I'm in the same boat. I actually have a lot of complaints but I'm loving it so far. Maybe it's just because it's a NEW Mario Party?

Things I like:
- Presentation is really slick. Maybe too slick? I miss some of the Mario themed fonts everywhere but do appreciate how easy the UI is to read.
- The minigames steal the show for me. I think most of them are really good so far. Even the motion controlled games don't seem too annoying.
- Pacing seems pretty good. Games go by more quickly than in some Mario Party entries.
- Lots of choices. Even though the boards are smaller, you hit a lot of forks in the road, causing you to make decisions. Do I go for the star, or do I try to get more coins/allies? Do I even have a chance of getting the star, making a grab at it a waste of time?
- The Dice Blocks - I like how they have some risk/reward involved. Any time that Mario Party allows the players to make choices is a good thing IMO. That was the main problem in 9 and 10. You just jammed on the A button until it was time to play a minigame.
- New characters - playing as Bowser's minions is a ton of fun. Hammer Bro.'s "Ohhh noooo" makes you feel pretty bad for him.
- Playing as Bowser - I thought this would feel "wrong" for Mario Party, but it's not really that bad. I'm still kind of a staunch advocate that Bowser should be lurking in the background of Mario Party, not a participant, but he works fine.

Things I don't like:
- I've said this numerous places so I'm probably a broken record here: The game doesn't have a "suspend" feature. You can't a.) Save a game to resume later, or b.) Soft save/suspend a game to resume later. I like playing 15 or 20 turn games, but we can't always realistically complete them in one sitting. Plus, it's the Switch! I rotate games all the time. It's unrealistic that I wouldn't want to try and level up in another game, or maybe we want to play Mario Kart. This game should be auto saving after every turn!!! Plus, if there was auto saving after every turn, online play would make way more sense. That way, if a player loses connection, you haven't lost your progress. I don't know how even Nintendo would omit a feature like this.
- Lack of online play - It really doesn't make sense to me. I have friends that I play Overwatch with for 2, 3 hours at a time. We've always wanted to play something like Mario Party together. I don't understand why we can't play the main game online. Another time where I'm like...can't Nintendo just do things the way other companies do?
- Pacing is a little TOO brisk sometimes - I like the faster games in general, but I also miss the fanfare. Using the magic lamp or stealing a star in past games always took forever. Now it goes by in the blink of an eye. This isn't bad, but I would almost prefer a middle ground. Declaring the winner at the end of the game has virtually no fanfare at all. No curtain unveiling, no stair climbing, no cutscenes. Just a split screen with some text. I wouldn't mind some slower moments for special events in the game.
- Not enough boards. The boards in the game aren't bad, but I'd like more of them.
- Soundstage - This mode would be AWESOME if the rumble and my TV audio weren't so out of sync. Even on my TV with slightly less input lag, I can't help but feel that the rhythm is off. I wish there was a way to calibrate the audio.
- River Rapids - I love this mode as well, but motion controls are required. I'd understand it if this mode was shorter, but it's actually pretty long! And there's no nuance to the motion - it's just waggle. I'd much rather press a button. ESPECIALLY given that you have to beat this mode three separate times to unlock Donkey Kong.. Speaking of which:
- Unlocking Donkey Kong - Seriously? I'm all for making the player work to unlock things, but this is a bit much, especially since you didn't have to do this in previous games.
- Walking around the plaza - This is a cute little feature, but at the end of the day, the menu works fine. I'm not sure that this was the best choice to select modes in the game. After the first hour with the game, I've essentially stopped using it.
- Playing as Bowser - I know I put this as a positive, but I'll also list it as a negative. Toad and Toadette just aren't the most charismatic hosts, and I think I'd prefer that THEY are playable instead of Bowser. At the very least, Toad has experience explaining games to you. I do wish that the Bowser spaces were back though. I live for the BIG moments in Mario Party, and Bowser spaces definitely fit that bill in past games.

