Super Monkey Ball


Super Monkey Ball is a series of arcade platform video games initially developed by Amusement Vision and published by Sega. The game debuted in Japan in 2001 as an upright arcade cabinet called Monkey Ball which featured a banana-shaped joystick. Later that year, it was released as a GameCube game. Several sequels and ports have been released.

Games

As opposed to normal games where the player takes control of the character itself, Super Monkey Ball has the player move their character around by tilting the world itself. By tilting the board at various angles, players can control the speed and turning of the character. The goal of each level is to reach the goal gate before the timer runs out, and without falling off the floor. Bonus points and extra lives can be increased by collecting bananas on the stage. Early games use traditional controllers to play while many recent titles utilize modern technology, such as the accelerometers of the Wii and iPhone titles. The gameplay is similar to Atari Games' 1984 arcade video game Marble Madness.

Characters

The playable characters of the whole series are Aiai, Meemee Baby, Gongon, Yanyan, Doctor, Jam, Jet, C Aiai, W Meemee, A Baby, F Gongon, P Yanyan, R Doctor, N Jam, and B Jet. Aiai is a playable character in Sonic Riders and Sega Superstars Tennis. Aiai also appears in Sonic & Sega All-Stars Racing. In this game, he rides a banana car and his All-Star move has him racing in his ball along with Meemee, Gongon and Baby crashing into the other players. He returns in the sequel, Sonic & All-Stars Racing Transformed, along with the addition of Meemee as a playable character. Aiai was also featured in Archie Comics' adaptation of the second game in Sonic Universe #45.
The primary characters are Aiai, Meemee Baby and Gongon. They are present in many games. Super Monkey Ball Adventure, , and Super Monkey Ball 3D incorporated a larger roster of playable characters, usually varying from title to title.
As of 2006, the franchise has sold 4 million copies. The iOS version in 2008 was one of the first games on the App Store and was the best selling app on launch day. A 2006 study conducted by the Beth Israel Medical Center found that surgeons who played Super Monkey Ball for 20 minutes prior to performing a surgical drill finished slightly faster and made fewer mistakes. In 2009, Edge ranked the first Super Monkey Ball #39 on its list of "The 100 Best Games To Play Today", stating "Seeing its sturdy physics model being used to perform incredible acrobatic feats shows just how finely honed it is." Writing in 1001 Video Games You Must Play Before You Die, Christian Donlan described Super Monkey Ball as "one of Sega's grade-A triumphs." An enhanced engine of the Gamecube games was used in F-Zero GX, which was critically acclaimed and Nintendo considered a step forward for the franchise. The developers of Super Monkey Ball went on to make the Yakuza series.
When commenting on the differences of the franchise between the Gamecube games and the Wii entries with Banana Blitz and Step & Roll, Toshihiro Nagoshi stated that they were made easier for kids and families. However if they got the chance, they would like to go back and make a game in the style of the old games that particularly the fans overseas want. Due to the older demographic of the PlayStation Vita, the difficulty for was made more on par with the Gamecube entries. The voice behind the game's narration was uncredited. However, on 7 December 2019 YouTuber Nick Robinson published a video which reported that the narrator had been Tokyo-based voice actor Brian Matt.