Time travel is not alien to the world of videogames, let alone RPGs. Partners in Time though treats timeline shenanigans in a clever, weirdly somber and mature approach, considering the depressing and oppressive turn the game's story takes: it is now the Shrooms whom act as cruel and memorable villains in this story, having conquered the Toad Kingdom past.

Mario, Luigi, Mario Jr. & Luigi Jr. work well enough together as a team, but it's not as effective as in Super Star Saga: instead of using points to use combo attacks, they are now essentially items you can buy. Since money was never an issue in M&L games, you can see where the issue lies: the game's difficulty takes a nosedive each time a new combo item is introduced, making enemies' health bars just a matter of time, instead of strategic thinking. Platform sections and puzzles are fun enough, but despite having more bros, there's much less to do in terms of combo and exploration. I'll be blunt, the game takes a lot of steps forward in settings, story, characterization, with the four protagonists weirdly well characterized despite never speaking and Prof. E. Gadd stealing every scene he's featured in. The soundtracks also kind of rocks?

At the same time, it takes away a lot of ingenuity and platforming\puzzles from Super Star Saga, not taking real advantage of the dual screen if not for the occasional battle animation. It tries striking a balance between funny and emotional, which doesn't always land. To me it'll always be charming, but there's a lot of things to consider and wade through before getting to the "good stuff". Strong beginning, weak middle, padded ending but satisfactory experience don't make for a game I'd recommend easily.

In terms the average game journalist can understand, it's a A24-produced, genre-redefining, trope-subverting, 40 KB JPG atmospheric, dark and eerie, emotionally draining [...] game.

It seems like a lot of people view partners in time as one of the weakest Mario and Luigi games, but I really enjoyed my time with it. It is one of the best-paced titles in the series. None of the areas really drag on too long, and I enjoy how each of them carves out their own identity. The idea of the babies is fun and I think it is executed pretty well for the most part. I don't think they got all that creative with the overworld functions of the babies, but the combat is pretty fun in this game. Utilizing all the buttons in attacks and counter-attacks is a cool way to spruce up the series in my opinion. Not to mention the adorable cutscenes of Mario, Luigi, and the Toadsworths attempting to cheer them up and any time baby Mario or baby Luigi says "thank you very much." The bosses were unique and, as always for Mario and Luigi, really fun. However, I was playing on the US version which made the boss HPs obnoxious, but it did help make the final boss very challenging and memorable for me (especially with the banger playing). Speaking of music, Partners in Time excels. The title screen, thwomp volcano, Yoshi mountain, and the time-hole music all also go off. Overall, I think partners in time is not talked about as an upper-echelon Mario RPG, but it absolutely deserves to be. Soul levels off the charts with this one.

One of, if not one of the few DS games I had as a kid I'd always come back to. Such a unique Mario RPG, even to this day. Incorporating time travel and alien invasion into one package, Mario and Luigi also teaming up with themselves as babies, it's all a neat idea overall.

Professor E. Gadd develops a time machine, and Princess Peach decides to use it to travel to the past of Mushroom Kingdom. Of course, it all goes awry when Peach stumbles in the middle of an alien invasion from the Shroobs, attempting to escape their own desolate world. Unable to return to the present day Mushroom Kingdom, it's up to Mario and Luigi once again to now travel back in time and find her. What an amazing setup for a JRPG, wouldn't be surprised if they were inspired by Chrono Trigger for this one. While I won't go into the rest of the story past the setup, this particular entry of Mario & Luigi is... dark. I'd never imagine a lot of these ideas would ever make it into a Mario game. A lot of situations as well, often frightened me as a kid. I adore all of it, and the Shroobs as a species are so mysterious and exude an aura of fear and just being unpredictable. Story takes a lot of dark turns, and even has some great foreshadowing and plot twists later, coming back to this game, I was honestly impressed with the story. I'd argue it might even be the best plot we've gotten in a Mario game, besides maybe Thousand-Year-Door, and Super Paper Mario.

