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Mario & Luigi: Dream Team |OT| Us North Americans Don't Have Bros

Stoof

Member
There's a lot of callbacks to Superstar Saga and Bowser's Inside Story in Dream Team, but you probably wouldn't miss out on too much. Mechanically it's almost identical to BiS except for the tremendous power creep, which is odd to see in the series. You can probably play them in any order without missing out.

You absolutely should play them all at some point though, they're pretty great. Even the worst among them (Partners in Time) is only bad because it does away with the free world exploration and over complicates the battle system with the babies.
Power creep?
 

Stoof

Member
Poor choice of words, but Mario and Luigi get a lot stronger a lot faster in this one. It's not even an issue since it's obviously designed around it, I'm just used to smaller numbers.
Ah okay. So would you say the enemies scale up too?
 

Berordn

Member
Ah okay. So would you say the enemies scale up too?

Most definitely. I stumbled on some higher level enemies by accident and they were hitting way harder and had more health than one of the bosses I'd fought earlier.

I ended up beating them after a while thanks to the battle system rewarding skill with survivability, but it was clear that I wasn't supposed to be there yet.
 

DaBoss

Member
Played the demo completely. I like how it starts with the seesaw mechanic, which I don't recall in previous games. The drill is cool. I like how I can skip most tutorials with the press of X or Y, but that seems to be a demo thing.

Action commands seem a lot easier to do in this game. I've been getting excellent on the hammer and jump attacks 95% of the time.

Luiginary and Bros attacks are more flashy than the previous iterations' counterpart. Gonna have to get used to gyro however.

And it also seems Mario & Luigi are quite powerful in this one, especially with the special attacks. That skateboard one did ~95 damage to one of the bosses you can face in the demo (Grobot was his name I think). But even with the high damage, it didn't die quickly. Basic attacks start with ~20 damage if you manage to get Excellent on the action commands.

Dream sections are like the 2D sections of BiS, but I only played a short part of it. It seems they will require one to use Luigi's abilities a lot. The demo had the mustache-pulling, and the stack. The stack seems like it will be used often.

I was getting my butt kicked by Bowser though. Wasn't used to moving and dodging lol. Didn't die though, but was getting hurt a lot and had to heal.

I enjoyed the demo and left a positive impression on me.
 

Stoof

Member
The art style and music in this game are phenomenal.

Most definitely. I stumbled on some higher level enemies by accident and they were hitting way harder and had more health than one of the bosses I'd fought earlier.

I ended up beating them after a while thanks to the battle system rewarding skill with survivability, but it was clear that I wasn't supposed to be there yet.

That's good to hear!
 

ffdgh

Member
So far I'm enjoying this greately. loving the music in this. Not getting the sound issues others are having either.
 

Sorian

Banned
Work can't end soon enough and I just feel more video game pressure. Have Tales of Xillia, this, a replay of Persona 4 Golden (which I can't put on the backburner because I am just getting to the good parts = November), my two MMO's with events and dailies (GW2 and SWTOR), then my other games that are not completed that I jump in and out of like Fire Emblem, Rogue Legacy, EO4 and something else that I am blanking on right now. THERE AREN'T ENOUGH HOURS IN THE DAY!
 

Muzy72

Banned
Bought the game last night and played for almost 3 hours lol. Tutorials haven't been too intrusive, but it is a wee bit annoying getting reminded on mechanics that are identical to BIS
 
Tried the demo and enjoyed it immensely. It blows my mind how Alphadream has made the battles more and more dynamic and fun with each installment. The Bowser fight alone has so many things going on. Being able to move Mario to dodge attacks is a fantastic addition. SO good.

Art style and music are incredible. The 3D is amazing too, some of the best on the system yet.
 

zroid

Banned
Most definitely. I stumbled on some higher level enemies by accident and they were hitting way harder and had more health than one of the bosses I'd fought earlier.

I ended up beating them after a while thanks to the battle system rewarding skill with survivability, but it was clear that I wasn't supposed to be there yet.

hard mode is going to be sooooooo gooooooood
 

Muzy72

Banned
I'm stuck :(

IMG_20130811_131556.jpg


How the hell do I get that piece!?!
 

Synless

Member
I will inevitably get this game, but the battle music that they have played in all the trailers is awful imo.
 

Kuro Madoushi

Unconfirmed Member
Love the game. Decided on DD to get it early. Much better than Sticker Star. Only complaint so far is the excessive hand holding. My fucking god...are they found to tell me how to turn on and off my 3DS too?!
 

Berordn

Member
I will inevitably get this game, but the battle music that they have played in all the trailers is awful imo.

I don't know what you heard, but the one in game is pretty fantastic.

