Wario Land: Super Mario Land 3 (1994)

Preliminary: Interesting. At first it was just feeling like a clunky follow up to the Super Mario Lands, but then I got the fire breathing hat... And decided to read up on the manual. And turns out it's a very robust game. I immediately loved the world map vibe, preceding the later Donkey Kong world map vibes. I wish the controls were a bit less clunky, and I hope it doesn't get too focused on adventuring and puzzle-solving instead of just fun platforming and new power-ups, but it's looking likely I will be playing this through!

Oh boo I was hoping for something more when I first was able to use a Gold Coin to open a Skeleton Lock thing. Oh lol and later I needed those 10 Coins to open the exit woopsie. (and turns out the other time it was a save point ;) )

Day 1

Some of the music is just annoying GB sounds, but some remind me... of something. yes of Mario but also of the Rugrats Adventure Game for PC.

It is fun having so many ways to harm enemies from jumping on them to throwing an enemy at them to the fire breathing to the body slam and so on. It's also fun feeling proud of myself noticing the probably very obvious early examples of secret areas :-p

I am loving this fire breathing power up and will not give it up for anything :-p

I'm not in love with doing a minigame after every darn level. I like the platforming, don't distract me. And the movement and controls still feel quite clunky, but it's all coming together as a very fun game.

I know it barely counts as a puzzle but I was proud of going back and figuring out that the spikey thing coming at you has to be used as a platform in the otherwise impassable lava, but I had left one block unbroken to help it have a path. Hehe. Okay I will stop typing after every level and just enjoy the game.

I like this first boss, and the tune for it, but it did highlight the slight delays in the controls and floatiness of the jump since precision was more needed here. I am sure I will get more and more used to its clunkiness.

Yesss I like the Look and Sound of Mt Teapot

Welp I finally found a true Treasure Room (I thouhgt I had when I found a bunch of Coins... even after reading the manual lol. Now I understand). Neat idea for optional collectibles, allows for lots of replayability especially if I had owned this as a kid, however I was a bit disappointed after the work I went through to get it... and giving up my Fire Breathing for it!!!

I am not a fan of this first level of Stove Canyon tune and it was kind of a frustrating level..

Cool that there are so many different endings. Silly they are based on number of total coins, but I suppose I will try for more coins then and start caring about the minigames more.

Welp I left off at Parsley Woods for the night. Stove Canyon last couple levels got a bit too mazey for me but luckily I was generally always headed in the right direction. Oh shoot wait there are only 40 levels hmmm maybe I should finish it tonight. Argh the platforming hook. Yeah after playing the first 2 levels of Parsley Woods I should probly take a break for the night to avoid burnout. Same ol darn sound effects and repeated runes now >.<

Day 2

Ugh these later levels are pulling a lot of annoying things I don't like in platformers. And the repeated use of enemies and level design elements is getting old.

Even as meh as late game as becoming, I am grateful for the non-infinitely-spawning enemies.

Lol absurd final boss setup and the genie talking during the ending was wild. I got one of the bad endings :-p cuz I stopped going for treasures and coins. The credits music is kinda annoying, tho not bad

Look: 7.5/10 If there were more variety to the enemies this possibly would've gotten higher. The world map and areas were nice

Sound: 7.5/10 Meh. Gave a slight boost cuz some tunes gave Feels.

Play: 8/10 Lots of flaws, but also lots of neat features and replayability and it definitely had that platformer hook.

Feel: 8/10

Attachment: 8/10

Overall: 7.8/10

Sad that this didn't get a 4 star, but I think it's just because giving honorary 3 stars has become so common, when 3 stars really should be commendable.

Completion: Main Story. About 13k Coins lol. Only 3 Treasures

Playtime: ~2h 10m

What a surprising twist to the Mario series when Nintendo gave Wario his own game 30 years ago! Let me say, this game is way more fun than it should be.

