The five star rating is less the game being anything amazing and more just me being in awe that the demake of Super Monkey Ball for GBA is anything other than a disaster
It's easy to write off technical marvels of yesteryear. Sure, a working 3D Monkey Ball on the GBA is an insane thing to even exist, but appreciating it on an interactive level can be a challenge in the first few minutes of gameplay. This is a franchise that relies heavily on analogue input and depth perception; playing it on a 2.9" screen with a d-pad and two face buttons is bound to bring some frustration.
Even so, when you get the hang of it Super Monkey Ball Jr. does offer a rewarding challenge, and utilizes some great features to make it a worthy portable expedient. I played this game exactly where it was meant to be played, on the bus and in the break room at work. With some accessible cheat codes to enable unlimited continues, SMB Jr. becomes a great pickup and putdown game for those looking for a bite-sized bit of precision.
The game isn't without sore spots. Expert levels ask quite a lot of the player, and it can be hard to imagine beating later challenges without using the inverted Konami code on the title screen. The lagging camera and difficulty involved with making micro-adjustments are a particularly big source of frustration. Still, it's hard to be too upset when you're playing Monkey Ball on a device with less than half a megabyte of RAM. Especially when the gameplay is as competent as it is.
Even so, when you get the hang of it Super Monkey Ball Jr. does offer a rewarding challenge, and utilizes some great features to make it a worthy portable expedient. I played this game exactly where it was meant to be played, on the bus and in the break room at work. With some accessible cheat codes to enable unlimited continues, SMB Jr. becomes a great pickup and putdown game for those looking for a bite-sized bit of precision.
The game isn't without sore spots. Expert levels ask quite a lot of the player, and it can be hard to imagine beating later challenges without using the inverted Konami code on the title screen. The lagging camera and difficulty involved with making micro-adjustments are a particularly big source of frustration. Still, it's hard to be too upset when you're playing Monkey Ball on a device with less than half a megabyte of RAM. Especially when the gameplay is as competent as it is.
By far the worst port of Super Monkey Ball, and yet... there's something deeply fascinating about it. It's impressive that Realism managed to get such a competent port running on the GBA at all, let alone with minigames and multiplayer included.
The minigames fare better here since they don't require direct movement input, but otherwise there's little reason to go for this when SMB1 and 2 emulate so well on just about any modern portable device of your choice.
The minigames fare better here since they don't require direct movement input, but otherwise there's little reason to go for this when SMB1 and 2 emulate so well on just about any modern portable device of your choice.
"damn they made a 3d game on gameboy advance?" the videogame
This review contains spoilers
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An interesting and somewhat faithful recreation of the original Super Monkey Ball on GameCube. While this game suffers from being a 3D GameBoy Advance game, it is still impressive and a fun game overall.
Pretty fun for an hour or two. I'm impressed that thq and realism figured out how to run a 3D game on the gba, it's what made me want to try this at all. Technical feat for its time that hasn't aged well.
I wanna say I respect the effort but I really really don't. I gave up on Advanced this game controls pretty shite and the graphics are pretty impressive for GBA but they really don't serve the gameplay whatsoever.
Adapta la fórmula de manera inmejorable a la mejor portátil de la época, la Game Boy Advance. El título es muy divertido y completo, tiene bastantes niveles, son variados, y además tiene minijuegos. Muy disfrutable.
Jugado en consola Anbernic.
Jugado en consola Anbernic.
my jaw dropped when i realized that this is just the original monkeyball game from the gamecube on the fucking gba
I think a very solid piece software in terms of graphical capability, showcasing how good the Game Boy Advance could render CG models compared to just sprite art.
Unfortunately not really a game worth playing when it's for the most part a straight port of the first Super Monkey Ball with just worse controls switching from a control stick to D pad.
Maybe a nice alternative to play back in the day but just obsolete by today's standards. Just play the original Super Monkey Ball
Unfortunately not really a game worth playing when it's for the most part a straight port of the first Super Monkey Ball with just worse controls switching from a control stick to D pad.
Maybe a nice alternative to play back in the day but just obsolete by today's standards. Just play the original Super Monkey Ball
RAW. IT'S FUCKIN RAW
Played this one out of curiosity just to see how it is and got to the credits in 10 minutes. Life changing experience would not recommend.
It is what it is, Super Monkey Ball Jr. takes the series to the mobile game device in its entirety, showcasing 3D environments rarely seen on the system. Its four titular characters are present: AiAi, MeeMee, Baby or GonGon; over 74 available floors are present, some taken directly from the first Super Monkey Ball game on console, the others made for the exclusive. The player can compensate for the lack of an analog stick by using the B and A button to speed up or brake.
