90. E3 Castle of Illusion – Gray
This treasure made the mistake o’ focus primarily on a mechanic — dodging zombies — done in so many other treasures, & done much better in a’least 2 other treasures. While it’s cool to see sneak previews o’ all the chests in this level, — obviously unopenable this early, since you can’t get their keys but the gray 1 — having to go back & forth, crossing zombie-infested platforms & going into rooms to hit a switch, can get ol’, specially if you manage to get snagged by a zombie & have to go thru it all o’er ’gain.
The puzzle in the chest room, where you have to break the floor & knock the stove onto the bottom floor so you can reach the chest, is somewhat new, but doesn’t have much to it, & still feels a bit too similar to the stove puzzles in “A Town in Chaos”.
89. E4 The Colossal Hole – Gray
This is a less annoying version o’ the red treasure, lacking the need to use Flat Wario to slip into crevices or the minigolf game, but also, since it doesn’t need Flat Wario, makes the smasher @ the top o’ the level pointless.
That said, what you do do in this treasure, getting poked by the Pneumos & floating up into the gray key chamber & up into the niche with the gray chest, aren’t all that interesting, either. Part o’ me feels this treasure would’ve been better — or a’least have mo’ dimensions to it — if the gray chest did require using Flat Wario ( keeping the cracked block ’tween the niche & the ladder if the player finds the gray chest before the key ) & replace the red treasure with something else, but part o’ me also likes the way this treasure offers a training wheels that doesn’t require Flat Wario. Plus, Flat Wario would’ve made this treasure mo’ tedious.
88. S2 The Big Bridge – Red
This treasure has 1 very cool puzzle: there’s a Brrr Bear @ the end o’ a long hall with a low ceiling where it’s impossible to jump o’er its ice shot. ¿How do you get thru? You use a Brrr Bear all the way left, the 2nd from the top o’ a column o’ Brrr Bears that try to knock you down from climbing up the nearby platforms. That 2nd-to-top Brrr Bear is placed just right so that if you get shot rightward you’ll go down the hall & crash past the other Brrr Bear, dispatching it. This is much better than the weak challenges that the green chest in this level offers. It’s just too bad it’s a repeat o’ a puzzle done in Wario Land II.
Also unfortunately, that’s all this treasure has, as otherwise there’s just a bunch o’ fish to dodge, like in all water levels. They put the red key in the stupidest place: right below the red chest, forcing you to fall down to get it & then climb back up. It’s only a few seconds o’ platforming, & the Brrr Bear in the hall should still be gone, but this still adds nothing to the treasure. ¿Why not have the red key in that crevice to the left o’ the column o’ Brrr Bears that you have to duck fall into, which just holds a music coin?
87. S2 The Big Bridge – Green
It’s not the best sign that the most memorable part o’ this level is traversing the bridge again, but this time while holding a barrel conveniently placed near the start, which provides no extra challenge than what you have to do for the gray treasure, except maybe the slight chance you fumble the barrel when trying to throw it @ the line o’ throw blocks blocking the chest room.
That is not to say there aren’t some strong points to this treasure. They did the bare minimum to tie the chest & key rooms together thru the throwing ability that unlocks this treasure by making the chest room & key in the key room unlocked thru throw blocks; & the chest room does have a cool setpiece where you need to jump o’er the ice balls the Brrr Bears spit out using conveniently-placed niches in the ceiling.
Howe’er, there are also missteps. Said chest room also has a needless minigolf game, & doesn’t e’en hide it well: they have an extra space you can fall into as you fall to the bottom with a large cracked block with nothing inside for some reason while the minigolf game’s door is in plain sight. ¿What is the point o’ this side area?
86. W1 Desert Ruins – Green
Much as “The Volcano’s Base”’s green treasure “adds” to its red treasure with minigolf & a lake, “Desert Ruins”’s green treasure “adds” to its red treasure with minigolf, repeating the setpiece o’ climbing a ladder & dodging Beam Robotas, breaking blocks with Wario’s head & rear, & breaking thru a block with Ball o’ String Wario. ’Course, the ladder climb is a’least an actual challenge & not just diving into a lake, nor is there any gotcha traps, like in “Castle of Illusion”’s green treasure.
Furthermo’, there is a slight cleverness to the green chest & key placement in that you can see the green chest from the green key, but they’re blocked from each other by a wall, forcing the player to go round it & go thru a passage blocked by a minigolf block ( the minigolf block isn’t so clever ). You can also see the green key from the red chest door as early as the 4th treasure in the game… sorta. By that point you only have the main charge attack &, weirdly, can only break the bottom-right-most block o’ the pipe wall dividing the red chest room & green key, which a curious player very well may do. If an e’en mo’ curious player squeezes in there they’ll be able to see the green key on the far left edge o’ the screen, but still not be able to reach it.
Also, if the player has the super charge ( which is not required to get this treasure — only the spiked helmet, which comes earlier, is required ), they can bust straight thru this pipe wall & bypass getting it from the top… tho this isn’t all that useful, as you still need to go up ’bove to get the minigolf game. I would say this treasure would be much better if the minigolf game weren’t necessary & you didn’t need the spike helmet if you have the super charge garlic; but you need the spike helmet to get the super charge garlic — which is itself a less-than-ideal design decision.
