• Hey Guest. Check out your NeoGAF Wrapped 2025 results here!

Happy 30th to peak SNES platforming

64gigabyteram

64gigabyteram

Reverse groomer.
Yoshi%27s_Island_%28Super_Mario_World_2%29_box_art.jpg
image.png


Beat it twice this year. It's so fucking good. Not much else to say, it's just a classic.

Give it a whirl today to honor the legacy this left behind. And what's your favorite Yoshi game? Besides this one, of course.
 
Yeah I replayed most of this game on nso recently and it's still a masterpiece, honestly I'd go further and say that it might be the best 2d platformer period (absolute peak level design). 2nd favorite is hard to say, I thoroughly enjoyed story, island ds, and the good feel yoshi games but none of them are particularly great. Maybe story just because of the nostalgia I have for the game having played it growing up plus it gave yoshi his voice (and honestly it's not bad just feels unfinished).
 
WAAAHHHH WAAAAHHHHH
 
The game that is in my top 7 of the best video games I have ever played in my life... Yoshi island


Yoshi Story is a piece of shit
 
Didn't touch it till an emulator a few years later. The baby was annoying. Game was kind of easy. Got bored. This came out around the PSX launch, anyone around my age that wasn't saving their money for that and instead wasting it on an overpriced cart game was... not with the zeitgeist.
 
Yeah, ever since this game I haven't been comfortable calling anything the best 2D platformer, the best it can hope to do is tie Yoshi's Island. It really is one of the best games Nintendo has ever done.
 
Avid Reading Horse said:
Didn't touch it till an emulator a few years later. The baby was annoying. Game was kind of easy. Got bored. This came out around the PSX launch, anyone around my age that wasn't saving their money for that and instead wasting it on an overpriced cart game was... not with the zeitgeist.
Click to expand...

If the game was so easy, why was the baby crying all the time? To unlock stages you need a perfect score of 100 on every level in a given world, which means finishing the level with the max mario countdown timer amongst other requirements like finding all the red coins in the same run...good luck. Doesn't sound like you played long enough for the game to get hard anyway though, first level of game is usually easy.
 
I remember vividly the day we got informed at Club Nintendo by fax from NCL about this game. It came out if nowhere, was coming out soon, had the FX2 chip, and was called Super Mario World 2: Yossy Island (sp).

You can imagine that right after the wonder that was Donkey Kong Country the excitement was through the roof. We imagined all kinds of 3D possibilities. The disappointment was immense when the DHL parcels revealed a hand drawn game with a weird game mechanic that wasn't one for a mainline Mario game.

Of course it turned out to be an excellent game nevertheless, but the badging of it as SMW2 was weird.
 
Last edited:
Robb said:
Great game. Too bad the sequels didn't reach the same heights.
Click to expand...
Eh, they get too much of a bad rap.
They still have some great level design. It's just that the shadow of the SNES original is too big. Everything you may complain about the sequels is already there in YI. And I'll maintain to my last day that New Island's music isn't remotely as bad as people painted it at launch.

Truth be told, nothing can top YI's final boss battle + ending. You can't really do it twice, yet it's exactly what they did. But I guess it's part of Nintendo's blueprint to always bring some good bits back for the newer generations.

Anyway, here's to YI's 30 years. I still remember getting it for Christmas. What a year 1995 was for the SNES.
 
BlackTron said:
If the game was so easy, why was the baby crying all the time? To unlock stages you need a perfect score of 100 on every level in a given world, which means finishing the level with the max mario countdown timer amongst other requirements like finding all the red coins in the same run...good luck. Doesn't sound like you played long enough for the game to get hard anyway though, first level of game is usually easy.
Click to expand...
I have no idea what a Max Mario Countdown Timer is supposed to be. The baby's annoying because who the hell wants a baby in their game when they're not 5 years old? The effects were fancier but everything else felt like a downgrade from Super Mario World. Also a pretty easy game, but a joy to play through and through.

Yoshi's Island seemed to come out after platformers were no longer cool, but before they were retro. Very sad.
 
An absolutely timeless classic. There's always people that want to chide it as a downgrade from Super Mario World or the other traditional Mario games, but Yoshi's Island is really its own thing, and it offers something that honestly... no other series has really replicated. I appreciate the distinct feeling this game has.
 
Last edited:
Knuckles chaotix released in April 1995. Good year for platforners. Peak 32x platformer.

Partially kidding but a lot of snes games didn't get proper attention in 1995. Some real gems.

Good use of the FX chip too. It's interesting that the team leaned into the art style against the rendered trend of dkc.
 
amigastar said:
'That's Shigeru Miyamoto magic and genius right there. Great game.
Click to expand...
He is only the producer and he is overrated, but that's another problem. This game was done with those beautiful graphics because of DKC success BTW. Without Rare DKC this game would be very different.

I still think this game didn't age that well compared to SM World or even DKC 1/2
 
Last edited:
NeoIkaruGAF said:
Eh, they get too much of a bad rap.
Click to expand...
Nah.
I stopped playing the first two kind-of-sequels (Yoshi Story and I forgot the name of the next one, whoops) not even an hour or two in. I was honestly put back how they aren't pulling me in at all.

