20 February 2024 , 15:00
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The first solo outing for Princess Peach in almost 20 years shows signs of sparkle, even if its breezy gameplay clearly pitches itself at a younger crowd.
Always the bridesmaid, never the bride when it comes to mainline Super Mario games, it’s all change for the Mushroom Kingdom’s resident monarch next month when Princess Peach: Showtime! comes to Nintendo Switch on March 22, 2024 . Not since Super Princess Peach for the Nintendo DS back in 2005 has she been the true star of the show, and Nintendo has now taken this to heart by placing her centre stage (literally) for a different type of action-platformer based around outfits complete with unique abilities. From my recent hour-long preview, this Princess Peach spin-off feels like charming fun so far, sure, but its breezily basic gameplay won’t make it a complete showstopper for many.
For those unaware, Princess Peach: Showtime! sees the rosy-cheeked icon take a little time off from being kidnapped and rescued, with a visit to the Sparkle Theatre. Unfortunately for her, however, the upcoming performance takes a bad turn when a mysterious masked villain invades and takes over the premises, forcing Peach – and her wardrobe of costumes – to save the local population of cutesy Theets. This is accomplished by acting in a series of plays, each riffing on a certain theme, and taking on a different role in each. As far as setups go, I was instantly hooked, and couldn’t wait to see what each performance had in store for me.
The power-up for Cowgirl Peach is the lasso, which also comes in handy while riding on horseback. (Nintendo)The first one I played was themed after the Wild West, where I was afforded the chance to ride a horse to give chase, crack my whip, and lasso enemies before lobbing them into one another in order to save the town. All these events play out on a literal stage, with each level in Princess Peach: Showtime! featuring its own designs themed in the style of a play. Backgrounds shift and adjust as you move from screen to screen, and animals are presented as string-controlled marionettes; there are even certain sections that see you dip below the floorboards. All of these elements coalesce in a way that constantly proved to me just how much Nintendo is committed to the bit of Peach’s adventure being a real-life theatre performance, rather than some half-baked attempt at the concept.
Each level begins with Peach in her normal form, equipped with her basic power to ‘sparkle’ things and shape aspects of the stage’s scenery, which often results in a fountain of coins spewing out. I wasn’t told what the coins could ultimately be spent on during my demo, but this still didn’t stop me from spreading joy throughout all the sights I came across. Unlike most Kirby games where you can swap and change abilities willy-nilly, Princess Peach: Showtime! is a lot more rigid in this approach. You’re only ever able to suit up in the specific form intended for that particular play. Does this make each level feel telegraphed? Yes, but it also lets Nintendo explore each costume’s potential in cool ways, albeit in a fairly restrained setting.
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The aforementioned Wild West level, for instance, has a particular moment which sees Peach transform into a cowgirl, at which point her sparkle ability morphs into the whip of a lasso. It works perfectly fine for lashing at enemies from afar, but it truly comes to life when you use it to grab barrels hurtling your way to fling them back to where they came from. Other outfits like Swordfighter Peach, are less creative in their approach, simply having you slash away at hordes of enemies – although admittedly this is the first one I was pushed towards.
Bright spark
My favourite of the four outfits I got to try was Ninja Peach. It’s here where Princess Peach: Showtime! dabbles with some semblance of stealth, letting Peach brush up against the stage scenery to sneak past enemies, or stay below in shallow pools of water to sneak up on enemies and avoid searchlights. One small detail that really made me chuckle came from Ninja Peach hiding in grass; rather than simply crouch down amid standees shaped like grass, Peach pulls out two grass props of her own to further obscure her location. It was just a small aspect I noticed, but is indicative of that trademark attention-to-detail and Nintendo magic we’ve come to expect from first-party titles like this.
The main concern I had about Princess Peach: Showtime! coming away from my one-hour hands on preview is that it all just feels very telegraphed and prescribed. From the way each level is designed to be relatively contained and small, and the incredibly simple control scheme, to how there really is no flexibility in terms of choosing what outfits Peach can where and when, this is clearly a 2D action-platformer hoping to charm and delight more so than it wants to innovate or push any genre boundaries. This makes it light, breezy fun accessible to audiences of all ages, but probably not the total coming out party a character like Princess Peach is deserving of.
Ninja Peach can bounce off walls one after the other, playing into the stealthy approach. (Nintendo)One last drawback is the performance of my demo build. Played on a big screen, there were lots of framerate hitching in a game supposedly targeting a steady 30fps. Alongside this, the load times when entering each new level felt unusually long for a game with as itemised approach to its structure as this. Super Mario Bros Wonder never had you waiting up to 30 seconds when entering each new level, so it’s a tad odd that this is very much the case here. Princess Peach: Showtime! is one of the few first-party Nintendo Switch games to run on Unreal Engine 4, true, but no such issues were present in last year’s brilliant Pikmin 4. I hope these issues are ironed out in time for the full release; neither are enough to completely break the experience if not, but it could just be a sign of the hardware’s age.
That said, there’s still so many unannounced outfits Nintendo is understandably keeping a surprise, and I’m eager to see whether or not any of the four outfits I did try – Cowgirl, Ninja, Patissiere, and Swordfighter – will return in later levels to be fully capitalised on, or if each really is more of a one-and-done type deal. Each floor of the Sparkle Theatre will be punctuated by a boss fight once you complete all the available levels, and I’m sure these are bound to be just as charming and cinematic as the various set piece moments featured within each play. So yes, while Princess Peach: Showtime! probably won’t end up being the show-stopping performance I hoped, the stage is still set for her to break a leg.