Ladies and Gentlemen of the Vizzed Community,

This will be my first game review so
hopefully the readers of this review will be able to cooperate with me and to
leave any suggestions or comments in order for me to improve on my future game
reviews. 

My first game review will be focused on Mario Party 2:

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*For those of you who have not played any game from the
Mario Party series, the Mario Party game series is basically a virtual board
game in a video game except it is more interactive and more fun especially with
friends. The goal is to win as many stars as you end by the end of the game.
Why play a boring game of plain old Monopoly that can go on for 8 hours when
you can play a Mario Party game that can last for a half an hour, an hour, or
much more with all of the fun, whackiness, rage, and laughter that it has to
offer? The Mario Party game series has been known to be the series to put
friendships to the test. Use a chance to test out your friendships; you either
gain some friendships or you lose them after a game or two. Trust me, I still
haven’t forgiven my friends for robbing some of my stars and coins in the past. 

Mario Party 2 is known to be the sequel or second game of
the original Mario Party from the Nintendo 64. In general, sequels don’t
normally match up to the original games but does Mario Party 2 have what it
takes to out shine the original?

Now before I talk about my review on Mario Party 2, let’s
start with comparing and contrasting the first Mario Party and the sequel Mario
Party 2. There have been some good changes and bad changes when jumping between
these two games. 

Differences:

Mario Party:

-It provides single player games in order to give players
a chance to receive more coins but however, it required more time to finish a
game round.

-Some mini-games involve rotating the analog stick with
the palm of your hand that led to complaints due to development of blisters and
skin peels (I was one of the unlucky ones who experienced this) but luckily,
Nintendo provided gloves for those were experiencing this problem.

-There were about 50 mini-games in this game consisting
of twenty-five 4 player mini-games, ten 1vs3 mini-games, five 2vs2 mini-games,
and ten 1 player mini-games.

-For every game in the end for party mode, coins and
stars (converted to coins) are needed to buy items and mini-game. Brought
mini-games give players a chance to play mini-games during free play without
the hassle of going through party mode.

-Players can win and lose coins depending on the
mini-game.

-Each character has their own board in party mode (there
are 7 in total) that created each unique quality of each and every one of them
(Examples: Luigi’s Engine Room and Wario’s Battle Canyon).

-The board layouts are smaller.

-There is a mushroom space (red mushroom to move forward
or poison mushroom to lose a turn during that same turn) 

Mario Party 2:

-Removed single player games in order to save time and
keep the game going as quickly as it can.

-Players aren’t able to lose coins anymore in mini-games,
usually the winner(s) of a mini-game receive the usual 10 coins each mini-game.

-Dueling games which involve 2 people to bet and play a
mini-game against each other if they land on the same space during the last 5
turns, have been added.

-For every game in the end for party mode, coins and
stars (converted to coins) are needed to buy mini-games only

-The boards for party mode are more general based
(Examples: Western Land and Space Land) and each playable character dressed up
in costumes according the appropriate theme except for Bowser Land (there are 6
boards in total)

- The boards are bigger.

-Items are in the game in which players can either land
on an item space or buy an item from the item shop

-There are battle spaces that involve players forced to
battle each other based on the amount of coins on the line.

-There are bank spaces hosted by Koopas. If you walk by
this space, you are forced to spend 5 coins or lower if you don’t have 5 coins
but if you land exactly on this space, you can receive all of the coins from
players who passed by this space.

-There are Baby Bowser/Bowser Jr./Koopa Kid spaces in the
boards and then they tend to replace the previous star space due to a player
buying a star. When you pass by this space, you are usually forced to pay 5
coins but if you get lucky, he will reward you 5 coins sometimes.

Similarities:

-Same basis spaces like the blue spaces (gaining 3 coins
each time you land on one), the red spaces (losing 3 coins each time you land
on one), chance time (a luck opportunity to win or lose coins or stars or help
out another player in the palm of your hands), and etc. The game layout still
basically stayed the game except for a few changes.

