Mario & Luigi: Dream Team

Mario & Luigi: Dream Team (Mario & Luigi RPG 4: Dream Adventure in Japan and Mario & Luigi: Dream Team Bros. in Europe & Australia) is a title for the Nintendo 3DS. It is the fourth installment in the Mario & Luigi series. The game was released in Europe on July 12th, 2013. It will be released in Australia on July 13th, Japan on July 18th, and North America on August 11th.

It is part of "The Year of Luigi" alongside Luigi's Mansion: Dark Moon and the New Super Luigi U DLC for New Super Mario Bros. U. The two titles and the DLC are in celebration of the 30th anniversary of Luigi's debut. As such, Luigi has a much bigger role in the game than in the previous Mario & Luigi games. A special edition of Nintendo 3DS XL with a Luigi themed print will be released in Japan as part of the event and include the digital version of Mario & Luigi: Dream Team preinstalled on the SD card.

Story
Mario, Luigi, Princess Peach, Toadsworth, and the Toads are invited to Pi'illo Island by Dr. Snoozemore through a message in his Broggy and travel to the island on a hot air balloon for sightseeing. During the flight there, Luigi falls asleep and dreams of Mario fighting Antasma. Afterwards, he dreams of the balloon they were in to fall and crash, but instead Luigi wakes up and falls to the ground out of confusion. Later on, while touring the island, Luigi then takes a nap on a special pillow which opens a portal to a place called Dream World. This allows Antasma to pull Princess Peach into the world. It is later explained that there are two powers in the Dream World, the Dream Stone and the Dark Stone, though the latter was destroyed by Antasma in order to create chunks so it is able to turn the Pi'illos species into stone. Mario and Luigi travel to rescue the princess and free the frozen Pi'illos and try and rescue the princess from Antasma who is lurking inside Luigi's dreams.

Gameplay
The gameplay seems to shift between Luigi's dream world, where Mario and Luigi move in a 2-D fashion and the regular world, where they freely roam the overworld, unlike the previous three titles. While Mario is playing inside Luigi's dreams, Starlow can move Luigi's face to affect the area, such as spinning platforms. The battles appear to give the player coins, similarly to the Paper Mario series. Due to the shift to 3D, the game also uses a new art style. Badges similar to those in Mario & Luigi: Bowser's Inside Story seem to make an appearance in this game. Sometimes Gifts may also appear in between or after battles. Giant battles from Mario & Luigi's Bowser Inside Story return, this time with Luigi instead of Bowser. The games art style also changes in this installment. Unlike the previous games' basic sprite look, this installment uses a pre-rendered look that makes the sprites smoother with the backgrounds.

During an developer interview it was revealed the game has a hardcore mode that's unlocked after completing the game. Also during battles if the player fails at Bro. moves a numerous amount of times in battle a slo-mo feature will activate allowing for easier hits. The game also has a added hint option which appears in battle if the player is struggling with an enemy, if chosen this gives information on the enemies weakness's and attacks.

The bottom screen of the 3DS displays the area map, unlike previous installments the map shows and follows the actual location of the Bros.

Battle system
The battle system in overworld is similar to those in previous titles, but the system in Dream World is different, as Mario will fight in all battles with Luigi's dream power. There are now five categories of attack, as in Mario & Luigi: Partners in Time. They are Jump, Hammer, Item, Luigi's face (which are Special attacks in Dream World) or Red Shell (which are Special attacks in the overworld), and Flee. There can be more than five enemies in battle, as in Mario & Luigi: Bowser's Inside Story. The Rank feature returns again. One change is the lack of Lakitus from the level up system.

Giant Battles
Giant battles play similarly to the ones in the previous installment, with the boss on one screen and Luigi on the other. The battles now offer a choice of left-handed or right-handed play. In this installment several things are different. Luigi is able to perform extra jump attacks like in normal battle. Also for Luigi to heal himself he has to get Mario to throw him mushrooms. The player has to tap to the timing of Mario's throws to catch the mushrooms and heal Luigi. Mario gets worn out after one of these moves and must recover for a few turns. Another new feature is that to finish a boss a special move has to be performed. This works with Luigi jumping high and grabbing a star, which Mario hops on and throws at the boss. The player has to line up the star's trajectory with the boss's heart to finish them off. It is currently unknown what happens if they miss.

Ranks

 * Mushroom Rank
 * Shell Rank (Level 8)
 * Flower Rank
 * Star Rank (Level 26)

Bros. Attacks (Real World)

 * Fire Flower
 * Dropchopper
 * 3D Red Shell
 * 3D Green Shell
 * Jet-Board Bash
 * Bomb Derby

Luiginary Attacks (Dream World)

 * Luiginary Ball
 * Luiginary Stack
 * Luiginary Hammer
 * Luiginary Sneeze
 * Finishing Bros.

Playable

 * Mario
 * Luigi
 * Dreamy Luigi (Dream World)
 * Starlow (Dream World)

Other

 * Princess Peach
 * Toadsworth
 * Toads
 * Bowser, the secondary antagonist who forms an alliance with Antasma
 * Yoshi
 * Starlow
 * Antasma, the antagonist, described as a "ghostly bat king" and feared by the Pi'illo people as a nightmare
 * Pi'illos
 * Dreambert, leader of the Pi'illo people
 * Eldream, a Pi'illo mentioned by Dreambert who can help Mario and Luigi
 * Dr. Snoozemore, proprietor of Pi'illo island, who is mysteriously absent when the heroes arrive at the island.
 * Broque Monsieur
 * Broggy
 * Brocks: Other members of Broque Monsieur's race.
 * Brickle
 * Blinda
 * Zeekepper
 * Shell Top
 * Beanish
 * Hooskis, citizens which resemble brown Hoohooligans.
 * Dreambunny, presumably Eldream's pet rabbit.
 * Private Goomp
 * Corporal Paraplonk
 * Sergeant Guy
 * Kamek
 * Popple, seen helping Mario & Luigi fight a Wiggler.

