Which Wario Land games have aged the best/worst?

[CM30]

And why is that?

For me, I'd say Wario Land 4 has probably aged the best, since everything from the graphics to the music to the game design still holds up as well now as it did back in 2001.

As for the worst? Hard to say. None of the games have fell apart like many a PS1/N64 game has, nor are any as archaic as Super Mario Land 1 is about now. But I guess Wario Land 3 does feel a bit clunky sometimes, and its world changing mechanics have been superseded by open world games and stuff like Banjo-Tooie in my opinion.

But what do you think?

 

[Gyo]

I personally like Wario Land 3 more than 4 in terms of aging. Wario Land 3 is extremely confusing as a child, but since I'm older now completing it is very satisfying. The worst in terms of age is probably Land 1. Everything about it seems archaic to me.

 

[CM30]

I personally like Wario Land 3 more than 4 in terms of aging. Wario Land 3 is extremely confusing as a child, but since I'm older now completing it is very satisfying. The worst in terms of age is probably Land 1. Everything about it seems archaic to me.

Wario Land 1 definitely feels like it's halfway between a traditional Mario platformer and a Wario Land one.

 

[Just a Wario Fan]

Best: Wario Land 4. As CM30 said, the graphics, the music, and the overall design still feel modern, or at least not that old.
Worst: Wario Land 1. It feels a bit ¨lagging behind its time¨ to me.

 

[ShyGuyXXL]

WL1 isn't as polished as the others. We've talked about the wonky programming before.
But it's not as badly-aged as, say, Super Mario Land 1 for instance.
So out of 1, VB, 2, 3, 4 and Shake, I'd have to say 1 aged worst. But again, that's not saying much since even the worst Wario Land is still a great game.
The sprites still look amazingly doofy, the music is classic, the world design and level design are still good so... it's really just some programming quirks that make it feel awkward sometimes. But never in a game breaking way.

 

[G01d3nGar1icbr3ad]

Wario Land Shake it! has Aged the Best; due to the Anime Esque Cutscenes, the Lack of Voice-Acting(Which is how Wario games SHOULD be, and NOT like in Warioware Gold) and the Smooth Consistent Gameplay & Progression

 

[KingDragonWario]

I'll have to agree with WL1 for what everyone else has been saying regarding the Wario Land that aged worst.

As far as the one that aged best? Hmmm... Wario Land 4 with Shake It being a contender. Granted, Shake It is one of the few Wario games I haven't yet played but it looks pretty clean and was also one of the earlier games to my knowledge to do hand drawn sprites.

 

[Magma]

I'm gonna buck the trend and say Shake It aged the worst. While it does look nice and there isn't really anything wrong with it, nothing about it really stands out to me like past Wario Land games. It just feels like a neutered and sterilized Wario Land 4.

 

[ShyGuyXXL]

The part of Shake it that didn't age well are the motion controls. Even if I ignore my bias against motion controls of this type in general, I just can't go back after the buttery smooth gyro controls that games like Splatoon or Wario Ware Gold have.
The Subwarine, the Unibuckets, the Rocket Buckets, the Cannons, even the throwing, it all just feels so sluggish and imprecise.

Another thing that might keep the game from aging well is the resolution. All the other Wario Land games use pixel art, so they'll look good no matter how big your screen is. But this is a Wii game with 2D graphics, so the bigger the screen, the more apparent the compression will be.

The artwork and animation itself is beautiful, but even the prettiest painting can be ruined by a low resolution or shitty compression.

 

[Just a Wario Fan]

WL1 isn't as polished as the others. We've talked about the wonky programming before.
But it's not as badly-aged as, say, Super Mario Land 1 for instance.

Have to admit: I think SML2: Six Golden Coins has aged better than both SML1 and Wario Land 1

 

[ShyGuyXXL]

Have to admit: I think SML2: Six Golden Coins has aged better than both SML1 and Wario Land 1

Well, it was exactly what you'd expect from a Mario platformer. SML1 was wonky and WL1 was experimental, so less what you'd expect.

 

[wariolandgoldpiramid]

I would say that while Wario Land 3 is a great game, it hasn't aged perfectly.
Any newcomer to the series can get confused by the whole metroidvania aspect.

I have an idea on how a remake could improve that, so maybe I'll make a full thread talking about that.

 

[CM30]

I would say that while Wario Land 3 is a great game, it hasn't aged perfectly.
Any newcomer to the series can get confused by the whole metroidvania aspect.

I have an idea on how a remake could improve that, so maybe I'll make a full thread talking about that.

Definitely make a topic about it. We'd love to hear how Wario Land 3 could be modernised if remade!

