Although given the subtitle "Super Mario World 2" for commercial reasons (like Wario Land: Super Mario Land 3), Yoshi's Island was actually the first game in a new Yoshi series. The sequel, Yoshi's Story (N64 1998), is in my opinion underrated. The series has had success in recent years with Poochy & Yoshi's Woolly World (3DS 2017) and Yoshi's Crafted World (Switch 2019), both of which I have enjoyed as well.
The story of Yoshi's Island is that, while the stork was delivering the twins Mario and Luigi to their parents, a Magikoopa named Kamek kidnapped them. However, he only got Luigi: baby Mario fell to Yoshi's Island. Now it's up to the Yoshis to bring him home. Opposed to them are various enemies, including a whole lot of Shy Guys. As a huge Super Mario Bros. 2 fan, I love that this game re-introduced the Shy Guys to the Mario universe. There are even a few Snifits.
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| Snifit |
The two most memorable things about Yoshi's Island are the cute cartoon graphics and the fact that baby Mario emits an annoying cry whenever he becomes separated from Yoshi! The Yoshis themselves are invincible, but whenever they get hit, they become briefly stunned, and baby Mario begins to float away in a bubble. He won't float far, so recovering him is usually easy. However, if the ten-second timer counts down to zero, Kamek's toadies appear and carry him off, causing a lost life. The timer can be increased by collecting little stars, each of which adds one second. Stars appear in various ways, such as by shooting an egg or enemy into a red blossom. Stars scatter and disappear after just a few seconds. More than once I died because I was frantically and imprudently trying to get a runaway star!
When I was an annoying twelve-year-old boy, I hated the way the game looked, and especially hated the crying baby, and refused even to try the game! However, about a year later I found myself in a situation where it was the only game available to me, so I tried it. I discovered to my horror that it was actually fun! Indeed, Yoshi's Island is a fantastic game, among the best on the SNES.
The Yoshis have three abilities that help them traverse the island and return their precious cargo. Firstly, they can use their long tongues (press Y) to eat enemies, then turn them into eggs (press ↓). The Yoshis shoot these eggs as weapons: the A button makes a reticle appears which moves back and forth in a 180° arc, allowing you to aim. (There are two available control schemes: one in which you press A once to engage and a second time to shoot, and another in which you press and hold A, then release it to shoot.) Eggs are also useful for picking up the coins or flowers they hit. Each stage contains five flowers to collect (sort of like the dragon coins in Super Mario World).
The second Yoshi ability is a flutter jump: by holding B in mid-air, the Yoshi exerts itself to defy gravity, gaining a little height. Yoshis can flutter multiple times in the same jump, although there is a cool-down period between flutters that prevents them from outright flying. Finally, Yoshis can ground-pound (press ↓ while jumping), which can destroy enemies that resist their tongue, like Bandits. Mario couldn't ground-pound until Super Mario 64, so maybe he learned it from the Yoshis!
Yoshi's Island has top-quality level designs, worthy of the Super Mario World moniker. There are moving platforms, hills, ditches, water, lava, pipes, bouncy springs, hidden areas, rotating spiked arms, seeds that grow into giant beanstalks—all the things. In a few places, Yoshi even turns into vehicles: a plane, train, helicopter, and tank. These transformations last a few seconds and allow Yoshis to enter areas they couldn't otherwise. In addition, there are a few Super Stars. Interestingly, they affect Mario rather than Yoshi. Baby Mario becomes invincible and runs fast, including up walls and upside-down on ceilings. Super Stars appear in sequence, so you can keep running and running, but if time runs out before Mario gets another one, they all disappear.
Yoshi's World has fun boss fights: each involves Kamek magicking an enemy into becoming gigantic. Beating them usually involves shooting them with eggs, but each fight is unique. The final boss, baby Bowser (not to be confused with Bowser Jr.), is innovative. He stands in the background, Godzilla-like, slowly moving forward. The egg-shooting reticle aims into the background, and you have to lob eggs at him! Meanwhile, Bowser shoots fireballs at you, which are easy to dodge, although the ground crumbling beneath Yoshi adds difficulty. It's an excellent ending to an excellent game.
Don't let the cute graphics fool you: Yoshi's Island isn't easy. I find it more difficult than Super Mario World, though that may be because I have played Mario World so many times.
Yoshi's Island uses a challenging collectible system that adds replay value. Each stage contains five flowers and twenty red coins (disguised as ordinary yellow coins). Each flower you get increases your chance of playing a bonus game at the end of the stage. These bonus games, which include things like card matching and a slot machine, award extra lives and items, such as an egg refill or extra time on the baby Mario timer. Items can be used at any time by pausing the game and selecting one. Getting 100 yellow coins in a level earns an extra life, of course. At the end of each stage, you receive a score out of 100: one point for each red coins, ten for each flower, and one for each second on the baby Mario timer (up to 30). These scores can be viewed while on the stage-select screen. Each new attempt at a level requires you to collect all the coins and flowers afresh.
The game contains six worlds of eight stages each, displayed in a linear map. If you score 100 on all eight stages, you unlock two bonus stages. If you ask me, the first such bonus stage is harder than any normal stage in the game! You have to ride the dog Poochy over some lava in an auto-scrolling level. You can't directly control Poochy; he always moves toward Yoshi, or forward when riding him. I must have lost at least 30 lives beating that level!
The backgrounds, sprites, sound effects (except the crying!), and music are all top-notch. Yoshi's Island is an SNES must-play. I feel embarrassed that it took me so long. I started it eight years ago when I got the SNES Classic, but I only got a few worlds in. This time I played it all the way through and had a blast. I'm not sure if I'll 100% it, though, because that would take many hours and, as always, other games call to me! Definitely play the game if you're a SNES fan and haven't already.
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| Grade: A+ |
Linked Reviews
"The gameplay isn't quite revolutionary. Yet it's the world that the developers draw us into that represents a smorgasbord of beauty, creativity, and whimsy. Yoshi's Island is a wonderful vision of pastel colors, majestic backdrops, and character-oozing sprites."
— Kaes Delgrego, Nintendo Life, 10/10
"Graphically, the game is unrivaled on the console. It is the longevity that makes it stand out even further, as each stage offers something different. The game is a masterpiece."
— Jim Evans, Ultimate Nintendo: Guide to the SNES Library, 5/5
"Yoshi’s Island had great puzzles, awesome powerups, and affected the canon of Mario’s games for the next decade and a half."
— IGN, #7 of Top 100
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