Mario vs. Donkey Kong (2004)

This is not a bad game by any means and it shares some of the great fun of the original Donkey Kong on the Game Boy, I just didn’t like many of the ideas that were added. The levels where you had to get all the minis to the end were cool but I felt the ones where you actually collected the minis weren’t particularly exciting and never very challenging. The puzzle element was often removed and replaced with platforming. I loved the original for its puzzles and having to look at the whole map to figure out how to get the key to the door. The levels where this was still the goal in this game were generally good fun although I felt that the puzzles weren’t as inventive as in the original and the worlds certainly not as individual. This is strange as you’d have thought with the additional firepower of the GBA they could have made the worlds a little more distinctive but ultimately the levels and soundtrack are nowhere near as memorable and most worlds just feel like more of the same.

I came away feeling slightly disappointed, though it must be re-iterated that this is in no way a bad game, the visuals look good, it controls pretty well, and the level design is good. However it’s missing that Nintendo magic that takes things to the next level and makes a game a really memorable experience. Things just feel a little stale.

I’m interested to play the ‘March of The Minis Series’ to see how that competes with this effort.