NOSTALGIA OVERLOAD. I didn't play many games as a kid (I played plenty, just not many different games), and just a few weeks ago I found out that the game I played the most at like age 6 or 7 was this one right here, Super Mario World 2: Yoshi's Island. The weird feeling of both joy and, surprisingly, anxiety this game gave me was unreal. It didn't take long to realize where that came from. Turns out, I made it quite far as a kid, to World 4 or 5 in fact, and the boss fights, which are actually mostly very easy, just had me feeling all kinds of anxious when the Magikoopa, Kamek, would make normal enemies into bosses.
But it was 99% pure pleasure to play this game, as I found myself remembering all the sounds, the music, the enemies, some of the puzzles, the platforming, the egg-shooting, the stairs and flowers that would come out of the clouds with a question mark on them, the sound of the plants dying when I shoot them with an egg, the power up mini games where Yoshi turns into a chopper and Baby Mario can become invincible, the balloon minigames, just all of it. Pure. Pleasure.
It helps that the game aged extremely well and is one of the most unique games I've played so far in the 6 years I've now completed as part of this challenge. Super Mario World 2 is not necessarily an actual sequel to Super Mario World because its main character and some of its core features are different, but that's a good thing because the way Nintendo was able to innovate for a soon to be replaced SNES in favor of the N64 is just magical. It feels like they're showing off just because they can. Turns out, this game had one of the longer development cycles for any game ever at the time, so it makes sense that they went a little extra with the variety on display here. Then there is of course the hand-drawn aesthetic to the game, which looks beautiful, and probably even if you don't look at it with nostalgia glasses like I've done the whole time.
The level design is fantastic, with more room given for exploration than per usual and lots of secrets to uncover without having to go back a level and bring Yoshi or a power-up with you like in SMW1, and constantly new threats and abilities that change things up nearly continously. Worlds 3 to 5 didn't offer as much in that regard as worlds 1, 2 and 6 but even those levels alone show more variety than 99% of platformers have in their entirety at the time.
The soundtrack is great as well, with my only issue being that songs keep repeating after a while. With the talents at Nintendo, I would have thought they could have introduced more songs in later worlds. The only new songs I remember later on where remixes of the main menu theme and boss fight themes, which were incredible.
Gameplay is smooth and wasn't as tough as I imagined, with most deaths feeling fair and like they were my fault and not BS thrown at me by the game. Those moments did happen, and Yoshi slipped off the edges more often than I would have liked, but it is still incredibly fun to play this game today.
OVERALL | 84/100 ⭐⭐⭐⭐½
One of the best platformers of its time, one of the best platformers to this day, an incredible final 2D game for Mario (kinda, more like a first Yoshi game) before he moves on to 3D in 1996 for the foreseeable future with Super Mario 64.
