Sep 20, 2002  Title: Yoshi's Island: Super Mario Advance 3 (Video Game 2002) 8.1 /10. Want to share IMDb's rating on your own site? Use the HTML below. In my opinion. The performance and screen crunch, though, is where this game starts to falter a bit. This is not to say this game doesn't run well, as it really does, but I've noticed that the game can. Weird title screen glitches on Yoshi’s Island (SNES). Thoroughly cleaned the contacts. Any suggestions for a fix? Title screen. The English title suffers from squished-text syndrome, but it's no problem for Yoshi's trademark 'egg-for-an-O'. Japanese version U.S. Version; File Menu screen. Probably due to limited space, the U.S. Version names the files 'File #' instead of keeping 'Yoshi #' from the Japanese version. Welcome To Yoshi's Island: 1-1.

1. Yoshi's Island Download
2. Yoshi's Island Game
3. Island Title Maui
4. Yoshi's Island Rom Download

Yoshi's Island DS is the direct sequel to Yoshi's Island. While the first game just had Baby Mario, this one features four other baby characters Yoshi can bring with him to enhance his abilities. Despite the cutesy appearance and mishmash of old and new artstyles, the game is still as unforgiving in difficulty as its big brother.

• 2Unused Levels
• 6Revisional Differences

Level Select

If the game tries to load a nonexistant .mpdz file, it will instead load an unused title screen, which also functions as a level select. ...Unfortunately, you aren't able to see your button inputs, so you'll have to count. The order goes 1-1, 1-2, 1-3, etc. until 1-E, at which point it goes to 2-1. Repeat until 5-E, at which point the last 'level' on the list is the enemy museum.

Controls:

• A/B/Start: Enter the level specified.
• Right/Left: Cycle through the level to go to.
• Up/Down: Press down to instead cycle (with Right/Left) through the subareas of the level you have selected; press up to go back to choosing a level.
• Select: Cycle through the music that will be playing in the level.
• R/L: Cycle through the baby you will have in the level.
• X/Y: Unused...?

You can use the following action replay code to replace the prologue level with the level select:

Unused Levels

Levels are crsb/cscn files, which call upon the map data files (mpdz) and define things such as entrances/exits, the amount of areas in the level, and starting positions.

13w1009.mpdz and 14k5146.mpdz

These are the only two mpdz files in the game's data that are never called upon in any crsb file. Fittingly, they crash the game when attempting to be loaded. In the case of 14k5146.mpdz, it's revealed when opening the file up in a hex editor that it's barebones and contains no level data defined.

Interestingly enough, both of these levels exist in the USA Kiosk Demo, and can actually be loaded, revealing what they were.

• 13w1009 was a work-in-progress version of an Enemy Museum room.
• 14k5146 was a work-in-progress version of Gilbert the Gooey.

Unused Graphics

An early Press Start graphic, meant to be used for the unused title screen shown above.

Graphics for character coins of Baby Wario and Baby Bowser. In the final game, only character coins for the first three babies appear in regular gameplay.

These two egg-looking objects are present in the graphics for the first adult Bowser fight. For whatever reason, they lack a palette; the one used here is from another file.

Bowser was perhaps once meant to retreat inside of his shell; present in the graphics for the first adult Bowser fight. (As a side-note, did you know that the sprites for adult Bowser are actually rotoscoped from Yoshi Topsy-Turvy, which Artoon also developed?)

An unused tileset meant for test rooms. Several test rooms present in the USA Kiosk Demo use it.

An early graphic for the Adventure Mode button on the main menu. Yoshi was touched up, as was Baby Mario.

An early graphic for the Time Trial Mode button on the main menu. Unlike the Adventure Mode graphic, this one is entirely different; it seems that the Time Trial mode was once planned to be something else. It reads 'Mario Clear Mode'.

Flashing Eggs

While the flashing eggs from the previous game make a cameo appearance in Secret 5, they can not be obtained or thrown.

However, by hacking them into Yoshi's inventory, one finds that they're fully functional and still retain their original use: they will create a red coin when thrown at an enemy.

Gather six eggs, and use the following action replay code to change all of them into flashing eggs.

Build Date

Present in stamp.rc are build dates, in YYMMDD format.

Revisional Differences

Levels

1-1 had a shrub moved in order to add an arrow on a pipe.

Levels with rain were modified, possibly to make it more visible for the player.

Level 2-4 had a gauntlet room altered - some vases and chairs were removed. In spite of it making the area easier, this might have been done to avoid lag issues. Also noticable in the comparison are differences between the vase's palette - the chairs also have a small difference in their palette.

Level 3-4 received a significant update. At one point, Yoshi must push a vase off a ledge to receive a key. In the Japanese and Korean versions, it was placed on a small pillar; because of this, the coins were moved.

A healthy amount of graphical glitches were fixed between the versions.

Music

The final boss music in the first-released USA/EUR is incredibly short, and seems to be missing a second half. The later-released Japanese and Korean versions fixed this, adding the rest of the song, along with modifying the french horns to be higher pitched.

