Big news folks! I’ve got a new job! I’m making video games now! My boss is a big, fat, greedy man who has a zigzag moustache and his breath smells like garlic. And every time I ask when I’m getting paid, he always laughs like this: “WHA HA HA HA HAAAA!” Anyway, in this blog I thought I’d tell you about the people I work with at my new job, the history of the company, and a little bit about what I do there. (And for you more gullible types, yes this is just a very creative and silly blog about the newest game I’m really into right now: WarioWare D.I.Y. It’s a DS title that lets you create your own micro-games.).

WarioWare Co-Workers (characters)

Anyway, first of all I’d like to tell you about the people I work with. They’re a very interesting and wacky bunch, so every day is an adventure!

Wario

He’s my boss. Like I said, he’s fat and greedy and has a zigzag moustache. He smells of garlic and tries to change the subject when I ask about getting my first paycheck. Even so, he’s still a fairly likeable guy and I don’t know why. At least he’s way cooler than that other Italian plumber who gets all the attention. When Wario eats garlic, he turns into Wario Man, a super-hero who can do stuff like, uh, open broken, stuck bathroom doors and such.

Mona

She’s a cute young lady who seems to have a different part time job in every WarioWare game! Maybe that’s why she’s always in such a hurry all the time! Let’s see if I can name all the jobs she’s had: gelato store clerk, pizza deliverer for Mona Pizza, a rock star, cheerleader, roller coaster operator, and some others that I’m probably forgetting. In D.I.Y., her games feature her as an explorer of ancient tombs. And then she sells the treasures she finds on her own TV Home Shopping Channel. Her pink pith helmet and explorer’s outfit is cute, though. In some of the WarioWare instruction booklets, they hint that she may have a slight crush on Wario. Ewww! That’s so gross! I’m going to have to have a talk with that girl one of these days!

Jimmy T.

Aww, yeah! Jimmy T. is an afro-wearing, disco-loving dude. He has a close knit family and a doppelganger named Jimmy P. who have been features in past WarioWare games. In D.I.Y. his games are based on sports. And his intro has him in his own aerobics exercise video. But I REALLY did NOT want to see Jimmy T. in workout tights. Thanks a lot, Nintendo.

Dribble & Spitz

They’re a taxi driving cat & dog duo. Their passengers are usually not of this world, and Dribble and Spitz almost always forget to collect their fare! That’s why I ride to work with them every morning! In D.I.Y., their games are all about science fiction stuff, but they’re games aren’t on the DS. You can play their games on the WiiWare D.I.Y. Showcase, which lets you play your created games on the big screen instead of on your DS. They actually work at our sister company: Wario Man Software. Dribble and Spitz are also brother Jeff’s favorite WarioWare characters, by the way.

Ashley

She’s a spooky, creepy young girl who is basically a carbon copy of Wednesday from The Addams Family. She has a hapless little red devil sidekick named Red and he’s scared of everything! Even though she’s one of my best friend’s favorite characters, I try to avoid her around the office because I don’t want to be on the receiving end of one of her spells!

Orbulon

We have aliens working at the company, too! His pig-shaped spaceship takes up THREE parking spaces at work, and his games usually involve brain teasing puzzles. His head is shaped like a bowling pin.

Dr. Crygor

He’s a cyberkinetic mad scientist. He invents a lot of stuff found in the WarioWare games, like the karaoke robot Mike and the GameMatic that you use to make games in D.I.Y. But he’s had his share of duds like fusing himself with an apple and making a washing machine that first turned Wario into Wario Man.

Penny Crygor

She’s Dr. Crygor’s granddaughter, and may be a better inventor than he is! She’s a cute, bespectacled young lass, and while she only first appeared in the original Wii WarioWare game, she’s really kind of the star in D.I.Y. (don’t tell Wario I said that). She’s the one who teaches you, step by step, how to make mini-games on D.I.Y. The instructions are very well written, too. If Nintendo wanted to make another educational game, they need to hire the people who made Penny’s lessons so easy to understand!

