I still remember the exact moment that this game was revealed, I was ecstatic. Nintendo hadn't forgotten about Mario Strikers after all! They knew what we wanted and were gonna give it to us, and to make things better it was coming out in just a few months! I couldn't have been more clueless. Mario Strikers Battle League is to this day the most disappointing game that I have ever played and has little to no redeeming qualities.
Of all the aspects to dislike about this game that gameplay is the one that I hate the least, granted that means I still hate it quite a lot but it's not as bad as the rest of what makes this game bad. The general gameplay here feels like they completely forgot how to make a Mario Strikers game, because it just straight up doesn't have the balance or fun of those games at all. The captain and sidekick system are completely gone, now there's just a roster of like 16 or so Mario characters to choose from, none of which are all that surprising to see present or different in ways that makes them feel better. What's even stranger about this is that you can break all continuity and just choose four of the same character to fill your team, so if you want four Bowsers or four DKs you can have it, and nobody will say a thing. It's like if in real soccer four Messi's walked onto the field for a game, you'd think that would be bizarre and pretty unfair, but it's done completely straight faced here and it just shows that they really put no thought into this game at all. The way items are handled is really bad here as well, instead of the game giving them out to a team that fills the requirements to earn one in the situation, the game just drops random item blocks on the field from time to time. If the current match is at a neutral state an item block that anyone can grab will drop, if one team is at even a slight disadvantage though the game will drop team specific item blocks that only the disadvantaged team can get and will continue to do so extremely frequently until that team gets its shit together. Another feature done for the worse here is the Hyper Strikes, this game's equivalent of the captain specific special shots from the previous games. In this game you can no longer pop one of these whenever you want, you have to wait for a Strike Orb to appear on the field, grab it and then you'll have around 30 seconds to pull off a Hyper Strike. Pulling off a hyper strike is insanely easy, given that you get to a spot on the field with ample distance between you and your opponents all you have to do is press "A" twice on a meter that determines the shot's accuracy, if you press the button twice while on the smallest blue section your shot will go in no matter what and score you two points instead of one, the problem is that this timing is incredibly easy to hit leading to virtually no challenge when it comes to these other than finding a safe spot to use them. The fact that you can't use them whenever you want though and that any character on the field can use them, rather than just the captain, makes them quite useless in the long run. These kinds of shots were so useful in the other games because they were a risk and reward type scenario to use helpful for tying the game when you got desperately behind or pulling farther ahead, here they just show up to infrequently to strategize around and to be considered any kinds of useful.
Like I've already mentioned, I was extremely hyped for this game before it came out and bought it Day 1, I remember coming home and playing like 2 to 3 hours of the main tournament mode before inevitably getting bored and putting it down, hoping I'd never have to play it again. What's funny is if I had only played a like 2 more hours of the tournament mode I would have seen all that the game has and ever would have to offer in terms of content. Mario Strikers Battle League is easily the most barren and worthless Mario Sports game in terms of content and surprisingly enough it wears that on its sleeve unashamedly. I am not joking when I say that literally all there is to do in this game is the tournament mode, which consists of six tournament cups, each having a four-match bracket within it and that's all. Now there is of course also the online mode that Nintendo was clearly putting all their stock into when making this game but clearly after seeing how bad this game is everyone who bought it as a whole decided to forego the online and move on with their lives and I don't blame them. This is quite honestly one of the lightest games in terms of content that I've ever seen and it's absolutely shameful, then again perhaps I should thank it because if there were more content here I'd be forced to play this game longer.
Finally, we get to the most egregious aspect of Battle League, the presentation. I loved the style of the other two Strikers games and have already gone on in lengths about that in the reviews I've done for them, so you can imagine my distaste when I'm presented with a game that throws all that out the window. Battle League attempts to copy the former games' style visually and musically in some places but completely misses the point of it but toning things down and not allowing the characters to be unhinged like they were in the previous games. Instead of actually charming and funny win/lose animations like we got in the previous game we instead get the most homogenized cutscenes of Mario characters doing typical Mario character things that fit Nintendo's evergreen vision for them rather than one that makes them more fun and interesting because God forbid these characters be interesting. And it's not just the characters either, the stadiums are no longer fun or different instead just being basic stadiums with themed backsplashes that do nothing but change the color of the grass, the UI is abysmal and boring to look at, and the music tries so hard to be crowd-pleasing only to be the most forgettable few notes repeated that I've ever heard. It's because of this game that this series that I loved has lost its soul and Nintendo refuses to let it go and find it again.
