Old-School Review - Konami Wai Wai World

It’s always been to my amazement seeing gimmicks such as crossovers of any form. Recently, I’ve been seeing many crossover games. Of course it’s no longer surprising considering that Capcom has done almost every crossover they could come up with in their fighting games. But don’t you think it would be cool if they could do a crossover platformer, adventure, or RPG game? So far though, I haven’t seen any such thing happen… At least not yet on my end. The closest I’ve seen to that was the Metal Gear Solid/Monster Hunter crossover in Konami’s Metal Gear Solid: Peace Walker, or Square Enix’s Kingdom Hearts series. But from all the crossover games I saw so far, for me, nothing would still top my one and (I guess) my only favorite retro crossover game: Konami Wai Wai World.

Konami Wai Wai World (or as I usually call it, Konami World) is an old-school game by Konami where they feature various Konami characters banding together to save the world. The game starts with your two main characters: Konami Man (I used to refer him as Captain Konami…) and Konami Lady. They’re both summoned by Dr. Cinnamon (from the Twin Bee series) and sent to different worlds using some sort of teleportation machine operated by Pentarou (from Antarctic Adventure) to save other Konami characters, and then travel together to space using Vic Viper (from Gradius) and Twin Bee to stop aliens from conquering the world… or at least that’s how I understand the game story goes.

Wai Wai World is a part platformer, part shooter game, having six platform levels to get through, one shmup level and one final platform level. Players will most likely need to get through the six levels to get their comrades, items and sub-weapons. Each world has a different feel, replicating the six Konami games they feature in the crossover.

There are eight playable Konami characters in the game. Each comes from other Konami games. (Well, almost.) I’ll try to share a little info on each character to the best of my knowledge…

Goemon: From the game Ganbare Goemon. His character is that of a ninja. I’m not really familiar with this character or any of his games. All I know is that he’s one of those old-school Konami characters. Goemon’s basic attack strikes upwards, giving you an advantage when hitting enemies from below. He’s also the only character that can open treasure chests for items. I’m not sure why, but perhaps it has something to do with his character.

Simon Belmont: From the Castlevania series. He’s a vampire hunter equipped with the legendary whip, Vampire Killer. Well, everybody who knows Castlevania should know about this guy. No need for further explanation. >=) Simon’s major advantage is his basic attack that can reach enemies mid-screen, However, it’s slow so you can’t always rely on it, especially since most enemies move at a quick pace. His sub-weapon (Cross Boomerang) is great… like always. >=)

Getsu Fuma: From the game Getsu Fuma Den, which I was fortunate to be able to play back then. Fuma is a swordsman possessing the legendary wave swords, called Hadouken, which he uses to fight off demons. Though he really looks cool in his game, I don’t see anything special about him in WWW. Strangely, he can break walls with his sword. Also, according to other reviews, with Fuma, items drop more often from enemies. I’m not sure though since I’ve never paid attention to the drop rate.

Mikey: From the game The Goonies, which was adapted from an old film carrying the same title. Mikey is a kid, making him the smallest among the characters. Because of this, his basic attack is also short-ranged and weak, but he can easily avoid projectiles especially when he ducks. Just be careful because he takes more damage than the others… because he’s a kid. >=)

Moai: This big-headed stone character was based on the enemies from the Gradius series and didn’t have its own game until they released a game some time after WWW, called Moai-kun (also one of the rarest games I’ve played back then) that featured it in SD form. Moai in WWW is big and is the strongest among the characters. He can break rocks and has tougher defense than the others… because he’s a rock, I guess. XP

Kong: From the game King Kong 2: Ikari no Megaton Punch. This game was based on a King Kong film. Like Moai, Kong is big and also one of the strongest characters available. He can jump higher than others because… he’s King Kong. (Why else? XP) His sub-weapon is also much stronger than others, but has very short range and the direction of the attack is downward, so it’s only effective when hitting enemies below.

Konami Man/Konami Girl: They’re the main heroes you start with in the game. The two are pretty much basic with decent attacks and sub-weapons, but later in the game, once you acquire a certain special item, they would have the ability to fly around, which is pretty helpful especially when using sub-weapons. Don’t think you can breeze through the game with this ability though. Its not going to work that way… >=)

Each character has their own theme music and plays whenever you’re using them, like Simon Belmont’s all-time favorite Vampire Killer theme. They also have their own death sequences. If any one of your characters dies, you have to revive them with the help of Dr. Spice (Dr. Cinnamon’s brother. They’re pretty much alike except that Dr. Spice wears black =/), and pay 100 bullets per character (yeah, paying bullets to revive a person doesn’t make any sense also =/). If all of them die, KM and KL are only ones that will be revived.

Twin Bee, Vic Viper.. launching! >=D

Once you’ve gathered all the characters, you’ll able to ride either the Vic Viper or Twin Bee for the shmup stage. The two ships have their own distinctive characteristics in terms of power-ups, like VV has its usual laser and missiles while TB has its knuckle missiles and ring beam. But they also share some common power-ups like the barrier shield and options. (which we all know belongs to the VV, but here, TB can also receive it. Now that’s crossover!) >=) After the shmup stage, you’ll reach the final stage of the game. I guess I should leave that part for you to see for yourself. ;)

Konami's old-school powerhouse characters >=D

Konami Wai Wai World was a very good platformer/shmup game. I believe its one of the best games Konami made for the NES/FamiCom, though I wouldn’t be surprised if only a few people have had the experience of playing it. After all, it was only released in Japan. The difficulty of the game was okay, as it depended on the stages themselves. Personally, Kong, Fuma and Moai’s stage were the hardest. Navigating through the options would be something that might need some getting used to since it’s all in Japanese, but it shouldn’t take too long to figure it out. ;) If you’re a Konami fan of any sorts especially of their old-school games, then you have to try this. It would be much appreciated if you would also play the games that were featured here.

You know, for many years I actually had this wish. I wished Konami would get the idea of creating a new WWW game and feature today’s Konami games: Silent Hill, Metal Gear Solid, Suikoden, Castlevania… uhm… and Yu-Gi-Oh! Now THAT would be a great crossover, don’t you think? >=D Well, anyway, its just a wish. That’s about it for now.

Until then!

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