The 'Shroom:Issue XLVI/Should Have Been

Should Have Been by

Hello, and welcome to my Should Have Been section again. I received no PMs, so I guess that means I covered everything. :3

Still, if you disagree with me or think that I have missed anything, PM me on the forums and tell me!

Today, I’ll be covering Yoshi’s Island DS.

What Should Have Been in This Game?
I believe that the prequel, Super Mario World 2: Yoshi’s Island, was far superior to Yoshi’s Island DS. While this is not really a bad game, I believe it lacked in places where the prequel didn’t.

Firstly, I’d like to complain about the music. Most of it is just repeating the same song with different instruments, and it is never as good as the prequel. The themes for when you complete a level and lose a life are terribly generic. It lacks the charm and the humor of the prequel. The title theme is disappointing beyond belief. In my opinion, they should have kept the old soundtrack, or at least based the new one on it.

Another point – most of the levels look the same. There’s hardly any innovations, and the loss of items means that you can’t change the gameplay or make it easier. There’s always some kind of level that has the same music, objects, items, enemies etc. I believe levels should be different, and have different objects and enemies. Many features were removed from the prequel, and I believe this should not have happened. Features such as items, watermelons, Poochy and the games where Yoshi plays against a Bandit were all fantastic additions, and were all removed in this game.

Also, parts where the screen starts scrolling can be hard. For example, Up the Creek caused me many problems in going “up the creek”. All of the enemies on the vines and the screen quickly scrolling upwards, plus the fairly slippery controls, made this part much harder than anything should be. Some sections of the game even can seem impossible. At first, I thought my game was glitched up when the way I was supposed to go was blocked.

I think Nintendo should have toned down the difficulty. In the Clouds is another one that drove me insane. If you slip up once, you die, and you have to time your jumps correctly on “M” Blocks, small clouds and fast‐moving clouds. Another problem I find is that a few of the babies’ special abilities are a little bit faulty. For example, Baby Peach’s ability, her parasol, sometimes won’t work, and the same goes for Baby Wario’s magnet. I believe this should have been fixed.

Again, I come back to the problem with the slippery controls. Sometimes, I find myself falling off platforms after I stop moving. Sometimes, I have to jump twice in order to stop falling off, especially at In the Clouds. It goes without saying that this should have been fixed. To be honest, the game overall just feels depressing. The prequel is fun, attractive, classic and colorful – this just feels like something’s missing. It feels much more serious and like the fun has been sucked out.

As for things that should have appeared more, I think all of Yoshi’s transformations should have appeared more. They hardly ever appear and are probably one of the least broken things in the game. The Yoshi Car and Yoshi Train didn’t even appear, and should have. Plus, the Yoshi Submarine can no longer fire missiles, making it worse. Otherwise, not much else should have appeared more. It feels like Nintendo used everything else too much.

Enemies Who Should Have Appeared

 * Goombas – Goombas are the main enemy of the whole Mario series. At least they appeared in Super Mario World 2: Yoshi’s Island, even if it was just once.
 * Grunts – Grunts were pretty cool enemies, and it’s funny to see them embarrassed. They were a great idea and completely ditched in Yoshi’s Island DS.
 * Harry Hedgehogs – These enemies were pretty cool too.
 * Ravens – Ravens were an awesome species, a unique idea, and worked perfectly. I mean, they even appeared outside of the Yoshi series.
 * Fuzzies – These enemies made Yoshi dizzy by giving the screen all sorts of effects, and were funny and a great idea. It would be good to see them again. They could have made the bottom screen go trippy too, if they were in Yoshi’s Island DS.

Beta Elements
Starting off, the game was originally going to have Nintendo Wi‐Fi Connection support. This means that you would be able to connect to the internet for something. It is unknown what the Wi‐Fi mode was for. A file in the ROM called “objeditor.arcz.” suggests that there may have been a level editor in the game at one point. The game was also originally called “Yoshi’s Island 2”.

The boss Big Guy the Stilted was originally a real Shy Guy, and not robotic like in the final game. However, one patch can be seen on his foot, and the sprites were probably incomplete. There were originally two different title screens, and one was scrapped even after it was completed. It was seen at the E3 Demo that enemies could only be defeated by jumping on them when Yoshi was carrying Baby Mario.

Black Yoshi and Baby Peach can be seen traversing a flowery area in a screenshot, which is not seen in the final game. Graphics for Baby Wario and Baby Bowser Baby Coins exist, but were not used in the final game. The level Donuts and Eggs wasn’t originally set in the wild west.

Well, that’s all. Thank you for reading my section. Don’t forget to send me your suggestions, if you have any. See you next month!