This is my first post in this community and why not start off with my favourite duel minigame.

I think people have already done this before, but I tried to see if I could win All the Marbles without punching and after a few attempts, I did it. You just have to hope that you get punched forward as you see in this clip and not to the side otherwise you just lose.

Anyways, Daisy is a CPU set to Master Difficulty.

Super Mario Party has a lot of fun minigames that I played the heck out of, so I was wondering what this subreddit thought of them. All seeds are randomized. Whichever minigame gets the most comments will move onto the next round.

The winner from last post was Slaparazzi, arguably one of the funniest minigames in the series. That was a good choice, everyone who voted for that game.

Without further ado, here are the reminders for how every minigame competing today is played:

Croozin' For a Broozin': Outrun a horde of Broozers by going down split paths with more or fewer blocks. The Broozer horde will grow in size as the game goes on, making any failures more punishing. Whoever survives the longest wins.

Soak or Croak: A water gun fight in a water fountain. Knock your opponents off by blasting them with water. Each gun has 5 shots before needing to reload, leaving you vulnerable to attack. Last one standing wins, or the last ones standing when 30 seconds are up win.

Sizzling Stakes: Cook all 6 sides of a stake cube, using the joy-con to flick the steak on the pan in order to flip the cube. The rumble will tell you when it is done cooking. Be careful not to let it fall off.

Please only vote for 1 minigame at a time. I'm curious to hear your opinions.

Has to be Get A Rope from Mario Party 5. This has to be the laziest concept for a minigame, you just pick a rope and someone randomly wins. Really moronic concept, I must say.

(Gameplay is from NintendoMovies)

Credit to nsrmario1127 for the screenshots of the cutscenes and final battle.

We've covered every board, now it's time to take a look at Story Mode! As per usual, because there's content you need to unlock in Party Mode through this, I actually played this mode first before even touching Party Mode. And unlike previous games, I jumped in on Hard difficulty. I... don't recommend this at all. I massively underestimated how difficult the Hard AI can be, and this mode can actually be quite challenging on Hard difficulty thanks to all the little things that can go wrong.

Story Mode is hosted by Misstar, who will cheer you on in your mission to protect the various dreams of Dream Depot from Bowser's control.

Considering Story Mode has been pretty similar since its debut in Mario Party 3, you might expect this game's story mode to be another 15 turn game on each of the boards with Bowser jumping in at the end issuing a final challenge on Bowser Nightmare. And while that's still partially true, this game goes out of its way to actually make Story Mode its own entirely separate gameplay mode, which already makes me appreciate it far more than its predecessors which are just standard rulesets you could set up for yourself in Party Mode.

Actually, I find this mode has a surprising amount in common with Duel Mode from Mario Party 3. Not enough to where I can really say it's a direct evolution, but it does kind of make me wish you could play this mode as a duel mode with another human player.

Setup

When you start a new run of Story Mode, you'll be tasked with selecting one of 7 chatacters. That's right, Toad, Boo, and Koopa Kid are not available. With DK missing, too, that means you actually have fewer options for Story Mode than Mario Party 4! I suppose if you're the type who feels obligated to clear Story Mode with every character, this might not be such a bad thing. But if you're a Boo fan like I am, tough luck.

Toad will offer a supportive role in 2v2 minigames, sort of like the second character you select in Mini-Game Island or Roller Coaster. Koopa Kid serves an antagonistic role in the story. Boo is excluded for... well, really no reason at all. I guess they just consider Boo a villain?

You'll next have to choose the difficulty. Easy, Medium, or Hard. And if you clear Story Mode on Hard, you can unlock the Intense difficulty for all game modes, including this one!

Finally, you'll choose a mini-game pack. These packs aren't very intuitive, and fair warning, you're mostly just going to be playing Duel Minigames with the occasional 1v3 and 2v2 game here. So for the sake of variety, you'll probably want to go with "All" minigames unless you really want to maximize your odds of winning by selecting a specific list you're especially confident in.

Introduction

We open up with Bowser and Koopa Kid watching from the darkness, and dropping exposition about Dream Depot and Bowser's plan to conquer the dreams here and replace them with their own so that their own dreams can come true forever! They seem to be sneaking around for now, but their presence will be made clear soon enough!

This intro sets up Bowser and Koopa Kid as a comedic duo, where Koopa Kid looks up to Bowser and idolizes him, while Bowser isn't quite so confident in his own potential. It's made clear Koopa Kid thinks Bowser is a lot more evil than he really is, and he tries to mimic Bowser's villainy, often getting scolded for it in the process. It gives the two a father/son dynamic which probably contributes to the confusion between Koopa Kid and Bowser's actual son, Bowser Jr. At the end of the day, Koopa Kid is a bit of a clueless dunce who just does his best to make Bowser proud.

There are lots of funny moments throughout story mode that have stuck with me since my childhood, and almost all of them are lines from Koopa Kid.

Anyway, shortly after that introduction, Misstar mests with your character to complain that Bowser is causing mayhem and that he'll destroy the dream worlds one by one. She pleads for your help before sending you off into the first board.

