Mario + Rabbids Kingdom Battle

Did You Know?

• In the 2018 fighting game Super Smash Bros. Ultimate, three of the Rabbids appear as collectable power-ups ('Spirits'): Rabbid Mario, Rabbid Peach, and Rabbid Kong.
• Rabbid Peach appears in Just Dance 2018 as the alternative playable mascot for Beyoncé's song 'Naughty Girl'.
• In January 2019, composer Grant Kirkhope was asked by Soliani for his contact information on behalf of Nintendo, leading to Kirkhope arranging music for Banjo and Kazooie's appearance in Super Smash Bros. Ultimate.

Plot

A fan of Mario who is also a young inventor created a device called the SupaMerge, which looks like a headset. With help from her virtual robot assistant, Beep-0, it can fuse any two objects into one. The problem is it keeps overheating. After a successful test merge, it overheats again.

While the inventor steps out, the Rabbids show up in their Time Washing Machine and start messing with her things, annoying Beep-0. One Rabbid puts on the SupaMerge and begins merging other Rabbids with objects in the room. The Time Washing Machine gets hit by the device, breaks down, and pulls everything into an interdimensional vortex. Above the Mushroom Kingdom, a spacetime rift opens during a ceremony for a statue of Princess Peach, sucking in Mario and his friends.

Everyone gets scattered across the kingdom along with enlarged objects from the inventor's room. Beep-0 becomes a physical being with Rabbid-like features and the ability to talk. He finds out the SupaMerge is now stuck on the Rabbid that wore it, and that Rabbid keeps transforming more of its kind uncontrollably. The enlarged Time Washing Machine nearly hits Beep-0, but Mario saves him as it crashes near Peach's castle.

The transformed Rabbids are now hostile because the SupaMerge's power became corrupted in the Mario universe. However, a group of four Rabbids, who resemble Mario and his allies, are not hostile. A mysterious contact known only as F.B. emails them weapons, abilities, and guidance. The two groups team up to stop the chaos.

Reception

Mario + Rabbids Kingdom Battle earned a "generally favorable" score on Metacritic, while OpenCritic gave it a "mighty" rating, with 92% of critics recommending it. In the UK, it launched as the second-best-selling physical game, and in Australia, it topped the physical sales chart for the week ending September 3. In Japan, it sold 66,692 copies in its first week, securing the number one spot across all formats. By September 2017, it was the best-selling Nintendo Switch game not fully published by Nintendo.

Ubisoft later reported in June 2021 that 7.5 million players had played it. Many reviews began by noting the absurdity of the crossover concept; Giant Bomb called it a "bad, late-night message board conversation." Critics generally had mixed feelings about the Rabbids franchise, especially next to Mario. Upon release, however, reviewers quickly changed their minds, finding the game surprisingly deep despite initial fears it would be gimmicky or rely too heavily on Rabbids-style humor.

Some praised how the tone and writing meshed with Mario's world. Wired's Julie Muncy noted that Mario often plays the straight man to the Rabbids' childish antics.