Lifestyle
Nintendo plays the extravagant host in 'Super Mario Party Jamboree'
An eight-player rhythm minigame in Super Mario Party Jamboree’s “Bowser Kaboom Squad” mode.
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112 Minigames. 22 playable characters. 7 boards. 5 unique multiplayer modes and an exclusively single-player adventure to boot.
Super Mario Party Jamboree is stacked like no other game in the decades-old series. It’s not as consistent as its last title, Superstars, but it’s an appropriately extravagant celebration of the franchise’s rapidly-closing Nintendo Switch era.
Controlled chaos
Mario Party might be a digital board game about rolling dice, collecting coins, and racing to buy stars, but it’s always lived and died by its minigames. Jamboree’s collection ranges from satisfying to mediocre — better than 2018’s Super Mario Party but falling short of 2021’s Mario Party Superstars. Many of its worst minigames are motion-controlled, but they’re thankfully few and there’s an option to exclude them.
The winner of this four-player minigame gets the privilege of recruiting Yoshi as a powerful ally.
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The most extensive (often best) minigames occur when you collide with a “Jamboree buddy” while running around the board. These allies parachute in from the main cast and challenge players to a special competition. Yoshi has you run a footrace, Waluigi has you play pinball, Donkey Kong has you drum to a beat — and so on.
Win and you’ll recruit the buddy, gaining access to their unique power and the ability to double some normal actions — allowing you to buy two stars instead of one, for example. These allies are so powerful that, unlike their equivalents in 2018’s Super Mario Party, they’ll only stick around for a few turns, and ditch you to join other players that pass you on the board.
Race to collect coins and find stars to purchase on returning board “Mario’s Rainbow Castle.”
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Other revisions hearken back to earlier titles or streamline old annoyances. Stars again cost 20 coins, not 10, pushing you to hoard money and minigame victories. Bowser spaces have returned — land on one and a giant “Imposter Bowser” will steal from you or launch a “Bowser Revolution” to equalize everyone’s coin totals. The game also has a swifter tempo, with snappy animations you can fast-forward through. Finally, optional “Pro Rules” rein in the randomness — trading hilarious upsets for tighter tactics.
Party favors
Jamboree bursts with other diversions aside from this main event. You can cooperate through rhythm challenges in a fantastical cooking show. You can tilt motion controls to slide items around a factory. You can even exhaust yourself with “Paratroopa Flight School” — where you’ll literally flap your arms to soar through the skies.
If you’ve got a Nintendo Online subscription, you can jump into the co-operative “Bowser Kaboom Squad” or cutthroat “Koopathlon” modes, which feature their own unique minigames for eight to 20 players. ( Sadly, each participant needs their own Switch.) Conversely, if you wish to party alone, there’s a surprisingly involved single-player mode called “Party-Planner Trek.”
16 out of 20 players remain in a Koopathlon minigame.
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Many activities quickly wear out their novelty. “Paratroopa Flight School” is difficult to maneuver, leaving me literally sore. “Toad’s Item Factory” requires patience and teamwork at odds with the game’s typically frenetic pace. “Koopathlon” feels like Nintendo’s version of Fall Guys: blisteringly fun when you’re at the top of the pack and terribly demoralizing when you’ve fallen behind.
But in this overbearing variety, Jamboree lives up to its name. Even if it’s not the classic that Mario Party Superstars proved to be, I can already tell that its approachable gameplay and goofy chaos will make it a family staple for years to come.
The Met Gala steps are a stage where celebrities strive not merely to look pretty, but to create indelible, avant-garde fashion moments. The most memorable looks tend to commit to the often abstract theme and take risks not typically seen on award show red carpets. Sometimes that works; other times it ends in disaster.
This year, guests stepped onto a mossy-looking, trompe l’oeil cobblestone carpet surrounded by a backdrop that recalled a Monet canvas. It was fitting for the evening’s brief: “Fashion is art.” It may be a bit on the nose for an event whose raison d’être is to raise money for the Metropolitan Museum of Art’s fashion-focused Costume Institute.
There were fake nipples and molded torsos; flowers and feathers; dripping jewels and one delightful burst of bubbles.
For close followers of our past most stylish lists, what follows is a shift in approach. Typically, we bring you a distillation of the looks that got people talking — the good, the bad and the most interesting. This year, since we now give you a chance to vote on your favorite looks, we’re saying, unequivocally, that these were ours (presented in no particular order).
Naomi Osaka
In this Robert Wun gown, spurts of blood — in the form of delicate feathers — spring from incisions in the fabric.
No other garment had quite the same movement as this frosty, fringed frock by Tom Ford that shimmied whenever Taylor struck a pose.
Chase Infiniti
Inspired by the “Venus de Milo,” this primary-colored Thom Browne gown is a no-naked take on naked dressing.
Troye Sivan
In a sea of sequins and other opulent baubles, what at least presented as a pair of distressed denim trousers — by Prada — was like a palate cleanser.
If Vermeer’s “Girl With a Pearl Earring” made a meal of her signature accessory.
Beyoncé
A look that was worth the decade-long wait for the star’s reappearance at the Met Gala.
Gracie Abrams
Gold adornments and jewel accents made Abrams look completely Klimtian in this peachy Chanel gown.
It’s goth meets grande dame. No engagement ring needed to get the people talking.
Alexi Ashe
For the real heads: the Yves Klein Blue body-print dress from spring 2017, one of Phoebe Philo’s last collections at Celine.