The Japanese and Korean versions have an extra fanfare in the .sdat folder titled 'J22'. All other versions only go up to 'J21'.

Other

• The Japanese and Korean version display small descriptions of what option is highlighted in the main menu.
• The Japanese and Korean versions had the order the minigames are presented in the menu altered.
• Some transition effects were altered between versions.

Releases

The two versions compared on this page are the following:

Box art

The Japanese packaging uses a vertical design, which is pretty normal for a Japanese Super NES game. As for the artwork, the Japanese version has more of a laid-back feel, while the U.S. box features Yoshi and Baby Mario rushing towards a Nep-Enut.

The main thing we wanted to point out here are the words 'Yossy Island' on the green banner under the Japanese title logo. 'Yossy' is another way to romanize 'Yoshi' that Nintendo's Japanese team uses sometimes. We'll see 'Yossy' come up again in World Extra 6...

Images from the official Super NES Classic American and Japanese sites.

Title screen

The English title suffers from squished-text syndrome, but it's no problem for Yoshi's trademark 'egg-for-an-O'.

File Menu screen

Probably due to limited space, the U.S. version names the files 'File #' instead of keeping 'Yoshi #' from the Japanese version.

Map screen

Below, we'll take a closer look at the last four map screen panels. For reference, here are the full World 1 map screens:

The 'Special' levels in the Japanese game are called 'Extra' levels in the U.S. version. A star was added to the panels as well.

In the Japanese version, the bonus panel shows the name of the bonus game contained inside, which changes for each world. The U.S. version shows a flower icon and simply changes the number for each world. Even though the flower takes up most of the space, the background color was changed from blue to green.

Though the score panel was redesigned, it has a blue pencil in both versions.

On the control options panel, the button colors in the Japanese version match the colors on the Super Famicom (Japan's Super NES) controller. The buttons were changed to light and dark purple in the U.S.

Super Famicom

Button colors

Despite the updated controller icon on the map screen (see above), the button colors on the control options screen were not changed. The letters on the buttons were bolded, however.

The button graphics in the Throwing Balloons mini-game also use the Super Famicom's color scheme and were not changed in the U.S. version.

Yoshi's Island Download

World 4-6 icon

The icon for World 4-6 was changed slightly. In the U.S. version, Flopsy Fish's fins come out of the water a little more. Also, a few blue pixels behind his fins were rearranged.

Popping Balloons icon

The Popping Balloons mini-game icon was also changed. Yoshi's arms were moved closer to his sides and the balloon behind him was flattened a little in the U.S. version.

(Note: The mini-game icons appear when you use the mini-game menu code.)

Sound advice

The first two message blocks in World 1-1 have illustrated help for making and throwing eggs. In both drawings, the Japanese version has onomatopoeia next to Yoshi.

In the 'Making eggs' tutorial, pon (meaning 'pop' or 'plop') is inside a word balloon.

Bun (meaning 'buzz' or 'zoom') is next to Yoshi's head in the 'Throwing eggs' tutorial.

Yoshi's Island Game

Score screens

The U.S. version has bold text on the pause screen and end-of-level totals screen.

Even the sun icons on the totals screen were thickened up.

Lost a life

On the screen that asks if you want to retry the stage (or continue from the Middle Ring), the U.S. version has a slightly different Yoshi icon and a smaller arrow icon.

Zooming in on the Yoshi icons, we can see that the updated icon is a little smaller, but looks more like Yoshi.

Popping Balloons mini-game

Island Title Maui

The Popping Balloons mini-game pits Yoshi against Bandit in a race to pop the randomly-chosen winning balloon. A few things were changed in the U.S. version.

When a non-winning balloon is popped in the Japanese version, 'Suka' (meaning 'miss') in blue katakana characters comes spinning out of the balloon. In the U.S. version, nothing appears for a miss.

When the winning balloon is popped, the Japanese version shows the kanji character '当' (meaning 'success') surrounded by a flashing circle of gold stars. This was changed to a group of stars that rapidly rearranges itself from a star shape to a circle and back again.

Thunder Lakitu

Thunder Lakitu is based on Raijin, the Japanese god of thunder. Raijin creates thunder by beating on his ring of drums, and is often depicted standing on a cloud.

World Extra 6

Shortly after the first Middle Ring, you'll find five platforms on rails, each one shaped like a letter to spell out 'YOSHI.' These originally spelled 'YOSSY' in the Japanese version ('Yossy' is another way to romanize 'Yoshi').

In this room, four spike clumps were removed from the bottom right, and three were added to the ceiling above the 'H,' leaving the U.S. version with one less spike clump than the Japanese version. However, the spikes above the 'H' make this part a little more difficult, since you have to keep ducking to avoid them while riding on the platform.