Now Partners in Time as a game, is also very fun. It's more of a continuation from where Superstar Saga left off, with the new concept of controlling two different groups to solve puzzles and traverse areas, being the Mario Bros., and the Babies. Unfortunately, Partners in Time suffers a lot from this gimmick, I will commend them however for their great use of both DS screens. Most of the gimmicks and puzzle ideas from this game also do not appear again in future entries, making Partners in Time pretty unique. Bros. abilities are back as well, and they're much more complicated than before, nothing too crazy here, though some of them can take time to setup and hurt the pacing overall. Combat is excellent however, and most of the new innovations here were actually used in future titles, which says a lot. Timed hits and dodges return, a substantial evolution from Super Mario RPG. Maximum damage from your attacks require you pay attention to timings, and countering your enemies attacks for added damage is very rewarding and has a ton of variety as far as what enemies are capable of. Some even make use of the top screen to attack, which again, the game is giving you reasons to pay attention and to stay engaged, which I thoroughly was the entire time in battles.

Even combat has a fair share of issues though, the big one for me is simply the Bros. Items. Instead of learning Bros. Attacks like Superstar saga, Bros. Moves are now consumable items that become available overtime. I don't hate this idea, as I was diligent to never run out of these items, but it can seriously be a huge detriment if you're low on these for bosses, because this game has some of the tankiest bosses I've ever seen in a Mario game. The other glaring issue is simply the duration of some of these Bros. Items, essentially, as long as you never mistime an input, the attack can go on forever. You can use one Bros. Item, and completely kill a boss with it, not only is this not very engaging, but it just makes everything too easy. If you decide to not use these powerful items, some bosses can take forever to kill, so you're sort of stuck with one or the other, and that's really the only thing in this game that peeved me. Enemy variety and boss fights are very engaging, having great designs and super fun gimmicks to figure out and abuse as well, so their actual design is amazing, HP pool can be pretty high, though you might actually really enjoy the longer battles, since some RPG's can have the opposite issue of everything dying too quickly.

Level design is also very well done, a great range of different areas and environments to explore, from gross, to colorful, to downright depressing, it's genuinely impressive how diverse this game can make you feel, and how well it does it. Even coloration of the areas is distinct, no single area shares the same color formats, which makes each area stand out from each other. I was very immersed with the expanded and remixed world Partners in Time offered, taking a darker spin on your traditional world 1-8, but there's plenty of happier areas for sure, but the majority is weird alien-technology combined with typical Mario settings, and it works very well.

Graphics for a DS game work well, there's nothing here that's hard to make out or looks bad. As I've said, the game has great color variety, the sprite work is incredible, and varies from your average Goomba, to some awesome mutated shroob variants of older and newer enemies. And for the time when this game came out, it was really exciting to see what the DS was capable of, and how much more potential it really had. Overall, a really nice game to look at.

Music is incredible. Everyone knows Gritzy Desert for a reason, and that's just one example. Phenomenal soundtrack, enhancing the atmosphere in every area very well. Not exactly diverse in instrumentation, but works great for a DS game. Battle music is perfect, frantic and full of energy, the kind of music that gets you excited and raring to go for a fun fight. Big fan of this soundtrack, I listen to it all the time, definitely has a specific vibe to it, one that I personally recommend a listen to outside the game.

Partners in Time is kind of a black sheep for the original Mario & Luigi trilogy, but I loved the new direction it took, as well as the risks involved in creating gameplay that would make use of both screens well. It isn't perfect, and there are definitely problems here a lot of people might not be able to overlook, which I completely understand, there were times I was very frustrated with certain gimmicks or puzzles. But I still stand by this game for the amazing advancements in the combat, and the compelling concept and story, as well as the great variety of areas and immense atmosphere. You can get Partners in Time on the DS, and works on every variation of it, such as DS, 3DS, 2DS etc. You can also purchase this game for a good price on the Wii U eshop. Just be sure to purchase it on Wii U before March 2023.

I've finally got around to beating the second Mario & Luigi game proper, and while it was a very slow start compared to how fast I binged the Superstar Saga remake, I mostly enjoyed my time with it!

