Review: Yoshi’s New Island

If there’s one thing I’ve noticed in my many years as a gamer, it’s that I own more and more games for each new console that’s released. That is, I own far more games on my GameCube than I did my N64, and even more on my Xbox 360 than on the GameCube. As I’ve talked about in the past, my first-ever console was the SNES, and I can still recall the games I first owned on it – Donkey Kong Country 2, Donkey Kong Country 3, Super Mario Bros. All Stars, and last but not least, Super Mario World 2: Yoshi’s Island.

As you’d expect, I was pretty keen when I heard news that Nintendo would be releasing a sequel for Yoshi’s Island. Maybe it’s because I only owned a handful of games at the time, but I look back on those few games of my childhood with a lot more fondness than the ones I’ve owned in the past 10 years or so. With Yoshi’s Island in particular, it was the only game on the SNES that I actually finished.

Yoshi’s New Island is very similar to the Yoshi’s Island that was released almost 20 years ago. While some gamers will consider this a mere rehash of an older game, I found it instead acted as a nice hit of nostalgia. The story follows a similar premise from the original game — a stork delivering both Baby Mario and Baby Luigi is captured by the evil Kamek. Baby Mario escapes the attack, but plummets to what we fear will be his death. Thankfully, Baby Mario lands safely and is taken care of by a island of Yoshis; together, both Baby Mario and the Yoshi crew work together to not only defeat Kamek, but save Baby Luigi. In addition to the re-occurring theme, Yoshi’s New Island also features many of the same enemies, characters and collectables. The important thing to note here is that never once felt like I was merely playing an old game on a new system.

Continuing on, the gameplay of Yoshi’s New Island follows almost identically from the original game too. From the enemies you eat, you can convert them into eggs which are used to take down other enemies, activate switches and reach collectables. The game is also filled with three types of collectables – stars (that increase the time you can be separated from Baby Mario), coins (with 20 red coins per level) and flowers.

Managing to find all three types of collectables in a level does nothing more than give you a few ticks in the post-level scorecard, but they’re fun to look for nonetheless. There’s a ridiculous amount of coins to collect during each level too, and while I found it to be overkill with New Super Mario Bros 2, I did have fun going for them in this game. Yoshi’s egg-shooting did feel a little unusual, especially in the first few stages of the game, but it wasn’t long until everything just flowed and felt natural.

Yoshi’s New Island isn’t a straight copy of the first game, with a couple noticeable additions. The first is the combination of two new egg types – the large standard egg and the large metallic egg. Both can be used to take down obstacles like stone walls and bars, but where the large egg can be fired in any direction, the metallic egg can only travel along the ground. In addition, the large metallic egg allows Yoshi to walk underwater, which adds a new dynamic to the game that wasn’t present in Yoshi’s Island.

Another change comes in the form of invincibility stars, which you’ll stumble across every once in a while in the game. With it, the game turns into an almost Sonic-esque platformer, with Yoshi being able to run extremely fast (up walls) and fly through the air too. The final change happens with transformations that allow Yoshi to turn into a number of different machines, such as a mining cart, submarine or helicopter. Using the 3DS’ gyroscope, you title the console to control Yoshi through a course, gathering whatever collectables you can.

Yoshi’s New Island is also centred around a combination of both platforming and light puzzle-solving, and this leads on to perhaps the one area that some gamers are sure to find fault with: its difficulty. Make no mistake, this game is really, really easy. To put it into perspective, by the time I put as many hours as I have in Yoshi’s New Island into Donkey Kong Country Returns 3D, I had rage quit and stopped playing it. With Yoshi though, I’ve amassed almost 90 spare lives. Most platforming feels fairly intuitive, and the only time you’ll fail is because you were being lazy as opposed to being challenged.

Yoshi’s New Island mightn’t be a lengthy game and is far from difficult, but what it lacks in challenge it makes up for in simple fun and enjoyment. For this reason I don’t think this game should be overlooked. The pencil-drawn art style is fantastic and a great reminder of the original. Combine that with the easy to grasp mechanics, returning enemies and sound design and Nintendo has a game for young and old gamers alike. Of course it wouldn’t be a Yoshi game without his signature sounds, which are back and cuter than ever.

I had wondered whether Yoshi’s New Island was going to be a boring remake of a classic, but what it really is, is a casual platformer and a reminder of “if it isn’t broke, don’t fix it”. It’s perfect for a bit of fun during your downtime on the weekend or on the commute to work.

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