HAUNTED BY POOR CONTROLS.
I think the general consensus is that Luigi’s Mansion is a great game, and that its 3DS sequel Dark Moon was a worthy successor. At the time of Luigi’s Mansion release however views were different, as it was hardly the Mario games fans wanted. I will outright say now that Luigi’s Mansion is still a great game and anyone who has never played it should, but I would say getting hands on a Gamecube copy is preferable to this messy remake.
Luigi one day gets a message that he won a mansion in a contest. When he arrives at the mansion he discovers it to be haunted. It also seems Mario was captured by the resident ghosts. With the help of Professor E. Gadd, Luigi does his best Ray Stantz (or Peter Venkman if you prefer) and sets out to face his fears, stop the ghosts, and save his brother.
PLATFORMS: 3DS
MSRP: $39.99
PRICE I’D PAY: $19.99
Gameplay has Luigi slowly exploring the house and clearing sections of it make sure it’s ghost free. Ghosts will hide in objects or just appear in the dark and Luigi will have to shine his flashlight on them to startle them and make a heart appear. Once in this vulnerable state, Luigi needs to pull out his vacuum backpack called the Poltergust and suck up the ghosts who will fight back until out of energy. As ghosts are captured, dark rooms will light up signaling all the ghosts have been captured. Objects in rooms can be interacted with using an interact button or the Poltergust to get gold and money hidden in objects, which help contribute to an overall score that is graded at the end of the game.
The most charming feature of this game is Luigi himself as a character. Luigi’s Mansion is the first time he isn’t just “Green Mario.” Luigi is easily frightened, but also overly confident at times. The voice work from Charles Martinet was and still is some of the most entertaining voice work in video games, as Luigi almost always sings along to the music. When the rooms are dark his cries out to Mario sound fearful and he hums the main theme of Luigi’s Mansion, however when the lights are on Luigi calls out to Mario in confidence and jauntily whistles the theme.
New to the 3DS version of Luigi’s Mansion is co-op. While it does require two carts to play the entire game in co-op, there are limited download play options as well. In co-op, the second player doesn’t receive any progress in their own single player experience and instead play as Gooigi. Gooigi is a Luigi clone that is entirely made of goo sent by the future version of Professor E. Gadd (from around the time of Luigi’s Mansion Dark Moon) to the past (Luigi’s Mansion) making this both a remake and sequel in a weird way. Time travel is messy stuff and so is Gooigi. He (or it because I’m not really sure) is weaker than Luigi, having only 50 hearts rather than the standard 100. Gooigi is also weak to fire, but doesn’t ever die so player two only waits a couple of seconds before Gooigi reappears in all his/its gelatinous glory. The issue is that despite myself and my friend playing on the “New” models of the 3DS (myself on a New 3DS XL and him on a New 2DS XL) there was a blatant delay between when the controller moved and when the characters (both Luigi and Gooigi) moved on screen. Luigi’s Mansion requires fairly quick response, so having this delay is tedious at best and at worst hindered my ability to capture ghosts. Defeating ghosts in co-op is far easier though as both vacuums going at once will quickly diminish the ghosts’ health.
Something carried over from Luigi’s Mansion: Dark Moon is the flashlight. The standard flashlight simply turns on and off like the original Gamecube game. The strobe flashlight from Dark Moon however charges up before sending out a stronger beam of light. Both flashlights have their advantages and it’s a nice addition to the game. What is weird is that in co-op both players are forced to use the player playing as Luigi’s flashlight option and there doesn’t seem to be a real reason for that, but is something that can take some getting used to if unfamiliar with one of the two.
Also new is Amiibo compatibility, which is completely optional and doesn’t add any new content. After testing out a few and discovering that the game didn’t save the fact that I had scanned any Amiibos in (meaning I would have to scan them each time I start the game up) I didn’t care enough to keep scanning them. Achievements have been added just for some fun challenges and nothing more. Something similar was done with Wario Ware Gold and I hope Nintendo keeps putting these extra tasks in their games. Last big addition is boss rush, which offers the ability to redo boss battles. There are minor changes throughout, but overall Luigi’s Mansion on 3DS doesn’t try to add too much to the original.
That includes the controls unfortunately. I won’t say Luigi’s Mansion on Gamecube had the greatest controls, but within the last year I replayed the original and had a far easier time controlling that over the 3DS version. The main issue comes from the fact that Grezzo decided to attempt to maintain all the controls of the original face buttons on the Gamecube version on the 3DS, relegating aiming to either motion controls or the horrible nub on the New 3DS/2DS models. Both of those options are terrible and making aiming (an important part of gameplay) unnecessarily difficult. Grezzo should have adapted the controls Next Level Games used in Dark Moon where motion controls were there but the aiming could be done with the face buttons. The terrible nub (apparently referred to as the c-stick) is just not accurate enough to be used to aim. To anyone with the Circle Pad Pro, that is objectively better and absolutely usable on this title and will reduce or remove that issue. No control option combination on the New 3DS XL felt good and that is extremely disappointing.
Luigi’s Mansion on 3DS is strictly a remake for people who either no longer have a copy of Luigi’s Mansion or have never played it before. To anyone who still has their original Gamecube copy, just play that; the additions are not worth $40. It’s still a great game by all accounts because the design of the game is fun and it is completely playable, but the controls in this version are just awful and with Dark Moon on the same console there’s absolutely no excuse for that.
Review copy of game provided by publisher.
