Mario Party is a series of games that offer a story mode but don’t offer anything in the way of a story at all. Super Mario Party Jamboree (SMP Jamboree going forward) is no different than the rest of the previous games in the series. The story mode, if you can even call it that is nothing more than a tutorial mode giving you a general idea of how the game is played and a single player experience involving the playing competing against a set of CPU players.
SMP Jamboree is easily the largest game in the series in terms of content being offered. The game has eight different game modes, features 112 mini games, and offers twenty characters to choose from, with two unlockable for a total for twenty two different playable characters. The different modes are Mario Party, Rhythm Kitchen, Toad’s Item Factory, Paratroopa Flight School, Bowser Kaboom Squad, Koopathlon, Minigame Bay, and Party Plaza. Mario Party is the staple mode in every iteration of the series. You pick a character, pick a board, then you battle it out to win mini games and be the one to earn the most stars to win the game.
Rhythm Kitchen is one of the many modes specific to this entry of the series. In this mode, you work together to build dishes of food. Each player will have an ingredient tossed at them and then you have time it right to hit it into the bowl, dish, etc to make the finished meal. Toad’s Item Factory is another that is specific to SMP Jamboree. In this mode, you are tasked with getting an item capsule from the shoot into the pipe. The way to do this is to hit or roll it into the pipe by swinging or rotating your joy-cons.
Paratroopa Flight School is a pretty unique mode in SMP Jamboree. I say that because it actually offers a couple of modes within it. You have free flight, battle mode, and a taxi mode. In the free flight mode, you can take to the skies as you flap your wings like a bird. You can see the sights, and even do challenges like collecting coins or flying through rings in the sky. Battle mode has you playing against another player and your goal is to be the one to gather the most beetles. You can fly into them and they will follow you, and you can also steal them from other players. The taxi mode is my favorite mode within this mode because it feels like a unique game of Crazy Taxi. You have to work with another player to carry your sky basket to an awaiting traveler. You pick them up in your basket and then fly them to their destination. It’s fun to work together to get your travelers to where they need to go and funny too when they are heavier or lighter than you expect. This can cause them to fall or fly out if you’re not careful.
Bowser Kaboom Squad has you fight an imposter Bowser on one of three different playing fields. You team up with sixteen random character NPCs. You work together to break crates of bombs, gather the bombs and bring them to the cannon. You can collect coins that will help you increase the damage the imposter Bowser will take from the cannon, provided you can collect the twenty bombs needed to hit him. As the rounds progress, you can all work together to complete a mini game and earn items to help take down Imposter Bowser faster.
Aside from Bowser Kaboom Squad, the last unique game mode to SMP Jamboree is Koopathlon. This mode has you competing against twenty players to gather the most coins in the given mini game. So for instance, you could play the mini game Leaf Leap, and you need to collect as many coins as you can while the rest of the players are simultaneously doing the same. Gathering the most coins at the end of the two minutes wins that game. This is a unique game mode in the sense that you play each mini game in a 3D Space where you might not if playing it traditionally.
The last two modes are Minigame Bay and Party Plaza. Minigame Bay is a traditional mode found in the franchise which lets you play any of the mini games you want and for as long as you want. It’s a nice way to practice mini games and explore games you may not have had a chance to play, but may have unlocked. Party Plaza isn’t a game mode at all, but rather just a mode that lets you travel around to the various buildings talking to NPCs to get info on the game and check out stats. Aside from checking out stats and getting info, you do have the ability to purchase unlockable stickers and such.
With SMP Jamboree featuring twenty two characters in all, it’s the most characters to ever be featured in a Mario Party game and it gives a lot of variety to choose from. Characters you would expect to see like Mario, Luigi, Wario, and Peach are all here. Then there are characters appearing for the first time like Goomba and Spike. The unlockable characters Pauline and Ninji were a nice surprise and very easy to unlock.
Graphics in SMP Jamboree are some of the best in the series and honestly are probably the best to ever grace a Mario game in general. Each character is modeled in full 3D and really stand out from the board and the environments they run around in. Each game board has it’s own unique environment with tons of things going on. The board that has a shopping mall theme, is three stories tall and features Goombas and Koopa Troopas talking to each other, going up and down escalators, walking around, and really seem to be shopping and enjoying the scenery. The board with the island theme has Goombas playing ball in the water, Koopa Troopas sunbathing, along with changes in the tide. The change in tide for this board not only changes the way the environment looks, but changes the way the board plays.
There is a surprising amount of detail in every aspect of SMP Jamboree that is truly surprising and a joy to experience. Even the graphics and theming of the mini games is really good.
Regardless if you’re playing Leap Leaf or Camera Ready, there is a lot of detail and theming that goes into each game. Some mini games go to the extent of feeling like they could be stand alone games that you’re able to play little snippets of.
There is that much detail that goes into these mini games and the game as a whole. So how does the game perform with all of these details? Well as we would expect, this is a first party Nintendo game and Nintendo always knows how to make their games shine like diamonds on the Switch. It is so well optimized that it runs buttery smooth. I mean it’s not like it runs at a steady 60 frames per second…or does it?
Well it does, but it doesn’t. To be clear, it runs at a locked 60 frames per second offline consistently no matter what, with the frame rate dipping when playing online. The frame rate while playing online is mostly going to be that buttery smooth 60 frames per second, with the exception of some mini games. Some mini games like the mini golf game, can dip down to the upper 40 frames per second depending on the number of real online players and CPU players. There are other games that will do this too, but again for the most part, you’re going to see that buttery smooth 60 frames per second consistently.
SMP Jamboree has some great music from the hub area, to each board, that really gives it a Mario feel. The music is mostly upbeat and just fun to listen to. What I like about this entry is that every mini game has it’s own little theme song. Even the hub area, various menus, and even the practice screen all have their own individual music tracks. With everything having it’s own music track, it makes everything unique and shows just how much attention to detail and care went into this entry in the Mario Party franchise.
So is SMP Jamboree worth picking up? Well I would say that would be a definite yes! If you’re on the fence as to which one to get on Switch, should you not have any of them, pickup Jamboree as it’s the most content out of all of them. Even if you have them all and you haven’t picked up Jamboree yet, you should. It’s a great entry in the series and is my favorite Mario Party game in the entire series!
Disclaimer: A review key was provided
In addition to writing articles, Ryan Byers also creates content for his YouTube channel called "Obscure Games and Consoles", collects video games, and dabbles in video game development.