Bowser's Inside Story Review

Mario & Luigi: Bowser's Inside Story - 1/1

Mario & Luigi: Bowser's Inside Story is a good game. I feel like that's all that needs to be said. It checks off nearly every box on that grand checklist of What Makes a Universally Good Game, and it does it with style.

It seems strange to me that something so niche and... ahem, "hardcore" as Demon's Souls is still being talked about today. Atlus isn't exactly a household name, and when good ol' Zelda Meets Resident Evil hit it big I was actually sort of surprised. It seemed like the death of The Hidden Gem Game. That game that gets rave review after rave review but dies on the market, or never gets brought up again outside of nostalgic love letters from thirty-somethings on 4chan. But whoa, Bowser's Inside Story. It got a slew of 10s upon release and hasn't been mentioned since, apart from a frankly shameful article on Kotaku that implied that adult's shouldn't be playing this game cause it's for children. Suck it, you goddamn kidult.

Maybe Inside Story suffered from being released around the same time as Super New Wii Bros Mario (which we've already shared our thoughts on), or maybe this stupid fucking Kotaku article shamed every person over 12 into ignoring it. If you take one thing away from this little write up it shouldn't be that Inside Story is a good game (even though it totally IS), it should be that it isn't a game for kids. It isn't even a game for adults. It is a game for goddamn everyone.

Inside Story is a game that nearly every human being on this planet should be able to pick up and just sort sort of get. It's got those traditional RPG elements and the whole active dodging and counterattacking thing the Mario RPGs are known for, but now it's honed to razor sharpness. Now you have Bowser tearing shit up on the overworld, and Mario and Luigi working behind the scenes in Bowser. Every fight is engaging and difficult, but not so much that a little practice and rhythm won't get you through. The music is scored well, the story is fantastic, funny, witty, and unexpected at every turn. Even the little voice bites that play ala Banjo Kazooie are entertaining (I dare you, any of you to not crack a smile at Fawful's 'YYYAY').

Okay that spiraled a little out of control. Let me put things in perspective and ground this a little bit. I got into this game from my older sister. This is really strange given she hasn't cared about a video game since Bomberman 64 almost ten years ago. She recently bought a DS for Mario Party with my little sister, and has been borrowing games from wherever she could (though she wasn't having no Order of Eclessia, no accounting for tastes I suppose). One day I find her absolutely engrossed and laughing along with her DS, every now and then she would groan, the telltale audible failure, and eventually her arms shot up and she let out a triumphant "YESSSSSS" alongside one of those girlish squeals I'm sure you've all heard at least once.

Sort of like this...

Getting to the point, she was playing Bowser's Inside Story. The fact that a gamer so unbelievably hardcore as myself could find the same amount of enjoyment as my sister, who can't tell the difference between a Gamecube and a Wii, should be enough for anyone to see that this game is good.

So there you have it. One out of one. The game takes you on this wonderfully cartoonish whirlwind of comedy and legitimate god-fearing compelling gameplay. Because the main story is so razor sharp though, the sidequests and optional bosses can be pretty easily dismissed, as they come down to rhythmic button-mash marathons, a single optional boss room, and grinding to the level cap. That's it! All the flaws right there!

   

More like this.

There's even a point where you find a Boo-Ray Player (if you thought that was funny, just buy the game already), and use it as a sort of X-Ray machine to navigate one of Bowser's gut dungeons. The game is just a marvel of telling a good story and allowing you to take part in the best parts of it, the action parts of it. It isn't an 80-hour RPG (though it can take a good chunk of your time), and it isn't the next blockbuster FPS (though it can demand quite a bit of reflexes). It's just...

It's just a good game.