Last week, Nintendo announced Mario Strikers: Battle League would be getting some new content - including new characters, a new stadium and even some fancy new gear.
This same update is now officially live. It most notably adds Pauline and Diddy Kong to the character selection lineup. There's the new 'Planetoid' stadium to play on as well, and there are some adjustments and fixes to further improve the overall gameplay.
Here are the full details via Nintendo's official support page:
Ver. 1.2.0 (Released September 21, 2022)
Additional Content
- Added “Pauline” as a playable character.
- Added “Diddy Kong” as a playable character.
- Added the “Planetoid” stadium.
- Added the “Barrel” gear set.
Added Features
- Added “Striker Rankings” to the Main Menu. Compete by comparing your individual ability over a fixed period of time with “Skill Score”, which varies with your performance in online matches (excluding Battle Friends).
- Added the following content to “Strikers Club”.
- You can now customize supporters in the stadium. Access this by going to “Club Management” → “Stadium” → “Supporters”.
- You can now use Coins to view fireworks and confetti when you score a goal or when you win a match. Access this by going to “Club Management” → “Match Celebration”.
General
- Adjusted the behavior so that CPU teammates mark opponents more quickly.
- Adjusted the order of characters when you switch characters.
- Adjusted the charge time of Perfect Free Passes and Perfect Free Lob Passes.
- Increased the amount of Coins and tokens you earn depending on the results of a match.
- Changed the period of time for a rule in Strikers Club, which states that a Club will not be allowed to join a season if no member of a Club has been online within a certain amount of time, from 90 days to 30 days.
- Changed the number of ? Blocks that are thrown to the losing team at kickoff from 2 to 1 when the difference in score is 2 points.
- Adjusted the match-making system in online matches.
- Made several other adjustments to game balance and fixed several other issues to improve the gameplay experience.
Have you downloaded this update yet? Notice anything else? Comment down below.
[source en-americas-support.nintendo.com]
Comments 60
Pauline has really great animation. So much charm and personality. Diddy Kong on the other hand is just a generic monkey at this point. Man, I really miss Rare-Diddy.
I hope they'll get Bowser Jr. & Nabbit added in that game like next month when it gets updated again.
@RareFan
Explain what Rare Diddy did that was so different
This is by far the most disappointing Nintendo game this year. How you guys gave it a 9/10 (the same score you gave Splatoon 3 btw) is completely beyond me.
@steventonysmith
He had more traits of a cartoon character back when Rare was in charge of the series. He had his boom box, an electric guitar, juggled with some balls, could be a bit nasty sometimes (see the end credits of DKC), that weird animation he did with his eyes, when he was surprised about something.
@RareFan I believe he still has them. He just doesn't use them much. That or all that "personality" you mention is under the license of Rare. Either way, Diddy Kong still has plenty of personality. He ain't no side character like Birdo.
I'm still waiting for a legitimate incentive to play this game. The new characters are nice, but the stages are still bland, there are no extra modes, and there is absolutely no incentive to play online.
@MrA-Game I like tennis and golf, but I wish they had more characters. I wonder what this game will look like with all updates.
Fireworks in Celebrations are now post launch content? Sad Nintendo
No Diddy Kong variation will ever beat Buddhist Diddy Kong from Mario Strikers Charged.
Cool, I’ll download it and try em out.
Pauline is an amazing inclusion to the game and she’ll be taking over as my team’s captain.
@MrA-Game Totally agree. That review was an absolute joke. I have the game and the mechanics are actually really good and the animations etc high quality. However, there is just nothing to do and the roster is miniscule. I get reviews etc hinge on opinion and personal taste, but those two problems are not subjective. The game IS barebones with next to nothing for single-players to do. To give it a 9/10 is madness.
Agreed, this is the only Nintendo game I sold. Boring and barebones.
These poor excuses of updates can't even save this game. How on earth did they go so wrong when it should have been so easy to take my money.
@steventonysmith first and foremost: they took away his voice (same for DK), they used to say some stuff, doesnt happen anymore
second: diddy used to be a mix of derp and cool guy in all previous game (dkc 1&2, dkr, dk64), but now he is pretty much only a spidermonkey with clothes on
@Shade_Koopa tbh i think he is on par with birdo in terms of personality... but nintendo cut down a lot of characters personailities and quirks, so yeah
@RareFan I agree ad he used to wear sunglasses sometimes too. He had some of that Sonic attitude. Retro probably thinks that kind of stuff is "too 90s" now 😔
I love the new characters...but this game was the most disappointing on Switch to me...up there as one of my least favourite Mario games ever (And I really liked Mario Pinball!!)
