The original Mario & Luigi: Superstar Saga permanently mapped the A and B button to Mario and Luigi, respectively. This meant that in both the overworld and in battles making Mario or Luigi jump (or use hammers or special moves) was always triggered by pressing their respective buttons--much of the gameplay was about knowing which button to press and at what time. Many people (myself included) felt that Mario & Luigi: Partners in Time unfortunately convoluted this by adding Baby Mario and Baby Luigi, who were mapped to the X and Y buttons. Having to deal with four buttons at a time ultimately made it too complicated to react fast enough. Fortunately that mechanic didn't carry over to Bowser's Inside Story, instead the X and Y buttons are both mapped to Bowser, who doesn't fight side-by-side with the Mario Bros. Bowser's X button is always used punch, while his Y button is used for secondary abilities like using his shell or flame breath.

One of the trademark elements of the Mario & Luigi franchise is the special attacks. When performing special moves, Mario and Luigi perform some elaborate attack animation that calls for the correct buttons to be pressed at the correct time to deal as much damage as possible. In Superstar Saga these SP-consuming attacks were elaborate Cirque du Soleil-esque routines with predictable timing that could ultimately be memorized by the player. Partners in Time replaced these attacks with 'battle items' (such as Koopa shells or fire flowers) that could only be used once-per-item, but were more random and harder to memorize. Bowser's Inside Story wisely retains the random element of the battle items while going back to the SP-consuming system of Superstar Saga, as to not discourage the player from using special moves by requiring them to constantly refill on battle items. While Mario and Luigi's special moves are all about knowing when to press the A or B button, Bowser's special moves are all touch screen based.

When playing as Mario and Luigi the game feels a lot like Superstar Saga, but when playing as Bowser the game uses the touch screen as much as possible. Many of the muscle-stimulating games are touch screen based. There are also occasional 'giant Bowser' battles that are completely touch screen controlled and played holding the DS sideways like a book. These story-prompted minigames are pretty frequent, but they're never annoying. They're actually so addictive that you'll be excited when you see them repeat once or twice later in the game. But they never repeat more than that. Most of the minigames are played by controlling Mario and Luigi inside Bowser's body and cause you to lose coins in place of HP when you screw up. Though this game can sometimes feel similar to the 'minigame collection' Mario games like Mario Party or Wario Ware Inc., the difference is that the minigames are strung together by a story (similar to Feel The Magic or The Rub Rabbits) and greater gameplay structures.


But don't think for a second that all the minigames means there's nothing substantial going on in Mario & Luigi: Bowser's Inside Story. The over-arching gameplay distills everything an RPG should do into a pretty light and simplistic framework. You'll agonize over which stat-raising minigame to play when you level up, and you'll save up money to buy expensive gear that helps you pull off a specific strategy. Mario and Luigi battle together so you can plan to raise their stats and equip their gear in a way that benefits the two of them as a team. Bowser plays solo which means you're strategy for him has to be a little different. For example, he can't revive himself with 1-Ups like how Mario and Luigi can revive each other, so you'll have to play it a little safer.

One of the more interesting aspects of the gameplay is that you have to bet against yourself. You can customize your characters in such a way that you'll be a powerhouse if you pull off every minigame flawlessly--but can you pull off every minigame flawlessly? You might actually be more effective if customize your character so that you get smaller bonuses for your smaller (and more likely) successes.

Graphics and Sound
The graphics are amazing. There's really not much else to say. Screenshots don't do the game justice--characters appear to be hand drawn at an unnecessarily high frame rate and with such precision that they almost look 3D. There are so many animations for so many different things--even things like a one-time cutscene where Bowser picks up a book and turns around slowly is animated in about twenty different frames. It's staggering how much care went into the art direction. Even the menus look amazing--the level up screen is hyper stylized like a graphic design company's website and is always a treat just to see.

The music isn't as great as the graphics, but it's fine--there's no reason to play this without headphones (especially considering that the sound effects will often factor into your timing in minigames). Some of the tunes sound familiar, and not in a good way. The Dimble Woods music almost sounds like it's trying to be a parody of 'woodland creature forrest music' in video games (i.e. sounding like Bambi) but not quite pulling it off. Regardless of whether or not it's intentional, the music sometimes comes off as cliche and maybe even mildly annoying. The music isn't really terribly flawed it's just not as amazing as the rest of the game and pretty easy to ignore.


Overall
Buy this game. I can't imagine any condition where a person would own a DS and not enjoy this game. Maybe you have an unopened DS that you got in a gift basket and you only play console first person shooters? Maybe you bought a DS for Square Enix remakes and nothing more? It doesn't matter, you should still play this. It somehow manages to perfectly distill everything that's fun about action games and everything that's fun about RPGs and seamlessly fuse them together. If you like any games in either genre all it takes is a few minutes with this and Mario and Luigi will be tugging your heart strings.

9/10