I can say in confidence that Mario Strikers Battle League is the both the worst Mario Sports game and just one of the worst games I have ever played in general. It is a spit in the face to the legacy of Mario Sports games and those like me who grew up enjoying them and now that I have finished it, I am glad I will never have to play it again.
Of all the aspects to dislike about this game that gameplay is the one that I hate the least, granted that means I still hate it quite a lot but it's not as bad as the rest of what makes this game bad. The general gameplay here feels like they completely forgot how to make a Mario Strikers game, because it just straight up doesn't have the balance or fun of those games at all. The captain and sidekick system are completely gone, now there's just a roster of like 16 or so Mario characters to choose from, none of which are all that surprising to see present or different in ways that makes them feel better. What's even stranger about this is that you can break all continuity and just choose four of the same character to fill your team, so if you want four Bowsers or four DKs you can have it, and nobody will say a thing. It's like if in real soccer four Messi's walked onto the field for a game, you'd think that would be bizarre and pretty unfair, but it's done completely straight faced here and it just shows that they really put no thought into this game at all. The way items are handled is really bad here as well, instead of the game giving them out to a team that fills the requirements to earn one in the situation, the game just drops random item blocks on the field from time to time. If the current match is at a neutral state an item block that anyone can grab will drop, if one team is at even a slight disadvantage though the game will drop team specific item blocks that only the disadvantaged team can get and will continue to do so extremely frequently until that team gets its shit together. Another feature done for the worse here is the Hyper Strikes, this game's equivalent of the captain specific special shots from the previous games. In this game you can no longer pop one of these whenever you want, you have to wait for a Strike Orb to appear on the field, grab it and then you'll have around 30 seconds to pull off a Hyper Strike. Pulling off a hyper strike is insanely easy, given that you get to a spot on the field with ample distance between you and your opponents all you have to do is press "A" twice on a meter that determines the shot's accuracy, if you press the button twice while on the smallest blue section your shot will go in no matter what and score you two points instead of one, the problem is that this timing is incredibly easy to hit leading to virtually no challenge when it comes to these other than finding a safe spot to use them. The fact that you can't use them whenever you want though and that any character on the field can use them, rather than just the captain, makes them quite useless in the long run. These kinds of shots were so useful in the other games because they were a risk and reward type scenario to use helpful for tying the game when you got desperately behind or pulling farther ahead, here they just show up to infrequently to strategize around and to be considered any kinds of useful.
Like I've already mentioned, I was extremely hyped for this game before it came out and bought it Day 1, I remember coming home and playing like 2 to 3 hours of the main tournament mode before inevitably getting bored and putting it down, hoping I'd never have to play it again. What's funny is if I had only played a like 2 more hours of the tournament mode I would have seen all that the game has and ever would have to offer in terms of content. Mario Strikers Battle League is easily the most barren and worthless Mario Sports game in terms of content and surprisingly enough it wears that on its sleeve unashamedly. I am not joking when I say that literally all there is to do in this game is the tournament mode, which consists of six tournament cups, each having a four-match bracket within it and that's all. Now there is of course also the online mode that Nintendo was clearly putting all their stock into when making this game but clearly after seeing how bad this game is everyone who bought it as a whole decided to forego the online and move on with their lives and I don't blame them. This is quite honestly one of the lightest games in terms of content that I've ever seen and it's absolutely shameful, then again perhaps I should thank it because if there were more content here I'd be forced to play this game longer.
Finally, we get to the most egregious aspect of Battle League, the presentation. I loved the style of the other two Strikers games and have already gone on in lengths about that in the reviews I've done for them, so you can imagine my distaste when I'm presented with a game that throws all that out the window. Battle League attempts to copy the former games' style visually and musically in some places but completely misses the point of it but toning things down and not allowing the characters to be unhinged like they were in the previous games. Instead of actually charming and funny win/lose animations like we got in the previous game we instead get the most homogenized cutscenes of Mario characters doing typical Mario character things that fit Nintendo's evergreen vision for them rather than one that makes them more fun and interesting because God forbid these characters be interesting. And it's not just the characters either, the stadiums are no longer fun or different instead just being basic stadiums with themed backsplashes that do nothing but change the color of the grass, the UI is abysmal and boring to look at, and the music tries so hard to be crowd-pleasing only to be the most forgettable few notes repeated that I've ever heard. It's because of this game that this series that I loved has lost its soul and Nintendo refuses to let it go and find it again.