One thing I will have to give PiT over most other Mario RPGs is how unique it is story wise (even within the M&L series). Honestly I think it could be argued that this is the darkest Mario game easily, even moreso than Super Paper Mario. The Shroobs unlike most Mario villains feel like an actually serious threat who won't hesitate to eradicate all life in the Mushroom Kingdom, and manage to almost irreversibly turn anyone that stands against them into non-sentient mushrooms, practically killing them. It's made even more creepy by the fact they try to take over and kill Baby Peach's kingdom, along with all the other adorable tykes. I think it's also worth noting that the much tougher difficulty of the game compared to any other game within the M&L series, as well as the game's DS era artstyle really lend themselves well to supporting this grim tone that hangs over the entire game. As much as I know people want a remake of this game, I honestly feel like it holds up well enough by today's standards (albeit, for an older audience). Not to mention, given the trends we saw in the Superstar Saga and Bowser's Inside Story's remakes, they would've likely used the 3DS Era Artstyle and have made the game much more easy, which wouldn't have fit Partners in Time's narrative nearly as well, even if it's more accessible for RPG newcomers.

Sadly, a darker take on a Mario story like this is something I feel we'll likely never see again in the modern day, SPM was the last real outing Nintendo permitted for even the spinoffs in this regard.

That said, while I think the story is definitely more interesting than the norm given the darker tone, along with really interesting concepts like the babies working with their adult selves, time travel, and just the overall narrative in general, I do feel that because Mario can only go so far into dark territory before Nintendo pulls the leash to reign it in, the story itself is limited in what it can explore as a result. Unfortunate, but it's to be expected, and I feel Mario typically is better suited for all ages/children in general, as Nintendo has other IPs better suited to more mature story telling such as Metroid and Zelda. Still, if we happen to get another RPG like this if say, Square's Mario RPG happens to get a sequel following its recent remake, I wouldn't be opposed. I feel like Square Enix's involvement could help push the envelope for a darker Mario RPG to go further in the same way that Super Paper Mario's story did.

The soundtrack ironically I feel is one of Yoko Shimomura's weaker works. While there are definitely some standout tracks such as Thwomp Volcano and the final boss themes, I found that it was a lot more forgettable to me compared to Superstar Saga's songs which I still remember a lot of fondly.

The gameplay is where things get a little more divisive for me. As I said before, I think the tougher gameplay lends itself well to the overall tone the game is going for. The combat has more depth to it that usual and has a much higher skill ceiling to master due to the fact you have 4 Bros. to work with, and juggling Bros. Attacks between them all can be really tough if you want to do the most damage possible. I welcome the challenge, though it definitely tripped me up a lot and I'm not as good at this game as I am other M&Ls as a result, but I'm sure other people really love that aspect of this game and have managed to master it.

That said, my one gripe with the gameplay (which is also the main reason why I like Superstar Saga's remake a decent bit more than this entry), is that a lot of the fights take forever as a result of the harder difficulty. I get that HP and stuff was upped across the board due to the fact you can do more damage with the Babies helping you, and I don't mind boss fights taking awhile to beat as a result of said challenge, but so many of the normal mob enemy fights take so long and made the pacing grind to a halt for me a lot throughout the game. It'd really halt my progress and make me feel like the pacing turned into a lot of stop and go on a moment's notice, and that really annoys me in RPGs. Mario & Luigi (and most Mario RPGs) are usually well known for the solid brisk pace their games have that keeps things rolling in a nice smooth flow that you can pick up and put down at any time for either a short fun session or longer binge ones, but this game really doesn't have that due to its difficulty.

The one saving grace of this gripe I have though, is that this game is much shorter than the series norm as a result, which made the pacing issue not nearly as bad as it could've been. Honestly, given how surprisingly short the game is, I'm pretty convinced part of the reason the difficulty was upped is specifically to pad out the length, much in the same vein as what NES games would do.

That said, it's pretty clear even the developers felt they went too far, hence why the European and Japanese versions of the game rebalanced things and toned down the HP of a lot of enemies to fix the difficulty. I ended up switching to the Euro version myself around the time I got to the desert area, and it made a big difference, really glad I did that. Thankfully my save file was compatible with it too, so I didn't have to restart.