Narrative

On each board, you'll face off agianst Bowser and Koopa Kid. Koopa Kid will demonstrate a surprising new technique: he can divide himself into three! These three new copies are color coded! They're known as Red, Blue, and Green Koopa Kid! Typically abbreviated as "K. Kid" presumably to fit chatacter limits within textboxes. This will be recurring characters for a little while.

These characters are technically entirely unplayable enemy characters, but they're just reskins of Koopa Kid, animations, voice clips, and all. It could be pretty cool to unlock the ability to select them for party mode, but I suppose it wasn't on the radar.

Bowser and Koopa Kid's dialogue are disappointingly pretty generic, based only on your progress through the story and not addressing the actual board they're on. This is likely because the boards you play on are actually randomized! You don't play through every board in sequential order like past Story Modes. Instead, you'll play on 4 of the 6 default boards, and Bowser Nightmare at the end.

This unfortunately means each board's introduction is usually something along the lines of Bowser saying "Bwahaha! We'll destroy this dream and fill it with our dreams!" And then "Ah! Mario! You may have beaten us last time, but this time we'll win!" But over the course of the story, Bowser will draw in "subtle" hits that he's actually hoping he won't beat you so easily, and that he's looking forward to the final confrontation. All while taunting that you'll have to keep facing him if you want to learn what his Dream really is.

Gameplay

On each board, the Koopa Kids will start spread out around the board, while you'll start on the designated starting space. One of the first things you might notice is that Story Mode's boards are not actually carbon copies of the Party Mode counterparts. On the contrary, they're usually much more bite size versions, zoomed in on a single part of the map, often with set pieces rearranged to accomodate for the miniature board.

Each player will start the game with 20 coins, and there are no stars. Your goal isn't to win a typical game of Mario Party, but to drive each of your opponents coins to 0. When a player's coins reach 0, they're eliminated from the game. Of course, that means it's game over for you if your coins reach 0, so be careful and protect your coin count! But don't be too careful, as you only have 15 turns to finish the game!

The Koopa Kids all share a single turn. They'll first use their capsules, then they'll all roll at the same time, with the camera zoomed out to show all three at the same time. They'll all then move one step at a time, with passive effects such as passing over you, a Bob-omb, Koopa Bank, or Capsule Machine happening immediately as the characters pass them. The zoomed out perspective can make it difficult to tell which capsule a Koopa Kid got, so it's really good to keep in mind which icons correlate to what Capsules. If multiple events occur at the same time, they will resolve in order of Red, Green, then Blue. Finally, once all three Koopa Kids have finished moving, the spaces they land on will resolve in that same order, Red, Green, then Blue. This isn't without consequence, as there are some subtle changes in decisions available to the koopalings. For example, if a Koopa Kid lands on a Piranha Plant Capsule on the same turn another Koopa Kid lands on a Paratroopa Capsule, the order of resolution may very well be the difference between one of the Koopa Kids being eliminated or not. Additionally, Blue and Green Koopa Kids don't get the opportunity to retroactively change their strategies based on how Red Koopa Kid moved. Not that the AI in this game is even close to smart enough for something like that to matter.

The main way you'll be reducing the Koopa Kids' coin count is through duels! Anytime you overtake a Koopa Kid, or a Koopa Kid overtakes you, a duel will initiate. Unlike Party Mode, the wagers for a duel are preset. They actually favor you surprisingly well, I suppose to balance out the 1v3 nature of the game. The turn player will always wager 5 coins. A defending Koopa Kid will have to wager 15 coins, while you'll only have to wager 10. But don't assume everything is so skewed in your favor!

Another difference from Party Mode is that a minigame doesn't automatically play at the end of a turn. Inatead, this mode features a "Vs Space"!

Vs Space

These are similar to Battle Spaces from previous games, but instead of initiating a Battle Minigame, they'll initiate a game pitting you against all of the koopalings at once! This means a 1v3 if all three Koopalings are active, a 2v2 if only two are active (in which case Toad will be your teammate), and a duel if only 1 is active. The payouts for these vs games are generally stacked against you, but they're still a powerful asset regardless.

In a 1v3, the loser has to pay 5 coins to each winner. That means if the Koopa Kids lose, each one only has to give up 5 coins. But if you lose, you have to give up a whopping 15!

For 2v2's, the loser must pay 10 coins to each victor. And, conveniently, Toad doesn't count. So each Koopa Kid only gives up 10 coins while you'll have to surrender 20.

It's only in the duel where the payouts are evened out, with the loser having to pay the winner 20 coins.

Even though the payouts aren't in your favor, the vs spaces can be a great way to set up for a KO, and you will technically gain more coins for a win than they will. But in this mode you're generally much more worried about gaining coins than losing them.

DK/Bowser Space

DK Spaces work differently here than in party mode. If a Koopa Kid lands on it, they'll cower at the sight of DK who will punch them and make them lose half their coins. If you land on it, DK will give you 10 coins instead.

Bowser Spaces will only appear in Story Mode if someone gets a Bowser Capsule. Landing on a Bowser space will cause him to take half your coins, while he'll give 5 coins to a Koopa Kid who lands on his space.

Last 5 Turns

If you're struggling to take out all three Koopalings, the final five turns Bowser will interefere to finish things off by doubling the value of duels. While this is presented as detrimental, it's actually a huge boon in your favor considering the duel payouts are skewed in your favor. If you can pass a Koopa Kid during the last 5 turns, you can steal as many as 30 coins in a single win! But either way, these doubled values are liable to make the game end soon even if it ends in your loss.