-Star spaces = 20 coins to buy one star

-Bowser spaces and Bowser = always trying to create havoc
or advantages for players depending on the stipulation chosen

-Single player modes where it only takes one player to
play and complete them (example: mini-game stadium). This feature is used for
people who wouldn’t play party mode with 3 computers, out of boredom or
challenge, and other reasons.

-Same characters with Mario, Luigi, Peach, Donkey Kong,
Wario, and Yoshi.

-Same goal and concept of the game: collect as many stars
as you can

-In the end of each game, bonus stars (only 3 are given)
are given to a player who has accomplished the most in a certain goal and gets
an extra star added to their score which may turn the tides to get a winner. 

Now, let’s get this party of this review started, shall
we?

Story (4/10): This story starts off Toad introducing and
narrating the story in a play stage setting with everyone is living in Mario
Land. However, Wario is the only one who didn’t approve of the name so then
this ends up in a big argument between Mario and Wario. Luigi, Yoshi, and
Donkey Kong try their best to settle the situation and calm down Mario and
Wario. Suddenly, Peach says that she has an idea to resolve the whole situation
and everyone stops to hear on what Peach has to say. She suggests that it would
be better if the land was called Peach Land as she puts her hands on her chin
in the most lovey dovey way which eventually led to everyone falling and dying
off digust thinking of the idea of Peach Land. More ruckus and anger suddenly
continues to rise with nobody stopping the argument. So Toad proposes that
whoever beats Bowser and becomes superstar, will be the one to name the land. If
you played every board at least once, you will see a scene of Toad getting
kidnapped by a group of Koopa Kids, leading to his replacement by a Koopa Kid
who won’t let you play other board maps besides Bowser Land. Once you beat
Bowser Land, Bowser has been destroyed by Mario and the gang which brings back
the peace and harmony back in Mario Land. Afterwards, Toad announces the “actors”
(and Peach) of the play who have casted a well done show.

I would give the story a 4/10 because the story was a
lackluster and it didn’t make sense to me with everyone living happily ever
after ending despite of Bowser being the main villain most of the time. Heroes
and villains don’t just randomly be happy and work together in the end but that
is Mario Party logic for you. 

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Graphics (9/10): The graphics were pretty good during its
time and I have not encountered any problems or glitches in this game. There
are very colorful three dimensional models that fit the characters that we know
and love. The Nintendo 64 was designed to put three dimensional characters in
its games and it has done a job well done with its progress and success during
its time. What could be better than lots of colors and three dimensional models
to top it off? 

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Soundtrack (10/10): I really love the soundtrack in this
game especially due to the nostalgia that it brings. It is very smooth and
charming to me. The soundtracks are in sync of whatever setting, board map,
event, or mini-game that is playing at that moment. Some are catchy, some are
smooth, some are very upbeat, some are terrifying, and so forth that Mario
Party 2 can give you lots of emotions while playing the game. I have listened
to the full soundtrack a couple of times and it never grows old on me.

Here is a link of the full soundtrack: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NBZ6c9R0298

Gameplay (9.5/10): After the first Mario Party, Mario
Party 2 has lots of good changes, improvements, and challenges that it has to
offer. The additions of duel mode, battle mode, items, and other little details
have made this game so much fun for me to play especially with friends. Not to
mention that mini-games are much more fun as well and most of the mini-games
are quite fun to play. Some of the mini-games have debuted from Mario Party and
made another appearance in Mario Party with its own improvements, recreations,
and classic-ness such as Bumper Balls, Bobsled Racing, and Handcar Havoc. This
game has the best mini-games in overall in my opinion. 

For no doubt, Mario Party 2 is one of the few sequels
that has done better than the original game itself with its improvements and
additional gameplay details and options. The mini-games are much more fun than
the previous game as well. It has brought lots of opportunities with its
options like battle mode, Boo, and Bowser in order to give every player a
chance to turn the tides in the game. Not to mention the removal of single
player games to reduce the time to create more fun and suspense to the games in
party mode which means more multiplayer fun for everyone.

There is no reason in doubt that Mario Party 2 is my
second favorite Mario Party game in the whole series despite of the bad
storyline that it offers. Party mode games are insanely fun when playing with
friends and I highly recommend this game to whoever wants to play a good Mario
Party game in the series. For those who really want to test their friendship
with friends, try out this game whenever you can! Be the superstar out of all
of your friends! 

