November N-E Game Club: Yoshi's Island

[Glen-i]

Super Mario World 2: Yoshi's Island is a platform game that released for the SNES in 1995. It stars 8 Yoshies who decide to help a baby reunite with it's brother via a relay system after a stork drops him on their home island. You do have to wonder why he wasn't immediately eaten though.

The thing is, this game is a prequel and that baby is Mario and a Magikoopa named Kamek somehow knows that Mario and Luigi are gonna be a right pain for the Koopas in the future. So Kamek has sent a group of Toadies to kidnap the baby.

Can the Yoshies reunite the siblings? Or will hunger eventually win out and ruin the whole Mario Timeline?

This game may have been billed as a sequel to Mario World, but it would spawn off a new spin-off series of Yoshi games. Yoshi is mostly invincible (Bottomless pits, getting crushed, spikes and lava will do it in though), but if it gets damaged, it'll get stunned and Baby Mario will drift off in a bubble where he'll subtly notify you of such by bellowing his lungs out. This will cause a timer to count down, let it reach 0 and the Toadies kidnap the kid and you lose a life.

This game was powered by the Super FX2 chip, which allowed for a gorgeous hand-drawn aesthetic, but is the main reason why this was never released on Virtual Console. There was a GBA port of the game as part of the Super Mario Advance series, which features a more modern Yoshi voice and 6 new levels.

The game is pretty well loved and still looks the part today thanks to it's well-aged visuals and different style of gameplay. Whatever you think of it, it was a pretty good swan song to the old Super Nintendo. Either the original or GBA port is fine for this month.

SNES Version available on: SNES and SNES Mini

GBA Version available on: GBA, WiiU and 3DS (Ambassador Program only)

There we go, nice and centered. So I'm gonna use this space to point out that the yellow and pink yoshi are in a very compromising position...

Edited November 15, 2018 by Glen-i

[Glen-i]

Anyway, I'm gonna go for the SNES version. And I'm not gonna go for 100%. I blitzed through this game in under 3 hours when the SNES Mini came out and I realised that I enjoy this game more when I don't try to collect everything, so I'm gonna try and beat my record.

[Jonnas]

Oh boy... First time we get a game I never beat! Not sure if I can do it, maybe hunger will actually win out on my end. But at least I can try.

...Sometime later this week.

[Hero-of-Time]

13 hours ago, Glen-i said:

Anyway, I'm gonna go for the SNES version. And I'm not gonna go for 100%. I blitzed through this game in under 3 hours when the SNES Mini came out and I realised that I enjoy this game more when I don't try to collect everything, so I'm gonna try and beat my record.

I don't blame you. I've done it a few times now and it's always a chore to do. It's easily one of the most annoying Mario games to complete 100%

[nekunando]

If I get a chance, I might play through it on the SNES Classic but there's no way I'll be trying to go for everything as I hate the way some winged clouds are hidden and that all of the red coins are disguised amongst the standard yellow coins meaning that you have to check every inch of each level just in case there's something there

[Glen-i]

18 minutes ago, nekunando said:

If I get a chance, I might play through it on the SNES Classic but there's no way I'll be trying to go for everything as I hate the way some winged clouds are hidden and that all of the red coins are disguised amongst the standard yellow coins meaning that you have to check every inch of each level just in case there's something there

In the SNES version. Coins that are actually Red have a slight red tint to them, so you can actually tell which ones are red.

[Dcubed]

Oh! Yoshi's Island ended up winning? Cool!

 

I actually completed it again just a few months back though, so I'll sit this one out; but it's a good choice! (then again, all three choices were hot fire!)

 

12 hours ago, Hero-of-Time said:

I don't blame you. I've done it a few times now and it's always a chore to do. It's easily one of the most annoying Mario games to complete 100%

Yeah, I have to agree with this.  It really isn't worth 100%ing this game, it's just far too frustrating and takes way too much time to do (unless you have an absolute photographic memory and the patience of a saint!).

 

It's worth collecting enough to unlock the bonus levels though! They're ace!  (And insanely hard too!).  But probably not worth doing for a quick replay...

Edited November 13, 2018 by Dcubed

[killthenet]

Awesome, I was planning on playing through Yoshi's Island for the first time once I've played God of War - will try and get it done by the end of November to join in the discussion.

[Glen-i]

I'm on World 3 now. 41 minutes of game time. Which sounds like good time, but the levels do get long later on, so who knows?

Going through as fast as I can has turned some levels into panicky states of "Which way is the right way!?"

Also, Flowers are the devil and must be avoided at all costs. Lest you activate the dreaded Bonus Challenge.

