Mario & Sonic at the Olympic Games review (DS)

Mario and Sonic on the Wii was a bit of a marmite game. Some journalists appreciated it for the multiplayer party fun, whereas others lambasted it for being extremely repetitive and having pretty severe design flaws, such as the need to unlock events and no online multiplayer. Unfortunately Mario and Sonic DS is unlikely to change any of those opinions, being pretty much the same game as the Wii version, only slightly less fun.

I enjoyed the Wii title immensely for a few weeks. It provided great entertainment with people around and even my wife got involved with it, which hardly ever happens. However, after the initial shine wore off, the design flaws started to grate more and more and I ended up trading it in. Plus it was getting hard to find anyone who was willing to play, as I’d become so proficient at it (having to in order to unlock the locked events) that I had a major advantage and no one else I had around to play stood a chance. However, whether it’s due to fatigue with the Wii version (more in the mental than the physical sense) or just simply because it isn’t as good, I didn’t get that surge of entertainment from the very start of playing M&S DS.

Mario and Sonic on the Wii was a bit of a marmite game. Some journalists appreciated it for the multiplayer party fun, whereas others lambasted it for being extremely repetitive and having pretty severe design flaws, such as the need to unlock events and no online multiplayer. Unfortunately Mario and Sonic DS is unlikely to change any of those opinions, being pretty much the same game as the Wii version, only slightly less fun.

I enjoyed the Wii title immensely for a few weeks. It provided great entertainment with people around and even my wife got involved with it, which hardly ever happens. However, after the initial shine wore off, the design flaws started to grate more and more and I ended up trading it in. Plus it was getting hard to find anyone who was willing to play, as I’d become so proficient at it (having to in order to unlock the locked events) that I had a major advantage and no one else I had around to play stood a chance. However, whether it’s due to fatigue with the Wii version (more in the mental than the physical sense) or just simply because it isn’t as good, I didn’t get that surge of entertainment from the very start of playing M&S DS.

Outside of the waggling events, you have to draw the relevant symbol to swim, drag the stylus to where you want to aim and other equally less-entertaining but workable control methods. And that’s the thing with M&S DS, it’s not as entertaining as the Wii version, but it’s perfectly workable. Graphically it’s very good, easily one of the most impressive looking DS games to date, and the audio is even pretty decent. It even has a splattering of new events, such as Cycling and even a few new Dream events like boxing and basketball. But what would have dragged it up a mark or two (and this applies to the Wii version as well) is still missing, and that’s online play. I don’t care about uploading records to see where I am in the world, especially considering how long it takes to do that. I just want to play against other people, rather than the AI, who anybody should be able to beat on their first or second go, no matter what the difficulty level is.

There is the option to play it wirelessly, but in order to play it properly every player needs a cart. You can play a small portion of the events with one cart, but not enough to keep it fresh outside of a short half hour burst. Online multiplayer would have removed this restriction of having to know people who also own the game and would have opened up the multiplayer aspect of M&S DS to a much wider audience. Also whereas the Wii version was a good way at getting any young/loved ones you might have around the house active whilst having fun, scrubbing a screen really isn’t as physically demanding and is yet another area where it fails to compete with the Wii version.

In conclusion, Mario and Sonic DS isn’t as fun as the Wii version and, even judging it on its own, is little more than a couple of hours entertainment followed by a short burst every now and again when the mood takes you. I do also have serious concerns about the damage it could do to your DS screen should you have even the smallest speck of dust on it when you start rubbing away like a loon. It’s hard to see anyone over the age of 12 getting enough enjoyment out of M&S DS to recommend it as a purchase, and then only if they have friends with the same game.