Yoshi's Crafted World | The Completionist

maybe you've heard of a little video game company called Nintendo they've got a few things going for them games so precisely and intricately designed that they hammer the pleasure center of the brain non-stop incredible art direction that is frequently jaw-dropping characters that range from badass to squeal inducing ly cute Yoshi games are the cutest games hands down cuter than Kirby cuter than captain toad cuter than everything but better than the cuteness is that there's always a level of depth once you get going and I'll show you how Nintendo's latest fits in with the rest of their excellently crafted games when I complete Yoshi's crafted world [Music] hey everyone and welcome back to another episode of the completionist we don't just beat the games we complete them Yoshi games are great and scratch a very particular itch in my gaming life Nintendo has done something special with the oh she's crafting world revived a real sense of play within me also inspired me to bust out a bunch of construction paper and crayons and cardboard but I haven't saving for just this day so that said let's begin Yoshi games are consistently delightful and we all need a little delight now and then crafted world is so dang cute and so dang satisfying the oshi franchise always feels like the series where Nintendo can express themselves most creatively and I love that crafted world leans super hard into this there was a time when I was bad at Yoshi games Yoshi's Island for the SNES is still a really difficult game maybe due to hardware controls or a more arcadey style gameplay I've never even completely yoshi story for the n64 because of that terrifying Yoshi song in the beginning stop but I always loved how each game had a distinct visual identity that was expressed in the gameplay too these games look like crayon drawings and storybooks whimsy like you wouldn't believe and as one of the few people who did every single thing possible in Yoshi's woolly world I can say that these games are more than just their look Yoshi is a crafty little Dino and fully completing his games is deceptively difficult woolly world assured in a more modern take on Yoshi games more focused on collectibles and costumes while also looking like the fever dream of a jo-ann's employee look at how outrageously adorable yarn Yoshi is look at it look at the amiibo costumes look at all the collectables look at the levels everything is something cute to hug and squishes aah now I thought woolly world was amazing in crafted world gave me a ton of similar vibes the cuteness is there and the death of play is as well but there's also a whole new level of accessibility which made this two and a half D puzzling platformer a joy to play and probably most chill weakened I've spent completing a game in ages crafted world starts out simply kamek and Bowser jr. aka Baby Bowser are added again causing trouble by scattering the dream gems all over the place yo she must cruise through gorgeous world that looked like they remained by extremely precocious third graders collecting coins and smiling flowers finding secrets and tossing eggs in any shy guy that will look at him funny all on his quest to find the gems and it's so flippin cute now I've also been informed that Bowser jr. and Baby Bowser are totally separate characters which like I knew but I didn't know the only difference is a little drawing on a bandana all right let's see according to the Internet it looks like Bowser jr. is baby Bowser's future child hold on how old is your she is the Yoshi in Super Mario World a descendant of the Yoshi's and crafted world anyways aside from the time-travel shenanigans the plot of this game is pretty simple that's not why anyone plays these games this game is flippin adorable I love Yoshi and I'm looking forward to a streamlined well designed Nintendo experience this is my form of self care relaxing on a couch and a flutter jumping my way that glory may be with the bunny because another thing I love about this game this can be played entirely with another person hey Ted ready to play some co-op and crafts and roll my dude boy am i I got my costume all made good I love your little fishes they're so well designed how well that you added the lights on top with your school bus help how did you even think about that notion help you to begin at this amazing school play you're good at look at the windows in the back of this bus and man this gives me a lot of harbor [Music] if Nintendo ever figures out a way to weaponize the cuteness of Yoshi's crafted world we are all doomed seriously every single thing on screen made me smile from the very start the details are so meticulous and specific that I knew I was in for a treat the whole way through a lot of games use style and place of substance but crafted world ties them both together to make this the most accessible switch game out there the art direction in this game is absolutely top notch in the had me wondering how they do that just about every two minutes every object on screen looks like something handmade it's like Nintendo really wanted to reinforce the idea of playing a game it feels like imagination is really being tapped into instead of a hyper-realistic digital world it feels adorably low-rent though it probably took just as much work to make this paper craft world come to life the game is pretty easy for about 90% of it but that works in its favor and helps put the spotlight back on the art style especially with a friend playing with me I gotta sit back and smile and what was going on right in front of me I can't say it enough every time someone in the office poke their head in to see what I was playing they'd exclaim oh my god that's so cute the cuteness is literally disarming and if we hadn't already domesticated Yoshi's into wearing saddles I'd be more than a little worried what are you talking about come on right give me one second let me oh my god everything I thought I knew about Yoshi is a freaking lie forget it Nintendo is gonna take over the world with adorable Yoshi's who are protected with shells and in this case cardboard as well if you're wearing a costume in crafted world Yoshi becomes essentially invincible depending