Something both impressive and crazy about Wario Land 4...

[CM30]

You know all those levels with lighting effects and stuff?

Well because the GBA couldn't actually handle the types of HDMA needed to draw them technically, the Wario Land 4 staff actually drew the shadows on every single tile individually, and then positioned them just right to look good.

It's especially nuts in the Curious Factory, the level has about 100 or so different tiles in the tileset just to give the light 'effects' in different areas and to animate various things.

Similarly, it's insane how many animation frames there are here. Those smashers in the Curious Factory for example... they seem to have about 20-30 frames for something that's basically a Thwomp. Similarly, those Robo Bird enemies in Hard and Super Hard (which I've been trying to get a good rip of forever), seem to have about 12 frames for literally doing nothing. For just hovering in place.

It's just mad how much detail this game has in its sprites and animations and tiles. All for stuff any other platformer would spend maybe one tenth of that time on. But it certainly shows they enjoyed making the game and put everything into it.

 

[CM30]

And one more thing.

See this?

This is from 40 Below Fridge.

But you know what's funny?

You have a tileset with nearly 110-120 different tiles (three of which have multiple animation frames).

It's used in two rooms, for about 30 seconds of the level.

Most games and artists have less decoration in an entire world worth of levels. Many games had less graphics than this... in literally 20 hours of gameplay (the whole game). The sheet above has more content than most full tilesets on Mario Fan Games Galaxy, SMW Central or Super Mario Bros X.org.

And it's for two rooms you spend less than a minute or two in. There's probably more variety in Wario Land 4 than there is the whole Mario platformer series to date.

 

[ChanceTime]

Wario Land 4's graphics really are amazing; The worldbuilding is absolutely fabulous and I'm certain that it's credited to the rate at which rooms variate. As with your example in 40 Below Fridge, there was clearly a lot of effort taken in making the levels feel as if they progress and give the player a sense that they're advancing. I would say that other examples where this is done effectively would be Wildflower Fields with its ascent up the giant sunflower leading you underground, through the stem and into the sky, and Pinball Zone, with its gradual climb up the pinball machine punctuated by themed rooms that go in a spectral order.

As you say though, the tiled lighting effects are done with such elegance that your eyes never get tired at looking at the same thing over and over, as many games with 16x16 square tilesets do. It's a really subtle effect that I imagine a lot of people couldn't pinpoint, but definitely subconciously sway them into thinking "These graphics are very good", at the very least. It's the sort of thing inexplicable reviews are made of, and there's a true sense of magic with that.

 

[OriginalName244]

Man, I might just play it again now.

Too bad I know the ending.

 

[CM30]

Wario Land 4's graphics really are amazing; The worldbuilding is absolutely fabulous and I'm certain that it's credited to the rate at which rooms variate. As with your example in 40 Below Fridge, there was clearly a lot of effort taken in making the levels feel as if they progress and give the player a sense that they're advancing. I would say that other examples where this is done effectively would be Wildflower Fields with its ascent up the giant sunflower leading you underground, through the stem and into the sky, and Pinball Zone, with its gradual climb up the pinball machine punctuated by themed rooms that go in a spectral order.

As you say though, the tiled lighting effects are done with such elegance that your eyes never get tired at looking at the same thing over and over, as many games with 16x16 square tilesets do. It's a really subtle effect that I imagine a lot of people couldn't pinpoint, but definitely subconciously sway them into thinking "These graphics are very good", at the very least. It's the sort of thing inexplicable reviews are made of, and there's a true sense of magic with that.

Wildflower Fields in general is a good example, the level of graphics detail there can reach crazy levels. The main background alone is incredibly impressive:

That said, it does also have one of the worst backgrounds in the game in another section, so I guess it evens out a bit:

On a side note, back when I was ripping Wario Land 4 tiles for SMW hacks, this level gave me the most trouble of them all. The background alone would take about 700 tiles in a SNES game, and then it's nearly impossible to include most of the foreground or decorations with it.

I've been trying to get graphics from Crescent Moon Village now though, and this is where it gets kind of insane. The lamps are not on a layer. The light effects are not an overlay on the standard tiles.

Nope, the artists actually drew versions of each tile in two different shades/styles; one with the light shined on it and one with no light shined on it. So someone placed tiles down manually all across the level so they'd look like light was shining on them from above. Oh, and these lamps shine diagonally too. So each tile not only has one with light shining on it and one without, but one with half the light shined on it diagonally. In two directions.

This game was not made like most games. This game was virtually built tile by tile. You'd be seen as nuts if you designed a modern indie game like this.

 

[ChanceTime]

That said, it does also have one of the worst backgrounds in the game in another section, so I guess it evens out a bit:

View attachment 691

...Yeah, I see your point there. I do find it impressive how I didn't notice how bad that background was, though; The winding vines and flowing water served as a good distraction from the main BG.

This game was not made like most games. This game was virtually built tile by tile. You'd be seen as nuts if you designed a modern indie game like this.

Absolutely, man. God... WL4 is one hell of a game. I honestly think it deserves to be heralded as one of the all-time greats.

 

[ShyGuyXXL]

Looking at the tiles of and first made me realize that the sprite artist of this game also worked on Metroid Fusion for example.
Sadly those games still get more recognition than Wario Land even though it's just as good.

 

[wariolandgoldpiramid]

That's the amazing thing about this game.
While it's much shorter than the previous games, only 18 levels, they went for quality over quantity.
Compare this to other Wario Land games, where a lot of levels reused the same tilesets almost all the time.
Here, they went all out to make every level unique and memorable.

 

[ChanceTime]

That's the amazing thing about this game.
While it's much shorter than the previous games, only 18 levels, they went for quality over quantity.
Compare this to other Wario Land games, where a lot of levels reused the same tilesets almost all the time.
Here, they went all out to make every level unique and memorable.

I find that it's pretty similar with gimmicks, too; Wario Land 3 seems to use what's essentially the same 'swim while avoiding the bubbles' schtick for several different levels, which means they bleed together somewhat. 4 was more likely to feature unique puzzles and obstacles to overcome. The quality over quantity principal definitely applies with 4.