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Note: This review uses a single use of profanity for emphasis. Usually these reviews avoid profanity and crude language unless it's in-game (Hotline Miami 2: Wrong Number and Prison Architect come to mind), but this is an exception.

I've talked about WarioWare: Twisted! a few times and despite associating with 2005 and its video games I've enjoyed of that time it was actually played in 2006, having been a late Christmas gift (so it is 20 years old around the time I'm writing this). It was the first WarioWare game I've actually played, and I really enjoyed it. (Also as of this writing, I have WarioWare, Inc.: Mega Microgame$! written up and I have WarioWare Gold written up. Once again, a large part of it is about the irreplacable memories I can't ever be able to tell you about, even if YOU, the person reading this, knew who I was. If you have both WarioWare: Twisted! and WarioWare: Touched! inserted into a Nintendo DS you get to unlock an exclusive souvenir on WarioWare: Touched! that plays the Mona Pizza tune. (The first "real" level features Mona, who has traded in her jacket and motorcycle helmet of the first game for a cute "pizza delivery girl" outfit). Now I can't remember exactly what I thought I was hearing but here's a good approximation. The Mona Pizza feature from WarioWare: Touched! is the REAL version.

This here is Mona Pizza. Makers of a well-fed pizza. Fresh sauce and cheese galore, brought straight to your front door. (Go go go go go!) This here is Mona Pizza. (Buon giorno! Bueno! Belissimo!) Makers of a tasty treat-sa. Our pie's crispy crunch, leaves others in the dust. Grab a hot slice and take a big bite! It's so good that you'll start upright for more Mona Pizza. (All-American choice! My name is Joe!)

We's-a the Pizza Dinosaur. We gonna go to save the world. Put some stuff in a sausage pan. Program it so they gotta give in. Mona Pizza's got nothing on us. Because we got six thousand plus. Pizza Dinosaur, Pizza Dinosaur...

In comparing it to WarioWare: Twisted! it does a lot of things right by improving on making things right. The high scores for the games are adjusted to be more reasonable (I think there's one that does require 25+ score, but most are 20 at most) so getting high scores on all of them isn't as onerous, except "Wario de Mambo", the final boss of the game, because FUCK that game. I got my brother to help on my first run and it still confounds me from 100%ing the game.

I remembered that there used to be a website that documented some of the changes that it went through when it was localized. It wasn't easy as I had to go back to the Internet forum where I read about it; none of the modern wiki sources cite it, including TCRF. I did find it: You can check it out here through Archive.org and most of the pictures (but not the MP3s, sadly) are intact. It is sad that most of the website was wiped, however. Something like this is way better than Mario Wiki's version.

Notice that the website accidentally calls the brown thing in "Handy Man" a rat. It's actually a cicada shell.

The big problem with WarioWare: Twisted! is it's really only FOR a portable console, and of those, preferably something light like Game Boy Advance. One of my major issues with WarioWare Gold is just that the Nintendo 3DS is too heavy to properly replicate the games properly. I can't imagine how difficult it would be to play with something like a Steam Deck though some have tried. Some people have tried to play it with the Game Boy Player, which is generally a bad idea (the FAQ for Game Boy Player play mentions it says not to do on the box). It also doesn't want you to play when it's charging as that could damage the connector.

It's also very poorly documented—there's a mini-game, "Apple Assault" in the game, and there's no longplay of using TAS (or just someone very good) to go through it, see how far it goes. I know after you defeat the "King Apple" you get to fight green apples instead of red ones. What happens after the green apples? Do you fight yellow apples? I don't know, would be nice to know, but there might be only three levels before things just get faster.

It's a shame that WarioWare: Twisted! is a gimmick game locked to a console that was discontinued years ago, but luckily in the grand scheme of things, such games are rare.

Box art from VideoGameX with modifications. Yes, the cover was holographic..

FINAL RATING:   

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