Just nothing to do...If I go online I get battered in seconds..even with CPU on easy I lose. Just no good for beginners! I'd rate it 2/10...and only 2 because Toad looks very cute in it!
...Was excited to get this, and of course it goes all online multiplayer focus...cool, so much for playing this game. Looks like all they care about now is just adding characters and no new modes or whatever...
I still don't get how the clubs works, so I'm manly playing the cup.. my kids weren't really interested in the multiplayer... dissapointed
Oh my, new animation ! And it is free ! Wow. I feel totally cool spending 59€ for this bs now. Cheers reviewers .
Nintendo had a game with the potential to be the next Mario Kart in terms of sales. Considering how barebones Strikers Battle League has been, it's worse than many free to play games and not much above FIFA's legacy edition on Switch.
I don't like Diddy Kong that much tbh and I remember wanting to punch him in the previous game. Idk the character just annoys me now.
@Joeynator3000
Which new modes would you like them to add?
@Lunatic002
Other than the DK animated show DK and Diddy were basically just an Ape and a Monkey. Cranky, Candy and Funky had over the top personalities but I don't recall Diddy doing anything over the top that stands out to me
Gameplay was fun in the demo. Looked to have some depth.
Too bad it doesn’t have the features to support it.
@ketrac
Which features do you feel it's missing?
Absolutely loving this game, and the free updates are great. Takes me back to the Wii games for sure.
Cool that Diddy’s back, but I’m beginning to get really sick of them bringing Pauline back, but having her only personality being that song, just give her a new song or something Nintendo please, the one she has isn’t even that good
@Clyde_Radcliffe
Animal cartoon characters sadly are kinda outdated now, which is the reason you rarely see them. And the once we still get, such as Sonic, are more written like humans / superheroes.
Pauline is Diddy Kong's mum.
@rockodoodle more Characters? Tennis Aces has something like 30 characters if I remember correctly.
That roster is really cool and the bigger one for a Mario Spin-off beside Mario Kart 8 Deluxe.
Really wish they at least added the missing Online Modes. Wanna play with my Online pal in the same team, against other random Online teams. Still can't do that :/
Please add the option to increase CPU difficulty when playing with friends online! That would be great!
@GoldenSunRM ok, I stand corrected. I think it could have had more venues tho.
@RareFan I get you. Like the opening scene of tropical freeze, where they go around the table "That 70's show" style and you really see Nintendo vision of the characters as simplistic stereotype characters. Basically Old, girl, scooby doo, and small monkey.
@Poodlestargenerica
DK is the Scoooby Doo one? Scooby has way more personality than modern DK.
@RareFan You're not wrong. He mostly just makes the noise
@Lunatic002 Shrugs if you say so. I found him rather in cool in the recent Donkey Kong games.
@RareFan @RareFan curious what u think is missing? He literally whistles for a kong barrel and hops in with mad style. He throws an absolute tantrum when he’s upset. He has all his cartwheels and style.
I guess he doesn’t use his jet pack, pop guns or have his boom box here but I still think he’s spot on!
@StarPoint I’d say there’s lot of incentive to play online, unlocking new items for ur stadium, increasing ur rank, and they just added a new single player ranking system for online play.
@Lunatic002 I couldn’t disagree more
@NDragon1412 you can, but sadly only with one friend not 3
@riccyjay Nowadays, many reviewers and websites try to promote games in their reviews, as they earn commission on game sales. So often the reviews become more "game sellers" than real reviewers. They just want to induce players to buy the game on impulse. Never buy a game on impulse.
You guys have to understand that giving this game a lower score than 7 would not make NL gain access to promotions and other goodies that's just the way the industry works unfortunately.
@Sky1Eagle1
Trust me, compare to old Diddy, this new version can be replaced with a normal monkey. Compare him to other monkey and primate characters in pop culture such as King Kong, Winston, Aiai, Amigo, etc. you can see how boring Diddy looks in comparison.
O? I guess I missed the part where King Kong does a one handed hand stand, whistles for a Blast Barrel and then does a triple backflip into it?
Have you even played Tropical Freeze? Diddy has tons of personality and great animations in it, he cheers DK on while he's playing switch/3DS, and even covers his eyes, he takes his hat off and slaps DK with it to dust him off when he gets dirty. Not to mention all of the boss cut scenes where he's constantly getting upset and willing to fight anything to get the banana's back.
I think you're severely underestimating current Diddy. Hell in DKC: Returns he knocks the moon out of the sky with his jet pack.
