3. Ruins at the Bottom of the Sea Story 3: Inside the Ruins

This here is the most daring level in this game: after rolling the long way right @ the beginning, granting you a sneak preview o’ the level proper, you end up on the far right side & the goal door, right there; & unlike levels like “Go to the cellar!!”’s “Find the exit!!” & “Uncanny Mansion”’s “The way to the open door” & “Coming back is difficult”, which tease you with showing you the exit, but making you play thru the whole level to get access to it, this level doesn’t bluff & does allow you to just enter the door right @ the start. But because this game is truly about 100%-ing it, not just beating it, — if one were just beating it, ¿why would one be playing thru a bonus chapter? — the player still needs to get the treasure, & to get the treasure the player will have to play thru the level to find its door & come back to the goal later. In a way, this foreshadows Wario Land 4, but in a different way: the goal o’ that game wasn’t just to hit the switch just to go back & leave. If that were the case, then its final level would be the easiest level in the world. Its goal was to collect the various items necessary to continue thru the game & safely exit with them. This level is the earliest iteration o’ that mechanic in Wario Land, with the treasure as the collectible with which you need to escape.

Playing the level proper involves navigating a maze o’ columns, breaking thru the 1-block-high cracked spots with rolling Wario, which in some cases requires timing jumps to get from the nearest slope to the cracked wall blocking your way forward. @ a micro level, this works the same as e’ery other use o’ this mechanic in the series, but nowhere else in the series, much less this game, is it utilized in such a memorable, intricate, & thorough fashion. For instance, this level adds a few backward slopes to go backward into certain niches. & while most rolling Wario setpieces thruout the series are relatively on-the-nose ’bout how to complete them, this level’s layout is mo’ complex & has mo’ variance to the placement o’ columns, blocks, & cracked passageways & requires mo’ scrutiny to follow the right path — especially when playing the game itself & only seeing a small screen o’ the map @ a time.

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9. SS Tea Cup Story 3: Get in the Tea Cup

The most interesting swimming level in this game, especially with the unique mechanic o’ the eels you have to dodge by quickly swimming in front o’ them & swimming back ’way, & then rushing past them as they pull back. Granted, I’m mixed on the treasure door’s hiding place under the last eel, requiring you to intentionally get grabbed by it down to the small pocket o’ clear water that holds it: on 1 hand, it’s certainly 1 o’ the most memorable treasure door locations; on the other, it’s a bit unfair & counterintuitive to expect the player to intentionally let themself get hit by something the game heavily discourages you from getting hit by, especially when you lose 2 coins whene’er you’re grabbed, e’en by the eel you’re s’posed to be grabbed by.

While not quite unique, the seagull platforms introduced in this level are also a rare mechanic that helps this level stand out, tho they don’t contribute much to this level beyond acting as stepping stones to collecting coins & can be completely ignored for just going from start to level goal.

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15. Go to the Cellar!! Story 2: Avoid the rocks!

The central mechanic o’ falling rocks o’ randomly varying sizes — small rocks, which can be grabbed & thrown, & large boulders that make Wario flat — is unique & clever. Unfortunately, going to the other extreme o’ this game’s most common problem to the greatest extent in this game, this level relies almost entirely on this gimmick thruout the whole level, with the only exceptions being a room with basic enemies & a basic room where you break blocks as fat Wario.

While I’m thankful that there are only 2 places where you’d want to be flat Wario, both just for coins, that leaves catching small rocks & dodging large boulders, usually just so you can throw the small rocks @ throw blocks in the way o’ coins, to hold up this whole level. A bit o’ variety would’ve gone a long way. They do add minor complications like needing to jump o’er gaps while dodging boulders & specially bats who not only risk grabbing you & making you drop the rock you’re holding, but can also make you drop your rock if you jump into it to try avoid being grabbed.

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21. One Noisy Morning Story 2: Turn off the giant faucet!

The better “flooded castle” level, replacing the sluggish swimming round bubbles & Drills with mo’ exciting platforming challenges o’er rapids that threaten to push you back whence you came, including 1 place with furniture that keeps spawning from broken-open holes, only to break ’pon hitting the wall @ the end, where you have to time a jump on it so you can be standing on ground to enter the treasure door — since e’eryone knows it’s scientifically impossible to go thru doorways while in the air.

This level’s ending is also similar but better than its sequel, replacing hitting some random block with shutting off the faucet causing this flooding in the 1st place by elbowing its spigot 3 times, with the extra visual touch o’ having the amount o’ water coming out decrease a bit with each hit.

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27. Maze Woods Story 2: Defeat the giant spear man

Riding the moving turtles, introduced in this level, is refreshingly rare in this game, being used only twice mo’; & tho it is an autoscroll mechanic, a’least this level was laid out in a way that minimizes standing around doing nothing. Nor is it used too much or too li’l, hitting that sweet spot o’ 2 iterations, the 1st a simple tutorial where you just need to jump up a few short platforms & dodge slow-moving Pirate Gooms & a 2nd with mo’ complex layouts where you have to quickly plow thru cracked blocks & dodge much mo’ dangerous fire foxes.

Howe’er, while I get how cool it is to have to time entering a door while on the turtle, it’s lame that you have to redo the 1st half o’ the 1st turtle section when you do so, as leaving the door dunks you right into the currents that push you back to the start, especially since all that door holds is a bunch o’ coins and is the same general o’erused puzzle o’ jumping on an enemy while holding an enemy so you can jump off that enemy while on the 2nd storey to reach the 3rd storey — which is especially uninteresting, since it comes so soon after a very similar puzzle room but with 1 Pirate Goom replaced by a stove. They could’ve avoided this by having a tiny turtle section o’ currentless water where the only need for the turtle is to enter the door, allowing you to just swim onward after leaving.

