Mario + Rabbids Sparks of Hope: I want more! Playing four hours is not enough!

A horde of wickedly grinning cartoon rabbits fights together with the protagonists of the Mario universe against evil powers: the back and front shouldn’t really go together. But it did an excellent job, as the collaboration between Ubisoft and Nintendo in Mario + Rabbids: Kingdom Battle impressively demonstrated. The result was a thoroughly charming strategy role-playing game for the Nintendo Switch, in which Mario and his friends, gun in hand, defended the Mushroom Kingdom against evil forces in turn-based battles.

Almost exactly five years later, on October 20, 2022, the sequel Mario + Rabbids Sparks of Hope will be released and I was already able to fight a few battles with Mario, Luigi, Princess Peach, their beautifully weird Rabbid counterparts and the new rabbit Beat heroine Rebella. Before I tell you my impressions, a little bit about the story: Mario and his friends are romping about peacefully in the Mushroom Kingdom and the Rabbids are fooling around as usual. Everything is normal until suddenly a huge flying ray appears and announces a new opponent.

You face Misera, a being who aims to gather the power of the Sparks, conquer the galaxy and simply snatch up Bowser’s minions to secure powerful henchmen for her sinister plan. The titular Sparks are the rabbit-eared Rabbid version of the Lumas from Super Mario Galaxy and Super Mario Galaxy 2, who have very special powers. Of course, you can’t just put up with the Sparks robbery and the journey across the universe begins to put a stop to Misera.

If you’ve played the predecessor, you’ll find your way around immediately. If not, that’s not an obstacle, because the first battles on the back of the ray are there to gently bring you closer to the quite complex combat events. Although, it only gets really complex some time later, the basics are quite manageable, but make for an exciting exchange of blows. You choose two – later three – members of your team to compete in the battle. I fought the first confrontations with Mario and Rabbid-Peach, who complement each other very well. Mario can take a lot of damage and target two targets with his duo blaster or hit an opponent twice in a row, Rabbid-Peach is indispensable as an effective healer and shoots three projectiles with her weapon Trio Infernale, which also targets behind some covers meeting.

Before you fire a shot, you will be shown the probability of your damage and how high it is likely to be. You have all the time in the world to think carefully about your approach and try out variations. Your turn is only over when you perform a direct attack with the equipped weapon. So don’t be hasty, but first look at what covers you can get, use techniques that heal your teammates, give them stronger attacks or reduce damage they take, and most importantly, use frenzy. This is not considered an attack and is available separately with its own counter. If you can get close to an opponent, they will be damaged by a frenzy attack and you can then walk comfortably behind cover and start shooting again.

In addition, special actions are available to you, such as a team jump, where you can move a fellow combatant near a chasm or one level higher. Or you can grab Bob-ombs and throw them at enemies before they explode in your hand, use special abilities like Mario’s Hero Vision to deal guaranteed 100% damage to enemies within range, shorten paths through pipes or use yours like in the predecessor faithful companion Beep-O to give you an overview of the area and to analyze the opponents.

However, this only scratches the surface of the options you have to meet the conditions for victory. These vary: sometimes you have to kill all enemies, sometimes only a certain number or simply reach a green marked target area. The big strategic innovation is the total of 30 different Sparks, which you rip from the evil Misera’s claws or receive as a reward when you complete optional side missions. The cute asterisks are valuable helpers, especially when you have to deal with brutal superiority and tough bosses in later battles.

For example, Gluto charges weapon-based attacks with a fire effect while reducing fire damage taken by a few percent. Bigbang, which you get right at the start, reduces incoming damage and greatly improves your heroes’ attacks, Astromorgana turns you invisible for a turn, and Reflexis reflects some damage back at the attacker. Together with the extensive skill tree, which you use to equip your team members with new and improved abilities, you have so many options to prepare for a fight. And if you ever suffer a defeat, the battle will restart or the difficulty level will be reduced.

Away from the battles, a lot of playful variety awaits you when you run across the different planet surfaces, complete side missions, discover secrets, collect coins, watch the wacky Rabbids at their actions or simply take a look at the many funny details in the area. Again and again there are obstacles on the way to the next main goal, for example when you have to sneak through a labyrinth without being discovered by the opponents or are presented with some tricky environmental puzzles.

I never got bored during the four hours of audition. On the contrary, I would have liked to have tried out all the character combinations and Sparks techniques in peace, especially the new Rabbid character Rebella did it to me. Among other things, the lightning-fast Blademaster can target and deal damage to multiple enemies at once. But that will have to wait until October. In the meantime, I’ll dig out my PS1 and play a few more rounds of Vandal Hearts.

Developer: Ubisoft Milan, Ubisoft Paris – Publishers: Ubisoft- Platforms: nintendo switch release: 10/20/2022 – Genre: strategy