Diddy has his jet pack and peanut guns in returns/tropical freeze, and his animations are top notch. He still has the attitude as seen in his tantrum in Strikers and his willingness to put up the ol fist o' cuffs whenever and boss challenges him in the Retro series. Not to mention he plays bongos in the Tropical freeze finale (Dixie has her electric guitar).
All I can really see missing from the Rare days is his boom box and sunnies?
@steventonysmith Asking people what content they would have wanted for Battle League this far in is frankly pointless, not only because their wishes are usually vague, but because by the standards of previous Strikers games any theoretical content would have been blown through in a summer week or two, let alone the couple of months we've had.
@Rykdrew Yep I'm thinking the same. Affiliate links and all.. and I kinda agree with @Mambitos
I am loving that Pauline is getting so much spotlight! If only she was added to Mario Party Superstars or at least Mario Kart 8😣.
Glad that she has now become a main staple to the Mario games as much as Rosalina is. Now if they added Sprixies... That would be fantastic! Cute little buggers
@Mambitos So give it a 7 then.
I'm not saying it's absolutely awful. People giving it 1s on Metacritic etc are also being unfair. It's got a fun game at its core and it looks polished visually so it doesn't deserve to be absolutely slated. But the shortcomings are so clear and obvious that giving it a 9 in a 'professional' review is crazy.
@meleehunter @steventonysmith
I obviously can't speak for everyone, but there are 3 main reasons why I already don't play this anymore and why my brother and I still got back to Charged. Just played it this month actually...
1.) Challenges: these are fun side things to do that add a couple of hours to the game. Some of them, Like Yoshis or Diddy Kongs, require the player to actually be really good at the game and get a lot of goals in a short time. Others like Bowsers require a shutout, which is very fun as long as one doesnt goalie hang. Even after playing it for all these years, these still provide a decent challenge and we still fail them a couple of times when we start up a new save. These give the game a breath of fresh air, something that Battle Leauge lacks.
2. The characters feel widely different in Charged. It's not just stats like Battle League. We like to run the Striker Cup a lot with Yoshi, but recently we've been running it with characters like Petey Pirhana and Waluigi. Between different captain specials like slinging mud, putting up vines, or rolling around in an egg, and how they hit and deke, they feel completely different. That's not even accounting for their different stats too. The eight sidekicks apply too, each with their own skillshots, dekes and hitting abilities. Imo it's so much more fun to mix 'n match in Charged. Especially with Armor, which I think is a good feature BTW, the characters blend fast. Speaking of striker cup, I liked it much more than the cup battles because of little things like the messages of how the team is doing. Not to mention that there are stages and cards that can be unlocked in the Hall of Fame that unlock cheat codes by getting the golden foot and doing challenges. In Battle Leauge there is armor to unlock and nothing else. Nothing to really go for.
3. Stages that actually feel different
Some may not like gimmicky stages, and I get that. For Mario Sports though? Gimme the gimmicks! I'll play Fifa if I want hardcore competitive stuff. I like stages where lightning drops down, fire fills the field, Thwomps come from the sky, characters can fall off due to the storm on Thunder Island... it helps keep the game fresh. I like it when things are ever changing in my games. That may be the biggest problem with Battle Leauge. Once I played 3 or 4 matches... I saw all the characters, I saw all of the stages, there's not much there.
Sorry for the wall of text but I'm just annoyed by people saying "Charged didn't have more content, quit crying" even though it's objectively false. Less characters, less stages, less items, no challenges... it's weaker nearly everywhere imo. I'm happy they removed Megastrikes though, those can be annoying when the Wiimote gives out. You guys can like Battle Leauge, but stop writing off opinions of those that like Charged more. There's a reason why Charged is my favorite Mario Sports game, and some others agree with me.
To all those trashing this game, remember that "Mario Strikers: Battle League is the best sports game on Switch right now".
I’m pretty sure there was only going to be 3 updates; we need a lot more then that
Can we get more characters for Mario Kart too? 'Cos personally I wanna gut out all the non-Mario characters and unnecessary alts of Mario and Peach, and replace them with characters like Pauline, Birdo, E. Gadd and such...
Game was a huge disappointment. The Mario sports games should have been great but they have all been barebones junk. NL giving them high scores is part of the problem.
Mario is an animal poacher.
Patiently waiting for the last wave where Birdo, Boo & Koopa Troopa will not be anounced to be even MORE dissapointed than that I already was for this game :')
@mykblo116 That would be cool. My guess is that with next month being Halloween, they'll add characters like Boo or Dry Bones. Some themed items along with a new stage and music would be pretty rad.
Hope for a new update soon.
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