Wario Land 4 is a platformer for the Game Boy Advance, and was released in 2001, the first year of the system. It follows the familiar story of Wario getting himself into some poorly thought out mission to enrich himself, and having to shoulder charge and self-harm his way to victory.
The game is similar on its face to the brilliant Wario Land 3, which I reviewed here. Both games feature a platforming control scheme, but a unique set of mechanics in that many of the enemies' attacks can physically transform Wario, enabling him to clear platforming challenges. For example, Wario can get hit by a fireball from an enemy, lighting him on fire, forcing him to run extremely fast, and turning him into a scorching wreck that can clear blocks that are otherwise impassible.
Wario Land 4, however, is more of a return to the form of the original Wario Land: Super Mario Land 3, in that the game eschews the Metroidvania stylings of it Wario Land 3 for a more traditional platforming experience. In its predecessor, Wario was invincible, save for one irritating example (read my reviews for more details). The transformations he suffered/used would sometimes set him back in the level, creating a difficulty curve even in the absence of dying. What's more, Wario gradually found more and more treasures, and many of these treasures were imbued with the ability to grant new and improved powers to Wario, allowing him to gradually move his way through the levels and return to them with his new powers, progressively unlocking new areas of each level.
In 4, Wario is still capable of his transformations, but many of his enemies can damage him now, which sets aside some of the unique charm and game design challenge of its predecessors. The structure of the game is basically that you have to progress through each level, getting four fragments of a gem to unlock the boss, and a key to unlock the next level. Once you've reached the end of the level, you must reopen the portal at the beginning of the level, which gives you a time limit to return to the beginning with your gems, keys, and all of the treasure you've received throughout.
The level design in the game is frequently extremely clever, and it definitely leans into its Wario roots by having plenty of puzzles sprinkled throughout the platforming challenges. Levels like the pinball level are some of the finest platforming moments on the system.
The visuals are really tremendous, especially when you consider the time in which the game was released. For a first year release on the console, this game is seriously one of the best looking on the system, period. It's got great colors, tremendous water and environmental effects, beautiful big sprites, and no slowdown to speak of. It's a great technical accomplishment.
I really didn't listen to the music much, as is typical of my handheld experience these days. If I was doing this professionally, I'd crank it on my own time, but I typically play during lunch hours at work, and wafting 16 bit soundtracks from your cubicle is not looked on terribly fondly in professional life, and I'd honestly rather listen to podcasts on my headphones while I play, so the music portion of these reviews gets a snub for handhelds. Sorry!
The game was too short, and far too easy. I only died a handful of times, and all of them were against bosses. The bosses were big and had great, creepy visual designs, but they were genuinely very simple. I think there were a total of fewer than 20 levels in the game, and an experienced player could easily chew through the game in less than an hour and a half. I think I cleared the game in about 3 days worth of lunch breaks, with no experience, and plenty of meandering through levels hunting for collectibles.
This is a good, unique platformer. But I think that they moved away from something that was truly genius in Wario Land 3, and took the easy way out. This is a very good game, but I wish they had leaned into the great tradition they had been building, and instead, we got a game that feels somehow flatter than it could have been. I'll give it an 8.8/10.
Up next on the handheld edition of What I'm Playing is a game I'm really enjoying that's going to take me a LOOOONG time. I probably won't see you back here until June with this bad boy. Hopefully I'll be knocking out a few home games in that time to compensate. See teaser below...
-TRO
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