" Wario Rox my socks."

Mario has always had a special something that no other game could ever emulate. It showed how talented these developers from Nintendo had become, and how much promise they had for the future. So I thought they would be one of the most successful companies from then on. Always innovating, always ahead of everyone else.

Now with the launch of the gameboy they countinued to emulate, but if I remember right there was always a special magic that came more with getting a new mario game for the NES than any other system. While playing everyone around always seemed light-hearted. Mario has always brought my family and friends together.

So Nintendo kept up with the innovating and out of this came the Game Boy Advance which was able to hold a lot more than the previous GBC systems which were pretty poor quality as well. Also, the graphics on the Game Boy Colour, were pretty poor. So now we have capabilitys for complex games, as well as graphics on a handheld...

Who would be the first to use this ability to its maximum capabilitys? Nintendo of course. With games such as Castlevania, and F-zero the GBA was sure building up a strong library of games. What was it missing? Ah yes, a mario spin off!

You have probably heard a lot about this game by now, I mean it is a very popular GBA game, and one which you should not be without. Every mini-game packed into this little cart has massive dedication worked into it, and most of them are very addicting.

So what is Wario Ware exactly? Well it is a collection of games which you progress through to get to the end of the game. You must defeat all the catagory filterd mini-games to make it to Wario (the boss) and defeat him in his uber-challanging final game.

There are lots of stuff to unlock here. Too much to speak of in a review. My faviorte unlockable though is the paper plane game, this is very fun, and I belive I have got a very fair score at it. Now the unlockables are pretty much the focus of the game, you see, you can't earn games without unlocking them, if that makes sense. To progress you will come across differnt games, and based on the difficulty or whatever setting you have it on depending on the game you will see and earn differnt stuff.

Once you have earned the games you can get little indicaters that show you have passed a certian score on all the games. This is on the grid-mode or free-play mode where you are then allowed to play whichever game you wish. First wario was stealing mario's stuff now he is stealing mine! I want my time back!

So logicaly, Wario is not the coolest character ever, but this game just works. At the same time Wario World was released, which was also a hit in my mind, but that is for anouther time. Why does Wario work out this time? Well, the story is about him opening some kind of company which is somehow related to GBAsps' and nintendos self-advertising misfortunes.

Now the variety is more than just amusing. It is addicting! It is probably greater than any other GBA game, rivaling Nintendo's other baby known as Mario Party. In recent years however mario party has become the lack luster, poor mans excuse for a cool party game. Wario Ware will probably turn you into a closet gamer at worse, since your friends will think it is instant crap. Luckily I got some of my friends into it and we sat there for hours playing! Good times.

Nintendo gives props to everyone! It is truly a testament to what they have come to acheive. Although i'm getting queit tired of this nintendo magic which is finaly fadding in a sad death. Wario Ware has many things which reach out to all gamers. In one game near the end it has the player taking part in a D&D role which admitidly filled me with a warm heart, and took my breath away as it then put the show on with its block busters like F-zero, Mario Zelda, etc.

You must be beaming with joy, I mean I get a mini-game for all of those great nintendo hits right? Well...when nintendo says mini they mean piddling, pint-sized, teensy, trifling, undersized, shrimp, runty, pretty, narrow, minute, bitty games that may last less than 2-3 seconds. Some may last 5 minutes, like the air-plane one.

Everything seems all tossed in and uneven sometimes, luckily nintendo didn't just put these in and let us have it like that. They added a linear passable story that adds the nintendo touch that I have come to expect from them. Never being ones to be very contriversial, nintendo makes everything very cute. You get to shove your finger in a nose, grab toast, brush teeth, find cats, make smooth beats, and just about any other thing you could do in a mini game. There is even a duck hunt game but that one sucks, haha.

The graphics are VERY good. I must emphasise this as they are bright, and extremely cute. You definatly want to keep in mind that the GBA, although more powerful than its earlier versions, displays everything in a very appeasing manner. Nintendo must rest in ease right now, as they can now skip to the bank with gba in pocket and be aassured it is the hip thing, they have made it so.

Now the replay value is a throw the roof, sure, but to be honest it is a hard game to come back to. Sure it is good the first what 2 months, but now I am struggling to come back to it for the sake of this review.

The sound is truly great for the GBA. I was greatly impress. There is actualy voices and retro/cool sounds blasting from the handheld that could. There are a few exceptions. Like games related to music. Well you know what, I really always have my gba sound off. When a game needing music pops up and i'm supposed to be ready, I don't have time to flip the music switch louder, I need a headphone jack, which is the one thing nintendo ''forgot'' with the ''special'' gameboy.

All the menus have been done very well, and you can definatly tell it is a Nintendo product. It has that much pride into it which they injected through the game. The main stream of things flows smoothly, as all (or most) of the games seem to be very fun. Too bad they are over so quickly!

All in all Wario Ware makes for good times. Especialy good for long car trips, as it can take awhile to get all the ribbons. I am an expert at the game now though, and devour it in a matter of 5 hours. Still a great game.

10/10

Nintendo has done it again.

Reviewer's Score: 10/10, Originally Posted: 02/02/04