Pros: good online play and a fast action arcade soccer game
Cons: the 1 player mode sucks.
The bottom line: Pull my finger
I got Super Mario Strikers charge for the wii a couple of weeks ago, I heard that the original Mario Strikers Charge was worse then the atrocity that was Mario Baseball so I skipped it but with all the buzz with online and “improvements” in the game I decided to go and check this one out. Well got good news and bad news for you, if your in for a wacky Mario game online Mario Strikers will hold you over till brawl or Mario Kart comes out, but if you are looking for a quick single player fix your in for one hell of a disappointment. Mario Strikers Charge single player game mode makes Mario Baseball look like a masterpiece but more on that for a moment.

Story
Basically the role of the single player game is to get your team and your team captain to win the strikers cup, and that’s basically about it. Mario Strikers is of course is a crazy arcade take off on Soccer so while the basics are the same play on the field in get the ball in the goal. The out of bounds is an electric fence which stuns your character and your allow to make illegal checks to get the ball, of course the other team is awarded a power up item for your over aggressiveness.

Graphics.
Graphically the game looks pretty good and the graphics do look better then a lot of Mario sports games on the gamecube. The stadiums have good designs from being out in space, to playing in a dump, or playing in an actual real soccer field the stadiums have good colors and some nice design. The character designs are pretty nice and I like the fact that they are all wearing body armor has the game is kind of rough on the charecters.

Sound.
The music is the same type of stuff you expect from the Mario sports series while not all of it is catchy it isn’t bad either. The same Mario voice actors are there except it looks like they found a new one for Peach has she sounds scary in some scenes, which is good because there is some rather warped humor in the game. Especially from Wario and Waluigi’s team, you can’t help but laugh when Wario farts and goes ah good vintage, or the fact that Wario seems to get off on being electrocuted.

Gameplay
Ok I’ll divide my gameplay section into 3 different parts, first the rules and gameplay on the field, 2nd the 1 player mode AKA the part that really sucks, and then finally the online aspect because it is important in the game.

Ok the basic premise of Mario Strikers is to get Mario to play soccer and like all Mario sports it’s extreme and a bit zany arcade version. Like I said there is no fouling the other team you can tackle them has hard you want and you don’t have to worry if they have the ball in possession. Of course if you tackle your opponent player and make what would be an illegal move they will get a power item so you have take a gamble you might get control of a ball for a moment only to have it stolen by a power item. The power items are similar to Mario Karts you have shells, chain chomps, bombs, super star, and then captain abilities. Each team has a captain (Mario, Peach, Luigi, Wario etc) and they all have there special ability that they can activate, Mario and Luigi can grow huge, Peach can imprison people in photos, and Wario passes gas and causes players to be disorientated. The power items to add more strategy and fun to the game.

Next to your captain that you choose your allow to choose 3 from the supporting cast of characters in the Mario series, characters like Koopa, Toad, Shy Guy, and Birdo plus several others can be chosen and you can make a team of 3 of any combination to help your team out. They each have there own stats and moves they can use on the field has well has special charged strikes to get the ball in the net. Birdos move will instantly floor the goalie and automatically get in, has long has no one stands in her way, while Toad can set the goalie on fire making it harder for him to block the shots. The captains also each have a charged shot but these are called Mega Strikes, when a captain powers up a shot a little meter fills similar to that found in a golf game. If you can charge it high one way the more balls will be fired at the goal (up to 6), and if you get it in the middle of the red mark they will go super fast. The captains stats will determine how easy it will be to both power up and make the ball go fast. A good Mega Strike can easily get you 5 to 6 points in a single move. Of course if you find yourself on a defense end of the Mega Strike you will take control of your goalie and point the wii mote at the screen and try to catch has many balls has you can.

Now then the game is fast and zany so why does the 1 player mode suck well it’s presentation just flat out sucks. Ok the one thing you have to enjoy about Mario sports games it’s there good for quick fixes games like Mario Kart and Mario Golf even if you find yourself loosing won’t infuriate you to much because they take only 15 minutes to play. Not so in Mario Strikers has the game has a linear quest mode. In this mode you have to play through all the cups with just one character, there is no save file, nor can you go back and choose another character and make edits to there line up without beginning the game all over again. Worse comes the length between continues while the game does let you save after every short 3 minute match, if you don’t make it through the prelims, or loose just one of the matches during the final you have to start the cup over. Seeing how a cup can consist of more then a dozen matches; finding yourself loosing and having to replay over an hour or two worth of matches can be frustrating. And by the way the old reset if your loosing a match so you don’t have to worry about loosing the cup won’t work either it’s an automatic lost if the wii shut off during a match.

So does all that sound like a mess well wait and in till I tell you about the AI. The AI is either downright idiotic and lets you do mega strike after mega strike just standing around while your captain powers up and releases. Or it just decides to plain kick you’re a$$, and by that I mean it gets really really cheap. For instance there players will start moving faster then yours and start to do these really beautiful combos which are usually impossible to do for your team in less your lucky. Also during these matches were it decides to be cheap expect to be practically alone on the screen but to be suddenly tackled from off screen right before whatever charged move you were about to do was about to go off. It’s just a frustrating mess to win all your games because you got a dumb AI only to find half way through the finals the computer decides to go cheap.

The good news is that Strikers has a great online mode, if you have your wii hooked up to the online all ready all you have to do is go to online, choose a Mii to represent you in the Mario Strikers universe and away you go. The online is pretty much like the DS games you need friend codes in order to actually book mark people and if you don’t have any then it’s just random people. Still the game runs pretty smooth when you have a great connection and only lags a little bit if your connection is less then ideal. The only problem I have with the online other then the friend codes is that like a lot of Nintendo online games they don’t exactly balance who’s been playing this game non stop since the thing came out and who is a noob, in other words I got paired against people who probably just got done with the tutorial section, and then got paired with someone who’s been playing the game non stop for the past several weeks. Still the randomness of online play and even playing against the top human players in the game is a less frustrating experience then battling against the cheap AI.

Final Recommendation.
If you have online and are itching for a Mario Sports game that goes online Mario Strikers will definitely hold you over in till Brawl or Kart comes out and hence I give it a 4 out of 5 star rating because of the online. If you don’t have your Wii hooked up to the online and don’t have friends that come over to play against on your Wii then this drops to a 2 star with a hell no recommendation the 1 player mode is just terrible.