on how rare your costume is it gives Yoshi an extra three four or even five hits which are completely filled at every checkpoint getting defeated by enemies in this game isn't really ever an issue and these extra hip points make even the sloppiest of run-throughs of a level an absolute breeze now the costumes are easy to come across especially if you're like me and have a kajillion amiibos lying around even if you don't have any to scan on you Yoshi can buy them in game from gumball machines in every area san first I was worried that there would be a level of randomness to the costumes and that it'd be a pain to find but nope when you buy a costume there are never any repeats so it's super easy to know how many you're missing and what part of the map to buy them from Nintendo took a ton of guesswork out and as the completionist I super super appreciated it it feels like everything was designed in such a way to reduce stress I didn't love playing co-op in woolly world but for some reason in crafted world it just works one player can ride on the other Yoshi's back and throw unlimited eggs making boss fights a joke you can super jump off another Yoshi's back making some platforming areas much simpler it's just another thing that adds to the accessibility it gets for people who play video games with others who might not be as well-versed in the medium or if you know Ted who needs all the help you can get there's even mellow mode designed for youngins where Yoshi can fly forever with its little wings by holding down jump Mel mo does seem kind of overkill in the game this simple but it's worth mentioning for parents trying to get their kids into gaming or if you've got a younger sibling you want to teach to play in this mode even the movement speed is slowed down making every level a cakewalk also our cake walks even a thing anymore ok I don't know but now I want a cake there are dozens of little touches throughout crafted world that demonstrate how Nintendo is all about helping people who don't normally get into gaming first you lure them in with the adorableness then you keep them with the smooth as butter non frustrating experience but there's more going on behind the scenes and that's where crafted world truly shines [Music] at first I thought that Yoshi's crafted world wouldn't have the same depth as the previous titles but after completing in I can say there's a ton of stuff to do in this game and while I might not be the most difficult thing I've ever done it's outrageously satisfying to do so and still feels very deep that part of my lizard brain that wants shiny things and checkmarks and completely filled out lists crafted world absolutely delivers on that and even if this game is relatively simple it's still incredibly satisfying there's a lot of backtracking in this game after completing a few levels little cardboard robots will show up politely demanding that Yoshi go back into previous levels and start looking for specific crafts which Yoshi must pinpoint and then Bob with an egg now this isn't all that hard to do most requests are as simple as find a frog crown or find five butterflies each level becomes a mini scavenger hunt and that's where the little touches in crafted world get a chance to shine this kind of stuff is where I really appreciated having a friend to play with one Yoshi can ride on the other's back and be the sharp-eyed lookout while the other navigates through the level it was really fun to gather up the collectables this way especially since I had to go through some of these levels three or four or even five times to collect everything with a friend the scavenger hunt becomes a game within a game adding a mechanically easy but still fun premise finding a craft in a level is as simple as shooting an egg at any suspicious-looking paper cup crab or chemic cutout there's literal depth here as I had to looked at the background and the foreground and it's incredible seeing objects pop in and out of the focus depending on what Yoshi's aiming at it's the first Yoshi game to take full advantage of the aiming reticle and I hope to keep it for future games another great little touch is that once you find whatever craft you're looking forward the game prompts you to just exit the level you don't have to go all the way back to the end you can just hop in find whatever you need and bail out I love this design choice and it makes it that much easier to see everything this game has to offer there's another great touch in every level the flipside after going through a level once Yoshi can go through the level a second time from the opposite side and from a different perspective on the flipside the player can search for missing Poochie pups and additional crafts this basically doubles the level count of the game even if options are more limited on these flipside runs this gave me a chance to view each level in a totally different way and I appreciate it seeing the behind the scenes work that went into the diorama like level design the flip is where you can see tape thumbtacks and the cardboard boxes that make up the front side of the levels in their unvarnished glory I feel like there's a little missed opportunity to take more advantage of the depth of the flip side dynamic in the e3 2017 trailer there's a moment where two players do a ground pound together to flip the entire level around 180 degrees but that mechanic got changed somewhere along the line this game could have been a lot more complex if players could switch views at any time which who knows maybe would have increased the depth of the gameplay this isn't really a complaint just a thought I had as I was playing through it for the most part gathering collectibles is easy but I want to stress that I never felt bored at any point I was fully engaged the whole time because the gameplay changes it up almost every single level there are cool little one-off mechanics that are fun and interesting and provide a quiet satisfaction some of the most interesting levels are the auto scrolling ones I love the idea of these each one of these have their own set of rules such as rolling through as a giant terrifying mecha Yoshi with boxing gloves that destroys everything stands in its way another one had