Review for Mario & Luigi: Superstar Saga + Bowser's Henchmen. Nintendo 3DS game, the video game was released on 05/10/2017 The version for 3DS came out on 06/10/2017
It was the year 1996, when Squaresoft used the Super Mario brand to try a path that our plumber had never taken before: that of role playing. Thanks to their experience with RPGs, the Final Fantasy house did a job on Super Nintendo that made a myriad of fans fall in love, making it clear to the great N that in the destiny of Mario and friends there were not necessarily only platforms or kart races . So here in 2003, on that fantastic portable console that was the Game Boy Advance, it came out Mario & Luigi: Superstar Saga, the first chapter of a successful series of role-playing games about the two brothers that continues today and has reached 5 chapters divided into one for Game Boy Advance, two for DS, and two for 3DS (namely the recent Dream Team Bros. and Paper Jam Bros.).
Almost 15 years later Nintendo decided that it was time for the first chapter to get a nice remake, so that it could be replayed with pleasure on the latest generation consoles. So it comes Mario & Luigi: Superstar Saga + Bowser's Henchmen, a complete remake of the first game in the series with several interesting additions.
Once again there was a lot of funky laughter
The story of Mario & Luigi: Superstar Saga remains the same as it was 15 years ago, so those who had already stripped the title on the Game Boy Advance will find practically nothing new but the joy of retracing the memories of yesteryear.
One beautiful sunny day, the ambassador of the Kingdom of Beanland and her assistant arrive at the mushroom kingdom to pay their respects to Princess Peach and open a new trade route, perhaps to establish an alliance of peace and prosperity between the two kingdoms. Every auspicious prospect moves away when the two shady figures, who turn out to be there Witch Ghignarda e Grin, steal Princess Peach's voice, leaving the poor girl to break eardrums and cause explosions every time she tries to open her mouth.
Of course for Bowser this is a problem: he can't kidnap Peach in these conditions, or he would end up destroying his castle, as well as having lost much of its charm. Absolutely unacceptable: this is why Bowser leaves with Mario and Luigi for Fagiolandia, ready to take back the voice of the beautiful princess.
Improvements and additions
Of course, Mario & Luigi: Superstar Saga for Nintendo 3DS it is not a mere 1: 1 copy of the original where only the sprites of the characters have been modified. However, it must be said that there is certainly a great improvement of the latter: they have been replaced with those of Dream Team Bros. and Paper Jam, the last two titles of the saga released for Nintendo 3DS and this has led to clear improvements in terms of graphics, but also to some negative sides such as a loss of personality regarding some characters, such as the Toad of the Mushroom Kingdom who originally had different heights or were dressed differently, while in this re-edition they are only of different colors.
Although the main game system has remained unchanged from previous chapters, thus relying on turn-based combat that requires a certain level of skill and timing on the part of the user to carry out more incisive special attacks, some improvements have been made from the most recent iterations of the saga. For example, the Paper Jam Emergency Parade is back, which allows you to reduce the damage suffered with the single press of a button, performing a guard that, although not powerful when the dodge is complete, allows a minimum of defense to those who do not. they feel confident in their ability to parry hits in a normal way.
There are also many other improvements such as the ability to save when we prefer in the Overworld, extra guides and options on the touch screen, small fills in points of the story that in the past were branded as directing errors, and various adjustments to the difficulty and statistics of objects and enemies.
This title also includes a brand new minigame called Bowser's henchmen, a freshly baked story in which we will be put in charge of all the various minions of Bowser such as Goomba, Koopa Troopa in an attempt to rescue their master in Beanland. In this mini-story we will have the possibility to choose which characters to add to the team, and then observe the battles that will take place automatically (with our little influence such as pressing a button at the right time or pressing it repeatedly to enhance some of our minions' attacks).
The clashes will have a Chinese morra-based system, where melee monsters are strong against ranged ones, ranged ones are strong against flying ones, while flying ones have the advantage against melee. At the end of the battle, the surviving enemies will have the opportunity to join our team, allowing us over time to create real armies made up of our favorite monsters from every Super Mario game.
Mario & Luigi: Superstar Saga + Bowser's Henchmen is an almost unexpected but certainly welcome remake. After 15 years it allows to be played by those who had never touched it before, as well as to be taken over by longtime fans who will be able to enjoy it in a new guise: an unaltered story, historical but improved soundtrack, sprites of the characters in line with those of the last chapters of the series. The addition of the miniquest Bowser's Henchmen only increases the value of the package, which in addition to being a classic, is a milestone in the history of RPGs.
► Mario & Luigi: Superstar Saga + Bowser's Henchmen is an Action-RPG type game developed and published by Nintendo for Nintendo 3DS, the video game was released on 05/10/2017 The version for 3DS came out on 06/10/2017
