This review contains spoilers
I have to say, this was genuinely a huge improvement over the first Wario Land in my opinion. It fixed pretty much all my major issues with it and it feels like a much more distinct game worthy of being a side series. As per usual with my reviews, here's some small disclaimers for my playthrough: for some reason I can't mark my playthrough as being on the 3DS, but that was the platform I used to play it on. I limited my use of Restore Points to make my playthrough as fair as possible, more so just utilizing it as a way to reduce tedium a little (mainly preventing constant backtracking to the boss whenever you get hit) rather than cheating the game. Took me 9 hours to beat this one, just an hour short of my time with the first game.
So, part of the reason this one feels like such a big improvement to me is the way the gameplay got shifted around. Wario's base move set is pretty much the same aside from a situational rolling move he now has, but WOW he controls so much more smoothly here that it isn't even funny. It does still feel a little off sometimes, particularly with how little freedom you have with aiming your throws which can lead to awkward situations when you need to throw an enemy to break certain blocks, but the physics and controls are pretty good overall and I can't stress enough how much better they are here. The base goal of the game is also the same as the first Wario Land, but they changed a lot here that just makes it feel like a different game. You're still getting to the end of each level and hunting for any coins you can find, but the level design encourages exploration much more and its just overall more interesting to me rather than just feeling like a Diet Coke Mario Land like the first game did. There are some cool new tools to play around with, like how they decided to make Wario immortal here. I'm really not sure if I prefer that over being able to die. In some ways, its really nice, since you can just focus on exploring the levels at your leisure (especially helps that there's no time limit anymore) and you won't need to worry about having your whole coin count slashed for getting a game over. The most enemies can do is make you lose a few coins, so they're more so a nuisance than anything else. I think the immortality was partly done to focus entirely on the coin collecting and exploration side of the game, as well as the new feature where certain enemy attacks affect Wario in different ways that can either benefit or hinder him. For example, when you get stung by a bee, Wario's head gets huge and he starts floating like a balloon, which is great for reaching new places but is also an absolute annoyance whenever you can't go anywhere worth going with it. I think these are sort of like a replacement for powerups from the first game. Unfortunately they're a bit of a missed opportunity in my opinion since there aren't really a lot of creative things you can do with them and some are purely there to annoy you, like when the penguins throw orbs at Wario that make him dizzy or when the snowmen freeze him with their breath. I like the idea behind it though and I hope Wario Land 3 expands on it when I get to it.
So this game tries a little more to have a story than the first Wario Land, but there's still not much to it. Basically, Wario's castle (I guess the castle ending from the first game was the canon ending) gets ransacked by Captain Syrup's goons and they toss an alarm clock in there to wake up Wario. That's about it. From there, he's just going all around the land to hunt treasure and find those guys that took his riches. I just figured I would at least mention it, since this game does have some cutscenes. The story is more so a backdrop for this game's wackiness, which feels like a natural evolution from the first game. Wario Land II has a lot of personality to it that I like, from the fact that a piece of paper with some kind of witty title pops up before each mission to the whole design of the game. It really leans into the zaniness that first game had and its just fun to see.
Going to make a dedicated complaint section here since, while I did mostly enjoy my time with Wario Land II, there are some pretty annoying things here that I didn't really understand. There's two minigames you need to play to get various goodies, whenever you're looking to get Treasures or fill out a map thing that I think unlocks more parts of the game, and both are not very good or fun. For the Treasures, you need to play a minigame that I swear would be impossible for me if there was no easy option and even then I don't always get it. Its one of those "pick the right card" games, where you have one card you're looking for in a deck of cards that only flip around to show what they are for like a millisecond if you're on Hard difficulty. I dunno, maybe my pattern recognition and short term memory are just bad (very likely); these were manageable in Easy difficulty but if I didn't have that option I would've just not been able to get any Treasures. They're an optional thing anyway, but I felt it was a big feature of the game. The other minigame is a panel board that you can spend money to reveal one of, with the goal being to guess what number it is. In my experience you pretty much have to spend the money for three or four panel reveals since a few of the numbers look real similar to each other. From what I can tell, you have to win it after every level to be able to finish the map, so I just said "Yea I'm not doing that" and skipped the option every time I beat a level. Last major complaint of mine has to do with bosses. I don't think they're as boring or annoying as the first game but I really don't understand why they made you have to backtrack any time you get hit by one of their main attacks. In some cases it wasn't too bad, sometimes you even need to lose to the boss once to find a bunch of coins. In other fights, though, it got on my nerves so much that I just used Restore Points at the very beginning of a boss fight so I wouldn't need to bother with walking all the way back every time.
