When comparing One More Dungeon vs Mario Tennis Aces, the Slant community recommends One More Dungeon for most people. In the question“What are the best single-player games for the Nintendo Switch?” One More Dungeon is ranked 13th while Mario Tennis Aces is ranked 17th. The most important reason people chose One More Dungeon is:
Staves act as the ranged weapon to shoot projectiles at your foes, as well have some magical attributes like freezing, poisoning, and burning. Staff use is limited as ammo comes in the form of various crystals (fire, ice, and acid) which can be found scattered around the maps. Some staves, such as the Ice Beam Staff, only consume ice crystals. However others, like the Mirror Staff which causes your shots to bounce off walls, requires 1 crystal of each type to use. Some enemies are also weak to certain damage types like fire or acid, so you'll have to plan and manage your crystals appropriately if you want to do max damage with staves. Between the sheer variety of staffs and micromanaging your crystals to use each staff to it's full potential, everything comes together into a ranged weapon system that's both interesting and functional.
Specs
Ranked in these QuestionsQuestion Ranking
Pros
Pro Interesting ranged weapon play
Staves act as the ranged weapon to shoot projectiles at your foes, as well have some magical attributes like freezing, poisoning, and burning.
Staff use is limited as ammo comes in the form of various crystals (fire, ice, and acid) which can be found scattered around the maps. Some staves, such as the Ice Beam Staff, only consume ice crystals. However others, like the Mirror Staff which causes your shots to bounce off walls, requires 1 crystal of each type to use.
Some enemies are also weak to certain damage types like fire or acid, so you'll have to plan and manage your crystals appropriately if you want to do max damage with staves.
Between the sheer variety of staffs and micromanaging your crystals to use each staff to it's full potential, everything comes together into a ranged weapon system that's both interesting and functional.
Pro It gives you a fresh experience every run
The dungeons, items, and enemies are procedurally generated. This ensures the levels are truly random each and every time, with items, bosses, traps, and secret rooms scattered about in new places every run. You'll never play the same map twice.
Pro Retro art style
The simple pixel art is full of charm for those that enjoy the bloated 8 bit style, and it takes a lot of it's inspiration from games such as the original Doom and Minecraft. The blocky textures, chunky pixels, and 2D enemies are a definite nod to old school gaming. It's a visual feast for retro lovers.
Pro You can customize the gameplay with Mutators for an added challenge
Every time you kill an enemy, you earn points which can be used to purchase Mutators. These Mutators are game options that change your experience a bit, and are a great way to try something new or add an extra layer of difficulty. Some examples of Mutators include starting the game with 1 hit point, reduced view distance, extra power ups, and extra enemies. There are quite a few to choose from, and you can activate 2 at a time which means you can mix and match them to find your perfect challenge.
Pro Barebones gameplay but still quite fun for a few hours
One More Dungeon is a fairly basic first person dungeon crawler. Roaming around dungeons, picking up power ups, killing enemies, avoiding traps, and using a variety of different weapons. There's no looking up or down, so combat is pretty straightforward. Run up and hit a monster, or line up your ranged attack. Bosses have a few simple mechanics but nothing fancy. Dungeons are randomly generated so you'll never play the same one twice.
Pro Couch co-op with a friend is tons of fun
Playing with a friend right beside you makes the game much more enjoyable. Reacting to each other in real-time is just better than playing against a computer opponent. There's no online co-op -- only multiplayer matches against random people -- meaning you'll have to be in the same room together to play.
Pro Solid roster of Nintendo characters to play as
There's a good variety of characters you can play as. If you're familiar with first party Nintendo games, then you'll see a lot of familiar faces here, like Yoshi, Bowser, Donkey Kong, Luigi, Peach, and of course Mario. Everyone has their own playing styles, with bigger characters like Bowser and Donkey Kong favoring hard-hitting power shots, and others like Yoshi and Mario that have a more balanced approach. You can go with whichever style or character you prefer, practicing with them until you master everything. Getting to see all of these characters together in one game is great for fanservice as well.
