Mario Hoops for DS

[Nestersan]

Videos:

http://media.ds.ign.com/media/774/774646/vids_1.html

Images:

http://media.ds.ign.com/media/774/774646/imgs_1.html

Preview:
http://ds.ign.com/articles/721/721897p1.html

Prelaunch Site with Donkey Kong 59 Point mega-dunk
http://www.mariohoops.com/Prelaunch/

Mario Hoops 3-on-3 is, at its core, three-on-three basketball. You've got a ball, you've got a hoop, and you've got to get that ball into the hoop. Everything else is pure Mario. The score system is now been bumped up by point inflation: twenty points for a short shot, thirty points for a basket beyond the line. Adding to that score is the collection of coins you manage to snag on the way - question blocks are scattered around that, like in Super Mario, reward players with the familiar "ba-ding" of a coin, and you can collect up to a hundred which can then be converted into points on the scoreboard. But only if you manage to get that ball into the hoop.

There are many elements that set Mario Hoops apart from other basketball games, but what's unique about the game is in its controls. Players use a D-pad and stylus combination that's becoming more and more common in the current generation of Nintendo DS software. With the D-pad, players move around their on-screen character, switching to the nearest teammate with the ball using the L trigger. The other hand takes the stylus and uses it on the touch screen for all sorts of maneuvers: passing the ball is a flick from left to right or right to left. Shooting the ball is a flick from the bottom of the screen to the top. And to dribble in place, simply tap the screen - it's location sensitive, so if you're tapping on the left side of the screen your on-screen character will dribble in that same location on the upper-screen.

This touch-screen sensitive dribble control is important to grasp, as it's the way to keep the defense from taking the ball. If you're dribbling in place, a defenseman can simply walk up and swipe the ball away if he's standing on the same side of the ball - but you can play keep away by making sure your dribbles are as far away from stealing opportunity as possible. Dribbling with the touchscreen is also important as you'll need to trigger question blocks on the court with the ball, and it's important to note that the ball won't trigger the block unless you're hitting it - walking on it isn't enough to snag what's inside when you're in possession of the ball.

The touch screen also comes into play with special character moves. Each of the characters in Mario Hoops 3-on-3 has a set of special individual shots and alley-oop that will put far more points on the board. Of course, these are difficult to pull off and leave your character susceptible to the steal. To activate a special move you'll have to enter a super special series of taps on the touchscreen specific to the character you're playing. Mario or Yoshi, for example, need players to tap the screen in an "M" pattern: Lower left corner, upper left corner, lower middle, upper right corner, lower right corner. Pull this off twice without getting trounced by your opponent and you'll see a spectacular showing of basketball skills. And more points than a regular shot.

Of course, this is a Mario game. Turtle shells will fly - and they're touch screen controlled, too. If you score one of these offensive weapons, flicking in a direction will send it rolling towards whoever's in its path. We've found lightning bolts, mushrooms, star invincibilities, and most nasty, the spiked blue turtleshell that explodes on contact.

The single player game structure's laid out similar to Mario Kart where players must complete special cups of increasing difficulty. The early cups are retardedly easy - computer AI barely reacts to anything you're doing, and you'll find that you can win with a spread of hundreds of points easy. But no worries, the game definitely bulks up in challenge, especially when you've unlocked some of the wilder courts. There's one that has giant piranha plants instead of hoops which makes it impossible to score via dunkshot.

Mario Hoops supports four player wireless for the basketball game, but you'll need multiple copies of the game if you want to challenge friends. For those that want a taste of multiplayer in this game, there's a single cart mode - but this only opens up a hundred coin race and an admittedly very fun Mario Kart-style battle mode. This battle mode puts the basketball engine to use in a deathmatch melee where players pick up and throw items at each other. Pretty cool, but we put more focus on the basketball game in our early hands on. Maybe we'll write more on the battle mode when we put more time into it.

I think it's fair to say that Mario Hoops 3-on-3 is, at the very least, the most beautiful looking Nintendo DS game yet. Fantastic and fast 3D engine running at 60 frames per second with incredible detail on characters and environments. There are some stunning special effects going on in this game as well that never seems to make the engine flinch. On top of this, Mario Hoops also has a remarkable soundtrack with some orchestral pieces thrown in. A lot of effort obviously went into the development of this game, and if you want to see what the DS is capable of when that focus goes into the hardware…check this game out.

In this brief couple of hours with the game, I'm pretty happy with the basketball turn-out on the Nintendo DS. The touch screen controls make a lot of sense when you experience it in action. Watch some movies of the game in motion by hitting the media link below - we captured quite a few minutes of footage today. The localized US version will be hitting these shores in September, and we'll definitely have more on the game before it ships.