Game Review: New Mii Plaza Games (3DS)

7/19/2013

Mii Plaza's newest editions

Anyone with a 3DS should know about the Mii Plaza, the first Streetpass option that most of us are given. In the beginning there was only Find Mii and Puzzle Swap. Then there came Find Mii II (which I still haven't finished all the pathways on) and they continue to update the puzzles for free. But now it's time for Nintendo to bring in some dough and to do so they have released, not one, not two, not even three, but four new games for the Mii Plaza. The catch? They cost money. The price tag? $4.99 a game or a one time offer bundle. But what are these new games like and are they worth the money? Read on to find out.

Pew Pew Pew

    Well the best way to go through this probably game by game, so lets start with Mii Force. In this game you use your collected Streetpass Miis to play an isometric shooter type game. You are the leader of the elite Mii Force and you're after a group of space mafie type thugs. You, as the leader, drive the main pod of what can be a super ship. The Miis you collect through Streetpass become your weapon pods with each Mii's favourite colour (defined by shirt colour) determines the type of weapon they become. Black turns into bombs, light blue into a wave beam and so forth and so on. As you progress through the level you can collect more and more pods depending on how many people you passed to a total of ten.

    Your task in each level is to take down waves and waves of bad guys and collect the jewels or rupees that fall out of them. The enemies don't just come from in front of you though, they actually come from all directions and to take them out you'll need to rotate your pods around you using the shoulder buttons. It adds a nice challenge to a game that at first would seem fairly simple. If you don't pass people on a regular basis worry not, you can use your hard earned play coins to purchase pilots. Unlike Find Mii your weapons don't get more powerful if you've passed the Mii inside it multiple times. This game is fun, but if you don't pass a lot of people you may end up using more play coins than you'd like to give you an edge in the fights.

What fun? No really...

    Next up, Flower Town! Yup, I just tried to make that sound waaaaaay more exciting than it is. This game is a complex simulation game where you grow and harvest flowers. When I say complex I don't mean that's it's a bunch of spreadsheets and such, it's more a big game of chance that doesn't always work out in your favor... for me it hasn't worked in my favor at all yet. Your Streetpass Miis enter your garden and help water your plant, once it's grown the people then come and crossbreed their plant with your plant to give you seeds. Grow 20 different plants to become a master gardener and that's that.

    To help you along the way you can work at the local flower place which allows you to buy more stuff for your garden and your flowers. There is a lot more to this game then there needs to be and that's why I say complex. There doesn't need to be as many shops as there are, nor the amount of customization of flower pots and my garden. Out of the four games available this one strikes me as the least fun of the bunch.

Charge!!!

Next on to Warrior's Way where you get to play as one of three great kingdoms trying to take over the world. This game is a prettied up version of rock, paper, scissors. You gain an army by Streetpassing with others; your army growing in size by the number of people that the other person has passed. Once you've passed people you can decide to enter combat or stay behind. If you fight you go into a three round fight and you pick how many of your people are chavelry, pikemen, and archers. One unit is better than the other making the rock, paper, scissors allusion, but there is a catch, you can overwhelm the other team with sheer numbers. So you can go in with brute force or think things through strategically. The game is fun and simple and the anticipation to see how many people the other team brings to you is quite fun. Again if you don't pass people on a regular basis you can use play coins to hire mercenaries to add to your numbers. This game is a nice edition to the Mii Plaza pack of games.

More Pews!

Saving the best for last, or the best in my opinion. Monster Manor is a ghost hunting game as the name may suggest and the whole point of the game is to climb to the thirtieth floor of the manor and escape. To get to the top you have to collect pieces of flooring from the Miis you Streetpass. The colour of the floor is dictated by the favourite colour of the Mii. When you make squares out of the same coloured flooring you get to pick up treasure like new ghost-guns or medals that help you along the way. Different coloured floors result in doors that separate the rooms and behind the doors may be a ghost that needs killing. The mini-game involved in taking out ghosts is quite a bit of fun, relying on a battery meters and timing to take out the ghosts and level up your gun and gain some in-game cash.

This game is the perfect blend of puzzle and action and again if you don't pass people often play coins are there to save the day. This is the game that I've put the most coins into since Find Mii 2 came out and I'm more than happy to do so.

In the end Mii Force, Warrior's Way and Monster Manor are worth getting, but at that point you've already put up the $15 needed to buy all four. Protip if you haven't already tried out the new Mii Plaza then know that to get the bundle package you have to talk to the rabbit that sells the games and say you'll buy any of the games, he will then offer you the bundle. If you buy any game without the bundle you will never see the bundle again. The bundle is worth the purchase if you take your 3DS out with you often, it just gives you many more things to do when passing the time. See what I did there? Yeah.

Buy 'em all, just trust me.

Comments