Mario Party DS

Mario Party DS is the eleventh installment in the Mario Party series (thirteenth in Japan), the second for the handheld consoles (the other being Mario Party Advance for the Game Boy Advance), and the first for the Nintendo DS. It was released in Japan on November 8, 2007, in the United States on November 19, 2007, in Europe on November 23, 2007, and in Australia on December 6, 2007. It includes more than seventy new minigames and five new game boards. Its functions include touch control, microphone control and dual-screen challenges. It is possible for up to four players to play in wireless mode.

Story
The story begins with a night in the Mushroom Kingdom, where five shining objects in the sky fall to the land. Mario spots one, and discusses it with his friends the next day. Kamek interrupts when he drops an invitation down to the gang. Bowser sent it, and it says that he is inviting them to his castle for a big feast, as apology for his evil deeds. Donkey Kong and Diddy Kong get an invitation as well.

The crew sets off for the castle, but they find that, as one may suspect, it was a trick. Bowser and Bowser Jr. trap Mario and friends in a cage, at which point Bowser uses a magic wand called the Minimizer to shrink them all down to the size of chess pieces, and they are literally thrown out. This leaves Bowser to look for the five shining objects, the Sky Crystals, in peace. The gang decides to get back at Bowser and heads back to the castle. To be the one Superstar that defeats Bowser causes the eight friends to pit themselves against each other for the great title.

Early in their journey, Wiggler begs the small heroes for help, as a nasty Piranha Plant has infested his garden. The plant was defeated when its own Bomb Seeds were fed to itself by the heroes. A grateful Wiggler rewards them with a Sky Crystal, which landed in his garden. Shortly after, Toadette came to the heroes for help, asking them to defeat a Hammer Bro that was abusing her instruments. The Hammer Bro was defeated in a drum-off, at which point Toadette found a Sky Crystal and gave it to the gang. Having two now, they set off for the jungle, where they find their monkey friend Diddy Kong. The anxious spider monkey shows the heroes that Donkey Kong was turned to stone by Dry Bones. The friends faced off against Dry Bones on his arena, where magic hexes were used to destroy him. Donkey Kong was restored, and quickly remembered the free food promised at Bowser's Castle. He and Diddy rush off, but not before Diddy hands over a Sky Crystal.

At this point, Bowser's Castle is in the sight of the gang. However, they find a Koopa Troopa asking for help, as Kamek has trapped his grandfather, Koopa Krag, in one of his many library books. The heroes fight Kamek after surviving a long hallway, at which point Koopa Krag is saved, and gives them a Sky Crystal. After Kamek's defeat, they finally find Bowser's Castle, where they are stuffed in a pinball machine that Bowser Jr. uses to mess them up. The one who collected the most Stars in the pinball machine broke out and got ready to fight Bowser. Bowser threatened to shrink them once again (probably to the size of a ant), but just then Donkey Kong and Diddy Kong arrived.

DK, frantic for the free food, runs around, bumped on Bowser (due to the fact he didn't see him), which gives the fact that Bowser let the Minimizer fall. Then happened to be that DK tripped on the Minimizer, which gives the fact that that wand broke. This brings the Mario gang to normal size, but Bowser reveals one more surprise - the Mega Morph Belt. The device transforms Bowser into Blockhead Bowser, and the heroes fight him by punching his golden Bowser Block, the weak spot.

Upon the Koopa King's defeat, Bowser and his son were tied up, and Mario took the final Sky Crystal from him. They formed to make a crystal DS, which was made exclusively for the fun challenge, Triangle Twisters. Bowser admits that he wanted the Sky Crystals just so that he could play the game. After hearing this, Mario decides to untie the two, and they all play Triangle Twisters together, thus ending the story. As for DK and Diddy, they eat the entire feast by themselves, and are quite satisfied.

Characters
This is a table of the major and minor Characters in Mario Party DS, along with their status in the game, as well as locations (if applicable).

Team Names
In Tag Team Mode, each combination of playable characters create one unique Team Name. The list of possible results are shown below:

Modes

 * Story Mode (1 Player) - In this solo mode, the story is as mentioned. As players make their way to Bowser’s castle, they must win first place on each game board, then beat the Boss Minigame for each board.
 * Party Mode (1-4 Players) - Compete against player or system-controlled players on a party board in a Battle Royale, Tag Battle or Duel Battle.
 * Minigame Mode (1-4 Players) - Play six games that draw upon the pool of all minigames for challenges that don’t take place on the game boards: Free Play, Step It Up, Battle Cup, Score Scuffle, Boss Bash and Rocket Rascals.
 * Puzzle Mode (1-2 Players) - Play six puzzle-action games, which include five classics from previous Mario Party games. This mode also includes the new touch-controlled Triangle Twisters, which has two play modes. In Frenzy Mode, players clear the field by twisting triangles so they connect with those of the same color. In Focus Mode, they twist them to build complex shapes, like turtles and pinwheels.
 * Multiplayer (2-4 Players) - Using one game card, players can wirelessly share Party Mode and Minigame Mode (2-4 players), plus Puzzle Mode (2 players) and the download-only Extras Mode with nearby friends who have a Nintendo DS.
 * Extras Mode - Includes games that are designed for two-player gaming: cooperative Pen Pals and competitive Desert Duel.
 * Gallery Mode- Check out 150 prizes, which includes figures, music and cut-scenes.

