‘Mario Party Superstars’ adds health warning to notorious N64 minigame

Mario Party Superstars has updated the N64-era Tug o’ War minigame with a warning advising against using your palm to rotate the control stick.

Ahead of Mario Party Superstars launching on October 29, Kotaku (thanks, EuroGamer) has reported that the Tug o’ War minigame has returned with a health warning.

As pictured below, the pre-game menu for Tug o’ War now includes the following notice:

“To avoid irritation to your skin and/or damage to the control stick, do not rotate it with the palm of your hand.”

THEY’RE BRINGING THE ORIGINAL CONTROLS FOR THIS GAME BACK, JUST WITH A PALM WARNING? NOOOOOOOOOOOOOO pic.twitter.com/NUZUkguvqk

— Anthony (@KirbyCheatFurby) October 23, 2021

Tug o’ War first appeared in the original Mario Party game for the Nintendo 64 in 1999, and involves one player in a Bowser costume playing tug of war against three other players. To pull the rope players needed to spin a control stick, though fans alleged that it was the source of blisters, second-degree burns and other injuries.

This was because players needed to spin the control stick incredibly quickly to avoid losing, and rotating the control stick with your palm – while usually hurting your hand – was often the only way to win.

Due to allegations of injuries over the Tug o’ War game and several similar minigames within Mario Party, Nintendo faced legal troubles in 2000 and had to commit $80million (£58million) to provide protective gloves for any Mario Party owner that wanted a pair.

While using your palms to play Mario Party Superstars can indeed cause injury, many have pointed out that it also runs the risk of damaging Joycon controllers, which seem slightly more fragile than a Nintendo 64 controller.

In other news, the latest update to Phasmophobia has added four new ghosts and a spooky new campsite that needs investigating. On top of the new content, the Nightmare update has reworked the difficulty system and added a weather system to all existing maps.