Young Cricket & Master Mantis

I never really thought this martial arts student and teacher duo were very interesting WarioWare characters, but their job in D.I.Y. really fits them. They run an Assembly Dojo, where you can take little tests that prompt you with a game programming challenges for you to figure out. It’s a great way to learn some WarioWare game-making tricks.

Kat & Ana

I’m not sure how Wario gets past the child labor laws, but Kat & Ana (get the pun in their name) are a kindergarten ninja girl duo. They love nature and animals, and kind of remind me of the PowerPuff Girls. They were assist trophies in Super Smash Bros. Brawl, and one of my favorite characters. You can play their games on D.I.Y. Showcase.

9-Volt and 18-Volt

They’re two friends who are also big Nintendo fanboys. Aside from Mona and Kat & Ana, 9-Volt and 18-Volt are my favorite WarioWare characters for various reasons. One, Nintendo uses them to make fun of Nintendo fanboys, which is a pretty funny thing to do. Especially since I’m a Nintendo fanboy myself (hey, I can take a joke, too). Two, their games always feature classic Nintendo games and references, and in each WarioWare title, I’m always looking forward to what they’ll have next. And third, 9-Volt and 18-Volt remind me of my friend and me when we were little. I was kind of smallish like 9-Volt and my friend was big like 18-Volt, and we both loved playing NES games together. These two characters make me remember those fun, childhood days that I miss now. In D.I.Y., 9-Volt’s games are on the DS and 18-Volt’s are on WiiWare’s Showcase.

WarioWare games also have minor reoccurring characters, like the square Fronk creatures and the news dog, among others. In the comments section, let me know who YOUR favorite characters are. Mine are 9-Volt and 18-Volt, Mona, and Kat & Ana.

WarioWare Games

When you work for a new company, it’s a good idea to read up on their history, so here’s a short section on the past games in the WarioWare series.

WarioWare: Mega Microgame$

This is the game that started it all. I liked it so much; I named it my Best Game of the Year for 2003. That’s when it came out on the GBA. The idea of playing simple, 3 second-long Game & Watch style mini-games with the challenge being to figure out what to do in that short span of time was genius. Aside from Animal Crossing, I feel that WarioWare is one of Nintendo’s best newer properties.

WarioWare: Mega Party Game$

A lot of people didn’t like this GameCube ‘sequel’ because it was the exact same game as the GBA. BUT it had multiplayer support with fun new ways to play the old classic WarioWare games. I had a lot of fun playing it with friends and family back in the day. And considering it was pretty cheap, I don’t think it was a bad game at all.

WarioWare Twisted

From here on out, WarioWare games had some sort of control gimmick. Here it was a special motion control in the cartridge that let you move the games by twisting your GBA around like a dial. Was Nintendo using this to test the waters for their upcoming motion controlled Wii console?

WarioWare Touched

Even though Twisted was made first, Touched came out in the US before Twisted did. This was for the new-at-the-time DS and used the touch screen and microphone to play the mini-games.

WarioWare Smooth Moves

And of course, the Wii version used motion controls to play the mini-games.

WarioWare Snapped!

This launch DSiWare game used the DSi Camera to control the games. Similar to the EyeToy. Of course, it didn’t work quite that well, but hey, neither did the EyeToy. But you know, even though it was kind of small and had a few shortcomings, I didn’t think Snapped was that bad. Heck, it was only five bucks, and is the only DSi game that really uses the camera to its full potential so far. I liked the idea that you play the games while riding roller coasters at Wario’s new theme park. And then when you’re done, you get to see how silly you looked playing the games with pictures afterwards! Just like when you get your picture taken on a real roller coaster!

WarioWare D.I.Y.

And the most recent game in the series has no control gimmick. In fact, all the games are just touch screen tapping. But the gimmick here is being able to create your own micro-games! And while the last couple of WarioWare games were kind of weak, D.I.Y.’s gimmick puts it back in top form again!