Love the game. Decided on DD to get it early. Much better than Sticker Star. Only complaint so far is the excessive hand holding. My fucking god...are they found to tell me how to turn on and off my 3DS too?!

I'm kind of surprised this is such an issue. They give you a primer on everything new, but after that it's pretty hands-off. Mushrise Park is probably the best example, you're taught how to use the hammers and a few Luiginary works early on, but once you make it to the dream world proper you're left uninterrupted.
 
One more time since this is the most important thing about this game to me, is the disgustingly horrible sound quality in the demo the same quality that is in the real game? Because I will not buy the game based off of that sound quality. Its so horrible.
 

Berordn

Member
One more time since this is the most important thing about this game to me, is the disgustingly horrible sound quality in the demo the same quality that is in the real game? Because I will not buy the game based off of that sound quality. Its so horrible.

It's been mentioned at least three times in the thread that it's the system's speakers, not the actual sound quality. Played through headphones there's no static or crackling.

Can't you skip tutorials like in the demo?

The basic ones about movement and battling you can, but things like new moves or the dream world specific stuff forces you into a few messages to show you what things do. You're kind of bombarded at the start of an area, but after that you're given free reign.

It's not any different from Bowser's Inside Story in that regard.
 
It's been mentioned at least three times in the thread that it's the system's speakers, not the actual sound quality. Played through headphones there's no static or crackling.

Is it just with the XL or is it also with the regular 3DS? Wow. I never had this issue with animal crossing, mario kart, 3D Land, or fire emblem... why would it appear just with this game?
 
One more time since this is the most important thing about this game to me, is the disgustingly horrible sound quality in the demo the same quality that is in the real game? Because I will not buy the game based off of that sound quality. Its so horrible.

Yeah, that stuck out to me in the demo. Must have been shitty compression or something - been playing the retail game for about an hour so far, and the sound quality is fine.

I was hating on the art style when the game was first announced, but the sprite work is ridiculous on the OG 3DS. Looks fantastic.
 

Berordn

Member
Is it just with the XL or is it also with the regular 3DS? Wow. I never had this issue with animal crossing, mario kart, 3D Land, or fire emblem... why would it appear just now?

I can only say on the XL at least that it's the high quality sound versus the low quality speakers. Shimomura pushes the audio to its limits and the system refuses to cooperate.

If there was actual low quality sound on the demo it was likely a result of compression, because the retail version sounds fantastic, and you can find some very nice quality recordings from the system online.
 
I was hating on the art style when the game was first announced, but the sprite work is ridiculous on the OG 3DS. Looks fantastic.

I was noticing they looked pretty blurry on the 3DS XL. Were they just really lazy when making the screen bigger or something?

I can only say on the XL at least that it's the high quality sound versus the low quality speakers. Shimomura pushes the audio to its limits and the system refuses to cooperate.
.

I'm regretting buying the XL because it just feels worse quality wise than my OG 3DS.
 
I was noticing they looked pretty blurry on the 3DS XL. Were they just really lazy when making the screen bigger or something?

Yeah, I had issues with the screen quality on the XL - I traded in my original 3DS for a blue launch XL, and ended up switching back a few weeks ago. The difference in sharpness killed the other XL benefits for me.
 

Kuro Madoushi

Unconfirmed Member
I don't know what you heard, but the one in game is pretty fantastic.



I'm kind of surprised this is such an issue. They give you a primer on everything new, but after that it's pretty hands-off. Mushrise Park is probably the best example, you're taught how to use the hammers and a few Luiginary works early on, but once you make it to the dream world proper you're left uninterrupted.
I just made it there and so far that was actually the worst part; they just pile on with the tutorials there.

I hope you're right and they stop this shit.

And yes I know BiS was like that, but I thought they needed to tone it down there as well. Shades of egoraptor, "MEGA MAN! MEGA MAN! PRESS A TO JUMP!"
 

Gartooth

Member
lol at title change.

Also really enjoying the game so far, about 3 1/2 hours in. But man the first few hours are killer, this game has some of the worst tutorials/handholding in a game I've seen yet and it's a shame because I already love the game if it wasn't for treating me like a moron. I mean do we really need three tutorial characters? (Toadsworth, Starlow, Dreambert) It's completely awful, this might have the worst handholding since Skyward Sword from what I've seen so far. God help me if Pokemon X and Y tries to do this, Super Guide at least was optional compared to this BS.
 
lol at title change.

Also really enjoying the game so far, about 3 1/2 hours in. But man the first few hours are killer, this game has some of the worst tutorials/handholding in a game I've seen yet and it's a shame because I already love the game if it wasn't for treating me like a moron. I mean do we really need three tutorial characters? (Toadsworth, Starlow, Dreambert) It's completely awful, this might have the worst handholding since Skyward Sword from what I've seen so far. God help me if Pokemon X and Y tries to do this, Super Guide at least was optional compared to this BS.

oh boy. I think I'll just skip this for now. The killer is that nintendo games takes forever to go down in price. ah well
 

Berordn

Member
I just made it there and so far that was actually the worst part; they just pile on with the tutorials there.

