It's very strange that in a bunch of the toughest levels I completed in Super Monkey Ball: Banana Mania it felt like controlling the camera was almost more important than controlling the stage itself, and it's also weird that the story mode will have large spikes in difficulty nested between other fairly straightforward levels; I found myself wishing the levels were reordered so that they had something better resembling a difficulty curve.

That said the game was a bunch of fun. I think the levels that require intense precision are not very interesting and can land on the bad side of frustrating (any level that asks you to go in a straight line down a very thin path falls into this), but the levels that demand you wrap your head around what the physics engine is doing, that ask you to iteratively form a plan and execute it well, or that just present a fun little idea to engage with, are generally a blast. In a few different instances during my story mode playthrough I would get stuck on a level for 10 or 15 minutes only to find finally completing it felt very rewarding and like all my hard work had finally clicked perfectly into place.

Barely played the originals so went into this pretty much blind. Loved all the story levels and some of the alternate modes were cool. Challenges seemed great at first but then you see the stage counts and realize you can't just pause or suspend. You have to do them all in 1 sitting and without hitting retry once like I did because dumb. Finished all the main game levels but master(should come back eventually) and marathon which is 100+ stages together fuck that. Tried out all the party games which seemed good except for Monkey Target. Went back into the original to feel the difference and yeah its trash in this game. Favourite party games are fight, golf and shot.

Unfortunately like that 1 annoying thing in challenge modes, there is another annoying thing present in all of main game. If you die like <5 times in a stage it asks you if you want to turn helper mode on. It repeats this for every stage in every session with no option to turn it off???? Seeing that graphic every time, pressing no everytime, having to also press skip each time to get past the replay. So many little things added up to bring down this game which they could have easily circumvented by having toggle options in the menu. Yeah the dlc is shameless too.

hallo
hallo
hallo
hallo
bad-phy-sics

I hope y'all enjoyed their best attempt at classic monkey ball bc you will not be seeing it again for a while, and they'll site this game as why

at least dark banana mode was fun

Super Monkey Ball: Banana Mania makes me feel things. This was my first Monkey Ball game, and as an introduction to the franchise, it was... something. Starting with the positives, the game looks and sounds great. The visuals are stunning and all the remixes are absolute slappers. Most of the levels are at least decently fun, although a select handful of them made me feel like ripping my arm out of its socket (Soft Cream can suck the shit out of my ass). By far the worst thing about this game is the camera, though. It does an excellent job obscuring exactly what you need to see at all times, and the ability to control it with the Right Stick isn't worth much when the regular default camera fights with it all the time. I eventually just stopped bothering even trying to control the camera at all, which kind of defeats the purpose of having camera control in the first place if the game arguably handles better without it. All in all, this is definitely a Monkey Ball game for Monkey Ball fans, with a bunch of general improvements such as no more lives and a bunch of adjusted levels, and I'm interested to see where the series can go from here.

Technically, I played the Anniversary Edition, but the game itself is the same across all editions... I don't know why they've been split up here, but I figure most people will be clicking on the normal version so here's where my review will go.

The physics are noticeably looser, as if every stage is made of glass. There's no sense of weight or momentum, partly due to the worse sound design (impacts and rolling noises are reduced, sometimes absent). The controls are less precise, and for some baffling reason they decided to make the camera follow you more loosely, while letting you adjust the camera with the right stick to make up for it.

You may be asking, "but doesn't every game now use the right stick for camera control?" Yes, however... It sounds counterintuitive, but the way the original games' camera always followed your movement made navigating precise stages much more comfortable and reliable. In Banana Mania, you will be making many, many camera adjustments while simultaneously trying to control a ball on tight ledges - with a strict time limit, by the way. It adds up to create an unnecessarily cumbersome experience.

The added content is cool, particularly the evil banana mode, but it means nothing when the core systems of the game feel so loose and imprecise. I suppose it's a step up from the PS2 port of Deluxe, but that's not saying much.

Stick with the GameCube versions of 1 and 2, and use 2's Deluxe mod for the Deluxe stages. They perform really well on Dolphin, so you should be able to get at least 480p60 on even the weakest laptops and phones of today.

on one hand: monki funny :)
on the other: this one's really fuckin weird. i never played the originals but i could tell from stuff like the weirdo comic book "adaptation" of the story mode that this one wasn't as good. i know a lot of people here say the physics are weird compared to the originals, and even though i don't have a reference point i kinda agree. sometimes clipping a random object will just shoot you a million miles off course, some slopes are so steep that you have to just slowly walk up them if you run out of momentum, etc. nothing game breaking but sometimes it's like. what the fuck aiai just walk up the damn stairs.

but ignoring the fact that it's inferior to a game ive never touched, it's a pretty fun. out of all the levels in the story mode and the ones from SMB1/2 that i played, there were only like three that i actually got frustrated with. otherwise, they're pretty diverse, challenging, and fun. i haven't touched too many of the other modes but there's definitely a lot to do if i ever feel like getting back into this one.