It seems as though ever since we met Professor E. Gadd he has been creating wild and wacky inventions and this time with his time machine fully prepared for testing, and Princess Toadstool takes it upon herself to travel back in time. When the machine returns, Peach is missing and inside is some kind of strange monster. Time portals begin opening up all around the princess's castle and it's up to Mario and Luigi to travel back in time to save her. Upon entering the castle of her childhood, they stumble across their baby selves and a fleet of shroobs - a nice new alien foe - hell bent on destroying Mushroom Kingdom.

For those new to the series, Mario and Luigi: Partners in Time may take some time to which to adjust. Each of the face buttons - A, B, X, Y - is assigned to one of the four characters you control. At first, the buttons will do nothing more than make each character jump, but as they split up and the game is progressed you have access to a more varied and unique set of moves.

It's with the help of the young (and old) Toadsworth that you come to learn more moves for the bro's, and with a tap of the R button the A, B, X and Y buttons become much more than jump controls. Eventually you will be able to roll, glide, spin and dig your way through to areas of the map you weren't able to reach previously.

Second to the humour, it's the fighting style that makes fans of the series come back for more. After initiating a battle with one of the many enemies in Mario's world the screen cuts to a stage of sorts: brothers on the left and enemy on the right. Just like the limited amount of abilities available while you're roaming around the worlds, Mario and Luigi start off with nothing more than a jump attack. In your first few battles you are shown how to attack, how to defend and even how to turn an enemy's attack against it.

As you progress through the game you will find yourself learning better moves and picking up objects known as Bros. Items. These items - which can be bought from a handy shop in the castle - allow a variety of tag team moves. Some of them allow each character to attack the enemy once, while others will keep going until you mess up a certain button sequence, but most of them require a fair bit of practice before being perfected, which can see you wasting a few of the sometimes expensive items.

With every battle won you will receive experience points and it's these that allow you to level up each of your characters. Upon levelling up you will find each of your stats - ranging from Defence and Speed to Hit Points and Stache points - automatically rising depending on how you've been fighting. You then have the chance to give one of your attributes a bonus point or five. Select the attribute you want increased and let the random spinner give you a little well earned bonus. For those not in the know, a bigger Stache (moustache) the higher chance of striking lucky hits against opponents and getting bigger discounts at the item store.

While Mario and Luigi: Partners in Time may not utilise all of the functions of the DS - you can't even use the touch screen in the menus - it does use the dual screens perfectly. While there is nothing of importance happening on the top screen it shows a map of the surrounding area, where you are, whereabouts you can save, and something of a hint on where you should be heading. At other times the screen is used to show where the Baby Bros. are, if they have separated from the older brothers for puzzle reasons, and also used to progress the story with cut scenes.

For anyone that has played Superstar Saga, you will not be surprised to see the graphics in Partners in Time are danm near identical. The developers went for what works, and it clearly does. Each character is animated so well that you will find it hard not to laugh (or at least smile) at what Mario, Luigi and pals get up to. Whether it's the cheeky posing of the Koopa Journalist or the spinning of Baby Mario's oversized hat after he strikes a pose upon winning a battle, you will be hard pressed to criticise this game.

One of the best things about this game is that you will not only keep the volume turned on, but you'll also turn it right up. The voices Alphadream have given Mario and Luigi are just perfect. While not speaking anything discernible, it's hard not to burst into laughter upon hearing them chat away to each other. Thankfully this was done intentionally and you will end up waiting for just one more conversation between the two.

The music is exactly what you would expect: the tunes we all know and love from the Mario universe blast from the DS speakers at all the right moments. While the babies' crying can get annoying, it's still hard to fault them. Everything sounds great.