Brian Leahy

Wario Land: Shake It! Review

By Brian Leahy - Posted Sep 22, 2008

We review Wario Land: Shake It! for the Wii. Is it worth exercising your precious wrist muscles? Find out!

The Pros
  • Gorgeously stylized presentation
  • Tons of replay value (if you're up for it)
  • Should appeal to both casual and hardcore gamers
The Cons
  • Too short
  • Shaking could annoy some people

Wario Land: Shake It! has been on many a Wii owner’s radar for a while now, and rightfully so. It looked like it had some really cool things going for it. The art design obviously caught people’s eyes, and the gameplay seemed like it was going to be a big swig of old-flavored Nintendo platforming. Well, I’m happy to say that Wario Land: Shake It! actually delivers in almost every way.

Wario Land: Shake It!O Wario, Wherefore art thou Wario?

After the nasty Shake King abducts Queen Merelda along with the creatively named Bottomless Coin Sack, it is up to the sleazy and rotund Wario to save the day. The beautiful and mysterious Captain Maple Syrup provides Wario with a magical globe that contains a portal to the Shake Dimension, which Wario uses to rescue Merelda’s kidnapped followers, beat mini-bosses to secure power idols, retake the coin sack and ultimately defeat the Shake King and return the queen to her kingdom.

Ok. So the story’s a bit wacky and clichéd in parts, but that doesn’t stop it from giving the game a tidy narrative structure that never gets in the way and never makes you feel like you’re wasting time. The overall story breaks up into different areas on the magical globe. You unlock each new area by purchasing maps with money you collect throughout the game. Each level progresses pretty much the same way: collect coins, shake enemies to get health or more coins, find some treasure, solve a puzzle, rescue a Merfle (imprisoned Merelda follower) and race back to the starting point before time runs out.

The only genuine challenge comes from the games six boss battles (including the Shake King) that conclude each map area. They are all equally bizarre and reflect the theme of their particular map in exaggerated ways. While a couple of them are easily beaten, the others will have you screaming with rage. Even when you know their attack patterns, you still need split-second timing and a clear understanding of what your next move will be in order to beat them. It can be frustrating for sure, but in that really good way that defines well-tuned games.

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Wario Land: Shake It!Shake Me All Night Long

In traditional Nintendo fashion, you play the game holding the Wiimote sideways, just as you would a classic controller. One button jumps, while the other does a short sprint. After you jump on an enemy, you can then pick them up by moving towards them, and then you can shake them to get coins or health. To perform a butt-slam and stun enemies or move objects, you simply move the remote up and down quickly. There are also several instances where you must tilt the remote to aim (either while throwing an object or navigating a vehicle).

The vehicles (a rocket bucket, a submarine, a mine cart, etc.) show up every few levels or so and really help break up the typical run, shake, jump cycle. Each one handles uniquely, but some are naturally more fun than others (the rocket bucket is sweet, but it only shows up once). Fortunately, they each make good use of the Wiimote’s motion-censor. Just tip the remote in the desired direction and the vehicles respond with fairly accurate results. The submarine missions are the only glaring vehicle-related issue I have, because they seem tacked on, and they lack all of the personality and texture of the rest of the levels

Now, as the title suggests, shaking is a major game mechanic. Now, some people might find the constant shaking tiresome and annoying after a while. But it’s really a bullet you should bite, because the game makes it totally worth the effort. Plus, the game only takes about four-to-six hours to beat (if you don’t try to find every treasure piece or complete every mission challenge), so it’s really not that bad.

Then again, if you want to be the ultimate Wario Land master, it will probably take you at least twice as long to secure every piece of loot (three pieces per level) and/or complete every mission challenge (at least three per level). You should know that these side quests are not for the weak willed, and even hardcore fans will have their hands full. Fortunately, they are optional. But for anyone wishing to attempt them, they will instantly add hours of replayability, which is always appreciated.

Of course, that’s also not counting each map’s hidden areas as well, which can only be found by performing a specific maneuver in a secret spot (that you’re able to locate more easily once you’ve beaten the game and given a special map). It’s hard enough trying to find the regular treasures on each level, let alone the super secret ones. Plus, in order to find many of these areas, you must explore every inch of a level, which can oftentimes only be done by jumping extra far to the left or the right in order to reveal a secret ledge or a hidden vine. As such, you will end up seeing pretty much every single pixel of content created for the game. (Not just 100% completion either. I’m talking every pixel.)

As far as the challenges go, they include standard things like finishing a level under a certain time, collecting a certain amount of money or killing a specific type of enemy. Others require you to destroy every exploding box on a level or to go an entire level without taking any damage. These challenges can be especially hard, because at the end of each level, you need to use a speed-boost machine that gives you extra momentum to clear obstacles or make long jumps, just as long as you don’t run into anything solid. This makes completing some of the challenges an all-or-nothing situation. These sorts of challenges are obviously only for dedicated gamers, but it’s nice to see them in a game clearly meant for younger players, because it shows that the developers are thinking about the player’s long-term enjoyment rather than just about giving them a quick fix .

Wario Land: Shake It!Wario, You’re Purty

First off, anyone who has seen or played previous Wario Land titles will instantly recognize the art design and presentation of Shake It!. It has a slick, 2D-3D hand-drawn animation style that really helps bring out the personalities and attitudes of all the characters and settings in the game. Wario moves with a lumbering gait, but then he’ll lower his shoulder or start sprinting and transform into a wrecking ball with stubby legs. The animations are smooth and quirky, and I didn’t encounter a single frame rate issue during my play sessions, even in some of the more complex boss battles.

Like I said before, the bosses in the game are wonderfully odd and well-designed, but so are the levels. Each map area has its own theme (desert, circus, jungle, snowy mountains, erupting volcano, etc.) and each level reflects that theme not only in the enemies, but in the puzzles as well. For instance, you swing and climb on vines in the jungle levels, roll into a snowball to crash through barricades on the snow levels, and hop along lava-walking robots in the volcano stages. This sort of design approach is obviously nothing new, but it’s done with such care and creativity that you can’t help but be drawn in by it.

The only issue that some people might have with the game’s presentation involves the console’s display mode. If your Wii is set to widescreen mode, the screen is bordered on both sides by status bars of sorts that show what treasures you have collected and what mission challenges you’ve completed. To get around this, you have to exit the game and toggle the aspect ratio to standard mode from the Wii home screen. It’s not a huge deal, but because the game doesn’t explain this very well, a lot of people (myself included) will just think the sidebars are supposed to be there.

Solid Shake

Wario Land: Shake It! has fun written all over it. Everything from the stylized presentation to the tiring yet satisfying controls to the hours of playtime added by hidden treasures and bonus challenges just screams, “Love me!” And despite being relatively short and the shaking can be exhausting, there isn’t much that fans of good old-fashioned Nintendo platforming won’t like here.

Review by: Jake Gaskill