Spaces

 * Blue Space
 * Red Space
 * ? Space
 * Friend Space
 * Duel Space
 * Bowser Space

Items
Mario Party DS introduces two types of items that are used during gameboard gameplay: Normal items and new items called Hexes. Items are basically items that the player can use by itself; they can be purchased in Item Shops. Hexes are new items that players use to place them on spaces; they can be obtained by passing a Hex Area.

Normal Items

 * Double Dice Set
 * Triple Dice Set
 * Halfway Dice Block
 * Warp Dice Block
 * Snag Bag
 * Star Pipe
 * Block Sensor
 * Grab Bag

Hexes

 * 10-Coin Hex
 * 20-Coin Hex
 * Coin Swap Hex
 * 1-Star Hex
 * 2-Star Hex
 * Space Swap Hex
 * Star Block
 * Coin Block

4P Minigames

 * Goomba Wrangler is based on Pokemon Ranger.
 * Dress for Success is a term meaning one should be dressed for their best work.
 * Camera Shy is a term used for people who are shy to have their picture taken.
 * Hedge Honcho is a pun on "head honcho".
 * Study Fall is a pun on "study hall".
 * Cherry-Go-Round is a pun on "merry-go-round".
 * Trace Cadets is a pun on "space cadets".
 * Hot Shots is a term used for a person who's really good at shooting.
 * Call of the Goomba is a pun on "Call of the Wild".
 * Roller Coasters comes from the same name of a carnival ride.
 * Shortcut Circuit is a pun on "short circuit".
 * Trash Landing is a pun on "crash landing".
 * Whomp-a-thon is a pun on "marathon".
 * Twist and Route is a pun on the song "Twist and Shout".
 * Parachutin' Gallery is a pun on "shooting gallery".
 * Dust Buddies is a pun on "dust bunnies".
 * Sweet Sleuth is a pun on "sweet tooth".
 * Tidal Fools is a pun on "tidal pools".
 * Raft Riot is a pun on "laugh riot".

1 vs. 3 Minigames

 * Peek-a-Boo comes from a game parents play with babies.
 * Flash and Dash is a pun on "crash and dash".
 * Nothing to Luge is a pun on "nothing to lose.

2 vs. 2 Minigames

 * Cucumberjacks is a pun on "lumberjacks" and "cucumber".
 * Hanger Management is a pun on "anger management".
 * Book It! is a pun on the expression of the same name.

Battle Minigames

 * Globe Gunners is a pun on "Globe Runners".

Boss Minigames

 * Hexoskeleton is a pun on "exoskeleton", "hex", and "hexagon".

Beta Elements

 * For a list of this game beta elements, see here.

Trivia

 * This is the second Mario Party without Koopa Kid (also known as Mini Bowser) at the Bowser spaces; the first was Mario Party 8.
 * Bowser Jr. makes his first appearance in a Mario Party game.
 * This is also Diddy Kong's first appearance in a Mario Party game.
 * The characters Hammer Bro, Birdo, Blooper, Dry Bones, Boo and Toadette were playable in Mario Party 8, but not in Mario Party DS. Many of them are currently supporting characters. However, Birdo and Blooper never appeared in the game, but as references; the Birdo Egg in Memory Mash, and Blooper's name mentioned in the description of the item Kamek's Inkwell.
 * This is the first Mario Party since Mario Party 4 to not have any Donkey Kong spaces.
 * One of Yoshi's artworks is based off his Super Mario 64 DS version. There, Yoshi is depicted holding Mario's Cap.
 * Kamek's artwork is the same as both Magikoopa's and Kamek's (who appeared as a cameo in the beginning) in Super Mario Galaxy.
 * The song that plays in the Puzzle mini-games is a mixture of the song that plays in the Piece Out minigame from Mario Party 5.
 * In Mario's Puzzle Party, if one were to play as Peach or Daisy (more notably Daisy) the artwork of that character would be that of Mario Party 3, with them is their classic dresses (and Daisy's classic hair). Also, Toad is the only playable character to not have his artwork from Mario Party 3 on that game, probably since he's the only character not playable in Mario Party 3.
 * The manual has a mistake on Page 26. It states that during a 2 Player game, (the player vs a CPU opponent or another player), only Battle or Boss minigames can be chosen. During a 4 Player match (the player vs 3 CPU opponents or human players), 4 Player, 1 vs 3, 2 vs 2, Duel and Boss minigames can be chosen.
 * This is the only Mario Party game in which there are no Bonus Stars given out in the Story Mode.
 * In every minigame where the player can jump and punch, he/she can also kick. However, the game only shows the player how to kick in one minigame.
 * Mario Party DS is the second game to have a whistle that alerts the player to start and end the mini-games, the first being Mario Party Advance.