I hope you're right and they stop this shit.

And yes I know BiS was like that, but I thought they needed to tone it down there as well. Shades of egoraptor, "MEGA MAN! MEGA MAN! PRESS A TO JUMP!"

It's absolutely a valid complaint, I'm not trying to downplay that at all. I'm just surprised that it's catching so much flack here when it's not really that different from BiS where it was treated as more of a minor grievance. The tutorials may seem like they're coming a little faster because there's so much unique stuff added in each area, so maybe that's it.
 

Teknoman

Member
So far I'm enjoying this greately. loving the music in this. Not getting the sound issues others are having either.

In the demo it seemed like there was some strange feedback going on, like if you turn up music too loud and the speakers cant handle it.
 

Gartooth

Member
Honestly BiS was nothing compared to this. Maybe my memory is a bit fuzzy but I never remembered the handholding being this shitty, and even then it had some sense of validity considering it was teaching the player how to use Bowser for the first time. Comparatively here the only thing that seems necessary is explaining Dream World mechanics and dreamy Luigi in battle, everything else players of past Mario & Luigi games should know how to do, and really Nintendo needs to learn that a lot of people who buy their games also happen to buy a lot of previous games in the same series. Just ask "have you played a Mario & Luigi game before?" and then cut down on the number of tutorials in the game for those players. Right now the dreaded tutorial will probably stop me from going through a second playthrough even though I will probably love the first.
 

subwilde

Member
Just picked this up earlier this morning. Only other Mario RPG I played was on the SNES. Going into it fairly blind so let's see how this goes!
 

Berordn

Member
Honestly BiS was nothing compared to this. Maybe my memory is a bit fuzzy but I never remembered the handholding being this shitty, and even then it had some sense of validity considering it was teaching the player how to use Bowser for the first time. Comparatively here the only thing that seems necessary is explaining Dream World mechanics and dreamy Luigi in battle, everything else players of past Mario & Luigi games should know how to do, and really Nintendo needs to learn that a lot of people who buy their games also happen to buy a lot of previous games in the same series. Just ask "have you played a Mario & Luigi game before?" and then cut down on the number of tutorials in the game for those players. Right now the dreaded tutorial will probably stop me from going through a second playthrough even though I will probably love the first.

But that's exactly what it does. All the standard battle tutorials, evading enemy attacks, etc are skippable. Everything else regarding the dream world and new abilities gets some instruction time. Bowser's Inside Story was the same way, where you could skip all the basic battle stuff with the Bros., but it'd still have you spend some time learning how each region of Bowser's individual mechanics worked (the X-Ray Beam, the Water Pump, etc).

And every time there was some touch screen minigame it forced you to watch a tutorial on that too.
 

Gartooth

Member
But that's exactly what it does. All the standard battle tutorials, evading enemy attacks, etc are skippable. Everything else regarding the dream world and new abilities gets some instruction time.

I know I can skip many tutorials, but it'd just be easier if before starting a new file the game would ask if I have played a Mario and Luigi game before so I wouldn't have Starlow/Toadsworth asking me about a mechanic in the middle of battle before I reply to them to shut up.

About BiS my memory is pretty foggy on that game so maybe I'm just being too nice to it in retrospect considering it was probably my favorite M&L game.
 

Berordn

Member
I know I can skip many tutorials, but it'd just be easier if before starting a new file the game would ask if I have played a Mario and Luigi game before so I wouldn't have Starlow/Toadsworth asking me about a mechanic in the middle of battle before I reply to them to shut up.

Which is understandable, but it's identical to how BiS did it. Even Superstar Saga had Toadsworth and Bowser popping up in the beginning battles to teach you about timed hits and evasion. It's a series staple at this point.
 
J

Jotamide

Unconfirmed Member
That demo was awesome! Definitely trading in Soul Hackers for this one. Hopefully, I'll get around to play it soon-ish.
 

Teknoman

Member
Speaking of music, i'm not having the sound issues the demo had with my 3DSXL, so maybe it was some compression issue like someone stated earlier?

EDIT: Really like all the NPC text, the way everything was translated reminds me of the SNES RPG days.
 

nikos

Member
Title should read "We North Americans." :eek:

Wish I still had a 3DS for this. Need to pick another one up soon.
 

khaaan

Member
I don know how long the demo has even out in NA but I just found out about it yesterday night. It was a lot of fun but I had to stop playing because if I had to go through tutorial messages again I would probably rage.
 
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