I can say in confidence that Mario Strikers Battle League is the both the worst Mario Sports game and just one of the worst games I have ever played in general. It is a spit in the face to the legacy of Mario Sports games and those like me who grew up enjoying them and now that I have finished it, I am glad I will never have to play it again.
Absolute garbage. I scrapped my whole video on this game just because of how bad this game was!
UNACCEPTABLE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Do not buy unless you have no friends. even if you had friends this game blows because the CPUs in this game is ABSOLUTE GARBAGE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
UNRELIABLE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I HATE THIS GAME!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
UNACCEPTABLE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Do not buy unless you have no friends. even if you had friends this game blows because the CPUs in this game is ABSOLUTE GARBAGE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
UNRELIABLE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I HATE THIS GAME!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Mario Strikers: Charged Football was one of my favourite games on the Wii and my friends and I were so hyped for this game.
And within maybe a week, possibly two, none of us were playing this. Only two players can form a league team despite 4 characters per team. None of the new mechanics account for charging the ball in the previous game. The character roster is smaller and the character customization means no character stats are unique.
And within maybe a week, possibly two, none of us were playing this. Only two players can form a league team despite 4 characters per team. None of the new mechanics account for charging the ball in the previous game. The character roster is smaller and the character customization means no character stats are unique.
Hot garbage, I've never been more let down by a game, especially after the wonderful job Nintendo did with Super Rush and how addicted I was to Strikers Charged. It still physically upsets me that they treated this game with such cynicism and neglect. Soccer on NES is more exciting and has more variety. Megaman Soccer is a better novelty video game franchise sports game than this pile of pterodactyl poop. Emlyn Hughes International Soccer on Commodore 64 has a more in depth plot. Every single FIFA game is a masterpiece when stacked side by side with this shit show.
IT SUCKS.
IT SUCKS.
Very fun for the first 5 hours, less fun in the next 5 hours, even less fun in the next hours...
Note that this is from when I played at launch. As far as I'm aware, they only have added characters, which still probably isn't enough. The game has substance, but it lacks content. It really sucks because from the animations, the songs, the gameplay itself, I can tell there was some work put into this. But once you've played one game, you've basically seen everything.
I can't even tell you why but this game just sucks and didn't click for me. Strikers on GC is my favorite Mario sports title so I was super excited for this.
The sheer incompetency it must've taken to make this. How do you take Charged, a perfect game, and then just strip it of everything that made it good
Mario Strikers: Battle League (2022): Que se hayan atrevido a sacar este juego es una vergüenza. A nivel de contenido apenas es una demo y el desarrollo es lo más vago que he visto, con una IA inexistente. Se salva del suspenso porque se actualizará y puede mejorar, pero...(5,35)
UPDATE: Tras dar por finalizado el juego y afirmar que no habrá más actualizaciones, sigue siendo igual de malo que el primer día, así que de aprobado provisional pasa a suspenso definitivo (4,15)
UPDATE: Tras dar por finalizado el juego y afirmar que no habrá más actualizaciones, sigue siendo igual de malo que el primer día, así que de aprobado provisional pasa a suspenso definitivo (4,15)
Decepción
pretty fun, but pretty barebones
Almost no content at all and it took like only 4 hours to unlock everything and finnish the cups
AGAGAGA
I bought this game and immediately regretted it. its trash
This game is my cigarette
of all of the mario sport games on switch this one pisses me off the most. i love mario strikers and this version of it has nothing to do. tournaments and normal matches are all you can do. gear is under-cooked. stadiums have no gimmicks other than how they look. the field is smaller and the goalies suck leading to high scoring games. just a lame game im sick of nintendo not putting enough effort into these games
ugh, so very disappointing. I did play a bunch on release, it was pretty fun playing online. But dear lord is there nothing to do in this game; no side modes, not a big roster. Just another mid Mario sports game in the switch era.
The first time I saw the trailer for this game, I was through the roof, I could not contain my excitement. However, it didn't take long for me to notice the red cards.
The characters arriving to the field like they are PNGs in a Power Point presentation, the generic and dull grass fields, the fact that this is a modern Mario Sport title...