Edited November 14, 2018 by Glen-i

[Glen-i]

New Record! 5 minutes off my previous time.

I almost didn't pull it off though. World 5 really did a number on me this time. That's a really hard world to speed through.

That credits music is still my favourite credits music on the SNES. Probably my favourite music from this game.

 

[Jonnas]

Ok, so I finally started this. I'm currently halfway through World 2 (just defeated the giant Boo).

I've been trying to pay more attention to its strengths, namely, that this was meant to be a leisurely game, to be played in a relaxing manner. But still, it's been annoying, from the stars that just jump off cliffs for no reason (super unsatisfying), the tutorials that keep popping up everywhere, the janky way that vertical egg tosses aren't fully vertical, the multiple points of no return in a game that should be about exploration... Even the instant deaths get annoying with the way health works in this game. I can see why this game never quite clicked with me.

But honestly, when it's pleasant, it's super pleasant. Game looks gorgeous, it's probably the best-looking SNES game, and everything about this childlike aesthetic just works. Might be that all of my issues will feel like nitpicking by the end.

[killthenet]

I just started World 4 and I'm not really feeling this game so far. I love the art style and the animations but it's not the relaxing platformer I had hoped it would be. Mario's cry is really grating, especially because you lose him so often, and Yoshi controls really oddly - the lack of a run button means you often find yourself at full speed when you don't want to be and so platforming can be more stressful than it needs to be. I'm surprised by how big the levels are and by how much I've got lost in them, the Yoshi series always seemed like it had a very child friendly reputation but some of the levels in this are way less linear than anything in Super Mario World.

It seems to have some nice ideas but the mechanics don't seem to gel together like they should. The music is probably the most confusing thing for me so far, at times its great (that underground theme is very Super Metroid) but the music that plays on the level select screen is pretty tiresome already. I'll try and finish it tomorrow, hopefully it grows on me before the end because at the moment I'm struggling to see how this lives up to the acclaim. 

[nekunando]

On 21/11/2018 at 3:11 AM, killthenet said:

I'm struggling to see how this lives up to the acclaim. 

Pretty much the story of my life..

I completely agree about Yoshi's Island. It's way too irritating to even breath the same SNES air as Super Mario World!

Edited November 22, 2018 by nekunando

[killthenet]

Just finished it, I really liked the ending but it definitely doesn't make up for the rest of the game. There were just too many things that didn't work for me, although I did like how the music on the level select screen gained more instruments as you got further in the game.

I think there are a lot of interesting nuggets of Mario lore wrapped up in the story, for one I didn't even realise they were supposed to be twins - always thought Mario was the older of the two. Along with the artstyle and animation the story was one of the best parts of this game, it's just a shame the gameplay itself was so frustrating.

[Jonnas]

I just beat it! One day late, but hey, the nominee for December hasn't been chosen yet

Many of my criticisms remained to the end of the game, especially the instant deaths. I really have to stress the fact that, in a game where enemy damage is lenient (Yoshi had auto-regen before it was cool), checkpoints are sparse, the levels progress slowly, and there are plenty of alternate paths to explore... instant deaths still exist and they also erase your progress up until that point. Who had the brilliant idea of designing the game like this? It's so frustrating, and completely against every other design philosophy that the game was going for!

In fact, level design was my biggest gripe. Besides everything else I mentioned, the points of no return that force you to replay a level from the start in case you're looking to collect everything are another terrible decision. Good thing I took @Dcubed's advice from earlier in this thread, and ignored that endeavour entirely. The faster paced levels near the end were much better, and the designers clearly had more experience with that type of level.

The visual style is still absolutely gorgeous, and the level gimmicks take 110% advantage of this, which is why the game is so fondly remembered, I'm sure. On that note, the music is cute, but I didn't find it too memorable.

Another excellent aspect to this game are the bosses, which are some of the best I've seen in any 2D platformer ever. So many creative fights! The final boss is super memorable, but even he wouldn't crack Top 3 in "Best Boss fights of Yoshi's Island".

In conclusion, this game has too many flaws to allow it anywhere near my SNES Top 10, but it was enjoyable in its own way.

On 22/11/2018 at 7:34 PM, killthenet said:

I think there are a lot of interesting nuggets of Mario lore wrapped up in the story, for one I didn't even realise they were supposed to be twins - always thought Mario was the older of the two.

Japanese culture puts a lot of importance in the concept of seniority, to the point that even twins keep track of which one's older than whom. So, from that perspective, "Mario & Luigi are twins" and "Mario is the older sibling" are both true.

[Ike]

I'm playing this late (sorry), made it to World 3 so far. lol at the Yoshi's face when you hear the 3-4 boss. That Yoshi saw things.