same way. Mario runs around with the d-pad from an isometric perspective, while Luigi follows immediately behind him. If you press Start on the GBA, Luigi will switch with Mario and lead the two around. At the top of the screen, there are icons for the A and B buttons. A always controls the actions of whoever's leading the pair, and B always controls the brother in back. The default actions for each button are a simple jump, so you can make the brothers jump individually. This means if you want to jump over a small gap, you have to run towards it, tap A to jump, and then immediately tap B so the second brother jumps with you and doesn't just run into the pit. It takes a little getting used to, but it becomes second nature in no time.

As you progress through the game, you will gain new abilities that you can map to the A and B buttons. These are called "Bro Actions", and often feature the brother in back in some way interacting with the brother in front. Once you get some Bro Actions, you can cycle between them by pressing L to cycle the actions held by the brother in back, and R for the brother in front. Some sample actions are a super jump where Luigi stands on Mario's head and propels the two high into the air, a spiral jump where Mario and Luigi stack each other and twirl over long gaps, and a hammer where either Mario pounds Luigi under the ground so he can get buried treasures, or where Luigi flattens Mario so he can walk through small holes. They even get projectile attacks later in the game that can be used as Bro Attacks. Mario's fireball, if shot while in the back position, will set Luigi on fire and cause the two brothers to run exceedingly fast and crash through certain things. Luigi can shoot a ball of electricity, that if shot at Mario, paralyzes him and causes the two brothers to move as a single unit — useful for navigating dangerous mazes.

If you press Select while in the field, you open the brothers' suitcase, which houses all your typical RPG status screens. At one point Mario and Luigi have to draw their own passports, and these scribbles are your profile images for any brother that's gone for some reason or another. In the equipment screens, various pants vary your defense, and badges give you offensive boosts. In a delightful twist, it seems that the brothers' moustaches determine their luck, and it is referred to as "Stache Power" — the power of moustaches. You can also manage your restorative items, as well as the various beans you collect during the game. Beans can be made into all sorts of other items, and you are awarded them for many minigames throughout the quest.

Now for the battle system itself. While it's turn-based, it's hardly lacking interaction. The A button always controls Mario, and the B button is always Luigi. Normal attacks, like jumping on an enemy or hitting them with a hammer, require an initial button press to start the attack, and another to finish the move. If you mess up the timing on the second press, the attack may be weaker, or not hit the enemy at all. Certain attacks require a quick tap of the button, and others require it to be held for a longer period of time. The same is true for evading enemy attacks. Every enemy in the game has a small sign that determines which brother it is about to attack. If you press the right button at the right time, you can avoid that enemy's attack — and sometimes even damage the enemy in the process.

You can also use Bro Attacks in battles, and the results are quite spectacular. Every Bro Attack requires you to hit the A and B buttons at very specific times during the animation in order to successfully complete the attack. Each attack has three levels that you can select, varying between ease of execution and the amount of damage done. Level 1 attacks are slowed down, and a little icon pops up on the screen when you need to hit a particular button. Level 2 attacks are much faster, and Level 3 attacks are as fast as level 2 attacks, but drop the button icons that pop up entirely. While the high level versions of attacks are much harder to time, they deal a whole lot more damage. Bro Attacks use Bro Points, which are the equivalent of MP in other RPGs. Higher level Bro Attacks actually use less Bro Points, as an incentive to try them out.

Alright, I've got a few more miscellaneous tidbits pertaining to the game, so I'll stick 'em all in this paragraph. When you run away from battles, you have to alternate between mashing the A and B buttons for each brother. As you do so, you drop coins behind you. If one brother is KOed, the other brother goes over to support him. Enemies will attack you both as a single unit, and you defend in kind. At one point early in the game, Bowser loses his memory; he doesn't know who he is for a sizable portion of the game. He eventually gets recruited by an NPC in the game and becomes a mere minion. There's a cola called the "Chuckola Reserve" that gains its unique properties by being told jokes. Mario is supposed to bring this cola to some woman, but he ends up drinking it all himself, so Luigi stomps on him to get it to spray out of Mario, into the air, and into the mouth of this poor woman. It's all quite ridiculous.

Mario and Luigi, according to the Nintendo employee who demoed it, is supposed to be surprisingly long. Supposedly it can be finished in 40 hours, but only if you already know what you're doing and skip all the sidequests. And if that's not enough, it includes the same Mario Bros minigame that's been included with every single iteration of the Mario Advance series on the GBA, and can be hooked up to them for multiplayer fun.

So after a less than impressive showing at E3, it seems like Mario and Luigi has made quite a jump up in quality. If they keep up this pace, there's no reason why this game shouldn't join the rest of the games in this article on your wish list. I wasn't even considering picking it up before, but I'm seriously looking into it now. If not for the gameplay itself, then just for the hilarious atmosphere that pervades the entire title.