The game included the mini-games found on their Gamecube and Playstation 2 counterpart, notably Monkey Bowling, Monkey Golf, Monkey Fight and Monkey Duel. Most game can be played either multiplayer or singleplayer, with the exception of the Monkey Duel mini-game requiring a link cable to unlock. This is an unlikely ports that not only bargained with the 3D capabilities of the Game Boy Advance, but also its lack of an analog stick, coming out rich in features and levels.
Monkey Ball Jr. was an addictive game and its port to the Gameboy Advance is little different from the Gamecube experience.
The game included the mini-games found on their Gamecube and Playstation 2 counterpart, notably Monkey Bowling, Monkey Golf, Monkey Fight and Monkey Duel. Most game can be played either multiplayer or singleplayer, with the exception of the Monkey Duel mini-game requiring a link cable to unlock. This is an unlikely ports that not only bargained with the 3D capabilities of the Game Boy Advance, but also its lack of an analog stick, coming out rich in features and levels.
Monkey Ball Jr. was an addictive game and its port to the Gameboy Advance is little different from the Gamecube experience.
incredibly technically impressive! i am, however, not fully convinced a human can beat this game
It's a miracle this port even manages to exist, which I have to give credit for. Still, the GBA simply isn't the right platform for this style of game. The misery I've felt trying to play through the levels with the limited control I have is immense.
At least the minigames were entertaining! Bowling was by far my favorite.
At least the minigames were entertaining! Bowling was by far my favorite.
It's Super Monkey Ball 1 on the Gameboy Advance. There's a lotta pop-in, but the mad lads at Realism actually did it, it and it's impressive it for the most part works and everything is recreated faithfully. Even the minigames, Monkey Fight is still stupid fun.
Digital Control with Monkey Ball's camera absolutely kills this game (instead of speeds based on how you move the stick, you can adjust your acceleration rate with A to increase and B to decrease), it's not bad until some of the expert courses which really demand you work with the much more limited monkey. That one part of Expert 7 with the slope killed me so many times just because it was asking a lot to align my monkey and the camera with the slope. It's like Mario 64 DS but a generation earlier and with a less popular IP so no one's really defending it.
They worked with what they had, which is really impressive from a technical standpoint that they got this much Super Monkey Ball to work in 2002 on the GBA, but I don't think the GBA was ready for Super Monkey Ball. Unless you like the one level with the realism name, I'd stick to the console releases of SMB1.
Digital Control with Monkey Ball's camera absolutely kills this game (instead of speeds based on how you move the stick, you can adjust your acceleration rate with A to increase and B to decrease), it's not bad until some of the expert courses which really demand you work with the much more limited monkey. That one part of Expert 7 with the slope killed me so many times just because it was asking a lot to align my monkey and the camera with the slope. It's like Mario 64 DS but a generation earlier and with a less popular IP so no one's really defending it.
They worked with what they had, which is really impressive from a technical standpoint that they got this much Super Monkey Ball to work in 2002 on the GBA, but I don't think the GBA was ready for Super Monkey Ball. Unless you like the one level with the realism name, I'd stick to the console releases of SMB1.
genuinely impressive they got this running on gba
I beat the game on beginner but I don't think I want to do much more than that. Very impressive and fun, but my god monkey ball wasn't built for a dpad.
extremely impressive from a technical standpoint, that being said i felt the urge to walk into ongoing traffic while playing this
I wouldn’t recommend playing super monkey ball this way but if it was your only option it is pretty good. Framerate and physics are a bit wonky but you can definitely work with it. Really short. But that’s ok.
Functional.
Super Monkey Ball doesn't work well on the GBA. It feels more like a tech demo than an actual game you'd want to play.
It good
this is actually really impressive all things considered
It's decent in blocky mode (to play at a higher framerate) and once I understood "A" speeds up and "B" slows down I started to enjoy this, I've been able to beat the game on expert and master without continues, it just takes some practice.
The game engine and limiting 8 directions makes it more difficult than it should be, it's far from great but much better than I expected from a 3D GBA game.
The game engine and limiting 8 directions makes it more difficult than it should be, it's far from great but much better than I expected from a 3D GBA game.
An impressive port when it comes to the concept, but it's just so bad, it controls like shit to the point where almost every later stage is plain unfair, with stupid time limits and even stupider stage design. Only good point is the minigames, they're still fun thankfully
Super Monkey Ball is one of those odd games that, these days, feel like it should be on a phone. It’s good in quick bursts or to beat your high score, but that’s about it. SMB is all about tilting a world around to get a monkey stuck inside of a ball to a goal. It harkens back to Marble Madness and days when motion control was a new thing. However, simulating physics and tilting on a GBA with a D-pad seems rather impossible but it’s not. SMB Jr. looks pretty darn good and feels natural with the D-pad. It feels like the game was hand tailored for the GBA.
