A whole generation of ’90s kids grew up with fond memories of stretching and tugging on a 3D rendering of Mario’s face as part of the opening animation of Super Mario 64. Now, Nintendo’s inviting kids of all ages to revisit their youth — and to share the fun with their own children. On April 9, as part of the rollout of additional products in the company’s My Mario toy series, Nintendo revealed Hello, Yoshi, a free download for Nintendo Switch and mobile devices.
Hello, Yoshi is a simple touchscreen game where you can pull and stretch Yoshi’s face, spin him around, and bounce him across the screen as he yelps and squeals happily. To start things off, you’ll want to tap the egg that appears onscreen until it cracks, and Yoshi pops out with a cheerful smile and wave. Poke and prod the dino enough times, and bubbles will appear on the screen, waiting for you to launch Yoshi in their direction in order to pop them. Some of these bubbles will contain familiar Mario enemies, like Bob-ombs and Goombas. Don’t worry though, none of the baddies can do you any harm here. The bubble-popping game will end if the screen is idle for a while, or if you manage to pop a total of 100 bubbles.
Tapping the ? block in the top-left corner will open up a small array of options. The Super Mushroom will make Yoshi bigger, and the Super Star will make him invincible for a brief time, making your bubble-popping tasks even speedier. If you’re looking to mix things up, click on the warp pipe to get a new Yoshi in a random color, or select the Blooper to change the background to an underwater environment — accompanied by that classic, soothing Super Mario underwater theme.
But all that face-pulling takes a toll, and after a few minutes, Yoshi will fall asleep. According to Nintendo, this is an intentional way to keep kids from being glued to a device for too long: “This is a great opportunity to take a break and help parents limit their child’s screen time. If you want to keep the fun going, you can turn off this feature by tapping the gear icon in the top-right corner of the screen when the application starts.”
Unlike a lot of similar apps Hello, Yoshi doesn’t require an internet connection, which makes it great for keeping kiddos entertained on the go — or for killing some time while you’re stuck between subway stations.
For Super Mario fans looking for a more traditional Yoshi game fix, a full-fledged Yoshi game is coming to Switch 2 in May: Yoshi and the Mysterious Book.
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