TEST
He is a plumber, he gibbered an incomprehensible Italian, he wore a mustache, a cap and a jumpsuit, he jumped into the pipes to collect coins. Mario, you say? Missed ! For once, let's talk about his brother Luigi, who looks like him like two drops of water. Finer and dressed in green, Luigi usually plays the supporting roles in Mario games. But since 2001, he has distinguished himself in his own license: Luigi's Mansion . The third episode is out for Halloween on Nintendo Switch exclusively. A nice success in the style of Nintendo: a family game, funny and inspired.
Luigi with Ghost SOS sauce
It all starts as a good old Nintendo game. Mario, Luigi, Princess Peach and their friends the Toads are invited to spend a stay in a luxury hotel. The dream ! Except that ... it's a trap! In the night, Mario, Peach and the others are captured by King Boo, the king of ghosts. Only Luigi manages to escape him. So it's her turn to play the heroes to save her friends by exploring the ghost haunted hotel.
Reassure the most fearful, Luigi's Mansion 3 remains a Nintendo game so it's not really scary. Besides, Luigi is not really a hero either. It's a real fun! He spends his time jumping, he walks on tiptoe, his knees are shaking and his teeth are slamming. The ghosts, they, give themselves to their heart to play him bad tricks.
But Luigi has an unstoppable weapon against ghosts ... a vacuum! Not a Dyson but the Ectoblast G-LU. A rather special model that sucks everything, including ghosts. And that's how Luigi fights in the game: first flaming the ghosts with his flashlight to paralyze them, then sucking them. It's a bit Ghosbusters in the cartoonesque world of Mario. In fact, the combat system is very repetitive, or even a little tired after about ten hours to aspire ghosts, even if there are different kinds with each weak point.
A rich and varied universe
Despite this small reservation, Luigi's Mansion 3 is really the Nintendo recipe for a successful game. Very accessible already: the goal is clear from the beginning, it is necessary to go up one by one the 17 floors of the hotel to go to save the friends of Luigi. Each floor has its own atmosphere: shopping mall, tropical jungle, Egyptian temple, movie set ... It's very varied and it compensates for the monotony of the gameplay. Each level is based on the same mechanics: exploration of various pieces, solving puzzles to progress and finally confrontation with the final boss.
But the whole is beautiful enough, funny and taking so that we never get bored. Just complete a few levels to be taken with an irrepressible desire to go to the end. To achieve this, count a good twenty hours, surprisingly long duration for a game of this type. The most meticulous players will lengthen the game by a few hours exploring the hotel from top to bottom to find collectibles (well) hidden.
But the real highlight of Luigi's Mansion 3 is its clever side. It's a clever game. So, one of the novelties of this episode is the possibility of invoking a clone of Luigi: Gluigi. It is a gooey version of the character that can pass through the grids and into the pipes.
And it changes everything in the way of playing! When we are faced with an enigma, we must think about what Luigi can do with his vacuum cleaner but also what Gluigi can do with his powers. In short, we must dig a little brains.
To advance, play several!
We come to a key element of Luigi's Mansion 3's success: the difficulty. On paper, it's a pretty childish game. But again, this is the legged Nintendo, the game is also for adults because it is not obvious at all! The higher up the hotel floors, the more complex the puzzles are and the more the bosses are twisted. It is not uncommon to find yourself stuck in a room, to suck up anything that moves or to comb through all the walls to spot a flaw or hidden mechanism. As for bosses, sometimes you have to agree to die several times to understand the pattern to beat them. Ingenuity must be the keyword of your adventure.
As a result, if Luigi's Mansion 3 is technically playable from the age of seven, it is above all a very good intergenerational game. The story mode is playable solo but also in cooperation with two. Perfect for a parent-child pair, the adult can come to the rescue of the little if it is blocked. Let's mention to finish the multiplayer mode, up to eight in local, very well done for parties with friends. It offers very fun mini-games or the opportunity to explore the haunted hotel to complete various missions in a given time, either for himself or in teams.
Our opinion :
Not really a flagship license of Nintendo, Luigi's Mansion cultivates with this third episode its singularity. Between Luigi, a terribly endearing freakish hero, and the jokey and zany ghosts, this visit to a haunted hotel is worth the detour. Novice players will take pleasure in facing the ghosts, hoover on the back, while the more experienced will find their happiness in the riddles and the meticulous exploration of the many levels. Above all, Luigi's Mansion 3 is the perfect game to gather parents and children and to afford a good laugh at the family.