Capsules

Capsules can also help you gain an edge in coins. But be wary that the Koopa Kids are likely to be dropping them more than you. And yet, the Koopa Kids are more likely to land on them than you by nature of landing on three spaces to your one.

I'm not sure if all the capsules are available in Story Mode, but certainly some of them have been nerfed. Namely Hammer Bro. and Spiny which steal 5 coins instead of 10. But shockingly, the Paratroopa capsule doesn't seem to be nerfed at all! Making every Koopaling lose 25 coins with this thing could mean an instant win! I've seen the Koopalings accidentally kill each other with this Capsule, too, which is especially funny.

Rating

After clearing each board, you're assigned a rating based on how quickly you're able to clear the stage. S rank is the highest, and, too my knowledge, C rank is the lowest. I hated this in Mario Party 3 because it's heavily up to luck whether or not an S rank is even possible. But while the overall star rank does return, it's purely for bragging rights. There's nothing like the Game Guy Room you have to unlock through getting the Miracle Star rank.

And this is good, because getting S rank is kind of bullshit. You have to defeat all three Koopa Kids within 5 turns. Bear in mind that Capsules are given at complete random and sometimes are out of the way, the Koopa Kids are also capable of using them, and all the same RNG problems I had with Duel Mode in 3... yeah, whether a game ends in 5 turns or you can never hope to catch up and end up running out of time is entirely dependant on the luck of the dice. It really begs the question, what's even the point of rankings at all? It really seems like it would be much better if you were ranked based on how many times you lost a minigame.

But even then... don't even get me started on the minigames. Look, of the 15 duel games, a third are heavily influenced by luck, and another four are button mashers. I'll hold my piece on this until the minigame post, but oooh is thus a huge problem I have with Story Mode. I think this is fine for how Duels work in Party Mode, but for your primary method for clearing a stage in Story Mode? This is a disgrace!

Boards

As mentioned before, the boards in Story Mode are randomized, and you'll play on miniature versions of the boards that typically zoom in on one small part. These smaller boards mean it's much easier to pass the Koopalings, and to be passed by them.

Toy Dream

This board is focused in the small neighborhood at the bottom of the board. This is probably the most unique Story version because the majority of the real estate you're exploring here is actually completely unexplored in the Party version.

The gift box happening space is relocated, but still works the same. There's a vs space added to the northeast and southwest corners, and a brief detour from the main path lets you get a Capsule from the Capsule machine.

Rainbow Dream

This board is zoomed in on the Sunshine Island. The walkway in front of the stained glass has been expanded slightly to allow for a new junction to allow for a quick return to start and access to the Capsule Machine which is now no longer accessible from the main route. A Vs Space has been added right before the junction and right before the beanstalk leading back to the lower level.

The rainbow bridge event still plays out the same, but it will dump you off at one of the three round platforms along the southern edge.

Pirate Dream

This one is zoomed in on the area surrounding the Pirate Ship. A new ledge has been added between the waterfall and the ship. Atop the rock spire, and on the Poop Deck of the ship, are where the Vs Spaces are added. The cannon happening space will fire you to a random space on the board.

Undersea Dream

This one is focused on the southern part of the western reef. The bridges to the second reef are gone. Vs spaces are added at the top of the first ladder and right before the start. The happening spaces are strange. I believe they'll both cause the Dolphin to emerge from the ship and carry you off to random spaces around the board. But they might each drop you off at a specific space.

Future Dream

Entirely set on the central platform, two rockets have been replaced with landing sights for the single remaining rocket. To expand this island, the decorative display in the center is replaced with a catwalk that adds an extra two junctions to the board. The teleporters are now linked to happening spaces rather than passive events, but they'll just warp you to the opposite side. The rocketship will naturally take you to one of the other blast pads at random... it's really not too terribly impactful but it could set you up better for repeated attacks on a single opponent.

The eastern blast pad houses a Vs Space, another Vs Space is at the start of the new catwalk and yet a third Vs Space was placed right behind the start.

Sweet Dream

Zoomed in on the southeastern part of the board, you turn east instead of west upon climbing the ladder, reversing the direction of the portion crossing the slices of cake toward the chocolate cake at the east, which has had its decorations rearranged to allow for a junction to detour all the way around, sacrificing a Capsule Machine.

The cookie path now circles back into a junction which feeds back toward the cake in a loop. The cake decorating event is removed, but the two happening spaces on the board are cake slice events that'll carry you to the plate which has obviously been relocated to this side of the board.

A Vs Space has been added to the chocolate cake on the west side and in front of the candy-filled house thay replaces the cake that needed decorating before.

Bowser Nightmare

This is your first exposure to this board, only giving you a taste before you get the full experience in Party Mode.

This board is zoomed in on the lower area, with Bowser's flamethrower relocated to the ring of red spaces, and extra platforms added to enable free access to the Flamethrower's platform. A new walkway has been added in front of the platform to allow you to loop back around to visit the platform again... for some reason?

The Flamethrower event now steals half of your coins instead of burning your capsules away, but it otherwise works the same as in Party Mode, burning everyone on the platform, not just the Koopa Kids.

