This was one of my favorite games growing up. Super fun.
What a fantastic Game Boy game. I wish I had had the chance to play this when I was young. Excellent level design, great exploration with levels that change after the first time you complete them. Treasures never felt unfair to collect, and grinding coins was not a chore. The power-ups were fun to use, albeit limited in scope. Bosses could be frustrating, but nothing unfair. Definitely makes me excited to play the rest of the series.
For a mid-life Game Boy game, this is pretty impressively robust. The dynamic levels that develop over the course of the game and the secret world are both pretty neat things, even if they are pretty simple. This also sits as a neat midpoint between Super Mario Land 2's "Mario World-lite" design versus Wario Land 2's very unique design; you can feel Wario starting to figure itself out as a series with its slower, more puzzle-like and combat-oriented gameplay.
I don't think this game could ever really win me over in full. What's here is solid, but it doesn't feel uniquely itself the way Wario does starting with WL2, nor is it a neat technical showcase that makes the most of its console the way Virtual Boy Wario Land does. This game is just itself. Nothing bad.
I don't think this game could ever really win me over in full. What's here is solid, but it doesn't feel uniquely itself the way Wario does starting with WL2, nor is it a neat technical showcase that makes the most of its console the way Virtual Boy Wario Land does. This game is just itself. Nothing bad.
Whatever distinct edge and attitude this game has at the start that made the mechanics more hilarious than your regular Mario game, is quickly deteriorated by the regular level design (and Wario's slowness and few powerups makes the gameplay extremely rigid like an european platformer of the time) and a repetitive visual style (and it's not an issue stemming from this being a Game Boy game, Mario Land 2 already had distinct locales to go through).
I still have more fun watching the crazy over the top and ridiculously pretentious (but more inventive) 1993 Mario movie than playing these easy games to be honest, at least it makes for something less bland. The funniest part of this game are the bosses doing Metroid sounds from Metroid II and Mario just straight out stealing Wario's reward at the end as a comeback for what he did in the previous game 🤣
I still have more fun watching the crazy over the top and ridiculously pretentious (but more inventive) 1993 Mario movie than playing these easy games to be honest, at least it makes for something less bland. The funniest part of this game are the bosses doing Metroid sounds from Metroid II and Mario just straight out stealing Wario's reward at the end as a comeback for what he did in the previous game 🤣
Not personally big on this game. It's a bit repetitive, and small Wario is the worst thing I've ever played as due to being completely gimped in the moveset department, but it's not a bad game. I don't wanna come back to it, but it was a fun experience.
This review contains spoilers
After seeing the recent surge in Wario Land inspired indies - mainly Pizza Tower (which I'm interested in playing sometime soon) and ANTONBLAST - I had a newfound intrigue in playing through these games. I've long heard about how fun and charming they are, but I didn't care much for checking them out until hearing the explosion of praise they're getting as of recent. Of course, I typically try to start from the very beginning when I start a new series, so naturally I began with this one. Thankfully, I was able to snag the whole quadrilogy before the 3DS + Wii U eShop died. Took me some time to beat this one, but its a Game Boy platformer so its not very long. I tried to use as few Restore Points as I could: I beat every level without it, but frankly the last few boss fights were pretty irritating so I used them just to save me the headache. Sorry if that makes me a fake gamer to you, I guess.