 

[The 3rd Wario Brother]

Well most of us seem to think WL:SML3 aged the worst. Objectively speaking yes it did (but my nostalgia says otherwise) . It didnt age bad but its a simple game with okay for the gameplay but still weird floaty/heavy jump physics. Platforming makes me feel like a fatass with a jetpack (well Wario is a powerful fatty so that works) a bowling ball with noodle legs and alot of ballons strapped to it.
VBWL aged better, despite it being shorter than i would have liked the level design and physics are certainly improved. I would say it aged great since it like a closer to perfect version of the same formula and could pass as a wario skinned indie game of today the way i see it.
WL2 aged kinda okay. This is a bit of an unpopular opinion but anyways. Gameplay is satisfying. Beating enemies feels good. getting coins feels good. and taking the linear route shows you good level design. But getting 100% is a chore even when i know the whole game and it really felt like a Nintendo Power game at times. I like that its more exploratory than before but maybe they bit off more than they could chew?
WL3 is the opposite as it has the mechanics of 2 but the level is better for exploring and doesnt feel super cryptic with its secrets and you learn how to do moves so the issue with using moves you needed to reading he manual to know about is gone. As a kid i didnt realize Wario had a groundpound in 2 for a couple weeks. WL3 even seems like a good point for beginners. Mechanics such as day and night and other environmental changes could have been more fleshed out but for what it does it does well.
WL4 aged best due to great level design. satisfying gamelay. the right amount of effort required for the best ending. great exploration. etc etc. I have no nitpicks with WL4 i can think of off the top of my head so it aged best.
Shake It has great graphics, music, gameplay, all that. But the difference between this and WL4 is amazing level design that essentially requires mandatory replays to get all treasures. Going through the game normally is fine but the game realize too much on gambling whether you should ground pound or not to get the treasure at the bottom of a pit on a screen below that you cant go back up to so you may or may not get your treasure. Or some treasures will be in cryptic locations. and some missions are dick ish like the ones where you cant touch water. Shake It aged mostly well but it feels like a fanmade sequel to WL4 more than anything. Not bad but in retrospect you are better of with its more polished predecessor.

 

[ShyGuyXXL]

but still weird floaty/heavy jump physics.

That's the thing, there basically are no jump physics.
You move up at a constant speed, until you reach the highest point, where you then proceed to drop immediately, at the same constant speed.
Usually you would slow down gradually towards the apex of the jump, and then increase in speed as you fall.
In WL1 that's not the case.
You don't jump like this...

...but like this...

Even if your character is heavy, he would still move like this.
That's why it feels like Wario has no real gravity. He has no momentum.

 

[CM30]

How does that compare to the other Mario Land games before it?

Super Mario Land has some weird physics too, with momentum being messed up there too.

 

[ShyGuyXXL]

How does that compare to the other Mario Land games before it?

Super Mario Land has some weird physics too, with momentum being messed up there too.

In that game it's not the jump momentum that's messed up, it's the falling momentum. But only when you walk off of a platform. You drop like a brick, immediately. Even faster than the fall after a jump.
Also, if you run in one direction, turn around and then immediately jump, you won't be able to steer your jump.
The mid-air steering in general was pretty hard to do, so Mario feels slower in the air than on land.

It's actually much easier to control that game if you aren't running all the time, something that other Mario games have conditioned us to always do.

Mario Land 2 didn't have any of these problems. Sure, the physics don't feel like a modern Mario game, but you still feel like you have full control over Mario.

 

[Just a Wario Fan]

It seems like the developers of these games didn't look at Super Mario Bros. enough. That game still has one of the best jump and fall physics of the NES games in my opinion. SMB 3 and SML are good too, but they are a tad too ¨slippery¨ and oversensitive to me. But as @ShyGuyXXL said, of the 8-bit Mario games, I think SML 1 definitely did it the worst. There's something called gravitational accleration, which means that the longer you drop, the faster you'll fall. There are many games that don't have this, like SMB 2, but it doesn't always need to. In said game, it allows you to control and aim your character during the drop, for example. But since the Wario games play differently, and Wario is much heavier than Mario, Luigi etc. the jump physics need to feel more like you're actually controlling a heavy character.

 

[The 3rd Wario Brother]

So I've been thinking on my critique of WarioLand 2.
So WL:SML3 had 40 levels. I don't remember the number of treasures but around 15 or something. The amount of treasures is just right but on a first playthrough you might look through levels that don't have treasure in search of them and your hint is the alphabetized treasures revealing the order clueing you in on the relative levels the next and previous treasures are in. As far as treasure hunting goes that's clever but for a handheld adventure you should keep things simple. They must've realized this because they changed it in VBWL.
In Virtual Boy Wario Land every level has treasure and you can see what treasures you got from what levels. The game however is much shorter so the incentive to scour every level for the best ending is higher and even more satisfying (Nothing beats a Castle or Planet but gameplay wise it's an improvement). This was carried over into WL2.
WarioLand 2 has treasures in every level but you gotta get plenty of coins and not get hit AND find the treasure room with the coins you need to have a good shot. WL2 is a pretty sizeable GBC sidescroller and is comparable in length to WL:SML3 and getting that best ending and final level is more overwhelming than the first two games. It's not that it's too cryptic the level design is fine but for GBC game there's so much to keep track of and it can get tempting to use a guide at times.
In that particular aspect I feel WL2 didn't age as good despite VBWL improving upon this.

 

[ShyGuyXXL]

It's not that it's too cryptic the level design is fine but for GBC game there's so much to keep track of and it can get tempting to use a guide at times.

I never really had that problem as a kid. I mean I didn't find everything right away, but I also didn't shy away from going back and looking for it.
Then again, I had no such thing as a guide, nor did I even know that such a thing could exist, so I had no choice but to find it all myself.

Should we even criticise games based on how much optional stuff there is to unlock?