Joel Peters

Ubisoft is not exactly known for having a perfect record. A while ago they came up with a universal policy of DELETING people’s accounts if they were inactive for too many months, they regularly release games in dire states, engage in unnecessary microtransactions and NFTs. And one such fateful development was the sequel to an actually good game: Mario+Rabbids.

It is important to establish that the predecessor, Mario+Rabbids Kingdom Battle, was actually really, really good. I am a strategy gamer at my core, but I also have grown up with and loved me some Mario. The game took the two and seamlessly blended them. It also mixed in a surprisingly decent plot, and the quirkiness of the rabbids franchise as a little extra thing you could engage in if you wanted.

Its DLC continuation, Donkey Kong Adventure, which was basically a whole nother game, was also fantastic. So naturally, when I heard that there was a big new sequel in the works, aiming to be even more ambitious, I was initially very excited. I bought the game on release and eagerly dived in. Here it the tl;dr of that experience: EVERYTHING they changed RUINED the game.

Not like, oh there is this one thing they changed that I didn’t like, and kind of takes away from the experience, no. I mean any particular thing they decided to change for the sequel completely botches the game up in some critical way. Let’s go over it briefly point-by-point.

1. Removal of the Grid+Other Combat Changes

As previously mentioned these are strategy games, where your goal is to defeat whatever grand evil is in question, by defeating its minions battle by battle. In the original game the battle map was outlined by a grid, and you would have three actions each of your three characters could take before the enemies get the same treatment: attack, movement, and technique. You would have to very tactically determine where and when to move so you can stay out of harms way for a turn, while still remaining an offensive asset, and determining the when and which of your character’s two techniques as they both have cooldowns. There is also the option of using your secondary weapon instead of your primary, which may provide an alternate advantage needed, but said weapon also has a cooldown. Basically, it felt like a very refined and thought-out version of DnD grid combat, and I LOVE it. I’ve replayed the game multiple times.

In Sparks of Hope, they apparently decided that removing the grid, and with it any meaningful form of tactics, was a step forward with the franchise. It was not. I’m not going to go in-depth with every little change they made to combat beyond that because it would take way too long for a brief analysis, but the end result of all their changes was a system that is straight-up not fun to play. When I first started the campaign I was enjoying being able to run freely on my character’s turn, but I was confused why the game just didn’t feel fun. It didn’t feel right. Removing the grid in exchange for free movement took away an essential part of the “strategy” feeling that, in retrospect, was needed for the game’s premise.

2. Difficulty is a Joke

Any one who loves strategy games will typically be heavy-thinkers. The type of people that analyzes the best decision to make very carefully, and thus, needs the sufficient challenge to compliment that. Kingdom Battle, believe it or not, was good at that. The game allowed itself to be very confidently challenging as all heck, particularly when you got into its final world. Apparently the producers decided that if they make Sparks of Hope piss-easy it will net in both new players and old thus equaling maximum profit.

This is so painfully flawed it makes me want to vomit. If you make this game easy and as previously mentioned not very strategic with the new combat system, you are alienating and losing the old players. New players will not give af about the game in the first place because if they did not enjoy the strategy in the first game, why would they even try the second one? There may be a small demographic that decides to start here, but they probably wouldn’t get very far and certainly wouldn’t buy the DLC if the genre isn’t their thing. Either you are a strategy gamer and think heavily, thus needing a sufficient challenge, or you aren’t a strategist and thus are not going to get into the game much. I cannot see there being much of an in-between.

Now, it is worth mentioning that unlike the first game there is a difficulty toggle you get to choose right towards the start of the campaign: Relaxing, Average, or Demanding. I, being confident in my abilities, immediately chose Demanding. And holy smokes I would have thought I chose Relaxing. The ENTIRE game is treacherously easy even on the HIGHEST difficulty. There would be some boss fights that were a big deal to the story, and they were an absolute joke. It did not help that I discovered a combo with Peach’s new ability plus the items mechanic where I can basically grant all my characters immortality every turn. Something like that should have NEVER gotten into the game. Did they even test this with anyone beside elementary students?

3. Progression is Horrible

Progression is a very hard thing to do right. If you just scale up the enemies with your progression it will feel pretty meaningless. I feel as though the first game did a decent job of handling it, as the game becomes progressively more difficult, faster than you can progress. This requires your skill to actually improve and it means that ANY advantage available you will take with open arms. And you actually progress more quickly the better you do in battles and the more you explore. It felt like everything you did mattered and made the later game less of a burden, and there was numerous different progression systems that gave you multiple decisions to engage in before every battle.