I'll jump straight into the gameplay. Wario Land feels like a pretty good successor to the Mario Land series, having the same basic structure as SML2 but shaking things up in a neat way through some of Wario's unique characteristics and a different gameplay focus. Wario has his signature shoulder bash, which has him running forward and knocking out whatever enemy he hits unless they have a weapon in front of them. You get a coin whenever you defeat an enemy with the shoulder bash. He can also pick up enemies and toss them around; if you really want to, you can just throw them around forever and they won't recover, but they only die if you toss them into a hazard (lava, bottomless pit, spikes, etc.) or if you...lodge them into blocks? Yea sometimes when you throw an enemy they just get stuck inside blocks and die that way. The goal in Wario Land is a little different from Mario Land. You're still getting to the end of each level, but, rather than that being the only real focus, Wario Land has you slow down a tad to focus on getting as many coins as you can. There's a bit more of a focus on exploration, with a bunch of treasures you can find (treasure hunting is far from my strong suit though so I only found two of them) and a coin counter that builds up as you gain more wealth. In replacement of the coins usual function of giving you lives, there are hearts you grab that give you a 1-Up when you get 100 of them. I think the focus change is a neat idea and it fits very well with Wario's character, but ultimately didn't feel too impactful or purposeful until literally the very end when your wealth determines what house the Genie gives to Wario. I got the birdhouse - the worst option - because of course I did. I died a lot, and lemme tell you, it's hard to make any bread when you're dying. If I had something to complain about with the gameplay, its that something about it just feels awkward. I'm not sure how to really describe exactly what it is, so instead I'll mention specific complaints. Wario's jumps are very floaty, but there were many times I thought I could go far enough to cross a gap and just couldn't. Usually, you have your dash to help you with going farther, but, when you don't, there are certain sections of the game where you pretty much just have to die and start again since Wario can't dash when he's small and you need to dash at certain parts. This also makes that dragon powerup feel like something you would never actually want because it replaces your dash with the fire breath. Grabbing enemies felt pretty janky to me, there's a few times where Wario just stopped in his tracks and didn't move when I was moving. There's this ghost enemy that functions like a Boo in that it only moves when you turn around, but you can jump on it too and I swear that was so awkward to finagle with. Especially annoying because there's a ghost boss where you need to jump on those ghosts to beat the boss. Any boss where you had to grab something and throw it at them was awful because of how janky the throwing feels. The physics are also just really odd and it can make taking out any enemy that moves around in the air an absolute pain in the neck. Overall I think this set a good precedent for the other Wario Land games, assuming they build off of what this one made, but it does feel pretty clumsy and odd. Surprisingly pretty difficult, too.
There's basically no story at all, so I'm completely skipping the section I'd usually dedicate to that and instead going to aesthetics. Wario Land seems to be very much going for a zany weird style. The Mario Land games were already pretty goofy, so, in my opinion, it only made sense to make the next game in the series make use of one of the Mario series most wacky characters. Wario was even invented by the Mario Land series, so its fitting to have him take the reigns. The music especially goes for a silly goofy sound, with none of it sounding particularly great on its own and rather just existing to elevate the mood. The worlds all have some kind of food related puns in the name (Rice Beach, Mt. Teapot, etc.) and the level design itself usually includes some weird looking enemies that have very expressive cartoony death animations. I think this is pretty neat.
Overall, I don't think Wario Land is all that spectacular, but it has some fun ideas despite its jankiness. It was decently fun to play through and it does have a good amount of content (about 40 levels and 5 bosses if I remember correctly). You might enjoy it more if you're all about finding secret collectibles; I'm not really a treasure hunting fiend myself so I don't mind being stuck with the silly "bad ending". Wario Land gets an alright 3 stars out of me, the game is far from bad but its absolutely carried by the great silly vibes it has and it has some weird issues that sets it back from being a 3.5 stars to me.
I'll jump straight into the gameplay. Wario Land feels like a pretty good successor to the Mario Land series, having the same basic structure as SML2 but shaking things up in a neat way through some of Wario's unique characteristics and a different gameplay focus. Wario has his signature shoulder bash, which has him running forward and knocking out whatever enemy he hits unless they have a weapon in front of them. You get a coin whenever you defeat an enemy with the shoulder bash. He can also pick up enemies and toss them around; if you really want to, you can just throw them around forever and they won't recover, but they only die if you toss them into a hazard (lava, bottomless pit, spikes, etc.) or if you...lodge them into blocks? Yea sometimes when you throw an enemy they just get stuck inside blocks and die that way. The goal in Wario Land is a little different from Mario Land. You're still getting to the end of each level, but, rather than that being the only real focus, Wario Land has you slow down a tad to focus on getting as many coins as you can. There's a bit more of a focus on exploration, with a bunch of treasures you can find (treasure hunting is far from my strong suit though so I only found two of them) and a coin counter that builds up as you gain more wealth. In replacement of the coins usual function of giving you lives, there are hearts you grab that give you a 1-Up when you get 100 of them. I think the focus change is a neat idea and it fits very well with Wario's character, but ultimately didn't feel too impactful or purposeful until literally the very end when your wealth determines what house the Genie gives to Wario. I got the birdhouse - the worst option - because of course I did. I died a lot, and lemme tell you, it's hard to make any bread when you're dying. If I had something to complain about with the gameplay, its that something about it just feels awkward. I'm not sure how to really describe exactly what it is, so instead I'll mention specific complaints. Wario's jumps are very floaty, but there were many times I thought I could go far enough to cross a gap and just couldn't. Usually, you have your dash to help you with going farther, but, when you don't, there are certain sections of the game where you pretty much just have to die and start again since Wario can't dash when he's small and you need to dash at certain parts. This also makes that dragon powerup feel like something you would never actually want because it replaces your dash with the fire breath. Grabbing enemies felt pretty janky to me, there's a few times where Wario just stopped in his tracks and didn't move when I was moving. There's this ghost enemy that functions like a Boo in that it only moves when you turn around, but you can jump on it too and I swear that was so awkward to finagle with. Especially annoying because there's a ghost boss where you need to jump on those ghosts to beat the boss. Any boss where you had to grab something and throw it at them was awful because of how janky the throwing feels. The physics are also just really odd and it can make taking out any enemy that moves around in the air an absolute pain in the neck. Overall I think this set a good precedent for the other Wario Land games, assuming they build off of what this one made, but it does feel pretty clumsy and odd. Surprisingly pretty difficult, too.
