Game review: Captain Toad Treasure Tracker

Spin offs: they are everywhere these days.

On TV, you have hugely popular shows like Breaking Bad spinning off into Better Call Saul, or award-winning shows like Battlestar Galactica spinning off into the woefully awful and instantly cancelled Caprica. In literature, A Song of Ice and Fire begot the the less popular though equally good Dunk and Egg short stories, while the Harry Potter series has spun off into multiple side books such as Quidditch Through the Ages and Fantastic Creatures and Where to Find Them. In Movies, Star Wars has had so many spin offs by this point it’s hard to keep track of them all.

Almost without exception* these spins offs are rarely anywhere near as popular or iconic as the media that spawned them.

And so, too, is this the case with video games.

Captain Toad Treasure Tracker is a spin off from the extremely popular and award winning Super Mario 3D World. It’s essentially an entire game made up of the small Captain Toad levels found within its parent game. Each of the games 70 worlds is a compact maze-like structure which has you using your brain to track down hidden gems and collect the power star at the end.

The levels in Captain Toad are very small and compact

Unlike uncle Mario, Captain Toad is unable to jump meaning he must rely on his puzzle solving wits to get through each level. This change, while sounding relatively minor on paper, has a huge impact on the way the game is structured and its levels designed. Gone are the time limits of the mainline Mario games. Gone are the hub worlds and sweeping 3D vistas. Instead the game focuses on very compact, localized challenges, each of which is over very quickly. It is not designed for long play sessions.

Even if this type of slow puzzle platforming isn’t your cup of tea, you can’t help but be impressed by the sheer quality of level design on display here. This is a very well put together game. The way you manipulate the height of platforms or transform the stage in order to move around reminds me of something out of a Zelda game, only played out on a smaller and more easily manipulated scale. This is definitely a good thing.

The pink blocks in this level can be moved around using the Game pad’s touch screen. This adds an extra level of interactivity not usually associated with a Mario game

Not to mention it’s gorgeous. It’s like playing a Pixar movie.

Of particular joy for me is the complete freedom you have over the in-game camera. Gone are the forced camera angles or over-the-shoulder perspectives of other 3D platformers. In this game, the camera points exactly where you want it, whenever you want it, which is a huge help in tracking down some of the trickier gem stones. However, one thing to note is that for some inexplicable reason Nintendo decided to map the camera controls to the game pad’s internal gyroscope, a feature which sadly can’t be deactivated. This can lead to unfortunate moments mid-game where you suddenly die simply because you shifted your grip on the controller slightly and the game interpreted this as you wanting to move the camera.

To say it’s frustrating when this happens is an understatement.

Some of the levels are extremely creative: like this one based on the inside of a pinball machine

The levels are a bit on the short side, however there is a strong incentive to replay them. Not only are there three hidden gems located inside each level, but there is also an extra bonus challenge which only becomes visible once you’ve play through a level once (although it can still be completed prior to this point). For added challenge, the game is compatible with the Toad Amiibo from the Mario Party line. Tapping the Toad Amiibo to the game pad unlocks a special mode which tasks you with tracking down an 8-bit Toad hidden within each level. For those who enjoy replaying their games, this one certainly gives you a reason to come back for more.

Some of my favourite levels are the ones where you need to toss turnips at enemies from the back of an out of control mine kart

Just like in any good Mario spin off, Captain Toad Treasure Tracker is packed full of items and power ups to help you in your quest. Returning from 3D World is the double cherry, which allows Toad to split off into multiple copies of himself. Also returning from Super Mario Bros. 2 are turnips, which can be plucked from the ground and thrown at enemies to kill them. There are also pick axes, complete with Donkey Kong arcade sound effects, which allow you to smash through blocks standing in your way to access other parts of the level. It’s a lot of fun.

Captain Toad for Smash!

On the other side of the coin, however, is the elephant in the room. The game is very short. Don’t let the glowing praise above fool you: this is a budget title and a spin off and it plays exactly like one would expect from both of these. A dedicated gamer could complete this game in less than 10 hours. There are only two bosses in the whole game and most of the post-game content, although plentiful, is made up of remixed versions of levels found within the main game. Couple this with the rehashed music and assets liberally stolen from Super Mario 3D World and you can see why the game was so stealthily launched by Nintendo over Christmas without any sort of fanfare and one of the softest launch dates I’ve ever seen for a mainline retail release.

Overall – C

It’s no secret by now that the Wii U is a struggling console. Nintendo lacks the third party support needed for regular game releases and this has lead to  droughts in the console’s software lineup over the last 2 years. Nintendo has clearly found it hard to make up for that software shortage on its own and so games like Captain Toad Treasure Tracker are developed: cheap and easy to produce budget titles that artificially plump out the release schedule during the vital Christmas months.

It’s not that the game feels rushed exactly (this is Nintendo we are talking about, after all, and there’s a reason they are so renowned in the industry for the polish they put into their games) but it does feel uninspired.

Like I said at the beginning of this review, this game is a spin off and it feels like one. Playing this game for longer than a few minutes just makes me wish I were playing Super Mario 3D World instead. After all, that game is clearly the superior one. And hey, it has Captain Toad levels included in it for free!

If you haven’t bought Super Mario 3D World yet, go get it now. Afterwards, if you are still hungry for more, then – and only then – consider giving Captain Toad a whirl. He might be “Ready for adventure!” but ready for Nintendo AAA treatment he is not.

* That exception being the hit comedy Frazier which was a far better written and more impactful series than its parent show Cheers ever was.