Wai Wai World 2 - SOS!! Parsley Jō

Moby ID: 54736
NES Specs
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Description

Parsley Castle, an outer space kingdom, has been invaded! And strange beings are to blame. Playing as Rickle, a cyborg built by Dr. Cinnamon from Konami's Twinbee series, and several of his friends from other (mostly Japan-only) Konami games, your objective is to save Parsley Castle and once again bring peace to Konami World.

At the start of the game, the player can choose 3 characters that accompany Rickle on his journey. Those characters will appear in a cute super-deformed style.

During the game, once the first level has been completed, the player(s) will then traverse several levels inspired by the games the characters are from, like Castlevania, Contra, Gradius, and more. In addition, various mini-games will play from time to time (including one inspired by Frogger, Konami's first major arcade hit).

In addition to Rickle, players can choose between Simon Belmont of "Castlevania" (a holdover from the first game), Bill of "Contra", Fuuma from the Japanese title Getsufūma Den, Goemon of his self-titled series (best known to Americans as Kid Ying from The Legend Of The Mystical Ninja), and Upa from Bio Miracle Bokutte Upa, another Japan-only title. The player switches between the characters he/she has selected by obtaining pods that fly similar to the power-up pods in the "Contra" series. Rickle will then become one of those characters for 60 seconds (decreasing with damage).

In addition, like the last Wai Wai World game, two players can team up to save Parsley Castle together.

Groups +

Screenshots

Credits (NES version)

11 People

Program
Graphic Design
  • Keita Kawaminami (Pemopemosanda Kawanami [ペモペモ サンダー かわなみ])
  • Kazumichi Ishihara (Ishihara Kamenosuke [いしはら かめのすけ])
  • P. Aratame (Aratame Pensuke [あらため ぺんすけ])
  • Hirotaka Fukuda (Ranmaru 'Pensuke' Fukuda [ふくだ らんまる ぱーすけ])
Sound Design
  • Yūichi Sakakura (Yuichi 'Milk Shop' Sakagon [さかごん みるくしょっぷ ゆういち])
  • Kenichi Matsubara (Ken-chan 'Jientoruman' Matsubara [じえんとるまん まつばら けんちゃん])
  • Satoko Minami (Satoko 'Muchimuchi Pudding' Minami [みなみ むちむちぷりん さとこ])

Reviews

Critics

Average score: 97% (based on 3 ratings)

Players

Average score: 3.8 out of 5 (based on 5 ratings with 1 reviews)

Why Wai Wai?

The Good
One look at my Famicom collection and you’d probably notice that about half of my imports are developed by Konami. Konami had a pretty decent selection of games for North America’s NES, but it was completely outclassed by the many great games that stayed in their native land. It’s because of these unlocalized games that it’s no surprise that the Konami Wai Wai World games didn’t make it across the ocean either. Considering it feature characters like Upa from Bio Miracle Bokutte Upa and Fuuma from Getsu Fuuma Den, a lot of the game’s tributes would be completely lost on a western audience. It’s honestly difficult for me to decide which is the greater shame; the fact that the above mentioned games where never localized, or that Wai Wai World 2 wasn’t.

Konami Wai Wai World 2 is a completely different beast from its predecessor. While the first was an incredibly clumsy but faithful tribute to the characters it contained, Wai Wai World 2 is a much more slick game. The exploration has been ripped out, and left in its place are simplified stages and a lot more gameplay variety. With much of its puzzle solving torn out, so too is its backtracking, which is a welcome treat. Even more of a relief is the removal of health bars for each individual character, which prevents the infernal grinding for health that plagued the first. It’s a much leaner experience because of this, which really helps it shine.

The game also has a much more light-hearted tone than the first. Though Wai Wai World was hardly straight-faced, a number of its enemies and environments were a bit on the gritty side to reflect the games they were based on. Here, everything is presented with fabulous exaggeration reminiscent of Parodius or perhaps Boku Dracula-Kun, which was released a few months prior. Even the Yomi stage from Getsu Fuuma Den is presented in a cute but faithful recreation. The result is that Wai Wai World 2 has its own personality, even despite the fact that it’s cobbled together from tributes to other games.

Another major difference between the two games is the selection of characters. Wai Wai World 2 has five available characters (not counting the main character): Fuuma, Goemon from the Ganbare Goemon series, Upa, Simon Belmont from Castlevania, and Bill from Contra. Missing is Mikey from Goonies, King Kong, and the Moai head, who were all featured in the first game.