The final boss was still pretty tough and took a good while even despite the fact they shaved off half its health from the original version of the game, so that was definitely a good move on the developers part. I also like that while the final boss reuses moves from Superstar Saga's final boss such as the spinning arms and you needing to destroy all of its limbs in order to make the head vulnerable so you can defeat the boss, the developers learned from the problems with SS's final boss and made it so the head stays vulnerable for a decently long amount of turns before it becomes invincible again. SS's final boss had the problem of having the head be vulnerable for way too short of time for you to damage it much, so that was greatly appreciated.

I also really liked how the post final boss fight has a really unique concept I haven't seen done in another Mario & Luigi game surprisingly. Making it so the Bros. can only counterattack to stop the boss and needing to land a certain number of hits to do so was really interesting, and I wish this would've been done in more Mario RPGs going forward, it's a really unique idea.

And honestly, that feels like the true claim to fame for this game. Partners in Time in many ways feels like one of the most unique and different Mario RPGs, and in mostly good ways! I really respect what AlphaDream did here trying to push the envelope on what could be done in this genre with Mario, and I wish we'd see more creative titles like this from Nintendo in terms of being more risky with Mario's IP. I think that there's a good chance we could see this should Mario RPG get greenlit to have more sequels hopefully, but only time will tell if that hopefully comes to pass. Overall, another great game from the series, and I look forward to revisiting my childhood favorite, Bowser's Inside Story, in the future!

Total Playtime: 17 hours, 56 minutes.

As a Mario-backed RPG, there are certain expectations that the player might have upon entering into this game if they're familiar with the franchise. The plot is as predictable as would be expected, to the point where "Rescue Princess Peach" could be the free space on your Mario game bingo card. The music is upbeat and generally enjoyable, specifically the battle music, which is admittedly important in games like this. The characters and dialogue are oftentimes enjoyable and charming, and can be quite humorous. These are all metrics you would probably expect from a Mario-type game, and Mario & Luigi: Partners In Time delivers on all of them fairly well. However, it's the combat that you spend most of your time in while playing this game, and it's the combat where the game very much fails to deliver.

Turn-based RPGs live and die by their combat systems. That's not to say that combat is what makes these games great, far from it. However, most popular or widely acclaimed turn-based RPGs are praised and enjoyed, firstly, for their story, their depth, their world, and their characters. In some games, combat is just a "story delivery system," and any slight monotony is forgiven in service of progressing the story forward. The best games of this genre are the ones that innovate, not only on story, but combat as well, in order to make all aspects of the game satisfying and enjoyable. The worst games of this genre, though, end up as tiresome and repetitive, and it's often because the core gameplay-the combat-is lacking. No matter how interesting the characters, how charming the world, how engaging the story; if the base gameplay is repetitive and unenjoyable, the game will likely fall flat on its face.

So where does that leave Mario & Luigi: Partners In Time? Well, the combat is, unfortunately, extremely repetitive and uninteresting. And as the main gameplay aspect, it gets old very quickly. There's only so many times you can perform the same attack on generic enemies while staying interested, and it takes far too long for each battle to finish. Boss designs are certainly more varied than common enemies, but even then, their health is always significantly higher than it needs to be. Even then, none of the fights are particularly difficult, so all a boss fight really means is that it'll take 15 minutes to defeat them instead of 1 minute. There simply isn't enough variety in the combat to make it compelling or fun.

So what aspect of this game is there to keep players interested? The plot? As mentioned previously, there isn't a whole lot there to latch on to. In fact, the plot in this game is actually less interesting than the average Mario non-platforming game, which means it fails to clear an already low bar. The characters? They are charming, and the dialogue definitely has its moment, but certainly not interesting enough to carry a full game. The villains and world are also about as formulaic as they get, so there's nothing there to get attached to. Any puzzles that exist in the overworld feel more like time wasters than they do interactive challenges. Sadly, there isn't enough in this title to make the tedious gameplay palatable, and the result is something that loses its charm quickly and ends up wholly mediocre.

