Mario & Luigi: Partners In Time
Image: Nintendo

For many years, it felt like Mario & Luigi: Partners in Time was the redheaded stepchild of the Mario & Luigi series. People criticised it for its more linear structure, overly long boss battles (at least in the US version), having to purchase items to use Bros. Attacks, and slightly cumbersome gameplay, among other areas.

Being released between the two most critically acclaimed games in the series certainly didn't help. It even got skipped over for the remake treatment, unlike Superstar Saga (+ Bowser's Minions) and Bowser's Inside Story (+ Bowser Jr.'s Journey). Even if it may not reach the lofty heights of those two, I’d argue Partners in Time is still a fine game in its own right—and even more so two decades later, in light of subsequent entries.

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The game’s titular time travel shenanigans begin pretty much from the outset. Professor E. Gadd has invented a time machine, and Princess Peach wants to be the first to test it. In a twist that surprises virtually no one, upon the time machine’s return from the past, the Princess is nowhere to be seen. Now, time holes are popping up all over Peach’s castle, and it’s up to Mario and Luigi to race to the past and find her. But that’s not all. They’ll also need to recover the shattered pieces of the Cobalt Star, a Macguffin said to be able to repair the rift in spacetime.

Oh yeah, and did I mention the Mushroom Kingdom of the past is also under invasion by the Shroobs, a race of monstrous, mushroom-like aliens? Even today, these guys rank among the most ruthless villains in Mario’s roster.

Mario & Luigi: Superstar Saga
A great start, but PiT is up there with it — Image: Zion Grassl / Nintendo Life

In addition to having no qualms with levelling entire cities, they revel in sucking out the life force of their victims, turning it into energy to power their flying saucers. Said victims get better—this is a Mario game, after all—but arriving in the past only to be greeted by lifeless Toads among the ruins of their ravaged town sets a sombre tone and cements the Shroobs as opponents Mario and Luigi do not want to take lightly. The game’s generally darker tone among Mario RPGs remains widely celebrated among fans.

Mario and Luigi have their hands full, but thankfully, they’re not alone on their quest. Their baby selves are caught up in the Shroob invasion as well, and they immediately show they’re more than capable heroes, even at such a young age. You also encounter younger versions of series staples like Princess Peach, Professor Gadd, Bowser, and even Toadsworth, who, for the first and thus far only time ever in a Mario game, is actually useful for something.

The time travel element allowed developers AlphaDream to utilise Mario lore in unique ways, unlike any other in franchise history. Of course, we’ve seen baby versions of the Mario crew before, but now we really get to see their characters shine. Baby Mario and Luigi, in particular, could easily have been monumentally annoying. It wouldn’t be without precedent, considering how ear-grating Baby Mario was in Yoshi’s Island.

Instead, they hold their own right alongside their adult counterparts, providing the occasional comic relief without drifting into the realm of burdensome. If you don’t get the warm fuzzies seeing Mario and Luigi coddle and play with them—their antics punctuated by delightfully squeaky sound bites by Charles Martinet—you might want to check and see if a Shroob has drained your life force.

The addition of the DS' 'X' and 'Y' buttons to the standard two-button Mario and Luigi formula was another calculated risk, but the gameplay is intuitive and easy to pick up, even for less nimble players like myself. Control Mario and Luigi with 'A' and 'B', and their younger counterparts with 'X' and 'Y'. Overworld traversal is a joy with a wide variety of incredibly creative moves, both new and returning. My personal favourite is the aptly-named Baby Cakes, in which Mario and Luigi roll up into a ball and flatten their baby selves like pancakes, allowing them to fit into tight spaces (no, it’s not baby abuse; they like it!).

I consider brevity to be one of Partners in Time’s greatest strengths [...] compared to later titles that are twice as long yet somehow contain no more plot.

It's the game’s turn-based battles that really put this new four-button system to the test. Mario and Luigi are the main attackers and defenders, with the babies acting as backup. In a design choice unique to this game, your Bros. Attacks are consumable items.

I’ll readily admit this change does strip away a layer of strategy to battles, though I personally enjoy not having to stress about regularly replenishing my Bros. Points to restore my abilities. While Superstar Saga’s Bros. Attacks were all basically glorified jump and hammer combos, this game introduces the flashier moves the series is known for, such as Koopa Shells you ricochet off enemies, Fire Flowers that let you pelt enemies with fireballs, and Trampolines enabling potentially endless jump attacks.

As you unlock new attacks, they become increasingly fun and satisfying to pull off. Some, such as the Red Shell and Copy Flower, have no cap, meaning the attack will continue, increasing in speed, until you miss a button input. With fast enough reflexes, you can wipe out many of the game’s bosses in only a handful of turns.

This alleviates what I feel is one of the unwarranted criticisms: bosses having too much HP. Fan outcry was so prevalent that, in the European and Japanese versions of the game, boss HP was significantly reduced. As a US-based gamer who owns the original version, I can say that, aside from the final boss, not one of them took me more than several minutes to defeat, especially later when you gain access to moves that can easily rack up 400-plus damage per turn. I’ve spent more time dodging overly drawn-out enemy attacks in later games like Dream Team and Brothership, where it feels like the developers prioritised excessive spectacle over crafting well-balanced fights that respect the player’s time.

In fact, I consider brevity to be one of Partners in Time’s greatest strengths. A playthrough typically clocks in at a respectable 18 or so hours, compared to later titles that are twice as long yet somehow contain no more plot.

Partners in Time is about as streamlined a Mario and Luigi experience as you can get. The plot moves at a refreshingly brisk pace, telling the story it wants to tell without succumbing to the excessive bloat of later entries. It forgoes side quests and exploration in favour of linear, more self-contained hub worlds—a valid point of contention, but one I feel can be argued further enhances the game’s tightened focus on story and gameplay.

Mario & Luigi: Partners In Time 20th Anniversary
Image: Alex Olney / Nintendo Life

On Metacritic, Partners in Time remains the third-highest-rated game in the Mario & Luigi series, and on Nintendo Life's Mario RPG list, too (without factoring in remakes), cementing its continued status as an overlooked gem. It may not have as rich a world as Superstar Saga or reach the epic highs of Bowser’s Inside Story, but looking at it two decades and several hit-and-miss Mario & Luigi games later, I still rank Partners in Time up there with the series’ best.