Almost two years ago I did a recap of the Yoshi series, but with a second new game just on the horizon I thought I'd better catch up on an entry that was released since then as the release of another game is fast approaching. Yoshi's New Island was released in for 3DS about a year and a half ago, in March of 2014. There wasn't a lot that seemed very unique about it compared to its predecessors, but I was hoping looks would be deceiving and that I would be pleasantly surprised.
Unfortunately, as with the DS iteration, the game cribs way too much from the original, actually even more so than the DS game. This seems to be the general consensus, and I'm glad to see that I'm not the only one disappointed by the stagnation of the series. The game has almost zero surprises and drags on, and as with the other editions, getting 100% in every level is incredibly tedious. I don't mind finding the 3 star coins in the Mario games, but having to scour every nook and cranny of every level to find the 20 red coins and 5 flowers is annoying, and having to not get hit once in order to keep your 30 star points is doubly annoying. It's been a hallmark of the series that it would do well without. The game contains some 2-player minigames, but they seem very basic and equally uninspired.
Aside from that main complaint, the game's not bad, really, it's just dull. That seems to have been par for the course with long-running Nintendo series for a while now (even with the 2D Mario series), especially ones that Nintendo farms out to other developers (in this case, Artoon/Arzest, who were also responsible for the GBA and DS Yoshi platformer games). By all accounts the forthcoming Yoshi's Wooly World looks like it'll succeed in not just breaking the mold, but being the first game in the series since the original to get rave reviews. I'm not really too psyched about revisiting the aesthetics of Kirby's Epic Yarn (a game that I found pleasant but fairly easy and mindless), but Nintendo has promised a good amount of challenge, so I'm keeping my mind open.
Check out the new tricks of these Yoshi's New Island links:
- Official site, includes wallpapers
- Entry at mariowiki.com
- Entry at howlongtobeat.com
- Review at NintendoLife