Mario Party Series

Mario Party (マリオパーティ, Mario Pāti^?) is a party video game series featuring Mario series characters in which four human- or computer-controlled characters compete in a board game interspersed with minigames. The series was developed by Hudson Soft and published by Nintendo; the arcade version was developed by Capcom. The series is known for its party game elements, including the often-unpredictable multiplayer modes that allow play with up to four (and sometimes eight) human players.

After the development of Mario Party 8, several of Hudson Soft's key designers left to work for Nintendo subsidiary Nd Cube, developers of Wii Party.^[1] Starting in 2012 with Mario Party 9, Nd Cube has taken over development of the series from Hudson Soft.

The series currently holds the record for the longest-running mini game series.^[2]

At E3 2011, Mario Party 9 was announced for the Wii. It was released in March/April 2012.

[edit] Gameplay

Over the course of the Mario Party incarnations, gameplay has changed to suit the technology of the hardware, and there are also several modes available for play in each game, each of which provides its own rules and challenges.

[edit] Party Mode

Every game in the main series has a standard Party Mode in which up to four players play through a board, trying to collect as many stars as possible. In every turn, each player rolls a die and progresses on the board, which usually has branching paths. Coins are primarily earned by performing well in a minigame played at the end of each turn. On most boards, players earn stars by reaching a star space and purchasing a star for a certain amount of coins. The star space appears randomly on one of several pre-determined locations and moves every time a star is purchased, usually occupying a blue space.

Every Mario Party contains at least 50 to almost 110 minigames with a few different types. Four-player games are a free-for-all in which players compete individually. In 2-on-2 and 1-on-3 minigames, players compete as two groups, cooperating to win, even though they are still competing individually in the main game. Some minigames in Mario Party are 4-player co-op, even though it doesn't say it. In most situations, winners earn ten coins each.

Battle minigames first appeared in Mario Party 2. These games are like the 4-player games, but instead of winners earning ten coins each, each player contributes a randomly selected number of coins (or all coins if the player falls short of the pot amount). The winner of the minigame receives approximately 70% of the pot, the second place winner receives the other 30%, and a random player occasionally gets coins left over from rounding.

Duel minigames also debuted in Mario Party 2, and were omitted in Mario Party 4 (though the Story minigames were all duels), but returned again in Mario Party 5. Duel games pit two players against each other. In Party Mode, one player initiates the duel, wagering coins or even a star against another player. The winner of the duel receives all coins or stars wagered. Starting with Mario Party 7, the player no longer chooses the wager in a duel, rather, the duel takes place and the prize to the winner, if any, is randomly determined. At the end of the game, bonus stars can be awarded to players. Three specific stars are awarded in Mario Party through Mario Party 6. All later games have six possible bonus stars, but only three of those stars are awarded per game.

[edit] Minigame Mode

In addition to Party mode, every Mario Party has a minigame mode in which minigames are played without the board game. Minigame modes vary from game to game, but later games have many different variations. In one such example from Mario Party 5, each player tries to fill a board with as many spaces as possible in his or her color by winning minigames. In Mario Party 6 and onward, there is one game in Minigame mode intended for single-player.

[edit] Games

[edit] Main series

[edit] Other Games

[edit] Mario Party-e

Mario Party-e is a card game that makes optional use of the Nintendo e-Reader and was released on February 7, 2003. Many of these cards contain "dot-codes" that, when scanned into the e-Reader, allow players to play minigames similar to those found in the regular Mario Party series.^{[citation needed]} The Mario Party-e contains a Play Mat, an instruction book and a pre-constructed deck consisting of sixty-four cards. An extra card was included as a promotion in an issue of GamePro.^{[citation needed]}

[edit] Mario Party Advance

Mario Party Advance was released for the Game Boy Advance on March 28, 2005. It is the first Mario Party game on a handheld gaming system.

[edit] Mario Party DS

Mario Party DS was released on November 19, 2007 for the Nintendo DS in North America. Many of the seventy-four minigames featured utilize the capabilities of the DS's touch screen and microphone, in addition to traditional minigames using the directional pad and control buttons.

[edit] Reception

[edit] Controversies

In Mario Party, certain minigames required players to rotate the controller's analog stick, including one in which the player is challenged to wind up Fly-Guy at the minigame house. Some players got blisters and other hand injuries from rotating the analog stick using the palms of their hands instead of using their thumb.^[9] Some wore away the stick because it was not very durable. The analog stick rotation has no longer been used since Mario Party 2. The exceptions are the mini-game in Mario Party 5 in which the player only needs to rotate it once and the mini-game in Mario Party 3 in which players see how far they can throw Bowser and did not need to use the palm of their hand to move the analog stick.

In July 2007, Mario Party 8 for the Wii was withdrawn from United Kingdom game stores shortly after its release date.^[10] This was allegedly caused by Kamek using the word "spastic." Complaints were raised from consumers because the term is used to refer to a mentally challenged person and is considered offensive in the United Kingdom. In August 2007, Nintendo re-released the game, replacing "spastic" with the word "erratic".^[11]

[edit] References

[edit] External links

• MarioParty.com
• The Mario Party Wiki