Japanese version

U.S. version

Notes:

• Yoshi travels from right to left through this room.
• We removed the moon-and-stars pattern from the background for the sake of simplicity.
• The maps show the approximate starting positions of the moving platforms based on the level data from the ROM. (See notes about the 'Y' and 'O' below.)
• Japanese version: On the second 'Y,' the platform drops onto to the slanted rail from mid-air, then goes to the left. Our map shows where it first lands on the rail.
• U.S. version: On the 'H,' the platform starts on the upper-right, then travels to the bottom-left. After that, it will only travel along the bottom half of the 'H.'
• Both versions: The platform on the 'O' actually appears to start out a few pixels above the rail.

More Message Block changes

The Message Blocks in the U.S. version feature new and redesigned icons mixed in with the text.

World 1-6

Entering the first door in World 1-6 takes you to a cloudy area with three different types of eggs and a Message Block. The English text has an added star icon after the word 'Stars.' Also, it's worth noting that the Japanese text tells you that the Flashing Egg creates a Red Coin; the English text keeps it a secret, even though the instruction manual reveals what it does.

Another message in 1-6 talks about the red Switches. The small switch icon was changed slightly, and the down-arrow icon from the third line in the Japanese text was removed in the U.S. version.

World 2-2

This message is talking about a nearby Arrow Cloud, which is represented by an icon in the English text.

World 5-1

The Winged Cloud icon was changed slightly in the U.S. version.

Controller buttons

The message with the 'Top Secret' code in World 5-4 has icons for Select, X, Y, B, and A.

The U.S. version has a different D-Pad icon, as we can see in World 1-2's first Message Block. An icon for the Down button also appears here.

Here's another one from World 1-2. Even though a 'Select' button icon appears in World 5-4's message, 'Start' is still just text here. This message also includes icons for Left and Right.

A message near the end of World 2-2 includes an Up button icon. This one also has an added star icon like the message in World 1-6.

L and R button icons appear in this message from World 2-8.

Enemies

The following chart compares the Japanese and U.S. player's guides.

* = This enemy was not listed in the Enemy Index section of the U.S. player's guide.

The following enemies were not listed in the enemy section of the Japanese player's guide: Bouncing Bullet Bill, Bowling Goonie, Bubble Dayzee, Coin Bandit, Hopping Tap-Tap, Kamek's Toadies, Mock Up, Needlenose, Potted Spiked Fun Guy, Seedy Sally, Short Fuse, and Whirly Fly Guy.

Notes:

• Most of the bosses in the Japanese game have 'Big' added to the normal enemy name.
• 'Borodō,' Bandit's name, is a play on the word dorobō, which means 'thief.'
• Since 'Sanbo' is usually called 'Pokey' in English, the following enemies are technically Pokies: Blow Hard, Cactus Jack, and Spiked Fun Guy.
• Donburi (Burt) is also the name of a Japanese rice bowl dish.
• Wanwan (Chomp) is equivalent to 'bow-wow.'
• Yari, the Japanese word for 'spear,' is seen in the names of Yariho (Spear Guy) and Yariyari Dancer (Dancing Spear Guy).
• For the Flightless Goonies, the Japanese game uses 'Ahōmushi,' a portmanteau of albatross (ahōdori) and bug (mushi).
• Harry Hedgehog might have been named after the 'Hari' in 'Super Harimannen' (hari = 'needle'). In Super Mario Bros. 2, the 'Harimannen' enemy was 'Porcupo' in English.
• Dosun, part of Incoming Chomp's Japanese name, is onomatopoeia for a 'whomp' or 'thump' sound. On a related note, 'Dossun' is Thwomp's Japanese name.
• 'Pukupuku,' known as Flopsy Fish and Piscatory Pete in the U.S. version, is usually changed to 'Cheep Cheep' for English text.
• The chū in Little Mouser and Little Skull Mouser's Japanese names represents a squeak sound.
• Based on his Japanese name, Mace Penguin is actually a Spike, who was first seen in Super Mario Bros. 3.
• If stomping on Mildes reminds you of popping bubble wrap, there's a good reason: The Japanese name for Milde is 'Puchipuchi,' which means bubble wrap.
• Gerogero (Prince Froggy) is equivalent to 'ribbit ribbit.'
• Raven's Japanese name 'Kyū-chan' comes from kyūkanchō (hill myna), a species of myna bird. The Ravens' walking on spheres is a visual pun on kyū, which also means 'sphere' in Japanese.
• 'Kemekuji' (Sluggy) comes from the Japanese word for slug: Namekuji.
• Tap-Tap's Japanese name, 'Kachikachi,' also describes a ticking or knocking sound.

Friends

Items

The following names are from the game manuals except for Arrow Lift and Chomp Rock, which were sourced from in-game text.

Notes:

• 'Special Items' are used from the Pause screen.

Metamorphoses

Yoshi's Island Rom Download

The following names are from the game manuals.

Level names

Notes:

• Chikuwa is a tube-shaped fish paste cake. The 'Chikuwa floor' pieces are known as 'Donut Lifts' in English.

Chikuwa (photo from Japanese Oishii Food)