Ok everybody, funny game time is over.

It's time to be a meanie.

Look, I know very well that I'm the minority here and that a lot of people REALLY like this game, and to everyone that thinks this, I have nothing but one thing to say to you: I absolutely understand it and respect you, whether if you loved as a kid or as an adult. However, I sadly cannot say with a good concience that I enjoyed most of this game.

The gameplay is probably the best part by far, only because at its core it's still Mario&Luigi, and Mario&Luigi's gameplay is, you know, really fucking fun, but even that here has problems, two to be exact... THE BABIES. Initially, the inclusion of THE BABIES seems like a cute one, specially in the context of the theme of the game (we will get to that later), and it is for certain things... until it starts to get tiring. Let me put in perspective: when a new mechanic is introduced in a series, it usually ADDS to was there before or in some cases replaces it for the better, the idea is for the mechanic to feel like is an inseparable part of the game's core design and something that makes you look back an thin ''Wow, this was really cool! I don't know how this wasn't here before''. THE BABIES however, do not feel like that for me.

Their introduction makes use of the X and Y buttons for attacks, which seems like a novel idea, but then attacks that before needed only the brothers make use of their younger selfes, and then you notice special attacks start to get longer and longer without the damage being worth the trouble, and then you start to get REALLY tired of separating the babies from the brothers to do puzzles that take A LOT of time and for the most part feel cluncky, or at least not as inspired like what came before or after. There are also some cool enemies and especially some of the bosses are really great, but a lot of normal enemies take A LONG time to kill, making this the only game on the franchise were I really didn't want to fight enemies.

That's the main problem with this game, everything takes longer than usual, LIKE THE FUCKING FINAL BOSS, or rather its third phase, the first and second are great, but the third represents whats wrong with this game perfectly: it's not intense, it's tiring. Oh and also, however came up with the idea of special attacks being purchasable items is a fucking maniac, the special points system was perfectly fine in Superstar Saga and thank god they brought it back to Bowser's Inside Story.

Oh and the time travel theme is a huge waste of potential. Due to the Peach Castle being a main hub area and the rest of zones are accesible throug portals, you only see other zones in the past version, which aside of Yoshi's Island and seing some characters younfg versions, serves no purpose story wise and gives me no connection to this places, sure, there are some cool shenanigans here and there, but in the grand scheme of things, this game could not have been abut time travel with some minor tweaks. Also the Shrooms are not that great... they are cool and dark at first but they blow their scary factor pretty quickly and they start to become too silly and unfunny. Also this is a minor complain, but the score is not that great in the grand scheme of the series; it has some stellar pieces here and there but as whole, is probably the weakest out of the series.

I really know that I'm being too harsh in some places, but I genuely belive that this game has some serious thematic and gameplay problems, but I'm not gonna ignore its ups and its condition. It was the studios' first DS game, and it ahs really cool ideas, and I'm happy to see they tried to go through a darker and more shocking route; also things like the rumble pack and a first really cool use of the dual screens are very respectable. And the end, the fact that this ended up even a bit fun and enjoyable is still a win, and all of its problems would later be resolved in BiS, so I really think this first step was needed.

I may not like the game, but I really do respect it.

Me and this game have a history. It was one of the games I had on DS while growing up and my little child brain would constantly run into moments where I would get stuck, shrug, restart the game, and play until I got the part where I got stuck again.

During my 2022, where I promised myself I would branch out and play more games, I decided to first revisit the games I started as a kid but could never finish. This had to be the most prominent one in my mind.

I started the game up to see how far I had gotten before getting stuck and low and behold it was a lovely 30 minutes in. What the hell was I smoking as a kid? (I'd love to smoke it again lmao).

But on to the actual review, and less of my embarrassing story. This game really surprised me! I went in expecting a Mario game to be pretty plain and inoffensive; easy game play, unmemorable cast and story with basic controls.

Instead, the game is actually quite clever!