Enemies

 * Gromba
 * Dromba
 * Gray rock-like enemies with hands, with faces similar to Junior Shrooboid's or Shrooboid Brat's. They attack in the overworld by tossing boulders.
 * Bloatula
 * Storch
 * Capnap
 * Dreamcap
 * Dreamcap Captain
 * Thorb
 * Walker Guy
 * Chain Chomp
 * Goomba
 * Fly Guy
 * Flibbee
 * Propellion
 * Boomerang Bro.
 * Lakitu
 * Spiny
 * Wiggler
 * Bandit
 * Banzai Bill
 * Piranha Plants
 * Talantula
 * Caccac
 * Pink creatures with green leaves on their heads
 * White ghost-like creatures with black eyes
 * A purple, pink and peach goo monster
 * A dumbbell-like creature
 * A pink and yellow moth creature
 * Viruses
 * Crab-like creatures similar to Sidesteppers
 * Red and pink birds
 * A yellow ball enemy with brown feet, a white spike on its head, and goggles.
 * A volcano that charges Mario and Luigi.
 * A shark with a drill on its head. Mario & Luigi race it.
 * A Purple version of the "Drill Shark".
 * A Large group of buildings that form a robot.
 * An igloo that chases Mario & Luigi.
 * Floating Relics that somewhat resemble Antasma's bats. They are seen in a battle with some Boomerang Bros.

Bosses

 * Antasma (first time, tutorial battle)
 * Smoldergeist
 * Dreamy Mario
 * Grobot
 * Antasma (second time), possessing Bowser
 * Drilldigger
 * Giant Bowser
 * Antasma (final time)
 * Unknown form of Bowser using the Darkstone

Items

 * ? Blocks
 * Coin Blocks
 * Attack Piece Blocks
 * Coins
 * 5 Gold Coins
 * 10 Gold Coins
 * Mushrooms
 * Super Mushrooms
 * Nuts
 * Super Nuts
 * Wonder-nuts
 * Syrup
 * Super Syrup
 * Candies
 * Super-Candies
 * 1-Up Mushrooms
 * 1-Up Mushroom+s
 * 1-Up Deluxe
 * Refreshing Herbs
 * Ghost Cookies
 * Secret Boxes
 * Slingshrooms
 * Seesaw Shrooms

Locations

 * Real World (Pi'illo Island) will presumably take place in
 * Pi'llo Blimport
 * Pi'illo Castle
 * Mushrise Park
 * Ohapaku Breeze
 * Slumber Desert
 * Wakeport
 * Dozing Sands
 * Mount Pajamaja
 * A town area inhabited by brown creatures resembling Hoohooligans. It also contains a shop.
 * A quarry area with fences on the floor and rock enemies.
 * A grassy area with mountains.
 * A shop with small pink creatures as employees.
 * A castle with purple rock enemies.
 * A Bridge which breaks down and leads into a cave.
 * Dream World
 * A grassy area with flowers.
 * An area with wooden floor with orange drill and purple slime enemies.
 * A dark blue void area with Luigi's face on the background, with "Don't leave me behind, big brother" messages passing through the screen. Also there are sketchy images of Luigi chasing Mario. Some places have some of Luigi's facial features being pulled apart and squished together.
 * A grassy area with rolling rocks.
 * A bright castle area with a greenish blue background.
 * A snowy area where a giant Luigi faces off against a volcano creature.
 * A cloudy area with protrusions of land in the background.
 * A Dark Purple Colored Castle

Luiginary Works
Luiginary Works are special objects found in the Dream World. When Dreamy Luigi is near a Luiginary Work, both react to each other, causing them to be surrounded by a green light. Dreamy Luigi, then, can "possess" the object, creating a special object that can be controled by the sleepy Luigi, with Starlow's help.

References to other games

 * Super Mario Bros.: A remix of this game's main theme is heard while a Luiginary Work is being introduced.
 * Luigi's Mansion: One of the messages from Luigi displayed in Dream's Deep is "I fight ghosts!"
 * Mario & Luigi: Superstar Saga: Popple and other Beanish characters appear in this game.
 * Mario & Luigi: Partners in Time: The Bros. Ball attack from this game returns. Also, Bowser resembles Shrowser when possessed by Antasma.
 * Mario & Luigi: Bowser's Inside Story: The badges are similar to the ones from this game. Starlow, Broque Monsieur, Private Goomp, Corporal Paraplonk, and Sergeant Guy return as well.
 * New Super Mario Bros. U: Bombs very similar to the ones used by Lemmy Koopa in this game appear in the Bomb Derby attack.

Reception
Both Gamespot and IGN gave the game an 8 which is the lowest review in the series by both of them. The reasons for this were that IGN believed that the overworld was less apealing than Dream World and that the game's intro was sluggish and filled with too many tutorials.

Trivia

 * This is the first game in the Mario & Luigi series to be rated E10+ (Everyone 10 and Up) rather than the usual E (Everyone) by ESRB.
 * This is also the second Mario game (excluding Donkey Kong and Wario series) to receive this rating, after Mario Strikers Charged.
 * This is also the first game in the Mario & Luigi series to depict the letters on Mario and Luigi's caps as red and green, respectively, instead of black, and to have Luigi's pants reach his shoes, hiding his socks.
 * Unlike the other Mario & Luigi games, Mario and Luigi don't let out their battle cries of "Let's-a-go!" and "Okey-dokey!" respectively when starting a battle.
 * This is the first time in the series that the tutorial battle does not feature Bowser.