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Nice work on this. First off, it's very professional and handles the idea of a review in a unique and fun way. I'd never noticed half of those differences between Mario Party and Mario Party 2, despite playing both within a few weeks of their releases. You obviously paid a lot of attention, and that makes for a good review/article.

Next, I love how you made this review your own. With such meticulous guidelines, we often see too many reviews that look exactly the same, but this one actually feels different. I love that about it. Nice touch.


Now for the bad stuff. :/
The only things I noticed that could have improved at all were the spacing, images, and (definitely optional) the categories. And those are almost all three treading a fine line when changing them, because you don't want to destroy your uniqueness in reviewing (start making them cookie cutters like so many others and I'll unfriend you! I mean...uh...), but you do want to press for perfection of your style.

So for the images: sadly html tags aren't really allowed in reviews currently, so links and images etc. aren't supposed to be in there (it's a more obscure rule, and even some staff members break it. No worries).

Spacing: it breathes really well, and that's a huge plus, so you definitely want to keep it. However, in some areas there was a little too much space between sections, such as the two paragraphs right before the "differences" section. Still, this is a far cry better than insufficient spacing, and when managed properly adds a bit of your own flair to the review.

And the categories: Now this is entirely subjective, and as the older folks around here (where I live) say, it should be "taken with a grain of salt". In other words, it doesn't really mean much. Also this is only important if you want to get your reviews featured. You left out a breakdown of your difficulty and addictiveness categories. Now that may have been intentional, and is by no means necessary in a good review (obviously, since this one lacked them and was still great).


Now if you don't hate me after that, I'd like to say this: this was a really good review. If half of the reviews we see on here were this quality, our overall review quality would be much higher to say the least. So don't take the few criticisms I offered the wrong way, as this is anything but bad. I'm impressed...I'm also rambling. So now I'll shut up finally. yay!

I pretty much agree with everything Eirinn said, but mostly wanted to mention the spacing.  If you made edits and previewed them, that might have caused extra spaces.  Sometimes editing posts is tricky, but if you mess with it enough, you should be able to remove them.

And like Eirinn, I think you did a really, really nice job on this review.  I mainly wanted to state that I've only played Mario Party 3.  I've always been curious about the other two, but I've never seen seen what they looked like.  Thank you for the information, as I found it very helpful.

(Oh, one more thing! You might want to shrink your first and last photos, as I felt they were a little too large for your layout.)

Continue to produce stuff like this and I'm sure you could get a review-writing position if you ever wanted one.  

Eirinn :
Singelli :

Thank you both for taking the time to read, check, and write about my first game review! This is the first time that I ever wrote one so I expected some feedback on improvements and negatives. I didn't know that images weren't allowed in game reviews because I got inspired by someone in the past (I forgot the person's name) who posted a game review with images on them and plus I thought that images help to make reviews better (I mean who doesn't like pictures?). No pictures next time, I got that.

I've seen some people who don't rate all sections of the game based on Vizzed's rating sections but I will reconsider including the difficulty and addictiveness sections in my future game reviews.

The spacing was very tricky to reformat especially when I typed my review on Microsoft Office beforehand or it could be the layout's fault which I am not sure. The spacing was way worse than what it is posted right now and I tried my best to fix it.

PS not many people who played the original game and the sequel game of a game series take the time to compare them both which I think is an important factor. I understand that there have been people who only played one of the games and not all which is okay. Not many sequels in games are very good in general but I am glad that Mario Party 2 is one of the few good sequels.

ghostfishy : Comparisons are -definitely- important.  

by the way, I think it's mainly been myself and another person using images in reviews.    I'm not so sure it's a bad thing, and I think David even liked it. We might have to ask him for clarifications on how to do it, if it needs to be done a certain way.

Davideo7 : Can you remind us of your opinion on this matter?  Thanks!

I actually agree that images can be good in reviews, because it gives you a break from reading for a moment so you don't wear out, and makes the idea much. I asked David about the rule and if it could be changed a while back, but he's yet to be able to reply. Hopefully he sees this and can let us know.

