Mario Strikers: Battle League Reviews
Mario Strikers: Battle League is a masterclass in competitive game design. What it lacks in options is more than made up by just how much fun the game is, and it's absolutely gorgeous to boot. As it stands it already feels like a complete product, but the promise of future updates down the line gives us even more to get excited about. If arcade sport action isn't your bag, it'll likely do nothing to sway your opinion, but if you have even a passing interest in this kind of caper, Mario Strikers: Battle League is the best sports game on Switch right now.
Rather than the triumphant return of a fan-favorite franchise, Battle League claims its slow season spot in Nintendo's calendar as just another sports game. If Mario Strikers saw a new release every year, there'd be a problem, but it's been well over a decade since the last entry in the series. Yes, it's more of the same, but when "the same" is so fun-and so hard to put down after just one match-more of the same is more than welcome, even if the game isn't as creative or ambitious as one might hope.
Another example of Nintendo giving the players a game that seems interesting on the outside but is kind of empty inside. Mario Strikers has some updates planned, but I really hope that the big N understands one day that a full price should mean a complete game. Still, I won’t lie – Mario Strikers provides lots of fun, because its core gameplay is good.
Review in Polish | Read full review
Mario Strikers: Battle League is a fun time that is easy enough for anybody to pickup and play but still without depth to mean it should keep an audience engaged for a long period of time. It's a little lacking in the single player department, but it's doing some interesting things in the online space to make up for it.
The core gameplay of Mario Strikers: Battle League is fast and frenetic, keeping your palms sweaty as you battle with your Nintendo favourites in an intense game of soccer. It’s flashy and well animated in all the best ways, with that trademark personality and charm carrying it a long way. It’s also a wonderful example of “easy to learn, difficult to master”, that starts simple but has some reasonable depth, even within the confines of its short matches. It’s a shame then that there just isn’t much more meat on the bone; with offline modes extremely limited with only quick play and tournaments, you’re going to have to truly love the mechanics to justify spending a lot of your time in competitive multiplayer. For those with a lot of mates to kick around with, that might be enough, but for everybody else, it’s a yellow card.
Mario Strikers Battle League is a lot of fun, but unless you commit to online play, it’s here for a good — but brief — time.
I was really looking forward to Mario Strikers: Battle League, and for the most part it has been a worthy successor, but it's a little hampered by the complexity of the gameplay. Even scoring goals can be a bit difficult overall. Soccer is definitely not known for high-scoring affairs but it is simply too difficult to score goals in the time allotted. This does seem to be different from what I remember in the previous games. It was a bit easier to score goals and that is definitely missed. There's a balance that sports games need to strike, but Battle League does tend to be just a bit more difficult. Still, there is a lot to love about Mario Strikers: Battle League, but it almost made me want a remaster of the first two games more than anything.
This simple set of manoeuvres is full of nuance, allowing for incredible plays and some serious mind-games, making it more like a fighting game than anything else.
We finally have a sequel to Mario Strikers Charged, but the Switch outing lacks content and interesting items to keep this soccer game engaging.
Mario Strikers: Battle League is the most stylized and chaotic Mario sports game to date, with quick, intense matches that reward strategic and aggressive playstyles.
Mario Strikers Battle Leagues adds a few new wrinkles to the original Strikers formula, and does in a tight and well-presented package. While it may disappoint those expecting more variety and a soccer component, fans of Nintendo fighters and the attack/counterattack battle system genre will feel at home here.
Mario Strikers: Battle League Football excels on the field, but it struggles to make a compelling offer for solo players or anyone not willing to invest time in forming and maintaining a Strikers Club. It's just pick-up-and-play enough to work as a party game with mates and it's compelling to watch in action, but the lack of embellishments is sure to hurt its long-term appeal.
With such solid and explosive gameplay, Mario Strikers: Battle League Football represents a decisive step forward for the franchise.
Review in Italian | Read full review
It remains to be seen how exactly the online create-a-club stuff pans out in terms of competition, but as a same-room couch jam Mario Strikers: Battle League Football gets better and better the more you play. A surprisingly deep, chaotic bit of Mario Sports action.
Battle League Football is a game I'm happy to see, even if it isn't necessarily the game I wanted. A far more technical game that I don't feel I have the time to master, it sits in a weird spot of not necessarily being bad in its gameplay execution, but falling short on the content required to keep people coming back. I do feel in time that this game has the potential to become great, but we again see a Mario sports game held back by being released half-baked.
The sleek and dazzling Nintendo polish does not disappoint in Mario Strikers: Battle League, and the online felt smooth and responsive even with a subpar connection speed. It could use a bit more variety and some mini-games to add some value, but you won’t find a more intense and in-your-face ball sport than Mario Strikers: Battle League.
Although the Battle League is far behind in terms of gameplay compared to the old games of the series, the possibility of online matches closes this flaw.
Review in Turkish | Read full review
Mario Strikers: Battle League Football is a very wisely prepared production that offers dynamic and interesting gameplay. Somewhere in the end there was no suitable content, but even in this situation it is worth putting on traffic jams, doing a few tricks and scoring a hat trick. This game provides a lot of satisfaction.
Review in Polish | Read full review
A fun and engaging football & brawl mashup that is let down by its anemic content especially in single player.
Review in Arabic | Read full review
Mario Strikers: Battle League is a bare-bones experience that facilitates tense competition but leaves behind casual players. The limited selection of game modes, stadiums and characters further limits its potential, leaving the title with good gameplay but almost no interesting ways to engage with it. The hope is that Nintendo has more to add via DLC, but what, when and how is still a mystery. As with previous Nintendo sports titles, you're better off waiting for the additional content to make a more informed purchase decision. In its current state, Battle League is fun and great to play, but it's hardly worth the full price tag.