me running the hell away from a giant raging undead Dino now these are great ideas for the most part but since I'm the levels scroll a little bit slowly it made missing collectibles a pain so I'd have to replay the level and wait until it scrolled where I needed to go this is a minor complaint though since the vast majority of the worlds in this game are just so inventive there are a few that are direct callbacks to all the world which yeah love it and one level that takes a hard left and just straight up Yoshi horror I'm talking unstoppable axe murderer clown dolls who chased me down until I hit under a light bulb and then called their friends once the lights went out I'd honestly love a more fleshed-out version of this game since it's so different than anything Yoshi has dealt with before the requirements for completing each level are the same all throughout the entire game even if the level has its own mechanics or rules it's satisfying to see how the designers work in the red coin challenges hidden smiley flowers it just feels good going through each exquisitely designed world I was reminded of a great shoe gear Miyamoto interview where he says that a game must give the player a sense of having accomplished something Yoshi's craft the world provided me that feeling again and again and again in little micro doses this game really put me in the meditative reflective kind of mood after a while it's sort of like interacting with actual arts and crafts where will you get into the flow of folding and cutting paper and pasting googly eyes on everything nothing else matters for a while and I could just smile and cruise on through [Music] so there's a ton of little things to do in Yoshi's craft in the world providing me with a little ping of dopamine that I love so very much but there isn't all that much to receive in the way of completion rewards whereas previous Yoshi titles tend to have a punishing end game crafted world isn't that tough which was honestly okay I didn't devote a ton of time to talking about all the stuff there is to collect in Yoshi's crafted world because real talk aside from finding the crafts which required me to revisit levels multiple times I was able to knock out almost every other collectible in a level on my very first try finding one hundred or more coins simple make me to the end of a level with full health with costumes I barely had to think about it the red coins and hidden flowers occasionally threw me for a loop but the game communicates pretty clearly about where you might have missed something so it was never a pixel hunt I'm okay with that maybe it's a little over communicated but it's all in the name of accessibility so I give it a pass the one big difference between Yoshi's crafted world and previous Yoshi games is that the hidden hills secret levels that are unlocked in the late game aren't really that hard at all they're still super inventive and do a great job of bringing back previous mechanics that I had to master from earlier moments in the game but the challenge level even without any checkpoints never rose to the level of the hardest stuff that woolly world had to offer there are a couple of postgame things to do like a boss challenge mode and a robot defined that shows up in every level again these aren't really much to wring your hands over just another chance to enjoy the scenery at your own pace and having an x-ray oh she around made this stuff a cinch so what's the big prize for finding every craft getting a crayon flower for every level and screen and beating both baby Bowser and kamek just a couple of snazzy extra costumes a different screen for choosing your Yoshi color and gorgeous little pinwheel flowers over every single level now I'd be more disappointed by these minimal rewards if I had slaved over completing this game but because it wasn't all that tough I didn't mind it so much when I completed Yoshi's crafted world there were 185 costumes unlocked some which are extremely adorable like this pirate ship and some which are not like this slimy blue Canasta 49 levels explored including all the boss levels each one an absolutely stunning diorama that made me say some variation of this is so freakin cute at least once 693 flowers found which is a super frustrating number just round up to 700 come on man 35 frustration-free hours played and one completionist who thought he knew some stuff about Yoshi lore and got totally schooled by his co-workers and the Internet Yoshi's crafted a world is a beautiful game and as someone who's been spending a lot of time with tough and scary games lately it's a perfectly Zen and mellow time I did what she demanded a little bit more of me at times but completing it also didn't ruin me for which I am very grateful for its joyful fun and grade to play with the friend little cousin or even significant other so with that in mind guys I give this game my completionist rating of complete it completers that's all tummy over today guys so please as always let me know where you got up today's episode somewhere on the internet if you liked the show hit that like button leave a comment down below and hey you can subscribe button if you like what we do here also we have merch now you want to go to the completionist comm slash merch or just the completionist comm we got all kinds of old designs back at it again the Krispy Kreme just for you I've been draw the completionist we'll see you next week with a brand new episode bye

Channel: The Completionist

Views: 269,273

Keywords: Yoshi's Crafted World, Yoshi's Crafted World review, Yoshi's Crafted World gameplay, Yoshis Crafted World, game review, game reviews, yoshis crafted world review, yoshi's wooly world, yoshis wooly world, yoshis woolly world, jirard khalil, yoshi, yoshi crafted world, yoshi crafted world review, yoshi switch, yoshi nintendo switch, yoshi's island, nintendo switch, nintendo, mario

Id: kRG-hPgDLtU

Length: 17min 29sec (1049 seconds)

Published: Sat Apr 13 2019

Reddit Comments

[u/[deleted]]

Fresh haircut man!

[u/Scukojake]

Played this game today with my wife and it's absolutely amazing. We will be taking our time with it, because it's such a nice and zen experience.

[u/andrewober]

Fifty dollars. Incredible.