There's basically no story at all, so I'm completely skipping the section I'd usually dedicate to that and instead going to aesthetics. Wario Land seems to be very much going for a zany weird style. The Mario Land games were already pretty goofy, so, in my opinion, it only made sense to make the next game in the series make use of one of the Mario series most wacky characters. Wario was even invented by the Mario Land series, so its fitting to have him take the reigns. The music especially goes for a silly goofy sound, with none of it sounding particularly great on its own and rather just existing to elevate the mood. The worlds all have some kind of food related puns in the name (Rice Beach, Mt. Teapot, etc.) and the level design itself usually includes some weird looking enemies that have very expressive cartoony death animations. I think this is pretty neat.
Overall, I don't think Wario Land is all that spectacular, but it has some fun ideas despite its jankiness. It was decently fun to play through and it does have a good amount of content (about 40 levels and 5 bosses if I remember correctly). You might enjoy it more if you're all about finding secret collectibles; I'm not really a treasure hunting fiend myself so I don't mind being stuck with the silly "bad ending". Wario Land gets an alright 3 stars out of me, the game is far from bad but its absolutely carried by the great silly vibes it has and it has some weird issues that sets it back from being a 3.5 stars to me.
I've truthfully only played through a handful of GB platformers to completion, but this is one of the more solid ones I've gotten through. As the last Super Mario Land game and also the first Wario Land game, this one has a little bit of an identity crisis in that it still plays quite a bit like Mario, but has some sprinklings of the elements Wario Land games would really become starting with the second entry. Levels are somewhat more open than the were in other Mario Land games, and Wario's controls and powerups have a bit more gusto to them. While the game has some decent length with 40 levels, a lot of them are pretty simple, and if you can manage to hang on to the Jet Wario power-up when you get one, I found it kind of trivial to just literally fly over a lot of the parts of the game.
I just think he’s neat! I love Wario more then I love that giant flaming ball of gas that our planet circles. I love Wario so much I could die. Warioland is so fun it’s a great contrast to how Mario plays in his games and this is where it all began. The stinky treasure hunter’s first outing may be simple but I’ll be damned if it isn’t a buttload of fun. It’s rough around the edges and is very short (standard for GameBoy games of course) but it laid the groundwork for the Wario franchise and I’m very happy because of it. I just have a Wario obsession.
wario commits tax evasion and kills millions
I enjoyed the story of Wario Land and how it connects to Super Mario Land 2. The gameplay was fun but it felt like the game has a slight identity crisis, trying to be its own thing while simultaneously holding on to the Super Mario Land name and format, which I think is proven by the shift in tone and gameplay in the following title. Overall a good game which stemmed my love for Wario as a character.
It's a decent time. Has a lot of annoying small things about it tho in its design, like how small wario can't do the dash attack and how the hitboxes can kinda be janky. This game is super interesting in that in being the first wario land game yet still bearing the mario land subtitle, it kinda serves as a transition piece between the more straightforward mario land games and the more puzzley and exploratory wario land games that would come after this. I think it definitely is rough around a lot of edges due to that and can be pretty frustrating at times, but despite that I still had a solid little time with it.
wario is very pog
pretty solid more mario than its later entries but not as good as the last two mario lands, the graphics are really nice, i got the worst ending.
One of the best things you can do with a Gameboy. Totally bizarre compared to Nintendo's typical platformer, but not so different that you can't see the family resemblance.
