“A swing and a……… half miss?”
Overview
Let me preface this by saying that I love tennis, so much so that I’ve played competitively for a good chunk of my life. Mario Tennis Aces, I do not love. The next step in a series that has seen success in the past falls short of its predecessors. The critical and I think most massive flaw with this game is the price point of 59.99, now 49.99. If the game was say priced at 39.99 or lower, I would be much more accepting in the repetitiveness, and lack of polish. The problem is games like Breath of the Wild, and FIFA exist at the same price point, and the sheer difference in the amount of content is astonishing. Mario Tennis at its core is a good tennis game. In classic mode, without Star-shots or any of the extra trimmings that make it "Mario," the game is quite enjoyable. What drove me to stop playing the game was the campaign and its insane difficulty spikes built using redundancy rather than skilled game design. For example, say a challenge required you to volley the ball 15 times with Shy guy, the next challenge would be to volley 30 with a Koopa Troopa, and so on until you reached 100. Problems like these just bore the player and don’t offer any real reward or gratification. The campaign, in general, was just too long for a sports game. The redundant challenges and lack of depth could have easily been avoided by shortening the campaign and focusing on what the game does best, which is tennis. It took me probably 10-15 hours to complete, and I was over it after about six. I'm sure if I skipped as much as I could and only did the minimum to progress that I could've beat it faster, but that's not how I play games.
The Details
There are six game modes in total, and all of them besides Adventure mode was unique and a blast to play. Tournament mode is a typical tournament setup and honestly would be my preferred campaign, all it would need would be some unlockable items and varying difficulty in the CPU. Both mechanics are already present in the game. Online tournaments add depth and longevity past the content that comes in the box. Co-op challenge, and swing mode both offer multiplayer fun typical of a Nintendo title. Co-op challenge being more mini-game and less tennis focused, while swing mode is a glorious tribute to the Wii sports tennis days of old. Ring shot mode takes the core idea of tennis and flips it on its head by making it a completely different game. In Ring shot games, players will compete, or work together to hit as many rings as possible when rallying the ball back and forth. This was especially interesting to me because I see it as I way to help younger gamers or people who don't want to invest the time to learn the rules of tennis enjoy the game. Beyond that, facing off against friends in Ring Shot mode added another layer of depth and almost a meta game to the multiplayer experience. Lastly, Free play is the classic tennis experience that will allow for any variation of the game to be played with any of the many unlockable characters, items, and courts.
The aesthetics of each zone are as true to Mario as it gets, from piranha plants to Shy-guys the game is full with the Nintendo spirit that makes their games great. The same Nintendo magic extends to the boss encounters, which are the best part of the campaign. Each boss was different enough to make me want to see what the next had in store but similar enough that I felt I knew how to beat each already. The bosses worked because there were just enough of them, one more boss fight and it would have been too much. While the overview of the map looks fantastic, its sheer size speaks to the main issue with the game — too much content. Nintendo has been crushing it since the Switch came out, and I think that actually had an adverse effect on the development of Mario Tennis. When it was released, the Switch still had a relatively small library of games. I believe this combined with the success of early titles on the Switch lead the development team to push themselves more than they had too. I could easily see how wanting to live up to the hype of Super Mario Odyssey, or Breath of the Wild would cause them to keep adding content to the game hoping to be on that level. The truth of the matter is that Mario Tennis Aces isn't the same caliber as other first-party Nintendo titles, but that's not a bad thing. If the game would have embraced it’s sub AAA status and delivered the polished product it is without the extraneous bells and whistles at a respectable price point it could have been a must-have on the Switch.
My favorite thing
The thing I found most enjoyable with this game was the online and COM tournaments. The COM tournaments served as the campaign that I expected from the game and continued to be fun through countless replays. The addition of Toad commentators and intro graphics capture the essence of competition and add brilliantly to the overall tournament experience.
In the end
At the end of the day, Mario Tennis Aces is not a bad game. Unfortunately, it’s not a great game either. Somewhere along the way the game lost what it was and fell short striving to become something more. That doesn't mean it should be skipped. As a title in the extended Mario universe, it's still a game with a ton to offer. The overall experience will be enjoyable for any Nintendo fan, and the game has the expected amount of Easter eggs and nods to other Nintendo titles. The length and quality of the campaign or Adventure mode, however, can take away from the overall experience, so I suggest skipping it or just playing the main missions needed to progress. If you can find the game on sale, or if its MSRP ever drops below 39.99 it is 100% worth picking up and a great addition to any Switch users library.
I give Mario Tennis Aces 3 out of 5 Snails.
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