Yoshi's Woolly World (Wii U)
By: Nintendo
NINTENDO spins another yarn starring their cutesy dinosaur, this time hewn in wool for a flocculent jaunt that tenderly hugs your eyeballs like a serial killer. Amazingly, it's also the first home console outing starring Mario's reptilian steed since Yoshi's Story, which landed on the N64 back in '97.
Its gameplay, however, is knitted more from the fleecy DNA of earlier SNES classic Yoshi's Island, where Nintendo wrung every visual trick from their groaning 16-bitter.
Developed by Good Feel, creators of Kirby's Epic Yarn, the craft shop aesthetic continues here, with the entire game world and its denizens "made" from cloth, yarn and assorted bobbins. The result is one of the cutest games you'll ever play.
The plush look, reminiscent of 70s northern-voiced pompoms The Flumps, is a joy, the Wii U rendering each strand of wool, crochet hook and fuzzy stray hair with intense clarity. Add a wonderful hipster soundtrack, all acoustic guitars and merry parping, and you have the craft micro-brewery alternative to Mario's all-conquering ale.
When Baby Bowser orders Kamek to transform the Yoshis into wool, it's up to our hero (and pal, if playing co-op) to journey the game's plush landscape to unravel his plans.
All the classic Yoshi elements are here, but never have they looked so good. Like a 50s housewife, it's a reliable mélange of the same old tricks, all gussied up in cashmere. Our hero leaps around some 48 levels, gobbling up enemies with his Simmons-esque tongue, which is also used to unknit secret areas.
Rather than turning enemies into eggs, Yoshi strips them from their component parts into yarn balls, used to whack baddies. Woolen dog Poochy (not Homer's pro-active paradigm, Poochie) is also set loose, solving puzzles and reaching areas Yoshi's too fat to squeeze through.
But without baby Mario in tow, the game has lost those sweaty-palmed moments when the infant plumber was dislodged, screaming his lungs out as he slowly disappeared into the heavens.
Some oddly placed checkpoints also rankle, but there's much to love here. Fleshing things out, local co-op lets two players tackle the stages together, though the fact that you can swallow your buddy is likely to cause moppet quarrels. For the particularly short on years, Mellow Mode even gifts Yoshi with wings, allowing players to breeze through tougher stages.
And with each level stuffed with flowers, stamps and assorted doo-dads to obsess over, the game invites you to collect everything, if you think you have the (woolen) balls.
At its heart, Woolly World doesn't reinvent the wheel, merely slathering it in yarn. An adorable spin on the old routine, then, but Yoshi's first home console effort in 20 years offers mechanically sound, lint-free platforming, even if it's mostly fluff. Just don't think about the fact that he's chewing on wool.