85. N3 The Vast Plain – Red
The twin treasure to “Out of the Woods”’s red treasure, also unlocked by ground pounding down 1 o’ the weird platform creatures & having to go thru a minigolf game to get past an area. This treasure is better than “Out of the Woods”’s, e’en tho it uses the o’erused Pneumos for its entire challenge, since it a’least has a focal challenge beyond avoiding Silkies ( which is e’en more o’erused ) & it did mo’ with its key by challenging the player to intentionally get hit by a Pneumo @ the end o’ the 1st area to float up to the platform with it, highlighting the positive/negative aspect o’ these powers.
I’m mixed on which is better, aestheticwise: in general, the lime-green caves look better, but “Out of the Woods”’s had moving cogs, giving an extra mechanical spin to it. Then ’gain, there’s no reason why those cogs should be in a cave under a forest, whereas a mossy-green cave under a meadow makes mo’ sense.
84. S5 Cave of Flames – Red
The only good thing I can really say ’bout this treasure is that it’s short & doesn’t involve too much repetitive action, beyond getting the red key, which requires making a blind jump down 1 o’ 11 holes, which you wouldn’t think would be useful to fall in. I’m actually not sure how I e’er found this key @ 1st, since it seems so obscure. I do know that I routinely forget what hole it’s in till I’m reminded when I fall down the wrong hole & have to climb back up ’gain.
Getting the red chest just involves some standard challenges — including hopping off enemies, a mechanic o’erused in this game & specially in this level — to climb up a room so you can eat a donut & fall down & break the donut blocks in the way o’ the red chest.
83. W2 The Volcano’s Base – Blue
As I said earlier, this treasure is very similar to “The Tidal Coast”’s red treasure, with an underwater section where you have to dodge bubbles while swimming downward, with a detour where you have to break upward thru cracked blocks & get bubblified to float up past downward currents to reach the blue key. Weirdly, this treasure has fewer bubbles, despite this treasure coming after “The Tidal Coast”’s; but that just makes this section less tedious.
The real reason this is higher than “The Tidal Coast”’s red treasure is that the room afterward, where you have to navigate upward using Vampire Wario, 1st having to dodge the vampire bats so you stay normal & can break thru the cracked blocks, & then needing to become Vampire Wario & stay so while avoiding the treacherous water drops as you fly upward, is a mo’ interesting tutorial to Vampire Wario than “The Tidal Coast”’s red treasure was to throwing enemies. Granted, this treasure’s focus on water & vampires has e’en less to do with this volcano level.
I also somewhat liked this treasure’s dynamic o’ having the blue chest right in easy access, but requiring you to enter a 1-way trip down into the underwater section to get the blue key & have to challenge your way back out to get back to the blue chest.
82. E6 The East Crater – Red
Another forgettable treasure, & 1 that’s mo’ annoying than challenging. The player needs to go thru a barely-developed room where they just need to dodge a smasher — so underdeveloped that the biggest “challenge” is not being tricked into intentionally becoming flat & going down the conspicuous small passage to the right, only to find just a music coin on the other side — to reach the other side o’ a passageway clogged with throw blocks & throw an enemy thru it, & then go back thru the previous rooms ’gain so you can ground pound a cracked block & reach a lower passage that leads directly to the right side, — as well as the key, which is just thrown down there — & then throw the enemy again so you can throw it @ a wall o’ throw blocks on the other side. Throwing the enemy @ the 1st row o’ throw blocks can be annoying, as it oft won’t break them all & get stuck in a small place where you can’t reach it, so you have to reset & try ’gain.
Finally, the player needs to get set on fire & jump up to the top passage to burn the fire-block walls after the throw-block wall. I think the player can fall off the small hole on the left side, but it’s such a short jump that by the very late part o’ the game the player is likely to due this treasure, the player should have no problem keeping up there.
All o’ these things have been done before & this treasure barely tries to make this treasure feel integral to this level: it could have been thrown in just ’bout any level & not raise eyebrows. All it does is add needless complexity & repetition.
81. W4 A Town in Chaos – Green
There is no greater plummet from greatness to weakness than the opening puzzle: we have this very clever setpiece with a giant Prince Froggie blocking a tight passageway & a grilled wall & 2 ladders around it on the other side where the solution is to bring a Brrr Bear, climb up & down to the other side o’ the grilled wall, & then lure the Brrr Bear to freeze you toward the frog so you can slide thru it.
Howe’er, once you enter the door below, this treasure’s promise goes out the window. Not only do you have to go back & forth doing a series o’ generic & slow challenges to hit switches on & off so you can inch a bit farther, but you have to do most o’ it a’least a 2nd time: once you reach the top you need to become fat & fall down to break donut blocks so you can enter a passageway to reach the key, & then climb back up to reach the chest. Worse, it’s very easy to land imprecisely on the donut blocks & end up not breaking them all the way, forcing you to climb back up & fall down yet another time.
These challenges include 1 particular annoying 1 where you need to throw a Para-Goom thru 2 passageways clogged by throw blocks, which is very common in this game, with 1 so long that it’s easy to get the Para-Goom stuck in it e’en when thrown with full force & hard to get it thru to the other side due to the randomness o’ whether or not it bounces forward or backward when bumping into it as you’re crawling thru. Thankfully, if you thought to break the cracked block o’er the ladder, on the mandatory return trip you only have to climb up the ladder to hit the switch.
Also, this is a nitpick, but considering Wario recovers from vampirism by touching beams o’ light, it’s odd that Wario turns into vampire Wario in this clearly well-lit room. ¿Why not make this room dark like the hall to the red treasure?
