Sure, we’ve all played his micro-games and battled him in kart racing and basketball, but since Wario’s creation in Super Mario Land 2, Mario’s bitter rival hasn’t had much of an opportunity to take the Nintendo DS spotlight. With the recently released Wario: Master of Disguise, Wario gets his chance but does the game make him a master or a disaster?
Nintendo once again passes the buck on Wario’s solo venture, handing development over to Suzak, which carries over many of the ideas implemented in previous Wario Land titles, but with a touch screen twist. As the title implies, Wario utilizes a number of different power-providing costumes in order to progress through the game and reach as much treasure as possible. While Master of Disguise will offer players a decent platformer, the game’s touch screen hook also proves to be its downfall.
Initially Wario only has access to a thief costume after he creates a helmet that allows him to enter his television and bust into the heist of renowned thief “The Silver Zephyr.” Upon entering the television show, Wario lands on Zephyr and jars loose his magic wand. Now in the possession of Wario, the wand not only acts as his looting companion but also feeds on gems, which power up Wario’s forms and grants him access to even more costumes.
Not content with the chump change lifted from the initial heist, Wario comes across a piece of the legendary “wishstone.” By assembling all the pieces of the stone, its user is, as you might guess, granted a wish. Motivated by greed, Wario sets off on a television adventure of epic proportions in order to become filthy, stinking rich.
Noticeable right from the beginning, Master of Disguise brings a completely different art style to the Wario universe. The Wario Ware cartoonish look gets spun 180 degrees and is replaced by static nicely done CG cut scenes and environments. While the graphics are far from terrible, compared to other Wario titles, the simple, stale animations that characters loop over and over fail to give the title any impressive flash in the foreground.
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