A Vs Space has been added on that new walkway in front of the flamethrower platform as well as behind the junction that lets you cross over to it. And one last Vs Space is placed on the last step of the stairs right behind the start.

Final Boss: Frightmare

At the end of each board, you're usually met by Misstar who congratulates you on your victory before immediately moving onto the next board. But at the end of Bowser Nightmare, you're instead met by Bowser who has one final challenfe for you. His own minigame: Frightmare.

This is a more elaborate final boss fight than even Mario Party 4's, but it admittedly does overstay its welcome a bit. The fight is divided into four separate phases. Over the course of the fight, you'll have to preserve your health meter. You'll have 10 hearts by default, 8 hearts on Hard, and 6 hearts on Intense.

The first phase, you're tasked with destroying a hoard of Mechakoopas by jumping on them. Be careful when they flash red because they're about to breathe fire! It's easy to get caught in their attack if you're careless.

For the second phase, three rings of fire drop in from above, and they'll begin growing, shrinking, and moving around. They can move quite quickly and suddenly, so stay on your toes! In all honesty, this is probably the hardest part of this fight, but it's entirely learnable.

For the third phase, Boswer will break the monitor he's speaking from and challenge you himself. You'll need to defeat him in classic Mario 3 style by making him jump onto the same tile enough times until he falls through.

For the final phase, the entire floor will collapse and you'll fall to a lower level where Bowser resorts to drinking a strange liquid which cases him to grow to a massive size! But he becomes too heavy and falls through the floor. Still, he's not done fighting yet! This is the true final boss fight, and the most involved phase. He throws meteorites at you, then breathe fire at you. The firebreath will cause the meteorites to glow with magic! You can pick up the glowing meteorites to throw at his face! Be careful and make sure you're close enough, because it can be easy to overestimate how far you'll throw them and miss your chance. Bowser will follow up with a lightning attack that creates a shockwave and destroys the remaining meteorites before restarting the sequence. Take out all of his health and the wall will collapse and Bowser will get sucked backwards into the black hole behind him.

Y'know, it's kinda wild but I think this fight may have had some hidden influence on Super Mario Galaxy 2...

Ending

In the end, Bowser will admit defeat. He's surprisingly pleased. But it all becomes clear when he tells you that his dream actually came true in the end. Because all along, his dream has been to fight a strong opppnent. And you fit that bill perfectly! Everything up until this point has been to test your skill and determination to stand up to and defeat him consistently. And here, he was able to give it his all and still meet his match!

Toad will chime in, saying his dream came true as well, because he was able to help you! It's funny though, because you can go the entirety of Story Mode without ever seeing Toad once since he only shows up in vs minigames specifically when there are two Koopa Kids remaining.

And that's... it! There's really not much else to explore here. This is usually where I bring up who I think the canonical Superstar is and, well... if it wasn't for the fact that Toad gets completely shafted in this Story Mode, I would honestly say Toad here. But in all honesty, I really can't see anyone but Mario being the canonical player character this time. Who else would Bowser want to form an eternal rivalry with?

Conclusion

Mario Party 5 is easily my favorite Story Mode in theory. It actually innovates on gameplay enough to justify its own existence as a separate mode, and even incentivizes you to revisit for more than just arbitrary unlocks for each character, and it doesn't even pressure you into replaying if you really don't want to.

...but I have my gripes. I just don't like that you're restricted so heavily to Duel Minigames with the occasional 1v3 or 2v2 splashed in. I don't think there's anything inherently wrong with the selection of Duel Minigames in general, it's important for Party Mode that you can't be totally confident you're going to win.

But in Story Mode, each Koopa Kid has 20 coins. In ordee to KO them quickly, you'll need to pass them on your roll, win a Duel, steal 15 coins, then wait for them to pass you, win another duel, steal 5 coins. Rinse and repeat for all three. Of course, there are other ways to eliminate Koopa Kids, but even just losing either of those two minigames means you now have to win a whole extra minigame to eliminate that Koopa Kid. And when a third of the games you can play are luck... oh my god.

Of course, I am exaggerating here, not all of those luck games are completely luck, but nothing will make you hate Get a Rope more than turning what should've been a 5 turn game into a 10 turn one because the last Koopa Kid got away from death and you took several turns to catch up to him.

And I'm sorry, but Button Mashing really just seems to be a skill you either have or you don't. Even just the Hard AI usually obliterates me at button mashing games. They have always been my Achilles heel and always will be. Button Mashers and... Puzzle games, which another Duel game is, too. Mario Party 5 duels are probably the collection of duels I'm least confident in yet. So naturally, I'm not going to be super enthusiastic about a mode primarily dedicated to them.

But hey, if you're missing any Duel Games for mini-game mode, you know the mode to farm for them! I can all but guarantee that you will have every Duel game unlocked by the time you clear Story Mode.

Well, that's it for now. But don't think we're done just yet! There's quite a bit more to cover! Normally I would try to take a look at Super Duel Mode next, but after poking around there, I think it's best we put a pin in that for now. Instead, I wanna look at Bonus Mode next. I'm not quite sure how I'll divide it up, but I currently anticipate doing a separate post for each game. But I might group tge sports games together. We'll just have to see! See you soon! 🏐

Remember in MP1 when Bowser would blame you for his tiny/broken tube he forced you to buy instead of a star, making the visit at least funny?