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33. One Noisy Morning Story 3: Let the water out!

A weaker version o’ the level that comes just before it. While I can understand the interest in wanting to develop the “story” o’ Wario’s castle flooding, taking up 2 / 5 o’ the 1st castle chapter with pseudowater levels is pushing it. This level does a’least use water in a different way, tho it’s less interesting: we have 1 use o’ a switch to make the water fall so you can reach a paltry 20 coins, & then have to switch it back on to reach a high-up shelf to continue the level. If you don’t feel like you absolutely need those 20 whole coins, you can just ignore the switch.

Kind o’ disappointing, considering this is the only level that has this precise gimmick, especially since they set it up to be mo’ meaningful near the beginning o’ the level, with the breakable block ’tween an early & late room, but underwater, & thus unbreakable, making one think that one needs to lower the water to break thru it; howe’er, the switch bizarrely doesn’t affect this room & you just get to the other side by going around doors.

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39. Invade Wario Castle Story 2: Storm the castle!!

Like the rest o’ the levels in this underwhelming chapter, this level is mostly a bunch o’ mid or weak challenges that repeat mechanics from other levels, lack much cohesion, & just in general goes on a bit too long. Particularly baffling is the dark room where you need to dodge weights dropped by bats, with no twist to this like in chapter 1’s “Go down to the cellar”: no reward for jumping on the weights after they fall or intentionally getting flattened anywhere. ¿& did this level need 2 levels where focusing on hopping on platforms & dodging moving spikes?

That said, there are some subtle touches to other rooms. There’s this unique roll section where you need to break thru & ground pound a bunch o’ pots before being able to roll out thru the short passage — tho it is a bit annoying have to go back & forth, rolling thru twice. The moving spike section on the small platforms just after has interesting arrangements, tho the awkward camera makes the last platform unfair, as you can’t see what’s down there till you already make the jump & the coin arrangements are just ludicrous: all the coins are down @ the bottom, where you go if you fail, but there are none on the main path with no extra challenge to collect certain coins while dodging the moving spikes. The fire-block arrangements in the room after that require fiddling with where you get set on fire so you’re position is timed right to burst into flames on the right side o’ the lakes on the top & bottom — tho this is mo’ a case o’ trial & error than making the right moves or thinking laterally.

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45. Maze Woods Story 5: Defeat the giant bee!

“Defeat the giant bee!” feels e’en mo’ like a padding level than other boss levels, repeating similar setpieces with the bees introduced in the level preceding this level, — granted they fit better here: they just would’ve had a better effect if they were introduced here — as well as returning the terrible floors you can fall thru to hide the treasure door, as well as yet ’nother down there for some coins.

The bees aren’t fun, either: puffy Wario is ’mong the least fun status effects in the series thanks to how slow it moves & how redundant it feels next to bouncy Wario; & thanks to the camera in this game, which doesn’t move unless you touch a boundary, it’s a guessing game where there are spots high ’bove you can float up to, so you’ll end up getting stung & floating up @ various places just to check e’erywhere if you haven’t already memorized the level or looked it up in a guide. They’re not challenging to get past, either, as you can just stay ducking & they can’t sting you. You’d think they’d put the effort to better differentiate this level from “Escape from Maze Woods” by making you climb up platforms that require you to be standing to reach them to add difficulty, but the bee sections in this level are actually easier & simpler than that earlier level.

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Wario Land II was a transition point from the 1st Wario Land. It introduces the main physics, controls, & moves that define Wario Land for most people: Wario’s invincibility; a greater focus on puzzle platforming than action, which better suits Wario’s still-floaty — but not as floaty as the 1st Wario Land’s — physics; & most importantly, introduces possibly the most famous twist o’ Wario Land games, the status effects where Wario gains special power by being hit by enemies, which in different contexts can be helpful or necessary for reaching places or stifle progress, whether it be springy or puffy Wario making Wario move higher than his jumps can move him, whether he wants it or not, or flat or fat Wario, the former o’ whom can go wider distances & go o’er gaps in thin passageways, the latter o’ whom can break thru ground that regular Wario can’t, but both o’ which have weaker jumps & cannot enter doors.

That said, I don’t think Wario Land II realized the true potential o’ the series, & this mainly comes down to its levels: with the exception o’ a few branching paths to multiple endings, which are basically glorified secret exits like those in Super Mario World, & the treasure doors with their repetitive, tedious minigames you have to find in e’ery level, as well as the also-tedious & repetitive guess-the-# game, which are like the bonus coins in Donkey Kong Country games, but with e’en mo’ repetitive challenges, this game’s levels are still linear &, due to Wario’s invincibility, don’t offer much in terms o’ challenge.

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5. Course No. 11

Like the level before this, this level’s shape fits its position on the o’erworld: much as the previous course was @ the peak where you go up & down, this level continues the downward trajectory. Howe’er, this level has mo’ interesting challenges. The 1st room challenges you to climb down a series o’ thin platforms while dodging the Pirate Gooms. Not the hardest challenge @ this point o’ the game, but it a’least feels fresh.

E’en better, later on in this level they build on this by having ’nother room where you go down thin platforms with Pirate Gooms, but this time they give you a star & let you just ram thru them for free hearts.

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