How did the sequel revolutionize this already functional formula? Leveling up by playing. The end.

It literally affects everything. Your health, damage dealt, skill points earned, and new systems unlocked, all determined by a static character level. And regardless of which characters you play they all level up at exactly the same rate, so there is literally no thought put into it. It is horrible. Granted, the 1 skill point/level can be put into a customizable tree, (unless you play with the setting that auto-distributes for you) but while the tree itself is actually decent, it is nothing that the first game didn’t already do (and did better). And it really doesn’t matter because the game is never hard enough to justify the time spent optimizing anyways.

While there is still coins you can collect and spend, you are only spending them on either healing your team between battles (as if the game needed something to make it even easier) or on items you can use in battle that are mostly useless. And if there is one of those you want to make use of on a regular basis, you will have no issue affording it, because the economy is beyond broken. Compared to the weapon purchasing of the first game where you had to choose which characters to invest in and which weapons were better, never having enough money to do everything, this is painful to see.

Also I should mention that, as the name implies, there are these “sparks” which are supposed to be an essential part of the game. Choosing which sparks to team your characters with and which to invest “star bits” in to level up is supposed to be a major component of the game. But it really isn’t, because usually you will find a meta of sparks that give you the objectively best advantages, and the difficulty never makes it necessary to optimize beyond that, and the star bit economy is just as broken as the coins one. Forget struggling to level up the sparks I need, I can afford leveling up EVERYTHING with flying colours. AUUGGH. Why?

4. Exploration…Improved?

One of the biggest revolutions of this game was supposed to be a massively expanded exploration. Gone are the days of simply going between battlefields on a linear path with a few secrets and a puzzle or two, now the map is open. There is just one problem (well, not really, there are so many but I am trying to write eloquently). They did not change the movement physics. Walking around the map is more or less the same as the first game. While Kingdom Battle never really struggled with it because the exploration was never a focus, its flaw is very clearly seen when running around the world becomes a major thing in Sparks of Hope.

It is so clunky and slow. I could try to sprint but then I will just run into an obstacle I couldn’t see and become dizzy for a few seconds that stops me entirely. Who designed this? The worlds are, at times, unnecessarily large and padded out with repetitive and useless filler content. The battles are mostly triggered by me walking up to a pile of goop, pressing A, and waiting for an infinite loading screen that will eventually lead me to a battle arena that takes place in some isolated location that has nothing to do with the map. I hate it. I so miss the battle arenas that were integrated with the landscape both from a visual and loading perspective.

Also what is with the RPG-like enemies walking around that ram into you, forcing you into a fight that is nothing but a waste of time because they are EVEN EASIER than the rest of the game? I could complete them with my eyes closed, they are SO annoying.

5. No Polish (The Ubisoft Special)

Sparks of Hope is far more buggy and terrible in performance compared to its predecessor. I think the movement freedom is a huge part in that, since the devs would have had a lot harder time optimizing every possibility, but at the end of the day I am not going to excuse this. When the game gets stuck in an infinite enemy turn forcing me to redo an hour long battle, and then does it again immediately afterwards, I don’t want to hear any excuses, I want a functioning game.

6. Art Style/Audio Difference

This one is far more subjective, but I think both the visuals and audio are a step down from Kingdom Battle. While the original composer, Grant Kirkhope, did return, he was joined by other composers and I guess they were not up to snuff to my ears. I can totally understand Grant being burnt out from all his past work as he’s done a lot and not wanting to solo it or dump in as much time for the sequel, so I do not wish to put any of this on him. And I do not remember the soundtrack being horrible, but rather that the first game was just really good. So, take it as nothing but a compliment Mr. Kirkhope.

Now visually, I don’t really know what to say. Just look at the difference yourself.

7. Final Thoughts

From the puzzles also being mind-numbingly easy, to characters with far less pronounced abilities, I honestly feel as though I have only scratched the surface of the issues I have with Sparks of Hope. What hurts the most, though, is not that Ubisoft screwed over yet another AAA game I had the misfortune to spend money on. It’s that the original was so good, and doing the sequel this disservice is a massive let-down for me and I know for many other fans as well.