Mario Strikers Charged First Impressions

LEIPZIG, Germany--Earlier today, toward the end of its Leipzig Games Convention press conference, Nintendo announced and then proceeded to demonstrate Mario Strikers Charged for the Wii. At first glance, the game being played on the Nintendo stage looked almost identical to Mario's GameCube soccer outing, Super Mario Strikers, but as the match progressed, we noticed some significant new features.

The first new feature that we noted was the increased number of captains that are available to play as. In Super Mario Strikers, there were only eight Nintendo favorites to choose from, but on the Wii, there appeared to be at least 12--although only four were unlocked. Furthermore, one of the playable captains was Bowser, who fans of the GameCube original might remember was so upset at not being allowed to play that he would often invade the field and cause chaos at random intervals. You'll also have more options when deciding which secondary Nintendo characters to fill out the rest of your squad with, as evidenced by the fact that the team fielded by Bowser today had at least one boo (ghost) in the team.

When the match got underway, it was played on a field quite different to any of those featured in Super Mario Strikers. The Thunder Island arena, which came with a one-word description--lethal--was located atop a tall mountain, and unlike all of the fields in the GameCube game, it didn't appear to be completely surrounded by an electric fence. Also, the field looked to be a bit larger than its GameCube counterpart, and its unusual location left it exposed to strong gusts of wind that affected the movement of the ball on occasion.

Super Mario Strikers' most recognizable feature was undoubtedly its super-strike mechanic, which let you unleash powerful shots that--if you managed to time a couple of button presses correctly--was not only worth more points than usual but was also unstoppable. Mario Strikers Charged employs a very similar system, except that none of the shots are unstoppable; super strikes can be saved by the opposing player by using the Wii controller as the goalkeeper's hands in a timed minigame. Regular super strikes will launch two shots at your opponent one after the other, while a perfectly executed super strike will launch three shots--each worth a point. Making saves in this way appeared to be quite difficult, but even having a slim chance to save a shot at goal is undoubtedly better than having no chance at all.

Mario Strikers Charged is playable on the Games Convention show floor this week, and we look forward to bringing you more information on the game just as soon as we get our hands on it.