Overall, Wario Land II is a game I have some gripes with, but was very enjoyable for me and a HUGE step up from the first Wario Land. Here's hoping Wario Land 3 is better once I get to that one. This game gets a pretty solid 3.5 stars from me, fun time.
So, part of the reason this one feels like such a big improvement to me is the way the gameplay got shifted around. Wario's base move set is pretty much the same aside from a situational rolling move he now has, but WOW he controls so much more smoothly here that it isn't even funny. It does still feel a little off sometimes, particularly with how little freedom you have with aiming your throws which can lead to awkward situations when you need to throw an enemy to break certain blocks, but the physics and controls are pretty good overall and I can't stress enough how much better they are here. The base goal of the game is also the same as the first Wario Land, but they changed a lot here that just makes it feel like a different game. You're still getting to the end of each level and hunting for any coins you can find, but the level design encourages exploration much more and its just overall more interesting to me rather than just feeling like a Diet Coke Mario Land like the first game did. There are some cool new tools to play around with, like how they decided to make Wario immortal here. I'm really not sure if I prefer that over being able to die. In some ways, its really nice, since you can just focus on exploring the levels at your leisure (especially helps that there's no time limit anymore) and you won't need to worry about having your whole coin count slashed for getting a game over. The most enemies can do is make you lose a few coins, so they're more so a nuisance than anything else. I think the immortality was partly done to focus entirely on the coin collecting and exploration side of the game, as well as the new feature where certain enemy attacks affect Wario in different ways that can either benefit or hinder him. For example, when you get stung by a bee, Wario's head gets huge and he starts floating like a balloon, which is great for reaching new places but is also an absolute annoyance whenever you can't go anywhere worth going with it. I think these are sort of like a replacement for powerups from the first game. Unfortunately they're a bit of a missed opportunity in my opinion since there aren't really a lot of creative things you can do with them and some are purely there to annoy you, like when the penguins throw orbs at Wario that make him dizzy or when the snowmen freeze him with their breath. I like the idea behind it though and I hope Wario Land 3 expands on it when I get to it.
So this game tries a little more to have a story than the first Wario Land, but there's still not much to it. Basically, Wario's castle (I guess the castle ending from the first game was the canon ending) gets ransacked by Captain Syrup's goons and they toss an alarm clock in there to wake up Wario. That's about it. From there, he's just going all around the land to hunt treasure and find those guys that took his riches. I just figured I would at least mention it, since this game does have some cutscenes. The story is more so a backdrop for this game's wackiness, which feels like a natural evolution from the first game. Wario Land II has a lot of personality to it that I like, from the fact that a piece of paper with some kind of witty title pops up before each mission to the whole design of the game. It really leans into the zaniness that first game had and its just fun to see.
Going to make a dedicated complaint section here since, while I did mostly enjoy my time with Wario Land II, there are some pretty annoying things here that I didn't really understand. There's two minigames you need to play to get various goodies, whenever you're looking to get Treasures or fill out a map thing that I think unlocks more parts of the game, and both are not very good or fun. For the Treasures, you need to play a minigame that I swear would be impossible for me if there was no easy option and even then I don't always get it. Its one of those "pick the right card" games, where you have one card you're looking for in a deck of cards that only flip around to show what they are for like a millisecond if you're on Hard difficulty. I dunno, maybe my pattern recognition and short term memory are just bad (very likely); these were manageable in Easy difficulty but if I didn't have that option I would've just not been able to get any Treasures. They're an optional thing anyway, but I felt it was a big feature of the game. The other minigame is a panel board that you can spend money to reveal one of, with the goal being to guess what number it is. In my experience you pretty much have to spend the money for three or four panel reveals since a few of the numbers look real similar to each other. From what I can tell, you have to win it after every level to be able to finish the map, so I just said "Yea I'm not doing that" and skipped the option every time I beat a level. Last major complaint of mine has to do with bosses. I don't think they're as boring or annoying as the first game but I really don't understand why they made you have to backtrack any time you get hit by one of their main attacks. In some cases it wasn't too bad, sometimes you even need to lose to the boss once to find a bunch of coins. In other fights, though, it got on my nerves so much that I just used Restore Points at the very beginning of a boss fight so I wouldn't need to bother with walking all the way back every time.
Overall, Wario Land II is a game I have some gripes with, but was very enjoyable for me and a HUGE step up from the first Wario Land. Here's hoping Wario Land 3 is better once I get to that one. This game gets a pretty solid 3.5 stars from me, fun time.