Pro You can compete against others online in multiplayer
When you run out of single-player content to enjoy, you can hop online to play against random opponents. The main game mode is the tournaments you can play, which rewards you with special characters if you score well. Online connectivity is good too, especially with the choice to drop out of matches beforehand against players who have bad connections. Playing online is a really great way to test your skills and improve your play, since anyone you get matched with is an actual player who has their own strengths and weaknesses.
Pro Intense and engaging tennis matches
Mario Tennis Aces is incredibly addicting to play. Matches are fast-paced and exciting, with one particular mechanic that keeps things unpredictable. Every time you successfully hit the tennis ball to your opponent's end of the court, you build up a power meter that you can use in a couple of different ways.
When you want to quickly finish off a match, you can slow down time and take aim at a vulnerable corner of your opponent's court for an instant win. Or, if they try to do that to you, you can instead expend some of your power meter to quickly reach the ball and hit it back. Things can get pretty tricky when you both use up your power meters at the same time, leading to some satisfying wins.
Cons
Con Repetitive gameplay
The randomly generated maps are very similar to one another. In most cases, they require a bunch of backtracking due to bad layouts, meaning a lot of play time is spent walking instead of fighting. Enemies either blindly charge at you or sit at the same predetermined distance to shoot at you, without any kind of noticeable strategy behind their actions. Overall, the similar maps and predictable enemies just don't change things up enough from level to level to retain your interest for long.
Con Melee weapons feel imbalanced to play with
The melee weapons seem to hit a little off center and to the right of where you're actually aiming. You can adjust for this with a little practice, but it just doesn't feel good to control. Also, the range on most melee weapons is so low that they're almost effectively useless since you have to be practically right on top of enemies. During the early game, you'll be too weak to be up close and personal with enemies, so the sheer difficulty discourages any kind of melee play.
Con You can't look up or down
There's no Y-axis which means you can't look up and down. This greatly reduces the immersion in the environment and your only perspective is limited to a straight on, first person view.
Con There's no story
The only goal is to escape the various dungeons, and there's no kind of story to keep your attention. While this may be okay for some, those who prefer at least a basic story with their games might be disappointed.
Con Very wide skill gap between experienced and inexperienced players
Mario Tennis Aces can be unwelcoming to new players. While playing co-op or online, it's tough to catch up with everyone else who knows how to time their power shots with the meter. If you don't pick up on this mechanic fairly quickly, you may feel like you're getting left behind. You don't necessarily have to use the mechanic if you and a friend agree not to, but this sadly makes matches pretty dull. Running against computer opponents is a good way to get your feet wet before moving up to other levels of play.
Con Limited gameplay options for solo players
If you're the type who prefers to game alone, then Mario Tennis Aces might not be for you. There's only one single-player mode, while the rest of the game is mostly dedicated to co-op and online play. The solo mode is also extremely short, clocking in at around four hours. Aside from that, there really isn't much else for you to do.
Con Certain characters are locked behind online tournaments
The primary way to unlock new characters is to win tournaments, but this isn't entirely fair. They're only available for a limited amount of time, with the rewards changing from tournament to tournament. Even though some of these characters are in the actual game as opponents in the single-player adventure mode, you can't get access to them unless you unlock them through these tournaments. If you don't like playing online, or if you don't have the means to pay for Nintendo's online service once it's implemented later on in 2018, then you're basically out of luck.
Con Single-player adventure mode is pretty difficult
The game's adventure mode makes up for its short length with some real difficulty. It's a rough introduction to the gameplay, as some of the matches and bosses are really hard. There's plenty of variety to things, like courts that have certain hazards in your way and uneven terrain such as tall grass, as well as inventive boss designs like a giant squid that shoots out tennis ball-shaped blobs of ink. But all of these things can get quite overwhelming, especially if you're using the single-player mode to get better at the game.