Tag Archives: Mario Party

Digital Playground

Mario and My Family: Mario in March

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Introduction

I think I said in the previous article that, similar to comics, the Super Mario games grew up with me. The two-dimensional side scrollers of my teenage years became three dimensional exploration games during my 20s when I had more time to devote to them. Then, as I got married, had kids, and worked more as a result, the games went back to simpler times. So, Mario and my family, as I’m sure many others can say, have a history.

That history includes the main series games. It also involves stories from the auxiliary games, mostly Kart and Party. We played Brawl (the boys more than Christine or me), but I stink on ice at that game. And, if I’m being perfectly honest, one of my (not so secret) nerd shames is that I have absolutely no idea how to even play the game. It resembles none of the other fighting games I’ve ever played and I don’t have the patience to learn any strategies. Plus, button mashing rewards you less than those other games.

Super Smash Bros

I remember thinking when I heard about the game, “A fighting game with Nintendo characters? What an amazing idea.” I also thought at the time, for some reason, that the game would be another Street Fighter clone. Playing the game quickly disabused me of that notion. No amount of half circle or F-D-F gave me the desired results. And, so, faced with that failure, I completely gave up on the hopes of ever being a Smash Bro.

I mean, seriously, what’s with the percentages?!

Mario Party

I first tried Mario Party with Christine on the Nintendo 64. We quickly discovered that, while a multiplayer game, it lends itself to more than two players. And, so the game went unplayed for another two decades or so until we had kids. Even so, we only recently started playing it as a whole family. Liam bought the game and we loaded it a couple of weeks ago on a family gaming night. We actually played through a few games and it looked like it might take a place in the rotation. So far, it hasn’t. But, April vacation is coming and we are going away with friends. So, There is the chance for another round or two coming up.

Super Mario Kart

The undisputed champion in the house when it comes to the Mario adjacent game is the Mario Kart series. I think I promised a story in the previous article about Mario Kart, so here goes. Me, Liam, and Aiden were playing Mario Kart. I went into the kitchen to put oil on the stove for home fries for breakfast. I, then, went into the living room to continue our Mario Kart series. The oil reached flash temperature and went up in flames. The fire alarms went off. I saw a 3 foot high flame licking at the bottom of our above range microwave. We left the house, called the fire department, and lived with her parents for 2 weeks as they cleaned the ash, soot, and extinguisher foam from the house and our belongings. How many of you can say you almost burned down your house playing Mario Kart?

More recently, we played Mario Kart 3 or 4 nights during one of our recent December breaks. We enjoyed the sessions so much that we promised to play at least once a month. As happens, that became once every other month. But, we still enjoy the times we get to play. Maybe I just need to try to force the issue more because Mario and my family miss each other.

The Verdict

Mario and my family have been a part of each other’s lives for the entirety of Mario’s existence and, therefore, my family’s. However, as I’m sure is true of other families, it wasn’t until the multiplayer party type games that it took hold of the entire family. Before that, I played Mario and Liam picked up on it. Quinn enjoyed Super Mario Maker. But, everyone plays Mario Kart and even Party on the rare occasions we load that one.

Digital Playground

Thankful for Multiplayer Mario Games

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Prologue

On my other page (currently defunct with no ETA on a return), I structure my posts like stories with a prologue, a story, and an end. As I drove to work this morning, I got the inspiration to do a similar thing with this post. Originally, I only wrote Mario Kart on my schedule, but then expanded it to include other multiplayer Mario Games like Mario Party. Let’s begin.

Once upon a time, a young man of 12 or 13 sat in an uncomfortable bench in front of a video game. The marquee read “Vs. Super Mario Bros” and featured a man clad from head to toe in red. Our intrepid young hero placed a quarter into the coin slot and the game began. As I remember, I only lasted to the first Goomba before dying. Okay, another quarter and then another and I’m going to be honest. I doubt that I even cleared the first level of that game after five dollars.

Leveling Up

We went without the new hotness video game system for quite a while. My parents never saw a reason to upgrade from our old Atari systems. Eventually, they relented and bought us a Nintendo Entertainment System for Christmas. Finally, I owned a copy of the game. No more quarters. I used this newfound power to finally beat that first level and, in due time, the entire game.

If I’m being honest, it wasn’t until we owned a Super Nintendo (that I purchased for myself and my brothers) that I beat the game. If my parents noticed little difference between Atari and Nintendo, then putting a Super in front of that Nintendo did little to persuade them to upgrade. That notwithstanding, my brothers and I playing together finally defeated the evil of Bowser.

And, y’all, we are always pissed every single time this happens, even today.

A Reason to be Thankful

Unfortunately, as you all know, our victory was short lived and Bowser returned again and again. I often say that all Nintendo has to do is release a new Mario, Zelda, and Metroid game on their console for me to buy it. I thought having kids might give me a built in play group for the various games that I play. While that proved mostly untrue for things like Magic the Gathering and Dungeons and Dragons, they all quickly became Nintenerds.

I took what life dealt me and cultivated their love of video games. We almost burned down our hose playing Mario Kart. And, so, began our enjoyment of multiplayer Mario games. Okay, time to come clean. I admit to taking some creative license with this article. I don’t remember my parents’ exact attitudes towards video games. I remember my father played Atari with us and even watched when we played Nintendo. Also, Christine and I hosted a few Mario Party get togethers with friends and roommates over the years.

Epilogue

With all of that being said, we found great joy in the most recent Mario Kart on Switch last year during Christmas. We may or may not have made some inappropriate comments during those play sessions. But, it was all in good fun and we’ve been meaning to do it again. Perhaps over Christmas break during this year. An annual tradition?

Who knows? It might happen earlier. Liam bought Mario Party a couple of weeks ago and he and Quinn played a round. He asked me to bring home some joycons from our school’s Nintendo club so we could play as a family. I told him I would over Veteran’s day this weekend and then again over Thanksgiving break. Here’s to hoping that it leads to some Mario Kart, too.