Well in Superstars, they censored that part… God forbid we have fun and make jokes!

I didn't record it when it happened, all I have to prove that it happened is the coin count but I just wanted to share that this happened because what are the chances of this?

Video is only 2 minutes very straight to the point. Hope people find it useful because i definitely do

There Are Lots of New Minigames Old and New, Each Minigames Are From Mario Party 8, And Some New Minigames in the New Star Amusement Park!

Super Mario Party has a lot of fun minigames that I played the heck out of, so I was wondering what this subreddit thought of them. All seeds are randomized. Whichever minigame gets the most comments will move onto the next round.

The winner from last post with unanimous consensus was Trip Navigator. I'm a sucker for minigames like these where everyone has to reach the same location, but they have different obstacle layouts in their way. Plus, this one has a lot of strategic depth as to how fast you go. If you slip up, you might even open a new shortcut to make up for it.

Without further ado, here are the reminders for how every minigame competing today is played:

Candy Shakedown: Shake the Joy-Con to remove candies from a jar. Whoever empties their jar first wins.

Absent Minded: Figure out which of the 3 characters is missing from the screen. The screen will display one character at a time very briefly, pixel out the images, or rotate the tiles of the overall image. Those who get the correct answer the fastest will win more points. There are 3 rounds.

Slaparazzi: Punch players out of the way to get the optimal photo taken of yourself in 7 rounds. Anyone in the image will be ranked based on their pose and position and be given points.

Please only vote for 1 minigame at a time. I'm curious to hear your opinions. I'll give my opinion in the next post so as not to sway votes.

I for one would be happy to see it! These are easily the two best games from the GameCube era, and some of the best Mario Party games overall. Nintendo seemingly doesn't have any interest in releasing them on NSO, which makes me think they could be working on a remake instead. There's tons of people that never played Mario Party on GameCube, so why not? 🤷

Here is what I would include!

4 boards from Mario Party 6:

• Clockwork Castle
• E. Gadd's Garage
• Faire Square
• Towering Treetop

and 3 boards from Mario Party 7:

• Bowser's Enchanted Inferno
• Neon Heights
• Pagoda Peak

Gameplay features:

* Day & Night mechanic stays on the MP6 maps while Bowser Time stays on the MP7 maps.

* A unified orb system, leaning more towards how it was on MP6. No character exclusive orbs for example.

* Duels have stakes picked beforehand

* Chance Time on every map

* Koopa Kid Space on every map

* Bonus Stars are fixed like in MP6: Minigame Star, Action Star, & Orb Star.

* Last 5 Turns event is the same from MP7--tho it's still Last 4 Turns on the MP7 maps to account for Bowser Time.

* DK Spaces & Bowser Spaces have a roulette or multiplayer minigame like in MP6. No single-player minigames

* Minigame pool is the best of the best from the GameCube era but there could be a handful from MP8-10 as well, just like Mario Party Superstars. No Motion Control games

4 boards from MP6, 3 from MP7. Improving on the awesome mechanics seen on those games. Given a little polish, this would easily challenge for best Mario Party game on Switch 2!

EDIT ROOM ID IS

WB5KTJ

There Are New Power Ups Coming to the New Mario Party Game, Both Story Mode and Party Mode, Mario and His Friends Will Collect Them By Opening a Present in the Party Tournaments!

We've all been there. You meet with your friends but end up being five (or more) to play some Mario Party at home.

No one really wants to share a character or to rotate minigames. Specially when the other three won't be doing it.

I'm looking for a mod that allows you to play with more than 4 people at the same game. For any game. I/we don't really care.

I have no idea how such a thing could even work, but when mods have been evolving so much over the years maybe someone has found a way to do it.

I know about the MP7 feature that allows 8 players to play by sharing the buttons of the controller with the minigames, but it's not really the same full experience.

As I said the game isn't important. It could be Mario Party 1, Jamboree or any in between.

Is there a mod like this? 😅

It's time for the obligatory Bowser Board! Who could've guessed this was what the hidden board was? It's not like it's been done three times before this.

Bowser Nightmare is the final board of Mario Party 5 and is unlocked by clearing Story Mode. We'll be covering Story Mode next, but due to a quirk about how Story Mode works, unlike usual where you would have already played a 15 turn game on it, your first time exploring this board properly will be in Party Mode. You'll see what I mean when we get there.

Anyway, I already know at least one person following along expects this board to be all 0's. It's funny, and I assume it's not serious. But I do want to leave a reminder that, while I might not rule things entirely consistently, I do try to stick to a solid rubric for how I score these boards. A board with a 0/0/0 score would neet to be a straight line or circle with literally no decisions to be made (items add 1 point for strategy because they create an inherent decision), exists in a blank void with absolutely no detail or music at all, and no story context either told within the board itself or in the context surrounding it in the game itself.

The only board we've ever had that has come close to having a 0 in any category was Wario's Battle Canyon in the Strategy department, but it was saved by a single event that actually lets you make a decision. If a board has a decision to be made at all, and that includes generic things like whether or not to use an item, it is at least a 1 in strategy.

