Yoshi Brought Joy, but Animal Crossing Board Game Bored
The final months of 2015 have been fairly inconsistent for the Nintendo Wii U. October brought players Yoshi’s Woolly World. As if Kirby and the Rainbow Curse wasn’t already cute enough, Nintendo went for the double-tap with a shotgun blast to the face of adorableness. This time, the next entry in the Yoshi’s Island series was made entirely out of yarn, and it looks and plays as nicely as it would probably feel. Nintendo made the fundamental game fairly easy with the gritty challenge being that of finding every collectible to unlock the intense levels for those daring enough, making Yoshi’s Woolly World another inclusive and cozy gem in the Wii U’s library.
The subsequent months, however, weren’t as kind, beginning with the October release of Fatal Frame: Maiden of Black Water. Regardless of its free-to-start play model, it failed to make the impression it could have, receiving warm to unfavorable criticisms, and it came across like an excellent idea that didn’t seem to live up to its full potential upon execution.
Then November brought Animal Crossing: Amiibo Festival. Many players’ hearts stopped during the E3 announcement of Animal Crossing in HD, only to see that it would end up being a board/party game. The generally negative feedback was a lack of exciting features, excluding one very interesting Desert Island Escape mode, but it wasn’t enough to prove to players that Amiibo Festival was more than a glorified supplement to buying the Animal Crossing amiibo series. Sure, it provides all the cuteness, but Kirby and Yoshi proved that, in 2015, being cute is just half the battle.