- The humor is silly and even as an adult got a few laughs from me at times.
- The art is very stylized and brings out a lot of character you don't often see within the Mario series, while still keeping their familiarity.
- The cast had a good personality, even when the main four can't really talk.
- The fighting is generic RPG with the twist of various party items to keep it interesting.
- The enemies' different fighting styles keep things interesting and make it fun to learn to avoid their attacks.
- The story's pacing is good, though it gets a little boring and repetitive at the end.
- The story in general is fun and creative. Not anything innovative but definitely keeps you entertained.
- The game in both story and fighting style uses the two DS screens super well.
- The Shroob characters are very fun in both personality and design.

The game did a lot even with the constraints that the Mario series often have to deal with. I went in expecting this game to be a bit of a boring 2-2.5 game for kids that I'm way too old for, but was honestly impressed at certain aspects that kept me entertained even as an adult. I can easily understand many kids completely falling in love with its humor, fun visuals and easy, but still challenging game play.

The game is still a Mario game though, holding back from going too far experimentally and is understandably fairly safe. I couldn't stand the suitcase telling me what to do every 20 minutes, but I have to remind myself that the game IS for kids haha.

I full expected the Shroob Princess to be Princess Peach forced into playing the role or getting confused through time travel and accidentally joining the Shroob forces (I remember even expecting this twist as a kid), but I guess Nintendo doesn't want to taint Peach's image LMAO.

The game is overall made for younger age groups I no longer fit into, and while I imagine it achieves satisfying that group fairly well, I'm rating this game as an adult and feel it pretty well fits at a 3.5.

This one tends to get overshadowed by Superstar Saga and Bowser’s Inside Story, with most seeming to regard this as the worst in the series. Why this is the case is beyond me as I find Partners in Time to be a more than worthy follow-up to the former.

Story wise it’s arguably a bit less ambitious than Superstar Saga, being almost entirely set in the Mushroom Kingdom with the only major new characters being the alien Shroobs, who act as primary antagonists. Unfortunately since the Shroobs are wider in numbers they don’t get to forge out distinct personalities like Fawful and Cackletta did in the previous game. This isn’t inherently a bad thing, but it does make them a bit less memorable by comparison.

What does stick out though is the much more grim atmosphere and tone this game has compared to the previous entry, or really any Mario games besides maybe Luigi’s Mansion. I wouldn’t say it’s as dark as some people make it out to be though, rather that it’s more akin to something like a Tim Burton film. What I mean is that even though there’s a lot of dark crap, there’s also a fair bit of light-hearted comedy to offset this. Particular standouts would be the escapades with the talking Star door and pretty much any scene with the 2 Luigi’s. Fortunately it doesn’t ever sway too far in either direction that it ends up feeling jarring, so it overall manages to keep a good balance in tone.

Gameplay wise there’s not as much to say that I didn’t cover when I reviewed Superstar Saga, with 2 exceptions: the Bros. Attacks and the enemy HP. As opposed to retaining the BP mechanic from the previous game, Alphadream controversially changed it to where each Bros. Attack is treated as an individual item like healing items. Likewise if you want more you’ll have to buy them in item shops as opposed to just replenishing your BP with syrup jars. I’m a little conflicted on this overall: on one hand I didn’t really think the BP system was particularly awful or warranted changing, but on the other hand the new system does alleviate the need to replenish BP every now and then, which in turns I feel encourages using Bros. Attacks outside of boss fights, which you’re gonna wanna thanks to the other major problem people have with this game: the OP as fuck enemies.

Now for the first half of the game I didn’t really see what people meant, but right around Toad Town the enemies just suddenly start rocking massive amounts of HP and in turn will hit you like fucking bricks if you’re not prepared. This wasn’t a massive problem for me as I was making a conscious decision to grind throughout each area so I could have the ideal stats but if you’re just playing casually you’re gonna have a real hard time with the last quarter, especially with the boss fights. I still don’t think it’s quite AS bad as a lot of people make it out to be, but yeah I do at least see their point to an extent.

