Review: Mario Strikers Charged!

Developed by: Next Level Games

Published by: Nintendo

With all the World Cup nonsense going on I thought I’d dust off one of the only 2 football games in my collection. Red Card on the GC being the other. You probably won’t remember this game. It’s from way back when people were still saying the Wii was a novelty console…anyway.

If you’re looking for serious simulation of the beautiful game then, well, this isn’t for you. This game is sort of the Mario take on games like NBA Jam, with Power-ups, mega-strikes et al.

If you tend to romp through Mario games then this is for you. The difficulty bar is noticeably higher than I’m used to on a Mario game: whilst I was able to beat the AI easily on the first couple of rounds they noticeably got harder nearer the final. This however isn’t a bad thing.

The game plays like this: Pick a Mario character from the usual suspects such as Mario, Luigi, Peach, DK, Daisy, Bowser, Wario and Wa-Luigi. As per usual they all have different skills and who you should pick depends on how you play. For example Bowser is good at shooting and defense, whereas Yoshi is a very balanced all-round charcter. This main character then serves as the Captain of your team, and you then need to pick 3 sidekicks from the Mario universe: Toads, koopas, Birdos and various others.

As with other Mario games there are various competitions to go through and win. Your first destination in Road to the Striker Cup is the Fire Cup. Each tournament is played in a group stage, where everyone plays each other, then a knockout phase, then to the final. There isn’t much to it other than that.

The ABC mode is a tutorial mode which explains everything from the very basics of the game to the more complicated Captains abilities. It is a very useful and well thought out mode. Striker Challenge mode, as its name clearly suggests, gives you set requirements to beat. Beating the challenge unlocks a player card and a cheat you can then activate in the game. Hall Of Fame does exactly what it says on the tin, letting you show off your trophies and awards.

In terms of longevity it will last and also has the added bonus of being one of the first Wi-Fi titles on the console, which is a joy compared to PBR’s and Next Level obviously knew what they were doing. You can have up to four players playing at once if you have the equipment.

You can even organise a MSCF World cup over your Wi-Fi connection. Online you have a ranking system similar to Mario Kart: 10 points for a win, 1 for a loss and 1 for each goal you score. Whilst MSCF doesn’t have a lot of players online now (due to its age), you won’t be waiting long for a game.

Graphically it looks good and you’ll be wondering with that intro if someone has plugged an HD cable in the back of your telly if you haven’t yourself already. It is only Mario and co but their armour and close ups are very crisp in detail and there aren’t any fog or blurring effects at all.

Each of the different pitches has a theme, from the slightly oddly named ‘Vice to The Dump’ to others such as ‘Galaxy’. In Galaxy the pitch is floating around in space but don’t let that worry you as the walls are all electrified, meaning that if your team member gets slammed into one of them they’ll be stunned for a few seconds afterwards.

Power-ups, as usual for Mario games, are scattered over the pitch and these range from the humble (but ever present) banana to the very nasty chain chomp. Along with throwing shells, elecrtrifying people and quite literally hacking them you also have the captain abilities to contend with. As your team passes the ball around it will change colour. If it gets to white then your captain occasionally gets a special ability. Yoshi, for example, has the ability to turn into an egg and roll through opponents and into the goal, hopefully with the ball. Bowser on the other hand has the ability to breathe fire and set everyone and the ball on fire. So just when you think you might lose you could get one of these charged attacks and turn the game on its head. It may be slightly unfair depending which side you’re on but makes for exciting matches.

The only fly in the ointment are the captain’s mega strike animations. Every time someone charges up a mega-strike you have to watch the whole animation. As the matches are only 3 minutes long, with no half time, this gets annoying after a while.

All in all a superb little game by Next Level Games. You should be able to pick this one up fairly cheap now.