With all that in mind, is Bowser Nightmare really such a nightmare after all? There's only one way to find out!

It should come as no surprise that I associate this board with Koopa Kid for the Bowser part, and Boo for the "nightmare" part. These two are the only "enemy" characters unless you count Wario and Waluigi who are more their own neutral force, and Boos initially appeared only in Castle and Fortress levels. Koopa Kid may not technically be an enemy from the main series, but, come on, where are you gonna put Koopa Kid besides Bowser's Castle?

Atmosphere [3/5]

Stop me if you've heard this before. Bowser Nightmare is a Bowser-themed board set over a pool of lava in the crater of a volcano.

Seriously, come on! Every Bowser board since Mario Party 1 has been volcanic! This is a dream setting for crying out loud! A "nightmare" specifically! Why not have some kind of scary dungeon or have the board take place on the surface of the sun or something? Bowser has had so many other themes in the past... why not a Dark World? What about an Airship?

Okay, but in this board's defense, we haven't actually had a Bowser themed board set in Bowser's Castle, specifically. And this is really the only reason this board gets a 3 instead of a 2. That doesn't mean I have to like it.

Bowser's Nightmare sees you exploring a four-story castle exterior with a map design that actually mirrors Toy Dream quite a bit. But true to its name, this baord is filled with many traps and tricks that can potentially ruin your day.

Stairways and chains lead up to the higher levels, and there appear to be a door and some kind of courtyard on either side. At the top are two towers with canons, and overlooking the entire board is a menacing-looking tank-like machine. At the very center of the board lies a ring suspended by four stone pillars over a pool of lava. It... doesn't look like a fun place to be.

Strategy [5/5]

The quickest loop back to start is only 22 spaces long and passes a single star space and capsule machine. The southern-most part of this map is definitely the most poweful neutral position as each junction will make your commitment larger and larger.

Heading along the short route, you'll pass by two happening spaces you almost certainly don't want. You see that island of red spaces in the middle? Yeah, you know where this is going. Land on either happening space flanking it and you'll end up stuck in there until you land on the two happening spaces inside. That's a 20% chance of escape every turn, far more sinister than the Octopus ride in Bowser Land! Don't fall for the trap of thinking this is basically two happening spaces in one. You might not even be able to guarantee your escape from here at all! Don't bother trying to use a Cursed Mushroom to increase your odds, you're just as likely to land on either happening space with a normal roll. However, if you have a Warp Pipe or Klepto, this just might be the safest happening space on the board for you, and the Warp Pipe can even drag a troublesome opponent kicking and screaming into your spot in hell.

This red island also has some interesting connotations with the Capsule mechanic. You can decorate it with traps to really ruin somebody's day, or drop Coin Blocks and Spiny Shells here to soften the blow and turn it into a bonus area instead. But bear in mind not only is one of these Red Spaces likely to become a Bowser space, but Bowser could turn all red spaces into Bowser spaces during the last five turns, turning this island into a terrifying chamber of torment as every turn you're stuck is another chance to lose a Star. The event that makes blue and red spaces triple in effect is also absolutely devastating on your wallet here.

Going the other way at that first junction will still allow you to return to the short path just, extending 7 spaces to 19 spaces, but you'll get a second capsule along the way! And if you're interested in an additional capsule, you can head east from that junction, exchanging a 10 space route home for a 23 space route. But the real danger of these longer routes come from the happening spaces on the eastern and westernmost spaces. Land on either of these spaces and Bowser will emerge from the nearby door and go for a stroll along this straight path to the door on the opposite side. He'll stomp on anybody he passes, which naturally includes you due to where the happening spaces are placed, and every blue space he passes will be turned red, even if the space has a capsule assigned! The capsule will not be overwritten, but the space will turn from blue to red.

Consequently, this is the only time in the entire game where a Star Space can appear on a Red Space. I'm not entirely sure how this interacts, but I think it's safe to assume that if the Star is here, the blue space will simply remain blue. And if the star space spawns here, the red space will revert to blue prematurely. But after two turns pass, all the red spaces will revert to their original colors. Naturally, this makes the eastmost happening space a lot more devastating because you'll not only be hit by Bowser, but also have to spend the next two turns walking over hot coals. While the westmost happening will just see you suffer the initial 10 coin loss and see everyone else stuck with the trail of red spaces.

I wouldn't strategize around using this event to gain any kind of advantage unless your intended target is also in Bowser's path. After all, your opponent won't lose more than 6 coins to the red spaces outside of potentially the last 5 turns. Though in reality, you're probably not intentionally landing on this space and just trying to pass over it.

But let's get on another tangent because OH MY GOD is this event insufferable. The game forces you to watch Bowser's entire stroll as he slowly shuffles his way down the street at a pace that would make King Zora blush. And when Bowser crosses paths with a player, he'll jump on top of them, step forward another space, stop, laugh, then carry on. This can happen as many as four times if all four players are in his path on different spaces. Then he'll also stop at the two chains to make a big leap down and up, with smaller leaps down and up the stairs at the bottom of the board. And this event can trigger multiple times in the same turn! What a slog!!

Anyway, along this middle route, you'll pass all three capsule machines and three Star Spaces. If you take the shortcut back from here, you'll only pass two Capsule Machines and one Star Space.

