Wonder Boy Collection (PS4) Review

Supported with smooth emulation and quality of life features, the Wonder Boy Collection is now available on Switch and PS4 will easily please fans of the long running series.

Included in this retro compilation are four games:

Wonder Boy – a side-scrolling action platformer featuring a cave man who needs to eat fruit every few seconds.

Wonder Boy in Monster Land – a sequel that incorporates more RPG features and swaps caveman items for more medieval weaponry.

Wonder Boy in Monster World – a Genesis sequel that features enhanced gameplay and an early quasi-Metroidvania

Monster World IV – a Japan-only sequel that features a female as the main character so the phrase “Wonder Boy” was dropped.

All four of these games offer a few hours of retro fun despite their gameplay being pretty similar between most of them and depending on personal preference. It is just a bummer that dedicated fans will need to purchase the physical edition to gain access to Wonder Boy III: Monster Lair and Wonder Boy III: The Dragon’s Trap. So even though it is a Wonder Boy “Collection” it is not a complete “Collection.”

The titles that are available are well emulated and have features retro enthusiasts have come to expect. Save states and border options are available but the visual CRT and scanline options are robust.  Personally, I like to play old games with as crisp of a picture as possible but definitely appreciate the amount of detail that can be adjusted here (you can even tweak the curve of the screen).  The most player friendly feature has to be the rewind feature comfortably mapped to the trigger button. I take no shame in taking full advantage of this feature especially since there is a certain slipperiness in each game. Sometimes deaths are not fully the player’s fault which is easily and quickly mitigated with the press of a button.

Even with games that are absent this is still a quality compilation. Personally, I grew up an Adventure Island guy so being exposed to Wonder Boy is mostly a new experience for me. Despite their age, I still got a kick playing them today and undoubtedly appreciate the quality of life features implemented into the overall UI.

Good Luck Trying To Understand: the history of Wonder Boy, the confusing naming conventions, mixed with the Adventure Island series  

Also Play: New Adventure Island on the TG16

Wait For It: a port of Adventure Island: The Beginning (WiiWare)

By: Zachary Gasiorowski, Editor in Chief myGamer.com

Twitter: @ZackGaz

Please consider supporting me on Patreon.