I think Wario Land (the first) really showcases how incredibly talented and innovative Nintendo has always been. They were able to take a successful formula, put it on a portable device and somehow make it different, and very good. In Wario Land, instead of just reaching a goal, the point of the game is to gather as much treasure as possible in the form of coins and literal treasures hidden in different levels across the game. The point is to get as much loot as you can to get Wario a new castle. It draws on the same premise of "Land" or "World" much like the earlier games did where each level is accessed through an overworld and each level can be revisited. In fact, it is recommended you do revisit them as some of the worlds can change allowing you to find secret exits, or bringing in a powerup from a different level to be able to find that hidden treasure.

The fare is fairly standard here, its a Nintendo platformer. But part of what makes it so good is not only your desire to snag as many coins as you can to get the best ending possible, but the desire to explore each level to see if you are missing a secret exit or treasure. There is a transition between two areas of the world map that you literally will miss an entire section of map if you do not find a secret exit. Cleverly, the game tells you this by jumping ahead a number of levels between one area to the next, so you know that you are missing something along the way. Also, the sheer amount of content here - 40 levels across 7 areas. This is originally on a GAMEBOY, need I remind you, AND its put together super well.

There is certainly some frustration which leads me to give this 4/5 instead of a full score. Some of the levels are painfully annoying, and the final boss is RNG hell, and a huge time waster as far as I am concerned. Otherwise, you can't go wrong. I ended up with a log cabin at the end of my play through. While I could go back and farm more coins and find the few missing treasures I didn't bother to flesh out, my list of games to play is far too long to want to do it again. You can't say this about all Gameboy titles, however this is one that is well worth your time.

I got the worst possible ending, but the game is just so fun from beginning to end I don't even mind.

It's also hard, tho, in a way that only early platformer games can be. After growing up with Wario Land 3 and 4 is funny how much things change as soon as you just remove invincibility and failure has real consequences.

I wanna play anything else for a while just for a change, but I'm totally gonna play Wario Land II at some point so I can say I've played 'em all.

Wario Land: Super Mario Land 3 has got to be one of the coolest ideas of all time. It's a breath of fresh air and a cool way to carry the series forward.

After the success of Super Mario Land 2: 6 Golden Coins, Nintendo got to work on Super Mario Land 3. After seeing the popularity of the main antagonist of the previous game, Wario, Nintendo decided to center this game on Wario. He's the main character in this game. This would put an end to the Mario Land series and start the Wario Land franchise.

The story is simple as always. After losing the castle he took over in Mario Land 2, Wario, desiring to replace the castle he lost, sets off to steal the Golden Statue of Princess Peach from the Brown Sugar Pirates and Captain Syrup to ransom for a castle

Wario Land has really cool gameplay. He is slower than Mario but is very strong. He can ram into enemies and blocks to collect coins. Power-Ups like Bull Wario make him stronger, Dragon Wario which lets him shoot fire, and Jet Wario which allows him to fly.

The game has a neat system as well. You can get different endings based on the number of coins you collected. You can be rewarded a Bird House to a whole Moon based on meeting certain requirements. This really encourages exploration to find all the treasure and coins you can. It's great.

Wario Land: Super Mario Land 3 may not be as good as Mario Land 2, but it's well executed and the start of a really cool series. Fitting how Wario basically stole this franchise. I won't be looking at any other Wario Land games. This is a Mario retrospective after all. But seeing how this is the end of the trilogy, I felt like I had to. Amazing time with this game

3/5

Would Recommend

Although it's pretty much a sequel to Super Mario Land 2 in name only, the first Wario Land game is probably my favorite of the series. By this point it seems like R&D1 really had a handle on the original Game Boy palette, with tons of character injected into a limited array of sprites.

I really enjoyed the optional treasure collectables, which offered a bit more challenge in a game that's otherwise a bit breezy for the era.

It's not perfect, but I'd say it's my favorite pre-GBC platformer. I can see how this ended up kicking off a new series.