The Yoshi series began as a spinoff from Super Mario franchise and became its own thing. Yoshi games usually feel like a sugar-coated storybook adventure to match the titular dinosaur’s cuteness. While most of the main Mario series had their foray into full 3D, Yoshi seems content with sticking to its 2D roots. There’s only so many ways Nintendo can refresh the 2D formula and with Yoshi and the Mysterious Book we’re getting a new twist from developer Good-Feel. Their previous two entries Yoshi’s Woolly World and Yoshi’s Crafted World had visuals and mechanics themed around yarn and cardboard. In their latest, we’re getting an encyclopedic adventure totally focused on discovery. Are encyclopedias fun? What’s a Bewilder Bird? Find out in our Yoshi and the Mysterious Book review!

Yoshi and the Mysterious Book
Developer: Good-Feel
Publisher: Nintendo
Platforms: Switch 2 (Reviewed)
Release Date: May 21, 2026
Price: $59.99

Yoshi and the Mysterious Book starts with Bowser Jr. reading the titular book, Mr. E (Mister Encyclopedia), who contains all the worlds and creatures within its pages. Bowser Jr. gets sucked up into its pages and the book ends up with the Yoshis, who are then tasked with uncovering its secrets. While there’s not much to spoil, what starts as cataloging strange things becomes an existential struggle for preserving creatures from extinction.

A lot of platformers end up feeling like a collect-athon but Yoshi and the Mysterious Book is more like filling in a Pokedex from Pokemon. Only here, the Pokedex is a portal to different worlds and you have to explore, experiment, and expose all its curious creatures. Each level is focused around a specific creature and its abilities, ranging from making flowers bloom, to spewing out bubbles, and even fishing! 

The collecting of weird species throughout the game is a delight, especially when you mix and match the abilities the creatures have. The game has a whimsical sense of discovery to see if Yoshi can use those abilities or if the critters can affect the environment. A lot of the creature abilities can also be mixed and experimented with to create new forms and alternate abilities.

What starts as gobbling everything visible progresses to seeing if a critter changes in a liquid, or if a certain plant affects Yoshi or the creatures. All of it feels natural and keeps encouraging you to keep testing things, and it’s a lot of fun. If you thought Nintendo ran out of ideas for monsters, I’ve gotta tell you they somehow invented even more fun creatures.

There are so many new creatures in the game and the all feel very unique – the boomerang slugs, the exploding tree nuts, the giant mawing plant that eats stuff, the surfboard that also doubles as a skateboard, the umbrella bird, and the rabbits with legs on top and bottom. I also found it hilarious that not only can you rename each creature, you can also rename old enemies like Shy Guys. Oh, there’s also musician Shy Guys, Jam Guys, that simply jam out and play music.

It’s really something that Nintendo adds mechanics to their games that are not only immediately fun but are also built around creatures and parts of levels. There may be times where I genuinely thought “ok where are they going with this” and then it became an alien eugenics cross-breeding program. There’s also surfing and fishing too – did I mention fishing?

This isn’t a big grand adventure like Donkey Kong Bananza and it’s not meant to be – you hop between hub worlds each with levels focused on a creature. Every level feels meticulously planned and festooned with secrets, puzzles, and objectives, and most come naturally.

I’d say 95% of the time the secrets and objectives were discovered by yours truly immediately, but there were a few optional ones that had me stumped for a second. There’s also no lives system or game over screen – this is more of a playful sandbox for all ages.

While I’ve played platformers my entire life since Kirby’s Adventure and enjoy a challenge, it’s okay that Yoshi and the Mysterious Book is a carefree slice of platforming goodness. It’s the breezy Sunday drive with no plans over a hellish morning commute to work. I think it’s wonderful that Yoshi and the Mysterious Book can bridge the gap between the youngest of gamers and genre vets like me.

Out of all the breezy and fun levels there is one level – the Behedger’s level – that makes your blood run cold. Yoshi starts shivering with fear after you’re dropped into what looks like a dungeon and – surprise! You get chased by a murderous beast with giant scythes for hands. Longtime platformer fans will be addicted to completing everything, too, and there’s plenty of side objectives that give more challenge.

The visuals in Yoshi and the Mysterious Book are endlessly charming and feel like a children’s book come to life – and that’s the point. The environments, creatures, and Yoshi all blend into a cel-shaded manuscript, and it looks brilliant. Even when Yoshi falls into a pit, you fly back to your last safe point and get scribbled back to life, like the actual page of a book.

It’s hard to tell if the actual character models from Yoshi to the critters are actually fully 3D because the painterly effect is so seamless. Yoshi and the Mysterious Book truly looks wonderful and really pops both docked on my TV and in handheld mode. Regardless of how much stuff was smashed or popped on screen, the game ran like a charm with a locked framerate.

The soundtrack in Yoshi and the Mysterious Book is a springy and boisterous cavalcade of what can only be described as Yoshi music. I don’t know how they do it every time but every Nintendo IP has its own themes, and most importantly a unique soundtrack as part of the mix. You’ll get treated to tropical delights, energetic marches, and dainty little melodies that all scream Yoshi. Music is so important for games and the soundtrack in Yoshi and the Mysterious Book really cements its eternal charm.

The game sprinkles cutscenes with Bowser Jr. throughout and sometimes you get into boss battles, and all of it is cute. The stakes may be higher for a mainline Mario game, here you’re basically cleaning up after Bowser Jr.’s mistakes. When you clear the main levels you get the initial ending – after that you get even more levels and find the game’s true ending.

As expected of such a sugary sweet game, Yoshi and the Mysterious Book concludes with a happy ending for all, despite the fact that Kamek has always been at odds with the Yoshis. There’s also a subtle, tragic backstory for Kamek that potentially retcons lore but at most – we can say in this game Kamek was trapped in the book for a long time. After completing the main story you also get the chance to buy “inventions” for your HUD with those flowers. These can display things like Yoshi’s vertical and horizonal position and more.

I had an absolute blast from start to finish with Yoshi and the Mysterious Book and while it may not be a mainline entry, it has a sizeable amount of content to please veterans and newcomers alike. All told you’ll get at least 8-12 hours just playing its main story and if you want to collect ’em all, you’re looking at double that for all its secrets and objectives.

If you’re pining for a big new Mario game and need something to hold you off until then, I wholeheartedly recommend Yoshi’s new adventure. With its signature whimsical style and endless experimenting, Yoshi and the Mysterious Book brings lots of fun for all ages and has a sizeable amount of content to bite – or slurp into.

Yoshi and the Mysterious Book was reviewed on Switch 2 using a code provided by Nintendo. Additional information about Niche Gamer’s review/ethics policy is here.