A great game about a little freak! Can't wait to play the rest
Run of the mill platformer that lacks a lot of the charm other Nintendo releases had at the time.
From a philosophical point of view, Wario is essentially Daniel Plainview
Tengo sentimientos encontrados con este juego. Por un lado, supone el nacimiento de una saga muy querida y el desarrollo de un personaje muy divertido, carismático y popular como es el antihĂ©roe Wario, contraparte del mĂtico hĂ©roe Mario. Pero, por otra parte, significĂł el fin de la saga Super Mario Land, tras dos grandes juegos en la primera portátil de Nintendo.
Como juego es notable, es un plataformas bastante correcto que destaca porque no solo hay que completar los niveles sino que, además, hay que encontrar objetos. Asimismo, el objetivo final no es derrotar a un enemigo sino acumular dinero, dando lugar a la rejugabilidad y al factor suerte. Wario tiene un buen set de movimientos y varios disfraces, sentando las bases de lo que serĂa el personaje en el futuro. Vale la pena jugarlo.
Jugado en consola Anbernic.
Como juego es notable, es un plataformas bastante correcto que destaca porque no solo hay que completar los niveles sino que, además, hay que encontrar objetos. Asimismo, el objetivo final no es derrotar a un enemigo sino acumular dinero, dando lugar a la rejugabilidad y al factor suerte. Wario tiene un buen set de movimientos y varios disfraces, sentando las bases de lo que serĂa el personaje en el futuro. Vale la pena jugarlo.
Jugado en consola Anbernic.
Good fun game! Good start to a side series i been enjoying alot so far!
A pretty fun platformer with some twists on the traditional Mario formula.
WAAAAHHHHHHHHHh
A perfectly cromulant way to start the franchise
Really wanted to like this game, but it's a bit too slow and jankey. The level design is also filled with too many "gotcha!" moments which just made it frustrating. I gave up when Wario's fat ass wouldn't float off of the minecart, and I had lost three of my treasures by that point.
It's a neat look at the turning point between VB Wario Land and Super Mario Land II, though it lacks polish, which ironically is what drew me in initially.
But the level design and lack of QOL from the later games made this hard to play. Maybe I'll come back to it, but gonna move on to Wario Land II for now.
It's a neat look at the turning point between VB Wario Land and Super Mario Land II, though it lacks polish, which ironically is what drew me in initially.
But the level design and lack of QOL from the later games made this hard to play. Maybe I'll come back to it, but gonna move on to Wario Land II for now.
Definitely has that Nintendo magic. Incredibly expressive, charming, and full of character for 8-bit sprites running on a black and white Game Boy of all things. As a platformer it's fairly barebones, but I can see a great foundation for its sequels to build on.
Having Wario be the protagonist and Mario the "villain" of Super Mario Bros 3 was a ballsy move. Some good ideas gameplay-wise, and good level design. A welcome change.
I'll start off by stating, I have never played the Super Mario Land games. This would technically be my first one. I don't have the earlier games to compare to. I bought this game on a whim at Magfest cause it was pretty cheap. What I can compare this game to is other Game Boy platformers that I have played, primarily those from and before 1994.
Wario Land is boring. It has impressive elements, but overall it is very boring. There are about four enemies, several repetitive stages, and a very slow, stiff walk cycle. This game did not feel good to play. It could be attributed to being a platformer on the Game Boy, which had its limitations, but many games before it had interesting stages, unique differing enemies, and good feeling movement (DuckTales, Darkwing Duck, Kid Icarus, etc etc etc). Maybe Wario would have felt better if he had something to throw or shoot, but that takes away a big part of the Mario formula, so I don't blame them. Wario has three differing hats, which give him three different powers: fire, jetpack, and butt stomping(?), but honestly, the jetpack is the absolute best and only one to prioritize, adding to the boring factor.
The music is fucking TERRIBLE. Again, something I COULD pass off as being from the Game Boy's limitations, if Link's Awakening and Metal Masters didn't come out a year before.
