Mario + Rabbids Sparks of Hope

The developers of Mario + Rabbids Sparks of Hope reveal that the game was originally conceived with grid-based combat like Kingdom Battle.
A producer of the Mario + Rabbids Sparks of Hope crossover title states that the game originally had grid-based combat during development. This game was the sequel to the 2017 release of Mario + Rabbids Kingdom Battle, where it took both the Mario cast and Rabbid characters on a new adventure into outer-space in a new tactics-based crossover. One of the major improvements from Sparks of Hope compared to Kingdom Battle was the decision to make the sequel more open as opposed to restricting it to grid-based combat.
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When Mario + Rabbids Kingdom Battle first released, it was a surprising experiment that proved to be rather successful, merging the worlds of Rabbids and Mario into a Turn-based tactics game in the vein of titles like XCOM. The sequel provides its own twist on this format, making it more of a Real-Time Strategy game and allowing for greater exploration. However, this was not always the plan, as Mario + Rabbids Sparks of Hope producer Xavier Manzanares stated the sequel did originally feature the grid from the previous entry.