- Refreshing Herbs are handy for status effects and are cost-effective for healing ailments.
- Syrup Jars are crucial for replenishing Bros. Points, especially in longer boss fights.
- Mushrooms, Candy, and other unique items help maintain health and BP efficiently in tough battles.
The undeniable star of Mario & Luigi Brothership (aside from maybe the brothers themselves) is the engaging turn-based combat system. This RPG subseries is defined by the combination of timed actions with turn-based gameplay to make getting through each of the battles less about just the numbers, and more about skill.
While the combat at the beginning of Brothership is not too challenging, as you get later into the game you’ll quickly realize that you’ll need a healthy supply of items to keep the plumbers healthy between checkpoints. Some of these items are incredibly useful, and you’ll want them on you at all times, while others are much more circumstantial, but which are the best?
7
Refreshing Herb
Back To Basics
In turn-based RPGs, status effects can often be incredibly impactful, and turn the tides of combat. While they are still very much present in Mario & Luigi Brothership, they aren’t as annoying as they could be, and they’ll only start to become more of a nuisance in the late-game.
You’ll want to keep some Refreshing Herbs on hand just in case one of the four status ailments (trip, dizzy, burn, and ice) is sticking around for too long. However, a lot of these conditions will naturally heal before they weaken you too much, so you’ll likely not need to buy that many Refreshing Herbs since you’ll get through them quite slowly.
6
Syrup Jar
Bros. Points Refresh
For the first couple of islands in Mario & Luigi Brothership, you won’t need to use your BP at all, but once you unlock your first Bros. Move, you’ll realize just how quickly this secondary resource can be drained.
It won’t be until you get to longer boss fights in the second half of the game when you’ll be consistently running low on BP, and when this happens you’ll want a healthy supply of Syrup Jars to keep you replenished. Since you likely won’t need these jars until the mid-game, hopefully you’ll have a good amount hoarded from the first half of the game to last you for a while.
5
Super Mushroom
Staying Healthy
It’s basic, but you’ll need to keep the health of both Mario and Luigi high if you want to succeed in Mario & Luigi Brothership. The best moves will require both brothers being fighting fit, so you’ll want to make sure that neither of the brothers stay on low health for too long.
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Of course, the best item that focuses on keeping the brothers healthy are Mushrooms. You’ll come across plenty of these in the overworld, so you likely won’t need to buy too many as you progress through the game. Also, make sure that the Auto-Mushroom Battle Plug hasn’t drained your supply, since this ability can run through them quite quickly.
4
Candy
Both Points Covered
While you probably won’t need to use Candy too often in the early-game of Mario & Luigi Brothership, the later you get in, the tougher the fights will be, and for these encounters, you’ll get through your health and BP quickly.
While you can spend multiple turns using Mushrooms and Syrup Jars to replenish your health and BP separately, you can save some time by instead using Candy to heal both at the same time. These consumables are rarer, so make sure you’re only using them when they’ll be useful for both stats it heals.
3
1-Up Mushroom
Getting Back Up
Compared to other turn-based RPGs, your party in Mario & Luigi Brothership never gets more members after you have both brothers, so it’s surprisingly easy for your entire party to be wiped out if you aren’t able to dodge enough hits.
This also means that reviving the fallen brother is important, since with one down, your safety net has dropped and the battle could end quickly. This is why you’ll want enough 1-UP Mushrooms on hand to ensure that you can always revive one of the brothers if they run out of health.
2
Nut
Enough For Both Of Them
While only a few of Mario and Luigi’s special abilities let them hit multiple enemies with one attack, bosses are much luckier and have plenty of opportunities to hit both brothers with a single attack. This means that you’ll often find that both of the plumbers can be low on health at the same time.
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It’s risky to just try and heal each of them individually, so in these cases you’ll want to use a Nut instead, since these items can heal both of the brothers simultaneously. Nuts only get increasingly valuable as you progress throughout Brothership, since enemies with multi-hitting attacks just get more and more common.
1
Boo Biscuit
If The Going Gets Tough
Most of the items in Mario & Luigi Brothership can be quite easily lumped together as more generic healing consumables, but one that stands out for giving the brothers a proper advantage over their enemies are Boo Biscuits.
These can be eaten by either of the brothers and will give them invincibility for a set period of time, meaning that they won’t take any damage from attacks, even if they completely fail to dodge them. This ability is especially useful when used against bosses that have charged-up attacks that are hard-hitting and tricky to dodge.
- Franchise
-
Mario & Luigi
- Released
-
November 7, 2024
- Developer(s)
-
Acquire
- Publisher(s)
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Nintendo
- ESRB
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E For Everyone Due To Mild Fantasy Violence
- How Long To Beat
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37 hours
- OpenCritic Rating
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Strong
- Nintendo Switch Release Date
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November 7, 2024