Everybody’s Workin’ For The Wario

But you know what the best part of my new job is? It’s that YOU can work here, too! All you have to do is snag a copy of WarioWare D.I.Y. Still not convinced? Well how about a little overview and review to conclude this blog!

WarioWare D.I.Y. has a handful of regular micro-games like what you would see in the other titles. But don’t expect a full game out of them. They’re just there to give newcomers an idea about what to expect. And you can look under the hood of each game and see how they did it.

Before you can even make a game, you must complete the first of Penny’s lessons. But you’ll want to do them all because they’re very informative and easy to understand. Seriously, Nintendo did a great job with this part of the whole package! Nintendo also included some more modes to ease you into making full games. You can draw artwork to put in a handful of Wario’s unfinished games. And there’s also the Assembly Dojo, which quizzes you on how to perform certain actions in the ‘programming’ of the games. All these modes will help you get a better idea of how to make your own games, and the lessons and quizzes are fun, too!

The Game MakerMatic looks like an arcade machine and it’s where you go once you’re ready to create your own game. To draw the artwork and graphics, you’ll use a program that is very similar to Mario Paint, which was a mouse compatible SNES cartridge that was similar to the PC title Kid Pix, another popular PC paint program at the time. I LOVED Mario Paint back in the day, and even used it for school projects! You could almost consider WarioWare D.I.Y. to be a spiritual successor to Mario Paint.

To make the game work and move, you’ll use a simple program language where you piece together ‘if, then’ sentences to make things work. Such as “IF PictureA is tapped, THEN you win the game!” Since I’m not a very logical person, sometimes the Assembly section confuses me a little bit, but it’s still very easy and fun to use.

You can even make small quips of music to use in your game. It kind of reminds me of a simplified version of the KORG-DS title. I’ve played music since I was in second grade, but I have a little bit of trouble making music here because I’m used to seeing notes and rhythms on a staff. It’s just how I was taught. I kind of wish the music program were more like the one in Mario Paint, but I guess this way is more versatile if you know what you’re doing. Luckily, if you’re not musically inclined, there’s an option to have the game create music for you, or you can import music from another game!

You can also compose records and comics using expanded versions of the drawing and music making sections of the Game Maker. The comics are like those four-panel manga strips, and the humor is very Japanese and hard to understand in the pre-made comics.

I would consider WarioWare D.I.Y. an educational game. It won’t teach you how to make games, but it will give you a good idea about the processes that go into making your favorite video games. Even though it’s rated E for Everyone, I’d give it an E-10 simply for the complexity. But at the same time, there’s something for everyone in this game, and it might encourage gamers to learn more about how their favorite pastimes are made.

Best of all, through Wi-Fi you can download new games every week. Some of these mini-games were made by famous game developers. I’ve downloaded a game made by a guy who worked on Metroid, the guy who created Kirby, a game made by Pixel, the dude who came up with Cave Story, and a game made by a member of the team who do the bit.Trip games. This week I downloaded a Shantae mini-game made by one of the folks at WayForward!

You can also enter game making contests, and the winners will get their games showcased for everyone to download…eventually. For the first contest, you had to make a game about robots, so I designed a simple little game starring R.O.B. from the NES. The next contest was about sports games, so I let Jeff make a game about curling that’s a LOT better than any of my games! It would be cool if one of our games won! Similar to 9-Volt, other games I’m making are based on classic Namco games. I’ve got a simple Mr. Driller and Pac-Man games up, and later I’d like to make mini-games based on Galaga, Rally-X, Super Pac-Man, Xevious, Dig Dug, and others!

Through friend codes, you can also share and edit each others’ games. I have a feeling that D.I.Y. is way more fun if you have a bunch of people playing and sharing creations. Only problem is I don’t know anyone who has this game! So one of the purposes of this blog is to share friend codes with each other so maybe we can start trading and viewing games!

Anyway, here’s my friend code: 4082 7946 9306

In the comments section, if you have WarioWare D.I.Y., please share your friend code so we can make this work! Also, please let me know what your favorite WarioWare games and characters are! –Cary

Tags: Game Reviews