 If you liked Wario Land 2, which I took a look at last month, you'll likely enjoy Wario Land 3 for Game Boy Color. The same basic layout is used here where Wario can't die, and you progress through each level by assuming forms that you obtained from being attacked by enemies, whether it's being lit on fire, gaining 200 pounds from eating donuts, or being smashed into a spring. There's lots of new reactions here too, like Vampire Wario, where he turns into a bat, and Electric Wario. As you can see, there's some fantastic sprite work here, especially with the reactions, and Wario Land 3 definitely looks, feels, and plays like a proper sequel. The sprites are a little more detailed, the levels are a little trickier, and there's definitely a lot more to the game, which I'll get into a little later. The story goes that Wario is flying around in his airplane when he crashes for some reason, and when he gets up, he's lured into a tree containing this weird music box, which shrinks him down and sucks him in. This giant face appears, and tells Wario that if he can help him, he can have any treasure he wants. Well of course Wario is down with that, so he has to traverse through five different worlds that can be played in any order, although the game kind of hints at the preferred order you want to go. Each world has at least six levels, and each level has four color-coded treasure chests you have to find. They'll either open up a new path, or grant Wario a new ability of some kind. Each new ability usually enables you to backtrack to a previous level, so you can get to another treasure you couldn't reach before, like a jump upgrade or a swimming upgrade. That's the main advantage Wario Land 3 has over its predecessors, is that it has an open-ended, non-linear quality to it, so you can explore and find all sorts of stuff at your own pace. It's also a nice touch that it shows the items being used on the world map itself. That's kind of cool for a Game Boy Color game. There's all sorts of other stuff going on here, too, like when you find a treasure, you're booted back out to the world map, where it's either night or day, and the levels and enemies change depending on that. Plus there's the same coin and mini-game system here as the previous game, but with a couple tweaks, like this mini-golfing game. For example, that you have to pass in order to progress with the game. Maybe this is just me, but this golf game constantly getting in the way is what I'd consider the game's only major flaw, and this is coming from someone who loves golf games. I guess I just got so caught up in tracking down all the different treasures that I got impatient with this game always popping up, so maybe that's a me problem. Anyway, yeah, Wario Land 3 is really impressive. It's a true sequel to the second game. It takes all the mechanics and ideas introduced there, and provides an environment for them to flourish. The level design here is top-notch. Making an open-ended game like this can be tricky, because it can be easy to abuse certain abilities, but the design here is clever to the point that that never really becomes an issue. Wario Land 3 is like a cross between a Kirby game, a Metroid game, a Mario game, and I don't even know what else. It really is something totally different. It's available on the 3DS Virtual Console for super cheap, and I highly recommend you check it out.