Whelp, I finally bought Mario + Rabbids after an eternity of mild temptations in repeat sales and gosh, it's pretty good! In fact after a few hours play I think I (whisper it) prefer it to XCOM. It's actually my first Mario game on the Switch too and wowsers, Mushroom Kingdom looks awful nice to run around in. For some reason it also looks fairly lush as a 1080p displayed on my 1440p with everything getting a sort of satisfyingly only-very-slightly-soft plasticine look. The main stumbling block on buying this was the Rabbids themselves, as I tend to loathe anything Minion style, but they actually translate well into this and there have been a few chucklesome moments thus far. The plot, such as it is, makes sense too.
Anyway, battles are brisk, fun and easy to restart if you realise you're going about things wrong. The jumpy-heady-movement mechanic is excellent and really opens up play, which probably has Firaxis mildly gnashing their teeth that they can't plausibly get hulking armoured resistance fighters in their game to jump on each others heads to flank snake-men and what-have. There's a nice exploration element too with light puzzling in order to pick up coins to upgrade weapons, and find hidden chests with bonus goodies. This works really well, as the puzzles fit seamlessly into the Mushroom Kingdom environment and you want to solve them just as part of exploration to see new vistas, to witness silly things going on and simply out of the simple joy of puzzle-solving. The fact that coins fly at you and chests open up is a happy bonus. Good lord, is this really a Ubisoft game where collecting things doesn't feel like gruelling treadmill work?
So yes. Mario + Rabbids is on sale today at £11 but the sale ends this very day, so if you're thinking of buying it I say snap it up now. It's good times.