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TMK Stuff => Game Blog => Topic started by: David on October 23, 2012, 07:11:50 PM

Title: Emily Rogers - "Why Yoshi's Island Should be Studied at Game Design Schools"
Post by: David on October 23, 2012, 07:11:50 PM

Emily Rogers of NotEnoughShaders.com (http://www.notenoughshaders.com) recently wrote an excellent article all about Yoshi's Island (http://themushroomkingdom.net/games/smw2).  The article (http://www.notenoughshaders.com/2012/10/21/why-yoshis-island-should-be-studied-at-game-design-schools/) discusses the game's development, its unique style, the critical reception (past and present), and uses these to argue that the game should be "required reading" for all new game designers.

Overall, it is an excellent article and reading it made me think of Yoshi's Island (http://themushroomkingdom.net/games/smw2) in a slightly different way.

Go take a look, everyone!

Link:  Emily Rogers - "Why “Yoshi’s Island” should be studied at game design schools" (http://www.notenoughshaders.com/2012/10/21/why-yoshis-island-should-be-studied-at-game-design-schools/)

Title: Re: Emily Rogers - "Why Yoshi's Island Should be Studied at Game Design Schools"
Post by: Luigison on October 23, 2012, 07:39:02 PM

Awesome article.  I didn't even know the name Takashi Tezuka before this article.  I now know he worked on many of my favorite games. 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Takashi_Tezuka

Thanks!

Title: Re: Emily Rogers - "Why Yoshi's Island Should be Studied at Game Design Schools"
Post by: The Chef on October 23, 2012, 09:31:19 PM

Personally, I think it should be required playing for everybody in the world.

Title: Re: Emily Rogers - "Why Yoshi's Island Should be Studied at Game Design Schools"
Post by: Glowsquid on November 05, 2012, 06:25:24 AM

Yoshi's Island is one of my absolute favourite game of all time and I usually dig NES' stuff (well, their interview moreso than their original content) but I can't say I share the enthusiasm shown by the first two poster for that article. The introduction is too long and rambling, essentialy reading like "Yoshi's Island is a great and revolutionary game. It should be played by everyone. It is a great game. It is revolutionary. It should be played by everyone. Did I mention it is great?". The part about game mechanics essentially says "uh, you can throw eggs and flutter your jump and that adds depth 'n.' stuff" (the part about how "Yoshi’s tongue is another example of a game mechanic that has more than one use" is a legetimately good bit of analysis, but it's not really explored in any depth). The level design section is short and uninformative, talking more about how it inspires ~a feeling of adventure~ than the actual construction and thought put into it, which is only briefly adressed by throwing buzzwords and two gifs showing funny gimmicks... etc. The entire thing reads like one of TV Trope's gush page (lol) with some pretense of analysis thrown in.

Quote

Personally, I think it should be required playing for everybody in the world.

Amen.