Welcome to our review of WarioWare Gold, the ultimate Wario Ware game that is out now on 3DS!
The infamous schemer Wario is back, voiced by the very talented Charles Martinet, you are set for a flurry of micro games where you often just have seconds to figure out what to do, how to do this and actually perform it. This is WarioWare Gold.
Sporting literally 300 micro games, WarioWare Gold is the craziest of games you can imagine. I had some experience with the IP, having played it on Gamecube, but nothing really prepared me for this.
First of all, Wario now speaks. I feel like Nintendo decided to let Charles Martinet go all out and go for the very first fully voiced game for Wario. Usually, we only get simplistic WAAH sounds, but this, hot damn, Wario is finally a full-fledged character.
Next, the 300 micro games, new and rehashed or remade games from all previous iterations and yes, our favorite nose picking game is still here. They are a hoot and most of all, they are hectic, just the way this entire game is presented.
Sure, there are the 3 main storylines to the story, presented as Tilt, Touch and Button. Later on, you will free up the microphone games too in the ultra league. The premise is always the same, beat several micro games in a row without losing all four of your lives and then beat the mini-boss to go to the next step. You will be able to revive for 100 coins, but you will prefer to keep those for different matters, more about that later.
It did not surprise me personally that the pace on WarioWare Gold is so incredibly fast. The micro game starts, you get just a glimpse at the screen and almost instantly need to figure out what to do. Whether this is driving a car, balance a bolt, destroy a zombie, lead Link into a cave, … the variety in WarioWare Gold is impressive to say the least.
Does it stop there? Not at all, there are the coins that allow you to either revive but more importantly, they will allow you to buy items like the amiibo workshop, cards with characters on them, mystery parts, historical Nintendo items like the Virtual Boy. There is so much more than the micro games and the desire to 100% a game like this, it is right there.
Add on top of that some very crazy graphics, much like its predecessors, WarioWare Gold is presented in a cartoon style which truly fits the game. Imagine poking your nose in a highly realistic game? Sure, it’d be fun, but cartoonish graphics do fit more, just to name the first example that came to mind.
My favorite part of this WarioWare Gold game is by far the collecting side, I love how you can collect older consoles like the TV-game or the Virtual Boy and on top of that, the game gives you basic information about it. I am a collector myself, but I still read them despite not learning any new information.
Fully voiced cutscenes make the game complete and despite being on 3DS, this game has very big potential to be one of the best games of the year on 3DS. But let us address the elephant in the room, how will it fare on 3DS when the big crowds seem to favor the Nintendo Switch lately?
I honestly can not answer this, what I do know however… There is a demo, if you got a 3DS or 2DS laying around, do give it a try. You will be happily amused by this title and incredibly surprised by the diversity and that it is a game for several hours of fun.
On a side note, WarioWare Gold supports amiibo through the studio. This unlocks as soon as you win the item by paying some coins. The amiibo unlock some surreal bits of art, which in return fetch some money. I own all amiibo worldwide including the ones from Japan like Boxboy, … So I tried to scan just my Kirby ones as they have been outside of my display case lately.
To my big surprise, there was a limit of 3 pieces on the first day. I will update this review to reflect if this is a daily limit or just for the first day as soon as I can. I wanted to do a video for YouTube showing off the special ones, but I guess that will take a few days to make now. Do keep your eyes on our YouTube channel like always as we do try to post great new content.
In conclusion, WarioWare Gold comes to the 3DS with a bang, bringing us a ton of fun and hectic gameplay which is both easy and hard at the same time. I had a real hard time using the tilt function to drive a car when I was already laughing out loud. But that credits the game for me, a fun game that I am giving 85% as my rating.
