Mario Sports Superstars Reviews
If you're looking for a fun little gift for younger players or if you are hankering for some casual Mario sports action you don't have to look further than this game.
Mario Sports Superstars it's a mediocre game by itself and even more in Nintendo's standard. The real problem is not that the developers sacrificed depth in favor of greater variety, but that the execution lacked charisma in each and every sport. There's no emotion nor intensity, only a very generic and technical experience. If Camelot and Nintendo would have chosen to leave behind the seriousness, to embrace the chaos and spontaneity that worked so well in the past, maybe then Mario Sports Superstars could had become a great sports game.
Review in Spanish | Read full review
The Italian plumber's new sports adventure is perfectly functional, but also free of imaginative spark (and reasons to keep playing)
We left disappointed from our time with Mario Sports Superstars. The intention was good, but unfortunately the scope was too narrow to really grab our attention. Nintendo seems to have rested on its laurels and its expertise to deliver reheated stuff, with no risks taken whatsoever exception made for just one sport which was more a miss than a hit. In reality, the title quickly becomes a drag wether you play alone or online. It's a shame because it shows beautiful assets with a colorful universe and diverse gameplays, but it seems that Nintendo athletes are somehow tired of running in every single competition.
Review in French | Read full review
Mario’s foray in to the sporting world has had its ups and down; soaring highs and disheartening lows. This? This is just middling, a mediocre package unlikely win the multifaceted Mario new fans.
At the end of the day, it didn’t really wow me at all. Horse Racing and Football were at least neat and I played them the most of the five sports. Outside of those, there was barely any real drive here to get them all checked off and finished.
Only one game in five is any good in this five-games-in-one compilation, whose brazen recycling of old content is equal parts embarrassing and cynical.
Mario Sports Superstars is like a coworker everybody hates because they do just enough work to not get fired. It’s not a good game, not by a long shot, but it does just enough right that I can’t in good conscience call it outright bad. What I can call it is a lazy experience, one developed solely for the purpose of selling what are basically Mario-branded Topps cards. Now if you’ll excuse me, I need to pour myself another drink.
Mario and friends have tried out a number of different sports over the years and the latest struggles to live up to that long legacy. The core gameplay of each of the sports is solid, but it feels like the most basic form of each was plucked from a superior title.
Mario Sports Superstars straddles that unfortunate line of mediocrity that makes it difficult to actually score. It's certainly not a bad game, as it has plenty of variety and content to offer with a robust multiplayer mode for anyone that wants all their Mario sports in one convenient package, but we'd struggle to call it a good game either. It merely exists; sitting uncomfortably in a space that Mario and Sonic at the Olympic Games has been eyeing up for years now.By offering five games in one it fails to offer a definitive version of anything, and even a pretty decent take on horse racing isn't worth the price of admission unless you're planning on really diving into the other sports as well. As a multiplayer title it could be fun to climb the ranks online, but as a single player experience it's totally functional yet painfully lifeless. It's laid out the groundwork, but Sports Superstars just needs to take a few more risks.
Mario Sports Superstars means well but ultimately fails in delivering a title that is on par with previous sports games of the Mario universe. While the rich visual environment will keep the eyes fairly satisfied, most of the sports included feel empty and fall behind the threshold of fun, thus not justifying a long term investment in the overall game.
Review in Portuguese | Read full review
It seems cramming five games into one has resulted in rather stripped back versions of each main sport when compared to Mario's previous standalone offerings. Most of the charm and range of options to extend the life outside of a few multiplayer sessions is absent, so Mario Sports Superstars ironically ends up as a pretty boring affair, despite the number of events to play. Fine for a few online bouts, especially if lamenting the lack of football or baseball main series games, but don't expect this to occupy the 3DS for long.
Mario Sports Superstars doesn’t quite manage a hole-in-one, its bare bones nature provoking harsh comparisons to other games in the series. The basic gameplay is certainly fun to play, but anyone looking for a deeper sporting experience would probably be better tracking down another Mario sports game. Place your bets elsewhere, Superstars is down for the count.
They’ve created some of the most amazing arcade sport games in the past, but those days are long gone. All you see now are own goals, strikes, bogeys, double faults and a racing horse that’s seen better days. Nintendo, here is your red card.
Jack of all trades but master of none, Mario Sports Superstars impresses more on paper than when exploring what each sport has to offer. The idea is sound, but, whatever the reason, the result soon meanders away from the road to superstardom.
After this it might be high time for Mario to put his sportsing behind him and stick to regaling kids with stories of his adventures, rather than his sporting achievements.
For some reason Nintendo insists that Mario Sports games should be vapid experiences that insult the intelligence of the very young children that they seem to be pitched at.
In short, Superstars is a solid game that perhaps bit off more than it could chew, and is tethered to a limiting Amiibo card system that holds players back needlessly. I do hope that Nintendo comes back to Superstars in some form on Switch, but for now this is a decent option for sports fans on the go.