That aside though I honestly don’t see why everyone holds this as the worst. Granted I haven’t played more than 2 of them to the end but I still don’t see the drop off point between this and Superstar Saga. The combat’s still fun, it’s got all the same heart and charm while also being a bit more dark than most Mario games, the soundtrack slaps just as much as Superstar Saga’s (I don’t think I’ve mentioned this yet but Yoko Shimomura is Marty O’Donnel tier as far as game soundtracks are concerned holy shit) and it’s overall just a really good time. It’s available through the Wii U eShop for like 10 quid if you’re interested in giving it a shot, along with the GBA version of Superstar Saga. I’d highly recommend getting it through there over forking over like 50 bucks for a used copy if you ask me. 9/10

It is arguably one of the weaker of the Mario & Luigi games due to its linear world (with not much incentive to explore), it lacks some attack variety with the Bros that Superstar Saga had (due to removal of SP), not that many fun mini games, and a relatively lackluster story due to the Shroobs being unintelligible.

Nonetheless, the details of the attack patterns of enemies in this game and the depths of the combat overall make it a timeless classic for me. For instance, there is this robot enemy that will throw a bomb with an M or L on it (obviously indicating who is being targeted) and when you parry the bomb back, the robot gets damaged and seems to be malfunctioning, and now when it throws the bomb, it is actually targeting the opposite bro. Just lots of small details in enemy fights like that are really enjoyable for me.

I enjoyed the music but no particular song really stands out for me, the babies were incorporated very well, and the relationship between Baby Luigi and Luigi is one of the highlights of the game. The expressiveness of the Bros without dialog carry the cutscenes.

For me I am very biased cause I love Mario RPGs so I put this game at 4 stars but it could definitely be 4.5 or 5 stars if it actually bothered developing the Shroobs at all and made the world actually fun to explore maybe with fun mini games to go back to.

If the measure of how good a game is depends on how much they have Baby Luigi doing the monkey as his idle pose, there's an argument to be made for this being the best game of all time.

For real though I think it's a bit weaker than its predecessor. The Mario fanservice and references have been toned down heavily. I guess there wasn't much new material to work with between the release of that game and this one.

It's the same battle system as before, which I love. Having all enemy attacks able to be either countered or dodged, with specific tells for which bro they're aiming their attack at is such a good mechanic that turns every basic battle into a kind of game in and of itself. And every new location you go to will give new enemies with new moves that you have to try and adapt to as fast as possible to ensure a clean run of the area.

Speaking of the locations, just like Super Star Saga, I really liked the ones in this game. Considering most of the platformer games in this series play it super safe with level themes, this and the last game have had some truly standout scenery for the Mario world.

this game is a lot more linear than the first. While that game was technically linear too, it was an actual full interconnected world and allowed a lot more freedom of the overworld before it blocked you off with a required ability. This game has Peach's castle be the hub while every single quest-area is accessed through portals. Whether intentional or not it is a pretty neat reference to Super Mario 64 if nothing else.

What makes it worse though is how it tricks you with a more open adventure. After the first couple of areas you visit, suddenly a bunch of portals open at once... except you'll quickly find if you enter any of them except the required one, you're immediately blocked off from doing anything before you can even talk to an NPC in that area. They're essentially just setting up exit points back to the castle to those locations for when you reach them via the story. Kind of a tease.

Last time one of my big problems was how the game tried to shove way too many field commands into A and B at once, resulting in way too much micro managing of your skills which constantly led to accidently using the wrong thing, or scrolling past the 1 of 4 sets of skills you can have on screen. This game kind of fixes that while introducing a new problem. See, with the DS having 2 extra buttons it'd make sense to have A and B always be jump, and X and Y be one of the bros special moves, able to switch just those with R like before. But with the introduction of the babies they take ownership of these new buttons (remember how in SSS every single Mario action was A and every Luigi one was B? That was kept, so the babies are now X and Y). They do at least give the babies their own actions, so it's spread out across the four face buttons. In fact they even trim the command list by removing the elemental attributes from Mario and Luigi, leaving all 4 characters with exactly 1 special skill and their basic jump commands. Works out pretty well - except the babies are by default always riding on the older versions back, so every time you want to use any skill you need to throw them off. You wanna use Luigi's spin move? Well first you need to press X or Y to throw the babies, which will automatically transfer control to them, so then you need to press A or B to put it back to adult Mario & Luigi, then press R to switch from jump commands to special commands, and now you can use the spin. It's just annoying they added this extra step when the babies show they are perfectly capable of moving around the world by themselves. I think the game would be a lot smoother if they just had a 4-person train, only needing to give piggyback rides to the babies to get up higher jumps.

