Princess Peach: Showtime Review – A Little Fuzzy

It feels like a lot of games lack ambition these days, or at least have their most creative ideas sanded down into something safer and easier to sell to a focus group by the time they arrive at our thumbsticks. Princess Peach: Showtime, to its credit, is definitely a highly ambitious title, offering ten distinct playstyles for Peach that go beyond just wearing a new costume. Unfortunately, it sacrifices depth for width, and ends up being only okay despite flashes of a much stronger game.

Showtime is Peach’s second solo outing, and the biggest criticism of her first game, Super Princess Peach, is that it pigeonholes her. The whole game is built around her emotions, and it’s often pointed out that this reduces Peach (and by extension women) to stereotypes. Showtime is a rebellion against that, shifting Peach out of the damsel in distress, elegant flower she was originally designed as and into far more exciting roles.

You have Swordfighter Peach and Kung Fu Peach that embrace more classic and aggressive combat gameplay, but Showtime is not an overcorrection, celebrating Peach’s femininity through Figure Skater Peach and Mermaid Peach as well. While no costume is terrible, there are a few too many. Some play almost identically, while others take up room other costumes could have had. The best ones grow in challenge and complexity across their three outings, but a handful never get out of first gear.

As a result of these options, a third of the game’s levels are little more than tutorials, which makes them feel like dead weight. This feeling only worsens when one of the boring ones returns, and you know the game is capable of so much better. A whole game of Cowgirl Peach, Swordfighter Peach, and even Figure Skater Peach could have brought Showtime up to Luigi’s Mansion levels. Instead, it feels more like Detective Pikachu with how little challenge it offers.

Of course, ‘I loved these three outfits’ is better than finding them all wanting – Patissiere, Ninja, and Kung Fu all do enough to pass too. But that leaves four (Detective, Mermaid, Mighty, and Dashing Thief) that are little more than filler. And the thing is, it wouldn’t really matter which four or five you cut for space to expand the rest – even Dashing Thief has potential if you pretend its name is Thief Catcher Peach. It’s more that there just isn’t enough time dedicated to any of them, making you resent the ones that don’t offer much to begin with.

Peach’s Ten Costumes

Those that excel do so thanks to an array of interesting gameplay choices. While the levels are linear, and each only takes around ten minutes to beat, each costume tries something new. Swordfighter is mostly a combat challenge but is also the only outfit in the game with a dodge mechanic, giving a greater emphasis on timing in battles. Meanwhile, Patissiere Peach is combat-free, and to win, you need to complete Cooking Mama-style challenges like icing a cake in the correct pattern before you run out of time. Not to belabour it, but we never see the best in any of these mechanics because of the game’s ease, but the range is definitely not phoned in.

As you might expect for a game in the Super Mario universe, there’s not much of a story. I mean, even the movie didn’t bother with one. However, the central conceit is more inventive here – Peach is at a theatre when an evil invader (Madame Grape) arrives and destroys everything. The reason Peach wears these costumes is because she goes into these plays to save each story, but the game is jarringly inconsistent with how this impacts things.

At times, it fully embraces the theatrical side of things, like having Cowgirl Peach ride a horse that is clearly a wooden puppet on strings, a la War Horse. When the sets look like they’re from a mid-budget drama club, it gives the game a strong sense of identity. However, at other times, it completely abandons this idea. Detective Peach climbs a real clock tower with active machinery and a real, flowing river outside, while Mermaid Peach levels take place entirely underwater, where Peach controls real fish.

Princess Peach: Showtime is a very approachable game and tries a lot of different ideas, which makes it perfect for extremely casual players or a younger audience. It’s just a shame that it doesn’t capture the ‘kids of all ages’ feeling of Mario’s adventures or the aforementioned Luigi’s Mansion. It’s more like Yoshi’s Crafted World, which makes sense as the two games were developed by Good-Feel. Though a significant step up from Super Princess Peach, Princess Peach: Showtime tries a little too much, and that means its best performances are overshadowed by discordant notes from the understudies.

Princess Peach: Showtime!

Reviewed on Nintendo Switch

Princess Peach: Showtime is a Nintendo Switch exclusive that finally thrusts the Mushroom Kingdom’s leading lady back into the spotlight. Tasked with taking down the Sour Bunch which has taken over the Sparkle Theater, Peach will assume various roles and accrue all sorts of different powers as her battle against the villainous group progresses.

Released

March 22, 2024

Developer(s)

Good-Feel

Pros

• Creative costume choices
• Range of gameplay options
• Gives Peach more character

Cons

• Too many shallow tutorial levels
• Several costumes feel like filler
• Lack of challenge throughout