"Super Monkey Ball" - Gamecube

The second Gamecube game, and one that I had as a kid. Super Monkey Ball!

When I was a kid I remember getting the game for around $20 at Walmart with my parents, and playing it for a night only to be disappointed in what seemed like a small amount of content. As an adult though, I recognize an arcade game port when I see one, and sure enough, Super Monkey Ball premiered in early 2001 in Japan in arcade format as simply Monkey Ball.

The failure of the Dreamcast in early 2001 meant that this Sega NAOMI (the board which shares components with the Dreamcast) arcade game, which probably would have ended up with a Dreamcast port, ended up with a Gamecube port instead. And, to be honest, it fits in fairly well on that console alongside Luigi's Mansion as one of its launch titles.

Looks like a 3D Nintendo game to me if I don't look directly at it. Or notice the SEGA logo.

Toshihiro Nagoshi, now best known as executive director for the Yakuza series, is responsible for the concept of Monkey Ball. I'm not sure how he got from monkeys rolling around in bubble-gum machine balls to beating the snot out of people on the streets of Kamurocho. Regardless, this wasn't his first game (he had also supervised Shenmue and Daytona USA, and was the chief designer on Virtua Racing), so Super Monkey Ball had a director with a little bit of clout.

Hidenori Shoji, Sakae Osumi, and Haruyoshi Tomita were the composers on this game, the first of which is a composer on the Yakuza series as well, interestingly enough.

Anyway, how about we play it?

Think about all the people in the world who have called this game "Super Monkey Balls".

----- Playthrough -----

The main gameplay loop of Super Monkey Ball is that you have a monkey, in a ball, on a stage, and you use the left joystick to tilt the stage, thereby causing the monkey in the ball to roll around. You roll your monkey around on the stage, ideally without falling off, and while collecting bananas, until you eventually roll it through the goal and that's about all there is to that.

That's everything you need to know to play this game.

After all, it's not Super Monkey Rocket Science. That one is the sequel.

The game is divided into 3 main courses (like race tracks, not parts of a dinner... though...?), Beginner, Advanced, and Expert. Beginner has 10 stages, Advanced has 30, and Expert has 50.

Scattered throughout the stages are bananas you can collect, and if you collect 100 of them, you'll get a handy 1UP. However, if you're going for score, you'll get far more points by rushing to the exit as quickly as you can. Sometimes this involves sneaky tricks like jumping off the track intentionally to land on a lower part.

Roundabout every 5 stages, you'll be given a bonus stage where you have a set amount of time to pick up a set amount of bananas. You'll get a little score bump if you manage to do this, but mainly it's an opportunity to get closer to one of those 1UPs.

Actual footage of the Kroger produce section being raided when there's snow coming.

By the way it's amusing to me that they actually got Dole to let them use their sticker on the bananas in this game. Weird product placement flex, but anyway.

Sometimes in the levels, you'll notice that there are different colored goals that might be harder to reach. These allow you to skip levels to keep from playing all 10, 30, or 50, because you're lazy, and playing that many levels takes time. The game will punish you for your laziness by making these goals harder to reach-- sometimes in the form of you having to figure out how to reach them, or just play a particularly hard section of level in order to.

Aw man, nice! Less gameplay!

Once you beat one of these modes, you'll be awarded some Play Points, and get to play a little credits mini-game, if you feel like it (or you can press A to skip it), wherein the developers try to force you to memorize their names through repeat exposure.

"Please remember us, or we will fade from this world."

Once you've had your fill of the normal game modes or broken one controller because of Expert mode and decided you needed a little time out from that, you can try the party game modes.

First up is "Monkey Race," which basically plays like Super Monkey Ball Mario Kart. You'll race around a track in your ball, competing with three other monkeys (AI or multiplayer), pick up random items to beat eachother over the head with, and compete to be the first one to cross the finish line. There's single races, and a grand prix.

It's BYOEB though (Bring Your Own Euro-Beat).

Second is "Monkey Fight," where you and three other monkeys are in an arena with giant boxing gloves stuck to you that can be controller with the analog stick, and shot out with the A button. Your goal, as you might have guessed, is to murder the other monkeys by pushing them into the abyss.

THERE CAN ONLY BE ONE!

Last is "Monkey Target," in which you and a handful of other players take turn going down a big ramp, launching off, popping your ball open to act like wings, and try to glide onto a target. You'll have to deal with wind blowing your monkey off course, and if you collect the bananas in the air you'll unlock super powers like being able to stop as soon as you hit the ground, or doubling or tripling your score for one turn.