This also applies for battles. Why are the babies relegated to sitting on their partners back when they show multiple times they're more than able to fight by themselves? Their stats outside of power and stache (luck) don't even apply in most non-baby-only battle unless the older bro faints, leaving the baby to step in as an extra life. However I do kind of get this one, as only the babies have hammers now, so it might be hard to think up ways for enemies whose moves can be countered with hammers to not be unfair on the older counterparts who don't have them.

My least favourite change of the game is the swap between bros moves to bros items though. In terms of them being a limited resource that's actually completely fine. The game gives you more than enough of every item without you ever even needing to buy them, which itself is always an option. I also even like actually using them, as each one is essentially it's own mini-game, and the extra buttons can often be used in smart ways, such as the shell items which normally have Mario and Luigi kicking them back and forth between it hitting an enemy. A simple concept, but a baby rides the shell and if you press the babies button when the shell hits the enemy it deals extra damage. I like the idea idea.
But they're just so horribly balanced. On one hand you get some items which are better versions than older ones, like red shells that do more damage than green shells, while also not stopping if they defeat one enemy, and start attacking the next one. These are fine. They do make the first item redundant, but as a concept having an "upgrade" version of an item is fine.

To demonstrate this, let's look at 4 (out of only 10 total) items.
Firstly there's the Cannonballer. It shoots all 4 characters into the sky at one enemy and they all fall onto the enemy in a random order - press their corresponding button as they land and deal big damage. Nice and simple.

Then there's the direct upgrade from this - the trampoline. It does more or less the same thing, except it targets all enemies (a random one is chosen each time a character drops) and it goes on forever, progressively getting faster, until you miss a button input.

All well and good! Then there's the Chain Chomp item which actually comes between these 2. It's another "lasts forever and gets faster until you miss an input". In it the adults will run across the screen one at a time being chased by a Chain Chomp, while the baby rides on the back of the chomp by the tail. Press the adult brothers button to jump on the enemy, and press the babies to swing a hammer for a bit of extra damage. It's a fine concept but a bit redundant isn't it? It's just doing more basic jump damage. It can't really do anything that the trampoline can't do, even with the fact the babies use hammers because if you use it on a spiked enemy the first jump will fail and the move will end.

Then there's the copy flower which you get AFTER the trampoline. In it all the bros, adult and baby, create an infinite amount of copies of themselves and it's yet another "jump on an enemy until you miss a prompt". But while the trampoline has one character falling from the top screen at a time, this move has multiple of the characters running from left to right, making it much harder to keep track of AND the damage even seems to be less per hit. So what's the point? Why would I ever use the copy flower which just has me jumping on the enemy in a much harder to track pattern than the trampoline which also just has me jumping on the enemy, in a much easier to follow pattern? And if you miss a prompt for the copy flower it insta-ends the move, while if you do for the trampoline it let's you still attack with the remaining 3 brothers as they fall down. So why is this one of the last items you unlock? It's so stupid and I want answers!

Ok other than that it's a great game.

This game was pretty good for me. Not as well as the prequel, SuperStar Saga but not that far behind.

I absolutely loved the time travel idea and being able see the younger versions of our beloved characters. The puzzles werent too bad, and the two new control for the babies made this game a bit more challenging, which is a plus for me. But with all of these great aspects of the game I had one problem. Which was that the shroobs were pretty dull enemies.

I really wish that the game dove deeper into the shroobs. I wouldve really liked to see more about the shroobs and why they did this full assault on the mushroom kingdom. Especially with Princess Shroob, I really wanted to see more about her character and her reasons for what she did.

All in all, the game was a pretty enjoyable experience and I wish that they made the game longer.