WarioWare debuts on our TVs with Nintendo Switch: find out in our Get it Together review! if the minigame is worth the candle.
The real challenge, in writing one review per WarioWare: Get it Together!, is to pass to the almost lethargic rhythm of writing (and, hopefully not, of reading) after the heart-pounding regime of the various micro-games. This is the videogame equivalent of a culinary judgment made to a tray of pastries: different from each other, yes, but in the end evaluated as a whole. The basic premise of the series you should already know: Wario and his friends subject the player to a mixed fry of different gameplay experiences, which are consumed within a few seconds.
However, the arrival of the series on Nintendo Switch represents many, many firsts for the series. The most striking aspect is the return of the original format of the saga on fixed console, after the parenthesis in party game sauce on Nintendo GameCube, the debut with Smooth Moves on Wii and the excursus of Game & Wario on Wii U. Secondly , which will inevitably affect the final judgment, is the push up for the price. The average cost of a Game Boy Advance game was around fifty Euros, and it is to this figure that first-party titles have returned after making the forty the norm on Nintendo 3DS.
“Narra!”
There is a reason why, in full embargo before any reviews come online, the leak that saw WarioWare: Get it Together! as the protagonist he spoke of “gameplay spoilers”. At the level of plotin fact, what is there ever to tell? We know very well what Wario’s calling is, and by extension what convinced him to switch to game programming. Wealth, on the other hand, does not disgust anyone, and the narrative fulcrum (or rather, the pretext) that moves the threads of the saga is easy money. The allure of vile money has seduced Wario and his friends for years.
Submitting to the whims of their tormentor, however, this time led the weird and lovable supporting characters into a trap. The staff of the ramshackle and fictitious software house that gives the series its name has found themselves within the game itself: a way like any other to justify the gameplay innovation that we will see in this episode. As we mentioned in our preview of the game, in fact, this time the cast will find themselves playing the role of “manual” input method, making the characters authentic cursors. Combining this with the variety of micro games, we should have announced success on our hands.
“Plays!” – WarioWare Review: Get it Together!
The first menu available, History, introduces us to the backbone on which the entire structure of the game rests: as in every other chapter before our review subject, this is where the classic WarioWare stages take place: Get it Together! and it is also here that we will have to return several times to unlock all the micro games. Ironically, although the themes of each level are still closely linked to the character who created it, we will be able to deal with it a bit with whoever happens. Not surprisingly, the introductory level immediately gives us not one, not two but three characters to juggle between one micro-game and another.
Since these are micro-games, we will have precisely five seconds or so to understand what the order given to us at the beginning means. However, while the other chapters of the series boasted very immediate inputs like touch (Touched !, DS) or movements (Twisted !, GBA), this time around we will also have to pay attention to who we are going to use. Not unlike Smooth Moves on Wii, the transient screen between games allows us to move it for a couple of seconds and get used to the new input. This makes Get it Together! the most difficult episode of the series at default.
“Critica!” – Review WarioWare: Get it Together!
One of the merits of the whole saga is the delusional demented atmosphere with a very “Japanese-weird” flavor of the whole experience, but in the review phase WarioWare: Get it Together! filled us with very conflicting feelings. On the one hand we have the new inputs, which transform everything into a sort of semi-platformer: using Wario, in this context, almost manages to give us the impression that Wario Land is actually back. On the other hand, however, the aforementioned light-hearted atmosphere is dampened by the constant concentration that the game first requires, then demands and finally demands.
Furthermore, the use of multiple characters is unfortunately mandatory throughout the story mode, making everything occasionally frustrating. This is a purely subjective criticism: if you have tried the title and you have found it well, so much the better for you. For the writer, however, multiplying the goal of each micro-game by the completely random variable of the characters available contributes to breaking the balance between chaos and simplicity that the previous chapters have been able to create with great skill. A small flaw, this, which leads to many otherwise avoidable game overs.
“Earn money!” – WarioWare Review: Get it Together!
During the review phase, we further found that, by beating it the first time, every level of WarioWare: Get it Together! fruit 1000 coins. That’s right: if you have avoided the possible “spoilers” until now trying not to run into even the guides, this game has a currency (fortunately it can be used in the game over phase to continue, at the first access to a level). It may seem like a small thing, actually, but the need to provide more content to the player is one of the many details that remind us how much Switch combines fixed and portable. The console combines two different incarnations of the Big N videogame philosophy, even though they were apparently irreconcilable.
