Mario Strikers: Battle League is chaotic 5-a-side football fun

Mario’s a bit of a goodie-two-shoes in most of his video games, whether it’s adventuring to save kidnapped friends and princesses, or staying true to the spirit and rules of the many sports he turns his hand to. Not football, though. While many millions sit down to watch football – or soccer if you must – for 90 minutes most days of the week, Mario Strikers: Battle League Football figures it knows best how to improve the sport without even a hint of VAR.

The football in Mario Strikers is no holds barred action; there’s no referee to spoil the fun so there’s no point rolling around on the floor clutching your shin, players go into a match kitted out with hefty American sports-style armour, and there’s not even the offside rule to confuse newcomers. It’s basically five-a-side, where you’re trying to deal as much physical damage to the opposition as possible.

Now, I never played Mario Strikers on Wii or GameCube, but it’s immediately clear that Battle League Football draws on the rich vein of gameplay and ideas from Mario Strikers Charged. You play on a smaller feeling pitch than in that game, but it’s still got rounded corners like an ice hockey ring, and it’s bounded by an electric fence that will zap anyone that’s brusquely shoved into it.

The controls are easy to pick up, as you’d expect from a Nintendo sports game, but there’s real depth here thanks to the team play. Passing the ball back and forth and getting off a quick shot is easy enough, but the AI controlled Boom Boom in each goal is more than good enough to stop these relatively weak shots. No, the trick is to time your button presses for passing to just the moment when the ball hits your feet for a tiki-taka one-touch pass, and the same for shooting. Alternatively, you can charge up your shot by holding the shoot button and (so long as you’re not tackled before letting it loose) send a much more powerful shot at goal.

Ah, yes. Defending. This is where we really get to see how the Mushroom Kingdom’s denizens feel about each other, flying kicks to the face and all. Again, there’s a bit of timing to get right, because you want to clatter into the opposition and nick the ball, but you can charge up a charged tackle that dashes forward and knocks them much harder. Artful dodging is even trickier to master, in my experience, but a must if you intend to play this competitively online.

Then we get to the silly stuff. Item boxes are occasionally thrown onto the pitch, sometimes colour coded to a particular team, and granting a bunch of Mario Kart-style pick-ups to grab and use. Bob-ombs, shells, giant banana peels (which I’m not really sure Nintendo have thought through the connotations of), and more can be grabbed and used.

There’s also the Hyper Strike orbs, which power up your team for around 20 seconds and let you unleash a character specific ultimate shot at goal. You have to charge it up with a golf game-style multi-tap input to set the power and accuracy, but while you’re winding up to shoot, the opposition can try to interrupt you. It’s tense trying to get the shot off, but you’re rewarded with a bombastic cinematic and then daft nonsense like Peach shooting a heart shape at the goalie, who then has to furiously tap ‘A’ to try and save the shot.

Oh, and Hyper Strike goals are worth two, because not even that rule is sacred. Then again, a bunch of players will happily just pick up and slap the ball with their hands…

While I’m not particularly great at the game, I can say it’s a lot of chaotic fun. Trying to string passes together and leading up to attempts on goal is really rewarding, and if you’re playing against another person instead of the AI, there’s all the kind of football game chat and banter that you can expect.

There’s a small selection of Mario game characters to choose from – it’s basically just the core characters – but there’s good variety to their various attributes, in addition to having wildly different animations. Peach trying to tackle Bowser will pretty much just bounce off him without charging up her strike.

That’s before you consider the different armour pieces that you can unlock and custom outfits you can wear. It’s not the broadest range of gear with just a few common sets shared between them all, but they tweak those attributes and can lean into slightly different playstyles.

Finally, a little shout-out to Boom-Boom, who’s just trying his best. He’ll pull off wonder save after wonder save, but then let himself down with the decision making of an exuberant puppy when closing down an attacker and timing a foot-first tackle.

Mario Strikers: Battle League Football is a lot of fun. It tears up the football rule book and concocts a bombastic pseudo sport that wouldn’t be out of place in a 1970s sci-fi dystopia. Seems like the perfect fit the soon-to-be vacant FIFA license, doesn’t it?

Try Mario Strikers: Battle League Football for yourself with the ‘First Kick’ online demo event on 4-5th June. Head here for more details.

• Coinsmart. Europe’s Best Bitcoin and Crypto Exchange.
• Platoblockchain. Web3 Metaverse Intelligence. Knowledge Amplified. FREE ACCESS.
• CryptoHawk. Altcoin Radar. Free Trial.
• Source: https://www.thesixthaxis.com/2022/05/27/mario-strikers-battle-league-is-chaotic-5-a-side-football-fun/