And to clarify, I don't think the images took away from the review at all. Not what I meant.


And the spacing thing happened to me in my recent article as well. I kind of wondered if that was the case here. And as for the categories: no need to write and describe all of them. That's completely optional. The only way it matters is when it's being considered for a featured review. Nothing wrong with your approach here at all.


And I agree that the differences portion is a huge help, and great idea. Also agree that you could be staff with your reviewing if you wanted.

Singelli : I thank you and Eirinn for all of your help on contacting David about this situation. I cannot thank you two enough. Reviewing my game review was more than enough. When I previewed my post a few times before I sent my review, the images would not appear due to the changing of blue coded hyperlinks of the images which I can think that the text box is sensitive to that. I had to fix it up by somehow not making it force change to those blue coded hyperlinks.

Eirinn : I know what you mean. I am the type of person who likes to see images on a game review if it relates to the game or adds humor to it.  I am just saying that it can be rather boring to read a full detailed page of a game review especially when game reviews can be rather wordy to people in general. It still stinks that images aren't allowed in game reviews. I would be okay if there can be a picture limit if possible.

tornadocam : Thank you for your opinion and suggestions! It means a lot to me. I hope that you are able to stop by to see my future game reviews.

No problem at all. I personally love pics in reviews and I think they add a lot to the quality. Plus, pictures also help break up the monotony of reading and engage interest by offering the eyes something different to digest. So good call!

Great review (wait, let me rate it..).

I have often thought of adding pictures to my reviews, and I think your use them is a great argument to how they can effectively add flavor and eye rests to walls of text or endless seas of paragraphs. Excellent  selection for the 3 you chose, and reminds me of good game boxes, which didn't rely solely on pictures to sell you on the game. 3 is a magic number, in this case.

"Will you ever have any friends after this game?"

Well, allow me to help you with this question.

I played Mario Party 2 ages ago. (Along with many of the other games.)

I won. A lot. And stole stars. A lot.

I presently have very few friends in real life. Only one of which actually played Mario Party 2 at any time with me.

So I would guess the answer is "no."

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This was an alright review. Outside of the formatting (which you will get better at as time goes on) and the pace (which again, you will get better with as time goes on) I think you nailed it.

Hey ghostfishy... I wanted to clarify my post because it's come to my attention that I may have given the wrong impression.  I do think you made a good call in determining that pictures would make the review more interesting. However, whatever David decides.... rules are rules.    So even if I think they look good and think it was a smart thing to do, it doesn't mean it should be done if the boss says 'no'.

And Eirinn is in charge of reviews and such, so he'd know better than I.  

Great job ghostfishy! You told a lot about the differences, improvements and similarities, which is a good thing to see
Have you played Mario Party 3 as well? I've only played Mario Party Advance for the GBA but that's considered as one of the worst games in the series and it's also the lowest selling game according to the Guinness World Records book

I can't really add more than the others said, except that you used a lot of spacing in the first sections, which makes the review look a lot longer on the first sight.

endings : Thanks man!

legacyme3 : That one friend is a true friend. Thanks for the feedback.

Singelli : I know what you mean. I am just curious if it is possible to put pictures on reviews. If this rule can be approved, that would great but if not, then I will deal with it and try to readjust to it somehow.

juuldude : Thanks for the feedback! I've played Mario Party 1,2,3,4,5,8,9,DS, and GBA. Mario Party GBA was more of a single player game and more story mode based which probably why it was that bad. The Mario Party series is more known to be a multiplayer game. I am glad that Mario Party DS was able to redeem itself for being on a handheld afterwards.

ghostfishy : You're one hardcore fan then! I think that it was okay to play alone, but there still is a lot to do with friends. 

juuldude : It's okay to play alone when you just want some free time, practice on the layout and game style of a game, or try your best to adjust to a game. Same thing goes with completing story mode if there is one for a game. You can play however you like!

ghostfishy : Exactly That's the nice thing about a game, you can try many different things to make it hearder, learn more about the game and so on!