Fun but easy and low-depth platformer.
Visually, the game isn’t that great. It’s full of bright colors, lots of them. So many yellows, red, oranges, and light blues hurt my eyes rather than look good…also not a lot of detail is put into the enemies and the locations make the graphics pretty sub-par. The sound is actually alright. At first it’s as annoying (the cheery, kiddy tone), being high-pitched and awful, but you’ll get used to it and it’s actually all right.
The control of this game is rather simple, you are Peach rescuing Mario (shocker!) and you have to go through 7 worlds spanning 4-5 levels to rescue him. The levels are decently long (Think of shorter than Super Mario World 2, but longer than Super Mario World and New Super Mario Bros.); you go through (at a very slow pace I might add), stomp on enemies and jump and go places to get to the end of the level. To make it easier though, Peach has an umbrella, which she attacks with, as well as scoop up, then use them to re-gain heart power (more on that in a second). She has hearts at the top of the screen, which means she has at least 3 lives per level, not the 1 that mario bros. games have. Sometimes she has 6, depending on how much damage an enemy does (usually ½ to 1 heart of damage). Again, this makes the game ridiculously easy. There are little obstacles in the levels, it’s jump and scoop up enemies, etc. But one unique thing to make the levels interesting are Peach has 4 unique powers; which she can use on a separate “heart” bar. They are on the lower screen as 4 hearts. (BTW, you won’t be able to play the game AND use the stylus, so prepare to get thumb smudges on the bottom screen) One lets you gain altitude in an area; another let’s you have fire around you, burning through bridges and killing all enemies; another one is she can cry, making her run fast across areas that normally fall underneath you, as well as water things; and the last one (the cheapest one) restores almost all your vitality. And remember, since you can capture enemies then “swallow” them with the umbrella; it restores a little heart power, so swallowing 4-5 enemies lets you use it again; which makes it, again, ridiculously easy. The 4 powers add some unique style and puzzles to the game, but overall it doesn’t make the game have that much depth. Also, 3 Toads are hidden in each level; which makes going back into a level again fun, as you have secret stuff to find. And let’s not even go into the dreadful touch-screen mini-games before every boss – they are annoying, frustrating, and stupid.
Like I already said, the game is short, you should have no problem beating it in just 5-10 hours at most. Replay is alright, they could have had more hidden stuff in the levels. Also, the difficulty really doesn’t want you to go back and play an already easy game. Overall, Princess Peach is a pretty fun game, the platforming elements from previous Mario Bros. games watered down and easier, however. If you are new to platforming and not very good at it, this game is recommended. If you have New Super Mario Bros. or any of the Super mario Advance titles and think they are too easy or just right, I wouldn’t recommend this. So if you want an easy, fun platformer, for the DS, this is the game for you.