This mode is tough, but I bet it would be entertaining with other people.

I'm gonna level with you: it's not very fun when you're doing it by yourself.

Remember the "Play Points" that I mentioned earlier? Well, every time you get 2,500 of those, you can buy another mini game! There's three of those to unlock as well, but it's not too much of a grind. I got enough points to unlock all 3 in about 50 minutes. If you keep getting Play Points after you unlock all 3, you'll get more continues for the main game, eventually capping out at infinite continues (which you'll probably need the first time through Expert...).

The first of THOSE mini-games is Monkey Billiards, which wouldn't you know it, is exactly what it sounds like. It's Super Monkey 9-Ball.

Which continues the pool video-game tradition of absolutely BS AI.

Second is "Monkey Bowling," which-- I have a feeling you get the idea. The other one is "Monkey Golf." I don't really need to explain those to you, do I? We're all getting tired, here.

We all just want to go home. Can this stop?

The point being that there are quite a few mini-games in this game to play with your friends. You can also play the main game mode simultaneously or alternating with friends. I guess all this might be why the game is labeled a 'party' game on Wikipedia.

But I'm a party of one, baby.

----- Review -----

How long did I play?
About 3 hours.

Did I beat the game?
I did everything in the game once except for expert mode, which I beat about 25% of.

Intuitive Design: 

How easy is it to intuitively understand the game?

I think this game might be one of the best examples of intuitive design we've really seen. I mean, there's really just the analog stick, and that stick is how you play 90% of the games here. Specifically in the main game, the first level is almost nothing but you and a fairly safe area to test the controls, and a big thing that says "Goal!"

I trust you can probably work that out.

Gameplay / Difficulty: 

How rewarding does playing the game feel?

Make no mistake, this game is pretty tough. Even the advanced mode is pretty tough for a first timer, but I played the game as a kid and remembered most of the tricks and how to complete the levels easier from back then, even with some muscle memory.

I never could beat the Expert mode though, and given I only gave it one try this time around, but it is definitely really frustrating once you get past the first few levels. I imagine that infinite continues would alleviate the tension a little bit, but trying to navigate narrows pathways and sliding off a corner is still a Hulk Smash Moment.

Slamming through a goal by a narrow margin is always a good feeling though, and I think the game in general feels and plays pretty well.

That's actually what my face looks like every time.

Depth: 

How deep/long is the game?

Like I said, when I was a kid I was really kind of disappointed by the lack of an actual 'story mode' or whatever I expected, but this is very clearly an arcade port. 90 levels + some extra levels if you can beat those without using continues is really nothing to sneeze at, and there are a lot of mini-games here to entertain yourself with if that's your thing.

I could personally do without having to grind out the points to unlock them. I think it would be better if they had just started you out at 2 continues and given you a continue every 2500 points from the beginning.

Please stop taunting me.

Sound / Graphics: 

How's the sound? How are the graphics?

Super Monkey Ball looks a lot like a Dreamcast game, which makes sense given that it was originally made for Dreamcast-like hardware. The look holds up pretty well on the Gamecube, and there are lots of small things (like the spark particles that fly off your ball when moving at fast speeds) that enhance the visual appearance. It's simple, but personally I think the look works for it rather than against it.

Honestly, the soundtrack is pretty forgettable for me. I struggle to remember any of the songs in the game, even though I just played it an hour ago, but overall I think the ending credits theme is probably my favorite of what's on offer.

Personal Chord: 

Does the game have that undefinable "something" for me?

There's some nostalgia here from when I was a kid, and I like the general aesthetic of the game, though to be honest I've never much liked the character designs for this game. They also seem a bit generic and hard to remember the details of whenever I step away from it for very long. They lack the staying power of other mascot-type characters.

I don't really think I like the game enough to rep it on a t-shirt.

Should You Play: 

Is there a reason to even bother with this one?

This is a tough question for this game. I think if you like this kind of game (the whole "rolling marble" kind of game) then Super Monkey Ball might well be the finest example of that kind of game that there is.

Personally, I'm not really sure I had enough fun playing this as an adult to recommend it to anyone as a favorite, but I do think it might be fun to pop it in and mess around with, especially if you have three friends to play it with.

It might be fun to check the game out, but I definitely think you'll live without it.

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