Now that WarioWare has made its return (this time definitive) to television, Nintendo intends to focus on longevity, especially in an atmosphere dominated by triple A open world experiences. Among the alternative modes we have the shop, with which it is possible to unlock alternative colors for the characters, illustrations and so on. A nice addition that aims, in the most positive sense of the term, to “lengthen the broth” as much as possible, but far from the idea that has always made us love the series up to this point. If anything, the real gems of this title for the hybrid of the Kyoto giant are others.
“Sblocca!” – Review WarioWare: Get it Together!
We’ve already published a guide on this before this review, but the many micro-games available in WarioWare: Get it Together! they can only be fully unlocked after reaching the end credits. At each successfully completed level, however, the individual challenges will also peep into the Wariopedia. For the less accustomed to the saga, this is where the unlocked micro-games can be faced indefinitely individually, alternating the three possible patterns (easy, medium and hard) before accelerating. As in all the other modes described so far, we will start with four lives available.
We have dedicated a separate paragraph to the whole to highlight a detail that caught our attention. In this mode, and only here, there is the possibility of creating a “team” made up of a single character, bringing the gameplay potential to the glories of the previous episodes of the series. Given how much the simple freedom of choice makes much more enjoyable the whole experience, and considering that the character selection screen clearly tells us which of them is the most or the least suitable for a certain microgame, it is natural to wonder if certain obligations during the campaign are worth it.
“Alterna!” – Review WarioWare: Get it Together!
One of the highlights in the main menu of the game, like the story mode, is the voice Great variety. Here we officially pass from micro games to real minigames, in a way not unlike what we saw previously on GameCube. In this menu there are the most disparate activities, able to transform a usable (and more enjoyable) experience in two players through co-op in a crazy party game which extends to a maximum of four players. We were just wondering, during the review phase, what happened to the minigames seen in the previous chapters.
We note with great pleasure that they have increased in number, and that here too the (in fact) variety is certainly not lacking. From Super Smash Bros. ‘Wario-like alternative (because each game must have its own equivalent, as Kirby Fighters 2 and Shovel Knight Showdown remind us) to a sort of work-themed side-scrolling adventure (in Japan they will know Camera Café … ?), there really is something for everyone. It often happens (in any game) to see a greater number of players relegated to secondary modes, but the schism between the maximum limit of two players and that of four is fully understandable.
“Collaborate!” – WarioWare Review: Get it Together!
So let’s talk about this blessed one co-op. The entire adventure (and the Wariopedia, of course) is available to two players, thanks to the (relative) simplification of the micro-games in favor of the possibility of facing them with several different characters. In a speech of “chicken and egg” we would not be able to say if it was the co-op that led to the choice of making more characters playable or vice versa, but all the limitations we have mentioned so far are immediately easier to justify. The game is still difficult, it is true, but any possible frustration is dampened by the more generous margin of error born from the co-op.
Two (pairs of) characters, in particular, they owe their gameplay peculiarities to the very existence of a cooperative mode. The two ninja girls Kat and Ana jump automatically, continuously, but Kat (the only one usable by the first player) will throw her shurikens only to the right while Ana will throw them only to the left. Similar speech for the two taxi drivers Dribble and Spitz, equipped with bazookas. The first will only shoot to the right while the second will only hit to the left. The most frustrating moments of the whole game (in single player, at least) are due to them, and in our case we didn’t finish (almost) a single micro-game with them without failing.
“Competi!” – Review WarioWare: Get it Together!
We are approaching the conclusion of our review with the other menus of WarioWare: Get it Together!, Starting from the high-sounding (and unlockable) Wario Cup. This is actually a ranking (single mode for a single player) with related themed challenges, which at the writing of the article is also a great way to unlock all the micro games. To follow we have Personages, with which we can train in controlling every member of the colorful cast of the last effort of the Great N. The last two menus, finally, consist in the dessert of this great binge offered to us by Nintendo, the first of which allows us to close the topic co-op.
The voice Local game it allows us to cooperate with two different consoles, should two players want to progress …