Woolly World was alright, but felt more like "Yoshi's Island lite".

It really wouldn't be THAT difficult to replicate or at least do a good continuation. Use the same graphical style, similar controls and mechanics, get rid of the crying baby (at least get rid of the crying :LOL:) and you're golden.
I honestly believe it was mostly the graphical style + soundtrack combo that made the magic happen.

And yet, here we are, 30 years later - not only unsurpassed but not even matched 🤷‍♂️
 
Last edited:
Physiognomonics said:
He is only the producer and he is overrated, but that's another problem. This game was done with those beautiful graphics because of DKC success BTW. Without Rare DKC this game would be very different.

I still think this game didn't age that well compared to SM World or even DKC 1/2
Click to expand...
Overrated? Dude, that guy was responsible for many masterpieces and classics like
Mario Bros (1983)
Super Mario Bros 3
Super Mario World
Super Mario 64
Legend of Zelda A link to the Past
Legend of Zelda Ocarina of Time
Starfox
F-Zero
Pikmin
many other devs would wish to make at least one classic game.
Overrated? I don't think so.
 
Last edited:
TheSHEEEP said:
Nah.
I stopped playing the first two kind-of-sequels (Yoshi Story and I forgot the name of the next one, whoops) not even an hour or two in. I was honestly put back how they aren't pulling me in at all.

Woolly World was alright, but felt more like "Yoshi's Island lite".
Click to expand...
I don't consider Yoshi's Story a sequel. It's not the same thing. I'm talking about YI DS and Yoshi's New Island for the 3DS, plus Woolly World. Those are pretty much the same thing as the original, gameplay-wise.
 
Avid Reading Horse said:
I have no idea what a Max Mario Countdown Timer is supposed to be. The baby's annoying because who the hell wants a baby in their game when they're not 5 years old? The effects were fancier but everything else felt like a downgrade from Super Mario World. Also a pretty easy game, but a joy to play through and through.

Yoshi's Island seemed to come out after platformers were no longer cool, but before they were retro. Very sad.
Click to expand...

When you get hurt, you are separated from Mario and he starts crying with a countdown timer. If you don't get him back in time, you die. The timer only refills so much by itself, you have to refill it the rest of the way with finite items to get it back to full. If you don't, a 100 score is impossible.

I really never minded the crying that much because it was always the consequence of making a mistake and it was like the games alarm "warning, countdown! You are about to die if you don't fix this and stop the crying right now!"

Ideally you would almost never have to hear it for more than a second or two and are avoiding it at all costs trying to perfectly clear levels.

Even without trying to score and unlock things the game isn't that easy, certainly at least as challenging as Super Mario World. There are 6 words in the game I think Mario 3 seemed easy until you cleared a few.
 
Last edited:
Shifty1897 said:
Definitely a top 3 2D Mario for me. I never 100%'ed it but I was close.
Click to expand...

When I was a kid I got really close to 100% but there were a few levels I just couldn't score 100 on no matter what and it was SO frustrating. Honestly, I don't think I could get as close today as I did then. That was REAL in the trenches gaming, like gold medals in Rogue Squadron, just pure maddening gameplay over and over and over.
 
NeoIkaruGAF said:
I don't consider Yoshi's Story a sequel. It's not the same thing. I'm talking about YI DS and Yoshi's New Island for the 3DS, plus Woolly World. Those are pretty much the same thing as the original, gameplay-wise.
Click to expand...

Playing Yoshi's Story for five minutes at my friends house when it came out left me so disappointed I never tried another Yoshi game ever again.
 
It's a great game but something about the art style and resolution combo, or whatever it is, actively turns me off and gives me a fucking headache. I've never gotten far because the way it looks and the sound design drive me nuts.
 
Lovely game, and a showcase of what the SNES was able to do.

Transparencies, rotations, sprites scaling to hell and back and even a little bit of 3D here and there.

9bd3e78c8a933afe63a440d4fd22bae9ff65fb6c.gif
 
TintoConCasera said:
Lovely game, and a showcase of what the SNES was able to do.

Transparencies, rotations, sprites scaling to hell and back and even a little bit of 3D here and there.

9bd3e78c8a933afe63a440d4fd22bae9ff65fb6c.gif
Click to expand...
I find it difficult to stick with, maybe I need to give it another go on the SNES mini....which doesn't get much usage from me.. certainly though it is the kind of game that showed the SNES still had it when it came to a visual showcase, and wouldn't look out of place at the time on the 32 bit consoles..
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Similar threads

COD BO7 debuts on Steam with peak CCU of 87k
Platform  2 3 4 5 6
262
2K
ValiantInstance replied
TIMECOP - SNES - By Angry Video Game Nerd
Opinion Analysis Platform 
9
274
DarkShadowXI replied
Happy Birthday to Shigeru Miyamoto
16
202
Sinozen replied
Happy Thanksgiving!
40
397
Ocean Dweller replied
Arc Raiders 324,925 CCU on Steam so far (UP: 700,000 peak concurrent players (PCC) on all platforms)
2 3 4
184
2K
ZehDon replied
Top Bottom