80%Xbox

easily the best super monkey ball game, sensitive controls be damned.

70%PlayStation 2

This is close to being a great game, but the PS2 controller doesn't fit the playstyle of the game; it was clearly designed with a gamecube controller in mind. The sound design is pretty lacking, and occasionally jarring, like the sound when the monkey goes to the next level. The loading times are sometimes unbearably long.
All that being said though, the actual game itself it a ton of fun. It's easy to learn, hard to master. Some of the minigames are fun too. There's a ton of replayability here for sure, and it'll take quite a while to master all the courses and unlock everything. Still, SMB2 on Gamecube is the best game in the series, and likely always will be.

70%PlayStation 2

Super Monkey Ball is a classic series with excellent pick-up-and-play appeal. For the most part, the levels are designed impeccably well, and the physics engine is fun to use and experiment with. Unfortunately the game faces a problem of difficulty scaling. Though there is definitely an increase in difficulty as you go along, there is a sharp increase in difficulty after the halfway point. Also, some of the levels ask for what seems like TAS-level mastery of the physics engine, which isn't cool by any standard. I have always loved this game and I always will--but some levels lack the polish of others, making them more of a pain than a challenge to complete.

80%No Platform Specified

Super Monkey Ball on N-Gage is a missed opportunity. One of the most accessible, frantic party games arrives as a choppy, single-player-only port. This should have been the game to really showcase the system's wireless Bluetooth abilities, but instead it's just another entry into the growing "played a better version a year ago" book. With the core multiplayer gameplay dynamics and mini-games like Golf and Bowling missing, Super Monkey Ball for N-Gage is just half the game it used to be. The single-player action of the Amusement Vision classic is still intact, of course, and newcomers to the franchise will definitely get some enjoyment out of the title. But I'd be a bad reviewer if I didn't bring up the fact at this point that a GameCube with both Super Monkey Ball games AND a GBA with Jr. AND a cell phone can be had for less than the cost of a single N-Gage unit with this stripped-down version of the game. So if Monkey Ball was your prime reason for buying an N-Gage, then sit this one out. Then again, nobody buys a gaming platform for just one game, so be sure to check out the other N-Gage offerings (both present and future) if you're in the market for a new handheld.

N-Gage and Monkey Ball seemed like a match made in Heaven, but this rushed version just doesn't live up to the glory of its predecessors. A good rental.