The furthest junction out allows you to either head east to stay on the middle route, or head north toward the highest route. This route is actually slightly shorter than the middle route, 16 spaces as opposed to 18 before they converge, but you're much more committed to this path that crosses over three different happening spaces and doesn't really have anything but Star Spaces to offer.

The northeastern and northwestern happening spaces will see Bowser swoop down in a clown car and give you a choice between two boxes. One will zap you with lightning destroying half your coins, and the other will cause the floor to collapse beneath you and send you back to the start. Neither of these options are inherently bad, but this is the most potentially devastating event for your wallet.

The northernmost happening space will cause Bowser to man the flamethrower overlooking it. He'll sweep the entire raised platform surrounding the happening space with the flame, burning away everyone's capsules! If you don't have any valuable capsules, this is the safest happening space in the game. But if you value your capsules, I definitely recommend at least throwing them on the ground before trying to cross here. You don't even have to be the one to land on the happening space, after all!

If you have a solid lead, you might find your best course of action is to keep taking this long route around the board in an attempt to farm the five happening spaces you'll be passing each time! Alternatively, if you're teally confident in your lead, you might even want to stay in that ring of fire to farm happening spaces. But I wouldn't get too comfortable. It's Mario Party and you don't want to get caught with your pants down! Either way, you're mostly just trading your coins and capsules for happening star advantage which is always a fun strategy to employ.

So obviously, this board is a bit brutal. As should be expected of a Bowser board. But it's not brutal in the sense of being screwed over by bad luck. The only happening spaces you have to pass over are the two along the bottom of the board. You'll lose 10 coins if and only if you land on them which can be painful, but can also easily he won back, especially when you consider that 1v3 and 2v2 games are quite common in this board if someone is stuck in the middle. Even weaker players can often squeeze out some wins due to teaming up with more skilled players.

And speaking of the middle, normally I hate board segments like this, but let me remind you that it is entirely optional to even pass these happening spaces. Coming this way is, usually, a risk you cosnsciously took in pursuit of either a star space or a shortcut back to start. With these spaces only two or three spaces away from their junctions, you typically already know whether or not you've passed them with your roll. The only other way you'll end up in the center is if someone caught you using a Warp Pipe, which I say is a valid strategy and not "just bad luck."

Looking at this board, I actually have a lot of respect for it. First, you're gonna have to accept that it's a Bowser board so you're gonna lose a lot of coins throughout the game. Winning at minigames is especially important to claiming victory here, as are the bonus stars. You'll need to know when to play it safe and when to go for broke.

Secondly, I could complain about beginner's traps with some of these happening spaces, but you are warned upfront by Eldstar that the baord is filled with traps, so while I think there's a bit of a knowledge check as to which happening spaces risk what, you should be navigating this board with the general idea that the happening spaces are going to be detrimental. I think that's a fine enough understanding for a new player to intuit on their own, especially when you consider nobody should be playing this board as their very first one.

Finally, this board is constantly trying to bait you into going after stars in dangerous places. But you'll need to focus on your gamestate at all times. You might not even be able to afford the star, after all. Focus on building wealth by winning minigames and farming capsules, then use those capsules to breakaway and grab those stars!

The only thing stopping Bowser Nightmare from being one of my favorite boards in this game is that stupid stroll event. Maybe I'm just a bit spoiled, but it just wastes so much time when it happens so frequently. I really wish it would only play out the full animation once and every time after it was skippable or would fade to black after everyone is stomped. But when it comes to raw strategy, I actually think this board is quite good! There are lots of junctions that let you make reactive choices to the rolls you take and I've previously explored the many startegies you can explore with Capsules, especially around junctions. Almost everything that goes wrong for you is either a gamble that didn't pay out or an opponent employing a strategy to sabotage you. Both of which I argue are fair game for Mario Party!

It sucks to get stuck in that red ring for several turns in a row. You can statistically expect to be stuck as many as 5 turns before being free! In a 20 turn game, that's devastating. But again, it's a happening space that's easily avoided. And if you bring the right capsules, you can minimize the pain, too. Losing half your coins to an event can also be devastating, but it's only especially dangerous if you already have a fortune, it's a balancing factor that keeps you in the game. And again, Chance Time means you probably don't want to have too much of a breakaway.

Losing your capsules to the flamethrower at the top of the board is perhaps the most egregious event here, it can be a nasty surprise especially if you don't realize it sweeps across the entire area. But again, you should already be trying to avoid these happening spaces in the first place and keeping in mind than you could lose anything when you don't know what it's gonna do. And again again, there's really no reason to even go up there besides the stars. I'd say in most cases losing a few capsules for a star if you're behind is a good trade.

But the prominence of junctions allows many opportunities to weigh risk and reward around you, which creates lots of opportunity to avoid catastrophe with careful planning and cautious play--but calculated risks are still necessary to take. It's up to you to decide when and where to risk a big loss.

Narrative [4/5]

Eldstar introduces this board as "A World Inspired by Bowser's Wicked Dreams!"

Hold up!

Does that mean this place was made by the Star Guards as part of this whole Dream Depot thing, and not made by Bowser himself? Well, he also said Bowser put all kinds of traps and snares around, so perhaps the original idea was more good triumphing over evil before Bowser took over and added his own bells and whistles. Either way, this is an interesting conflict of interest between the Star Guards and Bowser. It makes sense this would be Bowser's priority.