Then later down the line, I started noticing:
- That the character roster had like only 10 dudes
- That the character animations were severely toned down
- That the characters had reused voicelines instead of brand new ones
- That none of the other Bowser minions were available as playable teammates
- That the customization aspect kinda made each character's stats meaningless
- That the game lacked any significant extra content
- That DAISY WAS NOWHERE TO BE FOUND.
I'll get to the point. This game is empty, and it has no meaningful content worth the price.
This game is soulless, not because Next Level Games could not make a good follow up, but because Nintendo clearly rushed them to make another subpar Mario sport title as soon as possible.
This game is a joke, because playing as each character means nothing anymore and because the main gimmick of this game doesn't even matter at all, or has any impact on the flow of gameplay. Oh, you are telling me that I can combine two different environments, but the actual game field will stay as two halves of just plain and boring GRASS? Wow, that changes nothing, how cool, thanks a lot.
This game is an insult to the people that were waiting for a Mario Strikers Charged follow up after more than 15 years of BEGGING.
This game is not Mario Strikers, so as far as I'm concerned, I am still waiting for said follow up.
The characters arriving to the field like they are PNGs in a Power Point presentation, the generic and dull grass fields, the fact that this is a modern Mario Sport title...
Then later down the line, I started noticing:
- That the character roster had like only 10 dudes
- That the character animations were severely toned down
- That the characters had reused voicelines instead of brand new ones
- That none of the other Bowser minions were available as playable teammates
- That the customization aspect kinda made each character's stats meaningless
- That the game lacked any significant extra content
- That DAISY WAS NOWHERE TO BE FOUND.
I'll get to the point. This game is empty, and it has no meaningful content worth the price.
This game is soulless, not because Next Level Games could not make a good follow up, but because Nintendo clearly rushed them to make another subpar Mario sport title as soon as possible.
This game is a joke, because playing as each character means nothing anymore and because the main gimmick of this game doesn't even matter at all, or has any impact on the flow of gameplay. Oh, you are telling me that I can combine two different environments, but the actual game field will stay as two halves of just plain and boring GRASS? Wow, that changes nothing, how cool, thanks a lot.
This game is an insult to the people that were waiting for a Mario Strikers Charged follow up after more than 15 years of BEGGING.
This game is not Mario Strikers, so as far as I'm concerned, I am still waiting for said follow up.
This game feels like folding a giant basket of neat looking socks. At first, you are drawn in by how charming some of the socks look, but after a while, you realize that there's only, like 4 pairs of socks that keep repeating. Then, you're just left with the excitement of folding socks.
A disappointing travesty that was so rushed that Daisy (of all characters) was missing in the first version of the game. How dare this game come out on my birthday.
the actual game is fine, it's mario strikers and is full of flair and a ton of personality especially in the after goal animations. it's just also the most barebones and lacking in content of not only the strikers series but of the switch mario sports games in general. i don't personally mind the strategy they go for with post launch content for these games but even playing this in its complete state it feels completely lacking. even just compared to the other switch mario sports game it has no story mode, maps mean nothing and all play identically, it has the least amount of characters. as someone who feels aces and super rush get a bit too much shit it's pretty insane how low effort this one feels.
i waited over 10 years for a new strikers and in return i get a game with 10 characters and 5 stages that have no gimmicks, suck my dick nintendo
This is the worst in the series, it's ashtonishing how bad this game is. Probably the only game I regretted buying on launch day.
We got Rosalina but at what cost?
FIFA entering the 'most basic football game award' when Mario Stikers: Battle League walks in
was not worth using a game voucher on, but it's okay i guess
Cool but unbalanced and not many game modes or customization.
N'est pas à la hauteur de ses prédécesseurs
Faible en contenu
Gameplay O.K.
Faible en contenu
Gameplay O.K.
Honestly, even beyond the lack of content, I just think this game is straight up unfun.
The game mechanics on the surface are enjoyable, but none of that matters when your entire performance is not dependent on how well you're playing, but on whether the bot-controlled goalies will block the ball or not. This shit is just as RNG as Mario Party and it doesn't even embrace that.
The game mechanics on the surface are enjoyable, but none of that matters when your entire performance is not dependent on how well you're playing, but on whether the bot-controlled goalies will block the ball or not. This shit is just as RNG as Mario Party and it doesn't even embrace that.
Even with the additions made with DLC, it just feels too bare bones. Some of the customization options like for stadiums really should have been added for single-player. And there really just aren't enough characters or armor differences.