Topic: Yoshi's Epic Garbage

[Webmalfunction]

Alex anti-hypes the heck out of the new Yoshi game.

http://www.nintendoworldreport.com/blog/33146

During the recent Nintendo Direct, when the new Yoshi game was announced, there was some rejoicing. Some people were insanely happy that Good-Feel wanted to take on a Yoshi's Story follow-up, while another, significantly smaller camp was disgusted that the Yoshi series was being handled by a group that has already proven incapable. I am in the latter.

I guess the largest issue is that the studio making this game is the same one that developed Kirby's Epic Yarn on the Wii a few years back. Despite the game’s (then-) creative art style and excellent music, its difficulty was insanely low and static (yes, even counting collectibles). And when style is taken out of the equation, the game as a platformer just isn't creative or high quality. The vehicle segments ranged from OK to not very fun, and the boss fights were a yawn. Moreover, should the new Yoshi game be developed in a similar style (and it already includes those gems), I can promise that what we're going to get is another blatant case of style over substance (and a potential rehash, for that matter).

And yes, Takashi Tezuka is taking some kind of reins on the project, but I wouldn't get my hopes too high. While there is always a chance he could “Miyamoto” it and improve (well, not always) or change direction as he sees fit, he could instead pull a Tarantino, having his name attached as producer while only doing basic consulting. Furthermore, even though he was the director of Yoshi's Island, he also produced the most disappointing follow-up to a game ever, which is also the basis of this game.

Oh, yeah. And as I've touched on, I reckon there won't be anything here for Yoshi's Island fans. No Baby Mario, and no crayon art style. Instead, this game is almost assuredly both a follow-up to Yoshi's Story and the apparently established Yarn franchise.

The reason why I'm upset, though, is that Nintendo seems to be ruining everything the original Yoshi's Island did right. While easy, at least the boss fights were creative, it was possible to lose, the platforming was masterfully designed, and the difficulty actually existed for those who wanted it. If this game turns out how everyone expects it to, I fear it will be years before we actually get a proper Yoshi game.

[ShyGuy]

Nintendo

Doomed

iPad

99 cents

Third Party

Narrative

edit:

Click Bait

Inflammatory

[Ian Sane]

You would figure after the lukewarm reaction to Yoshi's Story that Nintendo would have just pretended it never existed and just continue with the Yoshi series as if Yoshi's Island was the most recent game.  It's the only "bad" game Nintendo made during a time period when they were making GOTY contenders every time out.  Instead it actually seems to have had the most influence on Yoshi, so much you would figure that Story was the legendary game instead of Island.  You figure there has to be some workplace politics stuff in place.  That's somebody at Nintendo's favourite game and they don't want to admit it sucks.  So they'll shove Yoshi's Story down our throats until we "admit" we're wrong.  The Urban Champion guy is doing the same thing.

I have long ago given up on Yoshi and Star Fox (and probably Metroid now, unfortunately) so I don't really care what Good Feel does with this.  It isn't like I'm expecting some great modern take on Yoshi's Island.  What I don't like is the resuing of the yarn look.  This just reaks of a company not getting it.  Everyone liked the style of Epic Yarn because it looked so unique and original.  Their response to that "so we'll make MORE yarn games"?  Any points you earned for creativity are taken away when you decide to take your interesting visual gimmick and apply it to everything.  First Kirby, now Yoshi, is Wario or Donkey Kong next?  Is this going to be Good Feel's thing; taking a Nintendo IP and putting it in yarn graphics?

It was never the yarn graphics.  If that's what Good Feel thinks then they're idiots that fluked out and if Nintendo thinks that they're fuddy-duddies that are missing the point.  It was that Epic Yarn had a creative and different look that mattered.  The uniqueness was the selling factor not the specifics of yarn graphics.  I don't trust the game will be all that great simply because "we should make ALL our games look like yarn" is such a DUMB and misguided conclusion to come to.  Good videogame minds would never come to such a conclusion so those that came to that conclusion would likely not be capable of delivering anything truly interesting.

[NWR_insanolord]

Tezuka being involved is my main counter to the arguments made here. This isn't just Good Feel; they've got one of Nintendo's best guys working on it with them, a guy who was involved in the original Yoshi's Island.

[lolmonade]

Yoshi's Island was released in 1995.  Yoshi games have been few and far between, and besides the DS remake of Yoshi's Island, haven't the games been varied in their playstyle? 

Yoshi games have always seemed to been open to a lot of experimentation and varying play styles.  I'd temper your anger and disappointment and wait for more details before declaring it DOA to you just because it follows a similar art style to Kirby's Epic Yarn.


Edit: Within 2 minutes of posting this, I get smited.  Someone's touchy.  The fact is there are a lot of logical leaps being taken in this article with very little information to go off of.  Kirby's Epic Yarn isn't the only game Good-Feel has made, and I don't see any reason to believe why everyone should assume they are a one-trick pony.