Moving on to the good of Wario Land, there is a lot that's super cool about this game. It's neat to see a villain get their own game, and how the game works forming around the character rather than forcing the character to fit the game. With Wario's greed, it's not too big of a surprise to see his game focuses now entirely around the coins. Collecting coins finally buys you stuff, allowing you a half-way point and, most important of all, the ability to complete/exit a stage. It's your entire goal in the game to get a high amount of coins/treasure (to get the best castle, but you don't find that out until the end). You get punished for getting a game over with your coin amount getting cut in half, alluding you to the importance of them. The bosses in this game are very cool (minus that pregnant bird looking thing...) and look great graphically. Honestly, the whole game is good graphically, with the map layouts and the bosses really just being the cherry on top. The ending cutscene was very cute too, where I of course got the birdhouse (worst) ending, cause I had only 35 coins at the end LOL. Made me wish there were more cutscenes, even just in the style of when first encountering Princess Syrup.
Overall, I have to ask myself though...
Did I have fun playing this game? In all honesty, I gotta say: not really.
And for that reason, I'm going to have to go with a 2.5/5 rating.
Wario Land is boring. It has impressive elements, but overall it is very boring. There are about four enemies, several repetitive stages, and a very slow, stiff walk cycle. This game did not feel good to play. It could be attributed to being a platformer on the Game Boy, which had its limitations, but many games before it had interesting stages, unique differing enemies, and good feeling movement (DuckTales, Darkwing Duck, Kid Icarus, etc etc etc). Maybe Wario would have felt better if he had something to throw or shoot, but that takes away a big part of the Mario formula, so I don't blame them. Wario has three differing hats, which give him three different powers: fire, jetpack, and butt stomping(?), but honestly, the jetpack is the absolute best and only one to prioritize, adding to the boring factor.
The music is fucking TERRIBLE. Again, something I COULD pass off as being from the Game Boy's limitations, if Link's Awakening and Metal Masters didn't come out a year before.
Moving on to the good of Wario Land, there is a lot that's super cool about this game. It's neat to see a villain get their own game, and how the game works forming around the character rather than forcing the character to fit the game. With Wario's greed, it's not too big of a surprise to see his game focuses now entirely around the coins. Collecting coins finally buys you stuff, allowing you a half-way point and, most important of all, the ability to complete/exit a stage. It's your entire goal in the game to get a high amount of coins/treasure (to get the best castle, but you don't find that out until the end). You get punished for getting a game over with your coin amount getting cut in half, alluding you to the importance of them. The bosses in this game are very cool (minus that pregnant bird looking thing...) and look great graphically. Honestly, the whole game is good graphically, with the map layouts and the bosses really just being the cherry on top. The ending cutscene was very cute too, where I of course got the birdhouse (worst) ending, cause I had only 35 coins at the end LOL. Made me wish there were more cutscenes, even just in the style of when first encountering Princess Syrup.
Overall, I have to ask myself though...
Did I have fun playing this game? In all honesty, I gotta say: not really.
And for that reason, I'm going to have to go with a 2.5/5 rating.
The start of a great series. A simple platformer that works well and Warios moveset really diversifies him from Mario. The idea's are good and the game is just plain fun, my favorite of the Mario Land trilogy.
Surprisingly fun Game Boy platformer. The music and levels are pretty standard, nothing being that memorable, but the slower pace and incredible amount of secrets make for a more methodical experience than Mario, which I really enjoyed. Play this game with quick save on hand if you don't want to go insane.
I was a bit let down by this one after playing Super Mario Land 2. This game makes big swings at something different but I feel like it doesn't really make any of it. Most of the game is honestly really dull. Wario doesn't feel satisfying to play with mechanics that are poorly communicated. The game has this really interesting progression of secret treasures in some of the levels, but they decided that if you game over you lose one of them. That made me not want to go for all the treasures. I understand what the music was going for, but a lot of it sounds really dull and grating. A lot of the levels are really samey. I died a ton in this but I never felt the challenge was all that interesting. I like that they made something different, but none of this really did it for me. I didn't do the secret world or get the good ending, but I doubt that would do much to change my stance on it. Interesting little game but playing it is not all that interesting I guess.
nintendo's answer when prompted with the question: "what is an evil mario game?" slow, methodical movement yet immensely powerful powerups. the player's greed is enabled and exploited with treasures that are lost at a game over and the option to gamble your hard earned cash. interestingly enough the end game reward system would get reused for Luigi's Mansion, which now that I think about it Luigi's Mansion could have totally been a game starring Wario about him cleaning up his Mario Land 2 mansion, but i digress. definitely my favorite of the Mario Land trilogy, levels work so well here at this resolution, whereas Land 2 could have had more space to breathe, and i just don't find Land 1 fun. leave the fast games on the SNES and also at the door, because we mosey in this household.