Again - I know that sounds like a ton of complaining, right? But I'm having a ton of fun with the game. Definitely makes me optimistic about future games. I'm so glad they ditched the car mechanic.

My fiancee and I had two games yesterday. One at 10 turns. Another at 15 turns. We we're having a bunch of fun. I'm loving the game so far. I can't wait to play with other past fans of the series who haven't played one in years.

The minigames are really fun so far. I'm liking the motion controls aspect.

@PogueSquadron
I do kind of miss Bowser's asshattery. Kamek is okay, but Bowsy had more panache.

I totally agree with your suspend feature, but I actually wish that the pacing were more brisk (possibly because I was trying to finish in a hurry in order to squeeze movie in afterwards).

And I remember 9 & 10 being more strategic regarding board movement, taking advantage of the items and ability to occasionally move backwards to maximize your mini-stars or screw over the other guy. Granted, I've only played one game of SMP...

By the way, four of us picking this game up on launch weekend is pretty impressive. It just might have hit the party game zeitgeist!

Played about four turns last night with a buddy before heading out to the bars. Maybe we weren't in the right frame of mind for it, but it wasn't my thing. I was pretty disappointed in the lack of personality; I get why they do it, they want it to feel more "modern" in the sense that this is just a generic board game starring Mario characters so it can have a wide appeal, but man, I'll take Mario Party 2 over this any day.

Played it with friends and played it again tonight with my fiancee. Wonderful fun still, though whoa the CPU had it out for her.

Do you guys play on Normal, Hard, or Very Hard mode when it comes to the difficulty setting? What's your favorite of the three base maps?

This is good. My sister-in-law got it and we've played a couple quick 10-round plays. The best addition for me is the alternate dice--there's now some genuine strategy to rolling, and I think it's great! I particularly like the character dice that have high probabilities for certain numbers, like Shy Guy and Daisy. Really clever addition to the series. The minigames have been universally enjoyable too, and the large roster is impressive. I've only played one of the side modes (the rhythm one) but it was actually nicely done with some fun presentational elements.

I'm still a bit surprised that some elements of Mario Party still haven't been brought back or improved upon though. For instance, I always loved the macro sense of progression in the first one with the stuff you can buy in the shop and the quest to get 100 stars for the final board. That element has always seemed really dialed back in every subsequent game. It's also puzzling how there seem to be a lack of options when it comes to board speed, game saving and using the Pro Controller. Playing with a single Joy-Con is kind of a pain, even though the high fives are fun.

The only macro progression seems to be getting the gems (which you seem to get from completing boards in the various modes) but apparently all that does is unlock a cutscene.

We've liked recent Mario Parties so I'm curious about this one. It seems similar to Mario Party Star Rush with its special dice blocks per character and the ally collection, but I never got the chance to play that in multiplayer so this game would help with that.

Considering that Joycons are still like $70-$80 bucks everywhere getting a pair of Joycons and Super Mario Party for $100 is actually a pretty solid deal right?!

Hmm, and since it is a game this might be something I could use GCU on and get for $80 total!? Not sure if it works with games bundled with hardware.

/EDIT Seems like Best Buy doesn't even really carry this bundle. Still, even at $100 it's not a bad deal if you were planning on getting new Joy Cons anyway.

@Zero Best Buy has it, you're just a bit late to the party. It sold out quickly because GCU does indeed work with it, lots of CAGs grabbed it right away. There may be a restock at some point, I'm not sure if this bundle is a limited time deal or a permanent fixture. Worth checking back later I s'pose.

@Mop it up Yeah I found the page I just wasn't sure if they carried it in any serious fashion. Would be nice if they restocked, but I will probably end up getting new Joycons before then anyway.

I might try to fix my broken Joycon first though. I found places that sell new analog stick replacements for $10. Looks semi complicated inside of the Joycon but might be worth a shot...

Oh man, seems the $99 bundle is sold out pretty much everywhere. I found one in a Rockford store, only 82 miles from my place!

Not worth it.