Mario Tennis Fever Review

Super Mario games have always been about adventure. It could be a haunted castle or a volcano lair, but in the case of Mario Tennis Fever it would be the various rooms of a tennis academy. The incongruously named adventure mode takes about six hours, half of which is spent on a tutorial that assumes you've never heard of tennis and may in fact need some deprogramming from the suspicion that the sport is all a conspiracy for the new world order.

The other half is spent in the aforementioned adventurous locations, but even that has the drawback of ending too quickly and too quickly. You'll also have to play as Baby Mario for the whole thing, with the goal of curing Princess Daisy of an unnamed illness. Even if she shows up midway and is cured and you have to keep trying to get rid of the baby anyway. All of this highlights the overall presentation issues the Fever continues to have.

Mario Tennis Fever has plenty of options, but limited depth.

There's a decent array of 38 characters, the most the series has ever offered, but it's also incredibly deep. Almost all games are unlocked by simply playing a certain number of games (you can get all 50), and several others are also rewarded for completing tournaments. There are only three of the tournaments and they are all played on the same court. Some are also awarded with challenge towers that only allow three people in your party, but at least they provide more variety.

The only kind of customization available comes in the form of unlockable palettes, which are also obtained by playing multiple games. Luma has 1 replacement, Koopa Troopa and Koopa Paratroopa each have 3, Shy Guy has 6, and Yoshi has 8. No one else has anything. You'll unlock everything over the course of 100 matches, which surprisingly doesn't include the Adventure Mode game, but between tournaments, towers, and the last few special matches required for characters and rackets, you should get there without even trying.

Special competitions are a variety of house rules games where points are scored using batting rings and the like. There is a greater variety of courts here, but only 14 total for the game. Three of them are grass/clay/hard pitches and the remaining six are academies made of various gimmick materials such as ice. Later stages of Adventure Mode head to new areas for some interesting (if basic) tennis-based boss battles, but these arenas don't convert into actual courts for play elsewhere. This looks like an unforced error on the part of developer Camelot.

This is my only free tennis analogy. Any further errors will be double errors.

But the star of the show here is the Fever Racket, which grants special abilities when charged. These are still unlocked in the same simple way, but have a much more valuable variety. Some are basic 'fireball shooting' abilities, while others are about spraying banana peels, sprouting giant armor to push away, or leaving sticky mud all over the court.

It's not very well balanced. Racquets with the power of flame provide a visual distraction, an on-field hazard, and can inflict damage with projectiles. But it's very fun. Fever Shot can be essential in providing an escape at a crucial moment, picking an unblockable spot, and instantly unlocking your opponent's impeccable shots. By the third tournament and tower, you probably won't like these traits once the CPU uses them. But the game was definitely committed to its central special effects.

Does anyone like tennis?

But underneath it all, Mario Tennis Fever is a tennis game. However, I'm not sure how accurate that is. Spiritually, it feels much closer to Mario Kart than to Aces, the Italian plumber's final tennis match. Ace was a tennis game with Mario. Fever is a Mario game with tennis.

Aces is a slightly more technically proficient game, while Fever is more of a party game. The ball is lighter, power plays a bigger role, and the floor to ramp is lower while still maintaining a high ceiling. If so, most people would say Aces is comparing it to Mario Tennis: Ultra Smash. So perhaps the series was always heading in this direction.

In any case, the time spent on the court is the biggest advantage of this game. However, it is unfortunate that there are not that many courts and there is not much diversity around. However, in this case the Fever racket's lack of balance is a bit more problematic. If Fever is best played with friends late at night, you'll always end up playing Volcano and Fire Bar, unless someone picks Metal to get immunity.

How well does Mario Tennis Fever use its huge character roster?

There are also questions about how and why the roster works the way it does. In fact, I didn't notice much of a difference in the middle part of the pack's characters over the 100 matches required to unlock everything. Bowser is slow and powerful, while Peach is fast and her shots have a better curve. But there is a lot of middle ground.

This is expected, but the statistics feel a little odd. Both Daisy and Rosalina are base characters that don't require any unlocks, but Rosalina has better stats in all four categories. I didn't notice much of a difference when playing as them, except for the fact that Rosalina has her trademark robes.

What I noticed, though, is that every character has their own unique walk-on to the court, giving them quite a bit of personality. Princess Peach's racket is carried by her royal guards, the spikes are rolled in as in a regular game, and Boom Boom is lowered on an anchor set down by his airship. Games don't always show a lot of personality, but here they do. It also shows it in another way that makes me want to rip my ears off and consume them. So all I could hear was the soothing rhythm of the blood flowing from my eardrums. This is Talking Flower.

The talking flower first appears in Super Mario Bros. Wonder. This is the only value he offers to the world. Here he is the commentator for the tournament. That means he has a zinger in every shot. He has about 20 zingers, so considering how many shots he throws in a tennis match, they get old fast.

If you perform a lob, a commonly used shot in tennis (and an easy way to score points by throwing green eggs and spamming against weaker opponents), he'll say “High ball! Were you planning on going through the sky?!” a) stupid b) makes no sense and c) stupid. How much I hate this flower.

If you buy Mario Tennis Fever and can play a few rounds of tennis with your friends like Mario Kart, you'll have a great time. It's a solid arcade tennis game with unique abilities and cute characters. But as an overall experience, it seems shallow, a bit unbalanced, severely lacking in creativity, and offering minimal options outside of the roster and rackets.