The last time handheld gamers got a chance to join the Mario Party it was on the Game Boy Advance in one of the lamest iterations of the series: Mario Party Advance. It certainly had some merit but ultimately, even though it had the same development studio at the helm as the console renditions, it just couldn't keep up with the rest of the Hudson designs. Mario Party DS, however, is a huge leap over the last portable rendition, bringing the on-the-go versions in line with what's been made for the Nintendo 64, GameCube, and Wii systems. And maybe that's what roots the DS game down into merely "decent" territory: it's just more of Mario Party, a decade-old tradition of varying quality mini-games strung out in a board game presentation…but now with touch-screen and microphone-blowing mini-games.