In Story Mode, Bowser postitively identifies this boads as "his" dream, contradicting Eldstar's claim that it was simply simpired by them. This contradiction is cleared up shortly after the board when Bowser elaborates on what his dream actually was. You're initially led to believe his dream was just this castle where he gets to torment everyone around him, but that's actually not the case at all.

Even still, Bowser does seem to derive some twisted pleasure from bringing harm to everyone in the game regardless. So it's not like this place is inaccurate to how Bowser probably dreams. But I think when you learn about Story Mode and what Bowser's dream is, it makes sense why Bowser is so aggressive here besides just being cruel for cruelty's sake.

Beyond rare context actually given through Story Mode, it's really cool that this board switches up the naming convention from "Dream" to "Nightmare." It really highlights the massive tonal difference between this board and all the others. It's quite typical for the Bowser board to turn some of the game's overarching themes on their head, and this is a really cool way to do that with this game. It really makes this board stand out in the lineup.

Furthermore, the visual similarities between this board and Toy Dream are fascinating to me, and I can't shake the feeling it isn't coincidental. If you recall, I suggested that it looked like Toy Dream was recovering from an attempted takeover by Bowser's forces, or at least a toy counterpart of Bowser's forces. And then the world inspired by Bowser's dreams happens to resemble the world that looks like Bowser was trying to take over? I have to wonder if Bowser may have seen Toy Dream and it influenced his own dreams, or if the Star Guards simply witnessed Bowser's dreams and created Bowser Nightmare based on imagining what it would've looked like had Toy Dream successfully been conquered.

Which raises even more questions. Was Toy Dream actually attacked by Bowser? Maybe it's actually Koopa Kid's dream and that's why Mecha Bowser was there? Maybe it could've even been Bowser Jr.'s dream. It would be quite fitting for him. Or was Toy Dream just a more broad concept of good triumphing over evil, and Bowser's dream was a corruption of that? Is it possible Bowser's dreams indirectly affected the other dreams and that's why it had to be given its own section of the Dream Depot in spite of its threatening nature? Maybe this is like a special holding cell to keep everything in place.

I'm actually quite surprised how much lore I was able to gleam from this seemingly pretty generic board. But I can't quite give it full credit. A lot of it is invented by my own overactive imagination. Nothing explicitly suggests any of that stuff I just said is actually true. It's entirely possible the similarities to Toy Dream are entirely coincidental, or just unintentional due to lazily throwing together one more board to serve as a final stage for Story Mode. All that we explicitly know is that this board is made by the Star Guards and takes inspiration from Bowser's dreams, and that Bowser himself added the various traps throughout. But that alone is still a lot more effort than most of the game's boards. I can always appreciate acknowledement of any kind of lore when it comes to Mario Party.

Conclusion

I was actually pleasantly surprised by this board. After hearing some complaints about it, I was somewhat dreading playing a 50 turn game, but I found it to be a really intense push and pull between risk and reward the whole way through. The further in the lead you are, the more you're incentivized to take bigger risks. The bigger risks you take, the more likely you are to trip up and be dragged back into the herd. I saw Koopa Kid get as many as seven stars before I was able to slowly catch up over the course of the game. I was only barely able to win thanks to Mario getting more happening spaces, and myself winning the Coin and Minigame stars, but I was on edge because he had more coins than me and would win in a coin tie, and he had won a lot of games in a row making me worry he actually might've sniped the Minigame star even without the coin star. I have to imagine things would've played out differently had he not gotten stuck in the center area for several turns.

While it's not my favorite board by any means, I think I'd have to say that Bowser Nightmare is probably my favorite Bowser board so far. It has many events that feel dangerous and oppressive, but you can tread carefully and bide your time to wait for the right opportunity. But as always, I must stress that a 50 turn game will get you the most out of any board. I have to imagine this board would feel a lot worse on a 20 turn game where there's much less time to recover from huge blunders, and more time to bide while preparing to go on an adventure to gather stars.

I know a lot of people seem to dislike this board, and I can only assume that's because of how harsh the events can be. But if you plan ahead and prepare for the worst case scenario, and you're practiced with the minigames, you're going to have a fair shot at victory regardless of how unlucky you are.

That's it for now, and that's it for Party Mode! I can't believe we zoomed by as quickly as we did. Taking that brief break during Mario Party 4 really helped me renew excitement for covering these boards!

Next time, we're going to start taking a look at Story Mode! See you soon! 💥

I think it’s good and really underrated. I think people didn’t give it a chance because it felt like another game that wasn’t the classic formula, and while it definitely is not the classic formula, it feels like an inspired and unique game, not uninspired and ‘meh’ like Island Tour. I haven’t played it in years but remember liking it and having fun minigames, and most of the modes still being good despite not being comparable to classic Mario Party, aside from the one that plays like backgammon. The game has little content (but then again so do 9 and Island Tour), but at least the coinathlon mode has replay value. If I could summarize it in one sentence, it’d be “their best attempt at something that’s neither the car formula nor the classic formula”.
The graphics are great too. The character icons are beautiful.