Poll: So, Will You Be Getting Mario Tennis Fever For Switch 2?

I’m surprised at just how dismissive people seem to be of this game. Maybe I shouldn’t be after Super Rush and Battle League were seen as duds, but Aces did have its fans, and I was expecting to see more people just write it off because “it looks good but it’s $70,” and not preemptively calling it another disappointment because…some reviews said the singleplayer was underwhelming. Seeing people condemn Fever for that while in the same breath saying they miss the golden days of the GameCube era, where not a single Mario sports game on there had a campaign…well, it just tells me how much nostalgia dominates the conversation when it comes to these games. They haven’t been critical darlings since the N64 days; 80 is basically the ceiling for them, and even well-regarded games like Mario Power Tennis, Mario Strikers Charged, and Mario Golf: World Tour are in that camp. I’m just confused as to why Fever outscoring Aces and being the best reviewed Mario sports game since World Tour is being treated like it’s yet another disappointment. It’s par for the course for this entire branch of the Mario series, and from day one it’s been clear to me that Camelot did take their time to provide us with a meatier experience, from the base roster being over twice as large as the 16 characters Aces started out with and tying with the GBA game for the most in the series to getting courts with special gimmicks in line with Power Tennis again.

I don’t blame anyone for not thinking it’s worth $70. I don’t think it is, and I’m only buying it at launch because I found a $20 giftcard I’ve been sitting on for over a year. But I hate seeing so many people already treating Fever like another disappointment when that feels at odds with the actual reviews and the clear steps taken to have a distinctly more content-rich game at launch. There’s arguably more here than Power Tennis had, and if they do support the game with more characters, Fever Rackets, and courts post-launch, it’s going to feel a lot more exciting because it genuinely won’t feel like it’s been held back (especially with most of the veteran characters returning, meaning the door is wide open for newcomers).