This time around, the Konami stars are temporary power-ups, rather than freely selectable characters. When playing as a guest character, you’re placed on a time limit, but are invincible during that period. Each character has its strengths and weaknesses, and in certain situations they have abilities that get them through places where other characters can’t. For example, Upa can eat the cake on his level and open the chests, whereas other characters can’t.

There’s a lot of variety on display this time around. On top of the simple side-scrolling stages, there’s horizontal, vertical, and third-person shoot-‘em-up sections and even a simple puzzle game. Even the platformer levels have a good amount of variation, featuring stages that scroll to the right or left, as well as a water stage. Best of all, the game prominently features a two-player coop mode, and it’s obvious it was built with it in mind. The game is a lot of fun to play with a friend and allows for dream team-ups. There’s nothing like having a good old fashioned geek out with a like-minded Konami fan.

The graphics are certainly pleasant, as they are with most games released around the time of the Super Famicom. Everything is really bright and colourful, and most of the games and levels represented look better than they originally did. The art style is what really ties it together. The sprites for the characters in the original Wai Wai World looked almost as though they had been ripped directly from the games they had originally appeared in. Here however, they’re all given a stylistic overhaul and are done in a big-headed, chibi style. The results are nothing short of adorable, and seeing Bill Rizer and Simon Belmont in their chubby and big-eyed form is a real treat.

The Bad
One of the problems that arise from the game’s genre hopping is a randomly fluctuating difficulty curve. The most obvious example is the Twinbee stage that occurs early on. It’s an almost exact replica of a real game of Twinbee, a vertical scrolling shoot-‘em-up. The player is given very little warning and is thrown in to fend for themselves. The stages are rather difficult, so if you lack the skills required for the genre, you’re basically up the creek; there’s no way to bypass it entirely. On the flipside, the Contra stage is a walk in the park, and then later there’s a stage mimicking Road Fighter, which is also pretty challenging. The difficulty isn’t completely unreasonable, but it’s easy to be frustrated by these sections if you’re only interested in seeing Simon Belmont crack the whip. The point is that if you’re going to die in this game, it will be these stages you die on, and it can lead to some irritation.

Level design is nothing to write home about. It’s not particularly offensive, but it feels like what results from the kitchen sink approach that this game followed. Levels may appear similar to the games they are pulled from on the outset, but more exploration shows that far less thought were put into them. Enemy placement is less meticulous, and game-specific level elements, such as the destructible blocks in the Getsu Fuuma Den stage and the turrets/item dispensers in the Contra stage, feel thrown in for the sake of it. The stages are also incredibly simplistic to the point where there’s very little challenge in navigating them. They’re functional and get the point across, but won’t impress anyone. The real disappointing part is that they don’t do that great a job of conveying the spirit of the games they’re ripped from.

The music, while not exactly terrible, is a rather large letdown. Considering that Konami’s Famicom games have some of the most recognizable music on the system, it’s a bit jarring to hear them remixed so poorly. I would suspect that the composer was trying to unify the soundtrack and put a light-hearted spin on the classic tunes, but the result deviates too far from the source material to be satisfying. Hearing the jungle theme from Contra carry off onto its own bizarre tangent is extremely disappointing. Like I said, it’s not terribly bad, but considering it’s trying to pay tribute to some of the best tunes on the Famicom, it falls short.

Another, much more petty complaint is the fact that you can’t fully customize your team to your liking. You’re forced to pick from predetermined sets of three. There are enough variations available that you can likely find one that suits your needs, but there’s an equal chance you’ll be frustrated by the inability to place Fuuma, Simon, and Goemon on the same team, or something to that effect. It would be much more satisfying to be able to build your own team, rather than be forced to play the presets.

The Bottom Line
Wai Wai World 2 stands as a great tribute to Konami’s fantastic Famicom library and a huge improvement over its predecessor. It may not always meet the high standards set by games it pays tribute to, such as Castlevania and Contra, but its simple yet light-hearted approach has loads of charm that makes up for it. It may be dragged down a bit by some too-difficult tributes to scrolling shooters, but when viewed as a whole, it’s a GOOD little game in its own right. Anyone with an appreciation for Konami’s Famicom library will definitely see a lot of value in this celebration of their accomplishments.

NES · by Adzuken (836) · 2015

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Contributors to this Entry

Game added by ryanbus84.

Wii U added by Michael Cassidy.

Game added March 4, 2012. Last modified September 8, 2023.