Nintendo

Doomed

iPad

99 cents

Third Party

Narrative

edit:

Click Bait

Inflammatory

I'm inclined to agree with you.

[NWR_insanolord]

This is one of the games I'm most looking forward to playing at E3. I probably care more about EAD Tokyo's Mario game, but I don't have nearly as many questions about that.

[Caterkiller]

I'm not entirely convinced this will just be Epic Yarn with Yoshi characters. Epic yarn for the most part was very flat with so much of the world being an outline. Judging by that other screen shot this looks to have more depth. Still with the little bit we know about it, it does seem its just epic yarn again with the beads.

I'm going claim that this game is extremely early and not intended to be shown yet but because of the leak they did anyway. In the actual video footage it looks like they took epic yarn and just added 2 characters, Yoshi and Shy guy. I'm betting the final game look more like Yoshis story and that pic that looks like Nintendo Lands Zelda.

[Shaymin]

At worst, it's the best Little Big Planet game ever. /damning with faint praise

Still, as someone who tried to ace most of the Epic Yarn levels he tried, they can shut up and take my money for Yoshi Yarn.

[UncleBob]

<3 Epic Yarn.

[Pixelated Pixies]

Am I the only one who doesn't like Yoshi's Island?

[TJ Spyke]

Am I the only one who doesn't like Yoshi's Island?

Yes

[UncleBob]

Am I the only one who doesn't like Yoshi's Island?

In spite of the fact that I own virtually every version of it, I've never been a huge fan of it.  I wouldn't say I don't like it, but it's never managed to keep my attention for a full repeat playthrough.

[MegaByte]

Tezuka being involved is my main counter to the arguments made here. This isn't just Good Feel; they've got one of Nintendo's best guys working on it with them, a guy who was involved in the original Yoshi's Island.

Tezuka was also listed as producer on Yoshi's Island DS, Yoshi Topsy Turvy, and tons of other games good and bad, so it will depend exactly what kind of involvement he has.

[MegaByte]

Am I the only one who doesn't like Yoshi's Island?

In spite of the fact that I own virtually every version of it, I've never been a huge fan of it.  I wouldn't say I don't like it, but it's never managed to keep my attention for a full repeat playthrough.

Ditto. It was a good game, but I don't think it deserves the praise it gets from a gameplay perspective.

[NWR_insanolord]

Tezuka being involved is my main counter to the arguments made here. This isn't just Good Feel; they've got one of Nintendo's best guys working on it with them, a guy who was involved in the original Yoshi's Island.

Tezuka was also listed as producer on Yoshi's Island DS, Yoshi Topsy Turvy, and tons of other games good and bad, so it will depend exactly what kind of involvement he has.

I doubt they'd make a big deal about his involvement in the Nintendo Direct if he weren't hands-on to at least some extent.

[ResettisCousin]

I've gone back and forth on how much I like Epic Yarn. For a while I was trolling message boards trying to argue in favor or Return to Dreamland. Ultimately, I do think that the creativity of Epic Yarn is great enough to carry some rather bland levels. And in truth, I did NOT have that easy of a time completing all three treasures and gold medals per level, plus the apartment challenges. So now I'm back in the Epic Yarn camp, a fan of how Nintendo was able to inject some fun in the levels and a fan of the incredible music and extremely strong visual design (Looksley's Lineup hinted at this, too). (Also, call me crazy, but the mechanic of Epic Yarn where you go under a layer to move to a hidden / not-so-hidden area seemed fresh to me. Maybe it's been done before but I couldn't remember.)


With that said, I was HUGELY disappointed to see that the new Yoshi game is... Yoshi's Epic Yarn. The ONLY way this could be saved is if each of the worlds feature a completely unique set of textiles so that you move from foam world to felt world, etc (maybe branch out and include construction paper world, fur world, who knows). But if Yoshi remains a yarn ball throughout, that seems less likely. And what was with them showing almost identical gameplay and animation of Yoshi's tongue vs KEY's whip? And what was with the gemstone beads in the opening sequence directly ripped from KEY? That looked so incredibly cheap. If we're lucky this was Nintendo being uncharacteristically desperate and showing pre-alpha concept footage far too rough to be seen by even the entire dev team let alone all the world.

[azeke]

Epic Yarn was charming to see for the first time and the cloth gimmick looked so original for the first time. And i really enjoyed it's music (hurr durr elevator jingles shut up).

This time around -- yarn isn't new and there is no music.

And what little they showed it looks like they're incredibly early in development. Like, they "didn't even chose the artstyle" early.

I really really hope we get a great game though.

Out of all new direct announcement it seems only Wii Party U and maybe X (Xenoblade was done more than two years ago, plenty of time) are arriving this year.