My only concern is that there’s no goal or challenge mode. You can select from sets of 10, 20, and 30 courses, you get two lives per level, and 5 continues per set. The goal is to try and collect all the bananas while also getting to the goal before the timer runs out. Some levels are easy, some are hard, some feel nearly impossible. Tilting the world around to get the ball inside the goal is a lot of fun at first but then it starts to wear thin fast. After you beat all 30 areas there’s not much else to do.
I won’t say SMB is a bad game, just shallow and lacks depth. It was more like the Gamecube version it may have been better, but understandably you can only fit so much on a GBA cart and the hardware is extremely limited. What is here is impressive for the little handheld.
If you missed this little gem, pick it up cheap on eBay. You will have one fun, and frustrating, afternoon.
My only concern is that there’s no goal or challenge mode. You can select from sets of 10, 20, and 30 courses, you get two lives per level, and 5 continues per set. The goal is to try and collect all the bananas while also getting to the goal before the timer runs out. Some levels are easy, some are hard, some feel nearly impossible. Tilting the world around to get the ball inside the goal is a lot of fun at first but then it starts to wear thin fast. After you beat all 30 areas there’s not much else to do.
I won’t say SMB is a bad game, just shallow and lacks depth. It was more like the Gamecube version it may have been better, but understandably you can only fit so much on a GBA cart and the hardware is extremely limited. What is here is impressive for the little handheld.
If you missed this little gem, pick it up cheap on eBay. You will have one fun, and frustrating, afternoon.
yeahhhhhh this didn't age too well
I may have nostalgia for this considering this is one of the very first video games I've ever played, but I don't think my nostalgia is great enough for me give this an extremely high score
let me get the obvious of the way, this is an impressive technological game for the GBA, shoutouts to Realism for their job on this. that said, putting Super Monkey Ball on the GBA is far too ambitious. you have a tiny control pad compared to the GameCube controller, you have to hold the A and B buttons to speed up or slow down, and the frame rate is YouTube tutorial 2006 quality. all those combined and got yourself a far from ideal Super Monkey Ball experience.
most of the music and worlds come from the GameCube version in its crusty GBA quality, but I say most because some levels and music tracks got cut. normally I'd be upset, but I'd rather handle going through 30 Expert levels instead of 50 with all these GBA limitations. hey, at least the party games that got included here are still fun to play.
for the time this game was cool, but it quickly got overshadowed once Touch & Roll came around, and with Banana Mania being playable on the Nintendo Switch, this game is pretty much obsolete nowadays.
Super Nice Try!
I may have nostalgia for this considering this is one of the very first video games I've ever played, but I don't think my nostalgia is great enough for me give this an extremely high score
let me get the obvious of the way, this is an impressive technological game for the GBA, shoutouts to Realism for their job on this. that said, putting Super Monkey Ball on the GBA is far too ambitious. you have a tiny control pad compared to the GameCube controller, you have to hold the A and B buttons to speed up or slow down, and the frame rate is YouTube tutorial 2006 quality. all those combined and got yourself a far from ideal Super Monkey Ball experience.
most of the music and worlds come from the GameCube version in its crusty GBA quality, but I say most because some levels and music tracks got cut. normally I'd be upset, but I'd rather handle going through 30 Expert levels instead of 50 with all these GBA limitations. hey, at least the party games that got included here are still fun to play.
for the time this game was cool, but it quickly got overshadowed once Touch & Roll came around, and with Banana Mania being playable on the Nintendo Switch, this game is pretty much obsolete nowadays.
Super Nice Try!
A fascinating and very impressive novelty, and an excellent attempt was made, but alas, this is the kind of game that just wasn't built for a control scheme as limited as this one.
The game is graphically impressive, although the 3D engine they're using can't help but experience slowdown in certain situations (not helpful). Music and sound effects always sounded WAY too fucking loud, no matter where I put my volume slider, or tweaked the sound settings from the in-game options menu.
The controls just don't compare to their original GameCube counterparts, even if that isn't exactly a fair comparison. Holding A will simulate harsher tilts, and holding B will simulate lighter tilts, but this only makes the movement feel jerky and imprecise. What's more, the moment you hit levels that more closely resemble their original SMB counterparts, it feels like the controls just can't handle it.
I respect that this game exists, but it should honestly only be played as a novelty. Nothing more, nothing less. It's not a very tolerable game.
The game is graphically impressive, although the 3D engine they're using can't help but experience slowdown in certain situations (not helpful). Music and sound effects always sounded WAY too fucking loud, no matter where I put my volume slider, or tweaked the sound settings from the in-game options menu.
The controls just don't compare to their original GameCube counterparts, even if that isn't exactly a fair comparison. Holding A will simulate harsher tilts, and holding B will simulate lighter tilts, but this only makes the movement feel jerky and imprecise. What's more, the moment you hit levels that more closely resemble their original SMB counterparts, it feels like the controls just can't handle it.
I respect that this game exists, but it should honestly only be played as a novelty. Nothing more, nothing less. It's not a very tolerable game.