Super Mario Party Jamboree’s new modes have Rhythm Heaven energy

Earlier this month, I got what I felt was an in-depth hands-on session with Super Mario Party Jamboree. I played a traditional round of Mario Party, dabbled in some loose minigames, dominated in the mass-multiplayer Koopathalon, and took on a kaiju in Bowser’s Kaboom Squad. It felt like I’d seen everything there was to see — but it hadn’t. Last Monday, Nintendo revealed a host of extra modes coming to Jamboree, including a suite of motion-controlled minigames: Paratrooper Flight School, Toad’s Item Factory, and Rhythm Kitchen.

As someone who still harbors a fondness for the days of Wii waggle controls, that reveal further piqued my interest in a game that already had my attention. Last year, WarioWare: Move It! showed me that I’m always down to move my body if you give me a good reason to. Based on a quick Rhythm Kitchen session in my second Jamboree hands-on demo, it seems like Nintendo is going to pull that trick off again, if only for a few short sessions.

Rhythm Kitchen is a simple, but fun side mode that feels indebted to Nintendo’s Rhythm Heaven series. When the round begins, my teammates and I are dropped into an Iron Chef-like cooking competition where we need to work together to make meals. That’s accomplished through a series of three minigames that test our timing skills in different ways.

In our first challenge, we need to decorate a sort of giant parfait by whacking fruits onto it with a baseball swing. It’s a classic rhythm setup, as I need to listen for changes in timing to swing at the right moment. The next has me whisking cake batter, which falls in patterned droplets between all four players. The final challenge sees sandwich ingredients rhythmically dancing between the bread. When they’re in place, my team and I need to give our Joy-cons a shove to lock them in place.

Naturally, a minigame like this comes with some traditional motion-control pain points. I had trouble totally nailing the beat during each game, which left me with a 55% accuracy rating by the end. I can chalk some of that up to learning timing on the fly, but at least a bit of that is good, old-fashioned waggle quirks. The inconsistency didn’t bother me much considering that chaos makes Mario Party more fun, but it’s something to be aware of going in.

Though not complex by any means, I get that quick hit of physical fun I crave during my demo. I find myself tapping out the beat with my foot as I lock myself in a bread-shoving stance. Sincere smiles go around the room as my teammates laugh at our pathetic sandwiches after we entirely botch the last minigame. That’s the kind of reaction that Mario Party thrives on, making something as simple as Rhythm Kitchen a neat fit for Jamboree, even if it’s a small extra that won’t have nearly the mileage of the core board game. You can catch me in the kitchen making garbage cakes next month.

Super Mario Party Jamboree launches on October 17 for Nintendo Switch.