One game that I have never played but always wanted to is Mario+Rabidds Kingdom Battle, as it taps into my love for Mario and the turn-based tactics genre of games. While only managing to play little bits of it, I’d always respected the collaborative work between Nintendo and Ubisoft, which culminated in a game that was far more highly received than anyone had expected it to be. Thanks to the lovely people at Ubisoft Australia, I was given the opportunity to spend some time with the upcoming sequel, Mario+Rabbids Sparks of Hope, and it is looking to be one of October’s most promising releases.
The preview session for Sparks of Hope lasted for a few hours and we were given access to a wide array of different activities and challenges, including a smattering of story-oriented content and some surprisingly unforgiving combat sections. Obviously, when it comes to the story, I can’t really say too much about it given only a small portion of the story was available to play, but what I was not expecting was it to be a complete callback to the Super Mario Galaxy games. Princess Rosalina has seemingly been kidnapped by Cursa, a mysterious villain whose design gives me a lot of vibes reminiscent of Giant Squid’s The Pathless and thatgamecompany’s Journey (read: I miss these games and should replay them).
As is to be expected with anything Nintendo-related, the characters and their associated dialogue are filled with identity and charm. I was quite impressed with how organically the writers were able to write Rabbid versions of the familiar, beloved characters of the Mario universe. A personal favourite is Rabbid Peach, who they’ve transitioned from a bit of a ditz to an Instagram queen (or princess, rather), whose weaponry is as powerful as her attitude. On top of these Rabbidfied characters, the original characters are also filled with equal amounts of charm. Every character that I had the pleasure of engaging with felt fully realised in its unique, quirky identity, which makes interactions feel that much better.
One thing I was expecting to be immediately exhausted by was the overall level and world design of the playable areas. While I won’t reveal too much, all I will really say is that even though the notorious Ubisoft style of repetitious side content still exists here, it is not forced on you in the same way that other games from the developer/publisher have. There are still reasons for doing the various side activities but it didn’t feel quite as ham-fisted as I was expecting, which was a relief. As a result, I was able to explore the areas of my own volition and I have to say, the two areas that were available were really cool. The variance in biomes was interesting, and I’m not sure how many areas there will be in the full game, and whether this level of biome variance will carry through to the rest of the game, but if it does each new area will immediately feel unique which is very important for crafting a memorable experience (glares at Halo Infinite and its notable lack of biomes).
Side objectives don’t necessarily pertain to combat encounters either, as there are a variety of world puzzles and challenges which can be completed. Completing these side objectives rewarded me with planetary coins which had a variety of uses, including saving them to purchase unique items from the merchant in each world. I’m not sure exactly what role these items play, but I am quite interested to see how these things play out.
In terms of combat, I was taken aback by how inventive it felt compared to the genre that it usually sits in. Rather than just playing like your typical turn-based tactics game whereby you tell a character where to go, you are given full control of each character and are shown how far you can move. To add to this, if an enemy is within the allotted area where a character can move, they can perform a dash attack, which is effectively a free small attack that can play a pretty vital role in some of the more challenging encounters. Speaking of challenge, having not really played the original, the level of challenge present within this preview really caught me off guard. However, none of the really challenging fights felt like they were unfair or ridiculous, more that they were clearly balanced around people having a deeper understanding of the revised combat systems and its intricacies over the course of the game – we were fast-tracked to this point so we could garner an opinion on more than the introductory levels of the game.
The movement capabilities didn’t just stop with the dash attacks either. Team Jump is a new mechanic introduced which allows you to push your characters further than you normally would through aerial means. The caveat is that you only have a small amount of room to move around once your character has landed, so it’s best to ensure they land near some cover and are not totally exposed. Some characters are able to utilise aerial attacks too, which is really cool as it means there are a number of ways to play out your encounters.
What also stood out in the experience was how the game would encourage creative use of the environment and level design to gain an advantage, whether it be the destructible cover that can lull your opponents into a false sense of security or gusts of wind that can blow your opponents away, allowing them to gather up into crowds and be more susceptible to big Area of Effect attacks. I’ll be really interested to see how this style of play and environmental awareness is encouraged throughout the whole game.
To add some more depth to the gameplay and combat systems, each character had a unique set of abilities that complemented their roles of healers, snipers and close-range attackers to name a few. On top of this were the Sparks, which are Rabbid versions of Lumas from the original Galaxy games, which added extra capabilities to your previously established characters. These benefits had passive and active effects that covered a variety of things, including immunities from elemental/secondary effects. These small boons can wildly change how you play a character – do you play your sniper more passively, ensuring it always has a way to defend and mitigate damage or do you buff its damage with elemental properties?
Sparks are by no means the only way I was able to flesh out the capabilities of the characters I used during my time playing the preview build. There are skill trees that you can customise that can vary from minor stat increases to brand new skills and/or expansions to current skills. As previously mentioned, there are characters that can perform aerial attacks from the Team Jump mechanic, this is a skill that can be purchased from the skill tree. The best part about the skill tree is the fact that it is fully refundable at any time for no cost. Sure, games teaching players about investment and the consequence of choice is great, but Sparks of Hope isn’t one of those games nor should it have to be. The biggest strength of this flexible skill tree is the fact that it can be modified to fit any changes in your team composition better; you aren’t locked into a singular playstyle because of this.
The last thing I will note is the flexibility of the difficulty selections. I’m aware that the original game did not pull its punches when it came to challenging the player, which is great for some people but can be grating for others. This game is much the same, in that it won’t pull its punches if things are left to the default settings, but this time around you are afforded the ability to change a variety of things, from basic stuff like AI awareness, right down to how much damage you take (you can even set this down to 0 so you take no damage). While I don’t think these settings are for me, personally, I think it’s phenomenal that Ubisoft is learning from the criticisms of the first game to make this sequel even more accessible and approachable.
I’m just going to come right out and say it. Mario+Rabbids Sparks of Hope rose to the top of my October Tight in the Jorts list from this preview alone. I’m a little tentative on how the entire game will handle, and whether a lot of the more Ubisoft-style design elements will outstay their welcome or not, but I’m hopeful regardless. I’ll happily accept a new turn-based tactics game, and one that can be easily enjoyed anywhere is even more appealing.
