Once again Peach takes to the stage as the hero of her own tale, and this time there are no tears or tantrums to be seen! Ahead of its release on 22nd March, I had the immense pleasure of going hands on with a few levels from Princess Peach: Showtime!
As always seems to be the case in the Mushroom Kingdom, anyone that gets a mysterious invite immediately puts their shoes on and heads out the door to attend. Considering that this has lured Mario to a trap at Peach’s castle, and seen Luigi heading to multiple haunted mansions and building, you’d think that Peach’s sense of self-preservation would kick in when she is invited to the Sparkle Theatre. It does not. Instead, as soon as she arrives, she’s confronted by Grape and the Sour Bunch, who have turned all of the plays showing in the opulent building into tragedies.
Now locked inside, without her luggage or Toad assistants, Peach has to join forces with Stella, your guide for the game and guardian of the Sparkle Theatre. Stella grants you a magical ribbon that allows you to defeat weaker enemies and transform into characters appropriate to whatever play you find yourself in. This ribbon can also be used to interact with the environment to find secrets and collect coins.
I got to mess around with four of these transformations: Swordfighter, Ninja, Cowgirl and Patissiere. Each has their own distinct gameplay mechanics, with Patissiere in particular moving entirely away from action for a more puzzle-based experience. The Ninja, on the other hand, was reliant on stealth and the swift dispatch of enemies, so that play involves a lot of hiding and creeping around.
My favourite from these four was – surprisingly – the Swordfighter. Although simple in terms of mechanics and objective, there was a little bit of depth to how it played that genuinely impressed me. You could easily get through that level simply by hitting stuff until it dies, sure, but timing your swipes with the rapier opened up the gameplay with last minute evasive dashes and some clever manoeuvres to open up the enemies for large amounts of damage.
The sections of the game I did get to play was a little on the easy side, but that can easily be forgiven as it was the start of the game starting immediately after the opening cutscene, so I kind of expected to be eased into it. Also, given that I know I’m not the target audience of this game and I didn’t find all of the collectibles in each level, I can see this title having a bit of bite to it later on and especially for completionists.
Princess Peach: Showtime! really nails the aesthetic of the theatre productions you adventure through. The transformation sequences in particular are stunning, really capturing the “magical girl transformation” feel that Nintendo were clearly going for. The only negative I can think of based on the time I spent is that I really wish there was full voice acting here, but that might just be because I was spoilt by the Super Mario Movie.
Princess Peach: Showtime! is shaping up to be a fun, easy-going adventure that feels just so refreshing amongst the legions of games with high-stakes peril. If the difficulty ramps up a little and the clever uses of the transformations continue, this looking like it will be an excellent game and a great new role for Princess Peach. If nothing else, it has more than piqued my curiosity, and I’ll be there front row on opening night.
