17 Years Later Yoshis Wooly World

17 Years Later Yoshis Wooly World

As a kid the Mario series was one of my favorite. I first played Super Mario Bros before I even turned 2, and when I got older I would play the games nearly every day. Mario Bros 3 was something I constantly wanted to played with my mom, and Super Mario World was the main reason I even wanted a SNES -- as I loved Yoshi. Mario 64 was the game that blew me away, and Sunshine was easily one of my favorite GCN game of all time (along with Paper Mario). Even so, among all of these games that I loved, there was one game that really stood out to me. It was a game I got for my 7th Birthday, and one I would play for a long time coming; it was a game known as Yoshis Story.

When I first saw Yoshis Story advertised, I was sitting at the dining room table watching some show on Nick. It was something I did every single day (so I didnt really pay attention to what was on as I ate), but this time around I found myself glued to the set as a Nintendo commercial came on featuring Yoshi. What I saw actually wasnt much, it was just Yoshi running and jumping around and some clouds in the sky, but thats all it took for me to know that I HAD to have this game. So, I asked for it, and when my birthday came that year it was finally mine.

Yoshis Story was special to me. I played it every chance I got in Walmart, and when I finally owned it for myself I would spend hours upon hours on it. Sometimes friends or my cousins would come over to play through it with me, but most of the time it was something I just kept all to myself. Heck, I loved the game so much that I actually studied non stop in school because my mom promised to buy me the guide book if I got a good report card! (Which I did, and yes I still own the book!) I just really loved this game, and I had always hoped that it would get a sequel -- little did I know it would be almost 17 years later.

Although near the end of the GBAs life a title called "Yoshis Topsy Turvy" came out which featured a similar style, it wasnt quite a true sequel to the original Yoshis Story. While Yoshis Story was a platforming game where you explored the world with multiple colored yoshis (and ate fruit to beat the stage), Topsy Turvy was a puzzle platformer where you would tilt the GBA (or DS) left and right to make the world move with Yoshi. It was a fun concept, but it never really evolved past that. Youd enter a stage, tilt the GBA, run up a wall, move some platforms, and within a few minutes you were done. It wasnt until today, that a game truly similar to the one I loved so much back then, would finally come out. That game is Yoshis Wooly World.

Although its not actually Yoshis Story 2, Wooly World features a soft fluffy world made out of wool, and once again it takes our young yoshis on an adventure across the world. The game mixes old familiar elements, such as throwing eggs and the Yoshi air flutter, with new ones thanks to the new wool/yarn like style. It also makes use of Nintendos brand new Amiibo figures (one edition of the game even comes with one). Its finally the game I have waited oh so long for, and now Im only left wondering "why." Why did it take Nintendo so long to bring us this moment? Im sure Ill never know the answer to that, but I can say that for the first time in a long time, I excited to play a Yoshi game.

Thanks Nintendo.