Thanks to Clear River Games for the review code
Title: Snow Bros Wonderland
System: Steam (PC)
Price: $29.99
Release Date: 11/28/2024
Story
In this sequel to the classic Snow Bros series, you take control of one of (four) of their descendants, embarking on a six-world journey to rescue the princess and restore each of the lands they come across from the wrath of various familiar demons!
The two Arcade games didn’t really have, nor were known for a plot outside of the little bit from some home console versions of the first game, so Wonderland tries to expand on it a bit by adding a few cutscenes along with plentiful voice acting during and between the stages. Most of it turns out to be pretty safe and harmless stuff, with some peculiar voices for the main duo that might take a while for you to get used to, (while the Japanese VA ended up being very grating, in my opinion) but there are some nice nods to the original Snow Bros thrown into this story, even though the full plot won’t end up being anything that’ll shock you by any means.
Presentation
Taking the 2D, stage by stage elimination platforming concept to 3D, Snow Bros Wonderland ends up with a pretty nice artstyle, translating a bunch of the classic enemies to 3D models in a rather faithful manner. Now rather than just being flat screens with some platforms on them, your goal per stage takes place across different segments of the stage’s map, with a lot more visual variety here than in the 2D games. Sometimes the camera uses a special angle, and there’s just a lot more variety between worlds compared to the themeless stages from the first Snow Bros.
Also added in were those cutscenes I noted earlier, detailing the plot via illustrations. These are OK, and come with decent voice acting, but nothing really remarkable. Still, they bridge the worlds fine enough, and the main duo look a lot more appealing in these cutscenes compared to the actual game, where their detailed eyes make them look just a little uncanny. Probably the one design from the original game that didn’t make a graceful transition to 3D, honestly.
The great news is despite the voice acting being hit or miss, the music is absolutely incredible, far more than I was expecting. Sure, the first world sticks to pretty safe remixes of the original Snow Bros theme, but World 2 onward just brings constant bangers to the mix, with World 2’s theme in particular really making that grassy landscape a lot more exciting to play around in. Toaplan had some excellent music back in the day, and I could feel a lot of that similar energy in Wonderland’s new compositions, making the OST here a worthy followup to that original score. I was just honestly happy that it didn’t play it safe with constant remixes!
Gameplay
In Snow Bros Wonderland, the main objective of each stage is to use the snowball throwing power to turn enemies into snowballs and kick them around to clear out the waves of enemies. But in 3D this time! Despite the easy to grasp controls, I was pretty impressed by how well the general mechanics transitioned into a 3D space. You still throw the snow, ball the enemies up, and kick them into other enemies to try and rack up combos and points, despite the scorechasing aspect of Arcades being a thing of the past. That doesn’t mean it isn’t fun to try and get those bonus items, since yes, they return here as well with their big point bonuses.
Throwing and jumping aren’t the only thing the new generation of Snow Bros have on offer, though. They can recharge their snow meter in a pinch, jump on top of a snow ball to reach higher areas, and learn techniques such as picking up and throwing the snowball far away, or drilling down from a mid-air jump. These extra mechanics lead to a lot more creative level design than the initial concept would make you believe, as later worlds end up adding a lot more platforming and puzzle solving elements to the mix, which are surprisingly fun! Hitting switches with a snowball or lifting up a snowball and taking it to a part of the stage hiding a secret gold present box really helps to make the game not nearly as monotonous as it would have been without adding to the formula.
One handy thing that helps encourage replaying the older stages for score comes in the form of Sushi Coins, which are given to you depending on how well you score in a level. You can switch between the three difficulties at any time, which also helps boost the odds of getting a lot of coins, and makes the game’s difficulty rather flexible, with clearing the highest difficulty’s challenges providing tons of coin for the sake of unlocking various cosmetics and bonus material.
Oddly enough, I did notice the translation was messed up when unlocking items with the coins, as it will prompt you to delete your save file anytime you wish to unlock something. Thankfully, buying a Fox Hat will not delete your save, and since the cosmetics still require progressing through the main story to fully unlock, you can nab a bunch of unlocks naturally without having to grind for money or even pay attention to that aspect at all.
Still, it does help to go out of your way to find those Golden Presents, as they provide various skills you can equip on the Snow Bros, from various enhancements to your general abilities to other handy aspects such as being able to move around if a snowball traps you within, or being able to see hidden items. Quite a few stages even have some alternate pathways mostly focused on solely getting a present, and these were usually consisted of fun side challenges I had a good enough time taking on.
Lastly are the boss fights. Pretty typical stuff here, with you turning the enemies into snowballs and throwing them back at these bosses, and they’re pretty fun, even if they do play rather safe and usually just focus on the current world’s gimmick. Still, they’re what I’d expect from a 3D Snow Bros, so might as well not fix what isn’t broken.
Conclusion
When it comes to being a sequel to a pair of fun Arcade games, Snow Bros Wonderland did the best job it possibly could in that regard, continuing on with the fun snowball mechanics and bringing them into 3D, while carrying over the four player Co-Op from Snow Bros 2. Stretching that across six worlds on the other hand manages to be tricky, and despite the fun factor to be had in Wonderland, it does manage to get tedious after a while if you play in long bursts, though not due to lack of creativity.
Each world has a fun theme to it and the gradual unlocking of new techniques does encourage returning to older stages to get those golden presents, and those who want to unlock absolutely everything will have a good enough time trying to best the high scores on their favorite stages and adding onto the many crazy ways to decorate the main duo. At the end of the day, Wonderland still manages to accomplish what it set out to do in the first place, and maintain a great transition of an Arcade concept into 3D, while adding in a few fun 3D Platforming elements to the mix as well!
Unfortunately, when even classic elimination platformers can get old after a while, that also applies to Wonderland a bit as well. The $30 MSRP can also be rather steep, though I found that the content here is still worth the price enough to keep you entertained if you really like Snow Bros or Co-op games in general.
I am at least glad Wonderland isn’t a bloated game; just one that might be a bit of a tough ask for newcomers to the Snow Bros series, or ones unfamiliar with similar Arcade-style action. Still, if you’ve always been curious what an Arcade game would be like in 3D without completely reinventing everything, Snow Bros Wonderland is a fun example of that possibility.
I give Snow Bros Wonderland a 7 out of 10.