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Redemption is always sweet. Artoon and Nintendo combined to try and redeem the old school Mario format with Yoshi's Island DS, a game very similar to the original Yoshi's Island. The problem? They just didn't do it right.
When a player starts the game, it seems like it'll be a truly great game. Old school format from the original Yoshi's Island is plastered all over the screen, and the look of the game seems tremendous. Mario's back in his child form, and Yoshi's here to help once more. It seems as though it's exactly like the original Yoshi's Island.
That is, of course, until the game starts. And when it does start is when the game goes downhill and joins the recent releases that have been bad and becomes another disappointment. From the start of the game, a player can tell that it just is not the same Yoshi's Island game we've all come to know and love.
In short: It's a terrible game.
Well, it may not be fair to say that. It's not a terrible game...except when it was supposed to live up to the hype of being a sequel to the original Yoshi's Island. Then it's a terrible game. The gameplay is just absolutely horrible. Well, the gameplay itself isn't so bad, it's just what the gameplay incorporates is terrible. Bad levels, bad music, bad characters, etc. It doesn't matter where a player starts, it's the same situation over and over.
But we have to start with something, so let's start with the levels. They're boring, plain and simple. They are incredible easy and much longer than the original game's levels. Generally, players like longer levels. But when they are no challenge, the longer levels just become more of an annoyance and a pain to play through.
It doesn't help the fact that certain parts of certain levels are tailored to a specific character. Yeah, each character should have a special ability, but the ones found in Yoshi's Island Ds are nothing. Dk, Wario, and Peach all have something that enables them to pass certain objectives and such. They just all take away from the old school Yoshi's Island feel of things, and there should have been no special abilities at all.
It would've been much better if each character was playable just because a player wanted to be them, not because they have to be them. There's a reason why Wario and DK have never been in a child form before, and Yoshi's Island DS hits on that and hits it hard.
Another thing that Yoshi's Island DS hits on hard is a player's ears. The music in this game just may be the worst Mario music ever for major titles. It is absolutely horrendous. There is nothing about the music that is in any sense enjoyable. And when the child riding on Yoshi cries, it's not very good either - but in all fairness, the original Yoshi's Island had the same thing.
Speaking of the original, a player would figure that there's bound to be a few old school tunes in there. Guess again, there's not. Very few songs are based off the original game, if not any at all. There is no audio value that comes with the feel or enjoyment of the original game, and there's just no reason to give Yoshi's Island Ds' music any praise.
However, it's not all bad, and some of it does have a right to earn some praise. The graphics are absolutely amazing. They are like the old game, styled and tailored to it exactly. Everything is colorful and the sprites in the game are incredibly well done.
And of course, at least they attempted to make a great game in an old style. Give them some credit for that.
In the long run, Yoshi's Island DS is a game that just didn't live up to expectations. It's like a replica of New Super Mario Bros. - it had all the potential to bring back respect to retro gaming. It just wasn't any good, but the attempt to do so must be recognized. Yoshi's Island Ds is a terrible game compared to the original Yoshi's Island, and it just doesn't fit the bill of a good or great game.
Overall Score: 7.1/10
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