Next Super Monkey Ball Game: Everything We Know

The ‘Super Monkey Ball franchise is a series of zany arcade platformers dating back to the arcade era with the original ‘Monkey Ball’ game in 2001. The franchise has since seen twenty different releases on a variety of different platforms across various generations, with the newest being this year’s ‘Super Monkey Ball: Banana Blitz HD’, a remake of the 2006 Nintendo Wii game ‘Super Monkey Ball: Banana Blitz’. What could be next for the delightfully colorful ape themed platforming franchise? Read on to find out everything we know.

What Can We Expect From the Next Super Monkey Ball Game?

The original ‘Super Monkey Ball: Banana Blitz HD’ came out over 13 years ago in 2006 exclusively for the Nintendo Wii, and was the seventh entry in the long running franchise. The game followed a fairly straightforward storyline that involves a new pirate villain called Captain Crabuchin who steals the Golden Banana Bunch. Our monkey protagonist AiAi must enlist the help of his friends including Meemee, Baby, Gongon and more to recover the scattered pieces of the stolen treasure.

The gameplay of ‘Super Monkey Ball: Banana Blitz HD’ and other games in the series is somewhat unique for an arcade platformer in the sense that you do not directly control your character. Instead, your monkey character is inside a bouncy ball that can be maneuvered by tilting the world around it. The angle and duration of the tilt dictates the speed and turning radius of the player character. The ultimate goal of every level is to reach the end gate while collecting bananas littered across the stage for extra points as well as extra lives.

The latest remake ‘Super Monkey Ball: Banana Blitz HD’ features several improvements over the original including revamped controls, a modern visual overhaul and all new game modes such as Time Attack and the Decathlon Mode. The game also features all new costumes unlockable via gameplay, including one for Sonic the Hedgehog.

The Steam page for the game describes it as follows“Head back into the fantastical world of Super Monkey Ball and blast through 100 twisting and turning levels. Play as one of your favorite monkeys and take back your bananas from the space alien pirate king, Captain Crabuchin. For the first time ever, play as Sonic the Hedgehog and dash through the levels, and unlock a selection of costumes for every monkey in the base game.”

One thing lacking in the remake in the mini games. The original version featured 50 different unique mini games, whereas the remake replaces it with enhanced versions of the ten most popular minigames.

By now it is standard to expect characters like the happy go lucky AiAi, his wife MeeMee, the infantile Baby and the brawny GonGon to be part of any new Super Monkey Ball game, and we can surely expect them to return for a sequel. Other possible additions include the ring tailed lemur YanYan and the wizenly and wise lemur Doctor.

Of course, we can expect a whole new bunch of levels, very likely even greater than the 100 plus found in ‘Super Monkey Ball: Banana Blitz HD’. A new villain with an all new banana related evil scheme is also very likely and should make up whatever little storyline the game boasts. Finally, a truly substantial new addition would be the inclusion of a proper competitive PvP multiplayer mode. ‘Super Monkey Ball: Banana Blitz HD’ does feature a multiplayer implementation, but it is leaderboard based and lacks direct PvP support.

Next Super Monkey Ball Game Developers: Who Could Be the People Behind The Game?

‘Super Monkey Ball: Banana Blitz HD’ is developed and published by Japanese video game giant SEGA. The sequel will also very likely be published by SEGA, who may choose to hand off development responsibilities to any number of the Japanese video game developers who have worked on the franchise in the past, with one possibility being Marvelous AQL, the developers of 2012’s ‘Super Monkey Ball: Banana Splitz’.

New Super Monkey Ball Game Release Date: When And Where Can I Play it?

‘Super Monkey Ball: Banana Blitz HD’ released worldwide on October 29, 2019 for the PlayStation 4, Xbox One and Nintendo Switch, with a PC launch scheduled for December 10, 2019. There is likely to be some time before a sequel is released, and I wouldn’t expect it anytime before late 2021. It will likely be available on the latest generation PlayStation, Xbox and Nintendo consoles, as well as on PC.

Super Monkey Ball Trailer

While we wait for more news about the next Super Monkey Ball game, you can watch the trailer for ‘Super Monkey Ball: Banana Blitz HD’ right here:

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