Mario Hoops 3-on-3

Mario Hoops 3-on-3 (also known as Mario Basketball 3-on-3 in Japan and as Mario Slam Basketball in Europe) is a Mario sports game developed by Square Enix for the Nintendo DS. This time around, Mario and his friends are playing basketball.

In the beginning, it was meant to be an original intellectual property, but Square Enix felt that it would work well if it were a part of the Mario franchise, and so Square Enix contacted Nintendo, who then allowed them to use the Mario label. This game is the first in which Mario and Final Fantasy characters appear together as playable characters.

Characters
{{legend|Technical – good at shooting|Powerful – good a stealing|Tricky – full of trick moves|Speedy – as said|All-around: Equal stats in all four categories}}

Mario Characters

 * Mario – All-around.
 * Luigi – All-around.
 * Peach – Technical
 * Daisy – Technical
 * Yoshi – All-around
 * Wario – Powerful
 * Waluigi – Technical
 * Donkey Kong – Powerful
 * Diddy Kong – Speedy
 * Bowser Jr. – Speedy


 * Dixie Kong – Speedy
 * Bowser – Powerful
 * Birdo – All-around
 * Paratroopa – Tricky
 * Fly Guy – Tricky
 * Boo – Tricky

Final Fantasy Characters

 * Ninja – All-around
 * Black Mage – Tricky
 * White Mage – Technical
 * Moogle – Tricky
 * Cactuar – Speedy

Non-Playable Characters

 * Petey Piranha
 * Malboro
 * Gooper Blooper

Gameplay
The main mode is Tourney mode, where a team of 3 is chosen and they compete against other teams for the cup, in generally 3 matches. Exhibition mode is like quick-play, as well as customizable.

Almost all of the gameplay in the game is controlled by the Touch Screen. The only exceptions are moving a character, which is controlled by the D-pad, and a special form of passing, which uses the L button. This can be switched around with the buttons controlling movement and the R button for passing for left-handed players.

There are many moves for offense and defense. The player's team of three is identified with a red circle below them, a blue circle for the opponent team's players. The player's team's basket is always facing ahead of them, and the opponent's team in the back, even when switching court. Therefore, generally, stroking up on the touch screen is used for offense and stroking down is used for defense. For more on moves, see the Practice section.

Scoring
Scoring is a bit different in Mario Hoops than in a real world basketball game. Each shot made is worth 20 points. Shots made outside of what is normally the 3-point line are worth 30 points (therefore, the basic shot is multiplied by 10 in Mario Hoops). Special shots, regardless of position are worth 40 points. To compound the points, coins also come into play. Players can collect coins by dribbling over the ? panels scattered about the court. Regular coins add 1 point each to the score, and red coins add 10 points to the score. Every time a team makes a basket, their coins are reset to zero. Getting hit, either from items or other players, will result in some of the player's coins scattering on the field, which can be picked up by anyone, including the character who lost them. The limit to the number of coins one team can have is 100 (therefore the maximum normal score for one shot is 140), and the more coins one has, the more are lost on a hit.

Challenges
Challenges contains both practice modes and then a true extra challenge-like mode after completing the main practice mode.

Practice
Practice game skills to use during games. Choose a skill you want to practice from the menu. As Mario, players will practice basic techniques upon starting the game, then advanced techniques after winning the first tourney (Offense 2 and Defense 2). If a defensive man is needed for practice, it is always Wario.

The following is a table of each lesson, which explains the control mechanism for each move, as well as each exercise to practice the lesson. If the requirement is just a number, the player must do the move that number of times. If it's a time limit, the player has that much time to do that objective (i.e. block a player from dunking).

Special Shots
"Practice dribbling commands of players who've mastered their special shots !" Players can practice Special Shots with any player unlocked (the shots themselves don't have to be mastered, despite the in-game description). It acts like a lesson, with the objective to do the special shot 3 times from anywhere on the court, with two other characters supplied for alley-oops. For specific info for each character's special shot, see the template.

Dribble Race (Time Trial)
"Get 100 coins from ? panels and head for the goal! Beat the best time !" This extra mode allows the player to pick any character and try to gather 100 coins from ? Panels and cross the finish time in as little time as possible. There are three of these mini-courses, to unlock the last one the preset records must be beaten in the first two.