[NWR_insanolord]

It will have been three years since Kirby's Epic Yarn later this year, and according to their Wikipedia page the only thing Good-Feel has done in the meantime is a couple minigames in Wii Play Motion. They've had plenty of time, and I'd be pretty shocked if this game weren't out by the end of the year.

[Luigi Dude]

What I don't like is the resuing of the yarn look.  This just reaks of a company not getting it.  Everyone liked the style of Epic Yarn because it looked so unique and original.  Their response to that "so we'll make MORE yarn games"?  Any points you earned for creativity are taken away when you decide to take your interesting visual gimmick and apply it to everything.  First Kirby, now Yoshi, is Wario or Donkey Kong next?  Is this going to be Good Feel's thing; taking a Nintendo IP and putting it in yarn graphics?

Or it could be that there were things Good Feel wanted to do with Kirby's Epic Yarn but couldn't because the Wii wasn't powerful enough, so they want to do another game like it on the Wii U since it's powerful enough to do everything Good Feel originally envisioned.  Then they'll move on to something different for the next game, similar to how Tokyo EAD made Galaxy 2 because they still had a lot of idea's left over from Galaxy 1 but then made something completely new with 3D Land after.

Here's a thought, why don't you wait til you know more about a game before declaring it an unoriginal rehash based on 10 seconds of early footage.

[Adrock]

I loved Yoshi's Island back in the day and I spent years trying to get my own copy (I borrowed my neighbor's). When I finally did with the Ambassador Program, I couldn't bring myself to play through it again. However, I think it's more a combination of not-quite-super-classic-status and my evolving gaming preferences. It will always be good, but it will never be as-good-as-the-memories-I-have-of-it good.

Anyway, based on what I know of Kirby's Epic Yarn, what I think can "save" Yarn Yoshi is if Good Feel subverts people's expectations of it. Everyone thinks it'll be super easy; it should be really difficult. Everyone thinks the graphics are a rehash of Epic Yarn; Good Feel should make the levels progressively more experimental and abstract. They can do a lot with yarn art (google it). Unfortunately, the game looks just as basic as Epic Yarn. Boo/hiss

I remember seeing screenshots of Yoshi's Island and thinking that I wouldn't like it because the graphics looked like a kindergartener's scribbles (oh, to be 11 again) which is exactly what Nintendo wanted and it worked. The game used its art style to its advantage. That said, I don't think reusing the art style is inherently a problem. I don't think anyone would be complaining if Good Feel made a 2D Mario game with the look of Wario Land Shake It! so that's a double standard. Rather, the problem is I don't think Epic Yarn quite reached its potential in using the yarn art style (though it certainly used it in creative ways). Yarn Yoshi could however. Good Feel just has to really commit to it

Start by making it feel like a Yoshi game that has that art style. Epic Yarn axed Kirby's copy ability. It wasn't Kirby anymore. There has to be some fidelity and keeping Yoshi's main abilities is important. After that, all bets are off. Good Feel could make a game that really challenges people's thinking. I don't think it's going to happen, but it sure would be cool if it did.

[smallsharkbigbite]

Am I the only one who doesn't like Yoshi's Island?

In spite of the fact that I own virtually every version of it, I've never been a huge fan of it.  I wouldn't say I don't like it, but it's never managed to keep my attention for a full repeat playthrough.

I like Yoshi's Island, but I don't think it deserves to be up there with SMB3/SMW or some of the other games that I would consider to be the best 2D platformers ever.  So I've never understood that type of praise for the game. 

[broodwars]

For me, my big problem with this game is that it looks like the exact same game that Kirby's Epic Yarn was, just swapping in Yoshi for Kirby.  Kirby's Epic Yarn isn't a traditional Kirby game in any sense, and almost everything Kirby can do in that game has a Yoshi analog (i.e. using his tongue to swing on buttons or gobble enemies instead of Kirby's yarn whip).  Kirby's limited flying ability? Now it's Yoshi's flutter jump.  I thought Kirby's Epic Yarn was an OK game, but it's really not something I want to play again.

[LudicrousDa3ve]

I'm torn. I'll reserve judgment until I get to play the game but... I don't know. On one hand, I really want them to pull out something crazy and surprising. On the other, I really wouldn't mind another Epic Yarn with Yoshi in it. Maybe not so much for me personally, but for my kids who(with my help) have probably squeezed a thousand hours out of Kirby.

[Fatty The Hutt]

Alex, I disagree with everything you say here.
But I shall defend to the death your right to say it, sir!
Excelsior!

[VickiL]

I just remember thinking that there were some substantial missed opportunities in that trailer.  It felt like a Kirby/Yoshi hybrid, not a Yoshi.  Why weren't the crystals changed to fruits or at least coins?  I'd think fruits would be a better way to fill Yoshi out than eating Shy Guys.  And why no egg projectiles?  But maybe I'm too traditional.  Maybe when they show more of the game I'll feel less indifferent.