Video game number one hundred and thirty two: Mario and Luigi Bowser's Inside Story

Video game review number one hundred and thirty two in my 365 Games in 365 Days project is "Mario and Luigi: Bowser's Inside Story"

A few minutes into this one, you learn that this game gets its name because of it's primary gameplay location: Inside the guts of the villain of the Super Mario Brothers games. Silly stuff like this had me chuckling out loud more than a few times while I played this one on the majority of a three hour flight.

This game starts out as a (possibly intentionally) poorly translated JRPG came. I couldn't decide if the translations were bad on purpose, or just accidentally bad. After playing for an hour or so, I started to lean towards thinking that they were intentionally bad...and very funny as a result. I retained a small shred of doubt that they may not have been done that way on purpose...in which case, this could quite possibly be the greatest game since Zero Wing.

The dialog (and this game is at least 75% dialog) in this one...is hilarious. Everyone speaks in broken english, including the Mario brothers. Occasionally...you hear them speak Italian, which I think is a first for them. I'm not talking "Lets'a go!", I mean they actually start speaking Italian gibberish to each other. It's pretty funny.

The missions involve using both screens of the DS to navigate through Bowser's inner space, and occasionally, you control Bowser up in the top window. You fight the usual Mario-type villains, but in RPG style (you hit them once for a little damage, they hit you back...and so on).

I am not generally a fan of turn based RPGS, and I'm especially not a fan of Japanese RPGS where you have no idea what the hell is happening half the time, but this one is kind of fun. I found myself wanting to play it even after the plane ride, and got a few minutes in here during the rest of my trip. Occasionally...it was time to return it to Gamefly, and I was not happy when that time came.

Overall score? 8/10. This is a good little game, and it's on my "to buy" list at this point. Hopefully by the next time I take a vacation....this one will be nice and cheap, and I can add it to my library. Then I'll be able to find out if the Mario Brothers ever escape from Bowser's colon.

One bad thing? Since the saves are on the cartridge....I've lost all my progress. I almost bought it from Gamefly to avoid this, but I decided I probably wouldn't really play it until my next trip in July, so I might as well send it back.