Glenn Martens
Other men on the carpet looked as if they had tried needlessly hard when Martens, the creative director of Maison Margiela, appeared in this undeniable tuxedo. This is how every man should dress.
A profusion of bubbles continuously spouting from this teacup dress brought some joie de vivre to the carpet.
Alexa Chung
It should be illegal to look so good for so long on so many red carpets.
Tory Burch
Many tried corsets; several donned sheer skirts. But none managed to look quite so delicate, elegant and demure as Aboah did, in custom Simone Rocha.
Tessa Thompson
More Yves Klein Blue, in whimsical curlicues by Valentino.
Stella Bugbee, Jacob Gallagher and Marie Solis contributed reporting.
Wi Spa, with its hot and cold tubs, specialty saunas and napping nooks, has long been a beloved L.A. destination for rest and rejuvenation. Now Koreatown’s most popular spa is kicking up its wellness offerings, getting ahead of the self-care trend. Or a head of it.
Wi Spa is opening a head spa. It’s more than halfway through construction of Root Head Spa, slated to debut within the next two months. It will be located on the lobby level, in the space that formerly housed a gym, with seven individual treatment rooms.
The idea for this new edition began before the head spa trend became so popular in Los Angeles, says Min Jung, a Wi Spa manager. After researching the various types of head spas, Wi Spa decided to create theirs “in the Japanese Yume Head Spa-style,” she says. Treatments will clean, exfoliate and moisturize the scalp, and they will include a gentle head massage. (“Yume” means “dream” in Japanese, a nod to the sleepy state the treatment leaves guests in.)
“But this is not a massage, this is not a head wash, it is actually a scalp treatment,” Jung says.
Videos of Chinese and Japanese-inspired head spa treatments started popping up on social media in 2022 — the arc-shaped “waterfall bath” is especially visually intriguing. We chronicled the rise of the trend, which first began proliferating in Asian communities such as Arcadia, San Gabriel, Temple City and Rosemead, in 2024 and 2025 — now there are head spas across the city.
Scrubbing the scalp aids circulation, strengthens hair follicles and helps to prevent dandruff, itchiness and inflammation, among other benefits, practitioners and dermatologists say. In our coverage, we said it “might be the most relaxing spa service in L.A.”
Wi Spa’s Himalayan Salt Sauna, a visitor favorite.
(Wi Spa)
An hourlong Wi Spa head spa treatment will cost about $150 to $200, Jung says, adding that prices are not yet set. That’s the upper end of average in L.A. for the treatment. Wi Spa’s $40 entry fee (which includes access to spa amenities) will not be waived with purchase of the head spa treatment, as it is with other Wi Spa services, such as a body scrub or massage, which typically exceeds $160.
Also in the works: Wi Spa is planning to build a wellness center on its third floor, in what’s now a skincare area. The new offering will likely include an infrared sauna and a red light therapy bed, among other things. This past summer Wi Spa also opened a salon for blowouts, called Root Style Bar, adjacent to its women’s dressing room. So (cue the violins) guests no longer have to trek out to their car with wet hair or attend post-spa events with a DIY blowout.
Next up: a spa-wide renovation to freshen up existing areas.
In the meantime, visitors may not know: Wi Spa has an “Aescape” AI-powered massage robot on its premises.
Reporter Deborah Vankin tries out the Aescape massage robot at Pause Wellness Studio in 2024.
(Christina House / Los Angeles Times)
We wrote about Aescape when it debuted at Pause, a wellness center in Studio City — it performs a 3D scan of your body to deliver custom robot massages. (Cyborg butt massages are not to be underestimated.) There are now several Aescapes around L.A., including at Equinox gyms. Wi Spa leased theirs this past summer. Guests can book robot massages for 15 minutes, 30 minutes, 45 minutes or an hour for $1 a minute, making it more affordable than Wi Spa’s manual massage offerings.
We’re partial to the most affordable massage option at Wi Spa, however: the plush, blue-lighted massage chairs scattered throughout the spa. Bring cash. It’s just $10 for a 30-minute “luxury” full body massage — and it’s surprisingly effective.
Vote for your favorite looks from the 53 below.
This page will order itself based on votes. Return to see how the race is shaking out before it closes.
The poll closes May 5 at 6 p.m. ET.
- 1
Beyoncé
- 2
- 3
Rihanna
- 4
Sam Smith
- 5
- 6
- 7
- 8
- 9
Rebecca Hall
- 10
Zoe Kravitz
- 11
Doja Cat
- 12
- 13
Jon Batiste
- 14
Eileen Gu
- 15
- 16
Suleika Jaouad
- 17
- 18
Janelle Monáe
- 19
Lisa
- 20
- 21
- 22
Patrick Schwarzenegger
- 23
Colman Domingo
- 24
Skepta
- 25
Kylie Jenner
- 26
- 27
Sombr
- 28
Sabrina Carpenter
- 29
- 30
Connor Storrie
- 31
- 32
Chase Infiniti
- 33
- 34
Hudson Williams
- 35
- 36
- 37
Kim Kardashian
- 38
Madonna
- 39
- 40
- 41
- 42
Cher
- 43
- 44
- 45
- 46
- 47
- 48
- 49
Alysa Liu
- 50
- 51
Stevie Nicks
- 52
Rachel Sennott
- 53
Simone Ashley
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