Super Monkey Ball Banana Rumble Review – Capsule-Sized Fun

The Super Monkey Ball series has a long history in gaming, originally launching with Nintendo’s famed Gamecube console in November 2001. In nearly 25 years, the game’s development has switched hands, with it now resting peacefully with Like a Dragon developer Ryu Ga Gotoku. Super Monkey Ball Banana Rumble is the second title in the series developed by them, and after spending some time with AiAi, MeiMei, GonGon, and the gang again, it kept me enraptured until I rolled credits.

However, because there are so many Super Monkey Ball games to compare this one to now, I noticed a few things that were lacking. Super Monkey Ball Banana Rumble is a challenging and exciting adventure, but some aspects felt a bit limited.

Keep Rollin’, Rollin’, Rollin’, Rollin’ 

The gameplay for Super Monkey Ball Banana Rumble is as you would expect, with the objective being to travel through different mazes and reach the end without falling. Each level has bananas for you to collect and a single golden banana that awards you with points when you reach the end. Levels also have different objectives to help you earn more, and the new Spin Dash ability allows you to find new and fast ways to reach the end goal. I’ll admit that I would spend far too long trying to Spin Dash in just the right way to hit a corner and bounce directly into the goal.

Something I didn’t know I would appreciate while playing the game is how quickly you can bounce back to the start of the level when you fall. I began to build a rhythm of starting, messing up, pausing, and restarting rather than waiting to hit the fallout barrier. It motivated me to try new ways of beating the level without burning out from trying over and over again. The only downside to this was muting my TV because I couldn’t stand listening to “Ready…Go!” at the beginning of each level.

A Fast and Short Ride

Super Monkey Ball Banana Rumble‘s story joins AiAi and friends as they collect nine OOPArtifacts with a new character, Palette, to find the legendary Golden Banana. Each artifact takes players to a new world, where they must complete ten levels before moving on to the next one. The gameplay only involves maze solving, with no bosses or fighting in sight. I was a little surprised at this fact, especially since the series was revitalized after Super Monkey Ball Banana Blitz HD, which included some awesome boss fights. I felt like I was flying through levels, collecting Artifacts one after another. When I finally rolled credits, only about three hours had passed.

The game does have new objectives for you to work on once the story has been completed. However, it feels as though there’s nothing to be gained from them, save for the ability to purchase more clothing for customization and for an end-game activity to grow a banana tree. Once the game’s story is finished, the rest of the gameplay relies on players playing multiplayer or co-op in various game modes. At that point, you’ve pretty much got yourself a party game with endless hours of gameplay and no need to return to the adventure mode except to complete new EX versions of levels.

I Hear and See Bananas In My Sleep

I’ve mentioned this before, but fast-paced games with loud and fast music just hold my attention better than anything else. No matter how often I had to restart a Super Monkey Ball Banana Rumble level, the music and sounds only fueled my intentions of going faster and beating my times repeatedly. Rarely did I feel frustrated that I couldn’t beat a level, and oftentimes, I’d switch through the worlds to find new ways to complete stage objectives with different characters. The sound of the stage announcer starting the level or announcing that you fell out of bounds got to be a little annoying, but that only became a problem once I realized that I was saying “Fallout” consistently whenever something would fall in real life. I’ve even considered changing the text tone on my phone to the sound of you collecting bananas.

“Ready…GO!”

Super Monkey Ball Banana Rumble allows new players to experience the timeless ball-balancing classic in a new way. However, the game feels limited compared to previous installments due to the lack of cool and interesting characters and gameplay outside of maze-solving. With about three hours of total gameplay from the story, this game is a better fit for players who intend to enjoy Super Monkey Ball Banana Rumble with friends and take advantage of all of the multiplayer game modes. With that in mind, be prepared for a challenge and the possibility of sinking a ton of time into trying to hit a ledge just right to reach the goal in less than ten seconds. I may or may not have done that myself.