 * Peach's Castle – Green Shells come out of three pipes. Each ? Panel has 10 coins. (45 sec)
 * Sunshine Road – Metal flatteners line this course. Most ? Panels have 5 coins. (55 sec)
 * Rainbow Road – Blue fireballs erupt out from under the course. Most ? Panels have 5 coins. (1 min)

Tourney
Tourneys are the equivalent of tournaments in the Mario Kart series. After picking a team of three, players go on to compete in a set of matches (2 periods of 2:30 each), each on a different course. In fact, the tourney is composed of a 8-4-2-1 basis. The other 7 teams are chosen random, and are represented by the captains (center / first character picked) on the elimination screen (shown right). When the player beats the first team, the captain breaks through a classic block while the losing CPU captain comes up with a deactivated block. The gold trophy stands at the top of this screen, with a ? Block below it. The player goes through Round 1, Round 2, and the Finals. Each time the player loses a match, he or she can try it again as many times as necessary to win and move on (i.e. there's no ranking out like in Mario Kart).

When the Final Fantasy team steal the trophy after the Rainbow Cup, the ? Block reveals a tall vine, which the captain climbs up to the Rainbow Ship, initiating the Extra match.

There are four tourneys, and they nearly follow suit with the Mario Kart series in being named Mushroom, Flower, Star and Rainbow. Once all four tourneys are won, their respective hard mode versions are unlocked. Each of the eight tourneys receives a bronze, silver, or gold trophy (separate from the automatic trophy presented upon winning, this is like a grade on how well the player did). They are determined as follows:
 *  Gold  – Winning all matches by 200 points or more
 *  Silver  – Winning all matches by 100 points or more
 *  Bronze  – Winning the tournament

Therefore, losing even once automatically puts gold & silver out of the question. By abusing the quit feature (which saves the player's position upon winning each match) when about to lose or win by too little, "redos" are possible.

Upon winning the tournament, the player is asked whether he or she wants to move on to the next tourney. If it is the Rainbow Tourney, the credits roll.

Exhibition
Players can choose a team of three, even the opponent's players if desired (each spot left blank is chosen randomly), and jump into any course played and won in Tourney Mode. There are some settings to enhance the one match as well: * Unlocked after winning Hard Rainbow Tourney.
 * Time per Period: 1:40, 2:00, 2:30 (default), 3:00, 3:20.
 * # of Periods: 2 (default), 4.
 * ? Panels: On (default), Off. If off, shots inside the outer line are 2 points, outside of the line 3 points, and special shots 4 points.
 * CPU Level: 1 (Amateur), 2 (Weak, default), 3 (Normal), 4 (Tough), 5 (Brutal), 6* (Pro).

After the match, the player can play with the exact same settings or quit the mode (there's no way to just change the course or one character).

Matchup
This is the multiplayer mode of Mario Hoops. DS Wireless Play includes three modes, while DS Download only includes two of those three.

Exhibition
"Mario Hoops Face-off! Game results will be recorded in the player ranking . Win matches to earn points and rank up !" The single mode that is limited to local wireless, two players can choose their team of 3 and face off against each other, subject to the same settings as normal Exhibition Mode.

Dribble Race
"Dribble Race Versus Friends! Nab 100 coins from ? panels and beat everyone to the goal!" Same as Dribble Race Mode, except it's not a time trial: the first to cross the finish line with 100 coins wins, and is available with 2-4 players.

Coin Hunter
"Coin Hunting with Friends! Throw items and scramble for coins ! Hold on to coins until the end to win!" This is a non-basketball related mode that draws heavily on Mario Kart's battle mode. Each player (up to 4) starts with 50 coins. Players then use items to reduce the other player's coins. The single player remaining with coins wins. In a three or four-player game, players eliminated early can stick around to annoy players still in the competition (similar to Mario Kart 64). There are four courses; the last two are unlockable.
 * Mario Classic 1-1
 * Mario Classic 8-4
 * Mario Classic 2-2
 * Forest Stage

Courts

 * Mushroom Tourney
 * Mario Stadium
 * Koopa Beach
 * Peach Field
 * Sunset Beach-Unlockable


 * Flower Tourney
 * DK Cruiser
 * Luigi Mansion
 * Daisy Garden
 * Malboro Garden-Unlockable


 * Star Tourney
 * Wario Factory
 * Jr. Street
 * Bowser Castle
 * Glare Desert-Unlockable


 * Rainbow Tourney
 * Sherbet Land
 * Bloocheep Sea
 * Pirate Ship
 * Rainbow Ship