{"id":12879,"date":"2014-12-12T00:01:34","date_gmt":"2014-12-12T00:01:34","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.gamerdad.com\/blog\/?p=12879"},"modified":"2014-12-08T00:00:07","modified_gmt":"2014-12-08T00:00:07","slug":"toads-top-five","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.gamerdad.com\/blog\/2014\/12\/12\/toads-top-five\/","title":{"rendered":"Toad’s Top Five"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"toad\"<\/a>Toad is my favorite Mario game character.\u00a0 And he\u2019s probably one of my top five favorite Nintendo characters overall, alongside Kirby, Samus, Princess Zelda, and Captain Syrup.\u00a0 So in honor of that and the new release of Captain Toad:\u00a0 Treasure Tracker for Wii U, here is a top five list of my favorite Toad moments in gaming.<\/p>\n

In a way, I\u2019m a lot like Toad.\u00a0 I\u2019m not very big or fearsome, but I\u2019m stronger than what I look.\u00a0 I don\u2019t really have any special or unique skills.\u00a0 And just like Toad, while some people may find me adorable and friendly, others find me annoying, believe it or not.\u00a0 Plus, if I were in a video game, I\u2019d be just as happy being behind the scenes, giving out power-ups to whatever heroes may pass.\u00a0 So that\u2019s one of the main reasons why Toad is one of my favorites. Anyway, let\u2019s look at my best Toad moments in games.<\/p>\n

5. Super Mario Kart<\/strong><\/p>\n

Super Mario Kart on the SNES is one of my top five favorite games of all time, and Toad was one of the playable racers.\u00a0 While this wasn\u2019t Toad\u2019s first playable role in a game, it was significant for me for many reasons.\u00a0 He ended up being my favorite racer to play as in this game, and the more I thought about it, the more I realized that Toad was really my favorite Mario character.\u00a0 Yup, it was Super Mario Kart that made me realize that.\u00a0 You see, before Super Mario Kart came along, my favorite Mario character was probably Luigi.\u00a0 But after this game, I realized that I liked Toad a little more.\u00a0 Toad was certainly cool in the cartoon and in the other games I played with him in it. So now in every Mario Kart game, I always play as Toad.\u00a0 The only time I ever picked another character was with the Mario Kart Arcade GP games, because those let you play as Pac-Man! (Namco made them so that\u2019s why)<\/p>\n

4. Super Mario 3-D World<\/strong><\/p>\n

In last year\u2019s Wii U Mario title, you could choose to play as Mario, Luigi, Peach, or Toad.\u00a0 Each had their own special skills, so it was kind of paying homage to Mario 2 on the NES.\u00a0 Toad was the worst jumper, but he ran the fastest, which was more useful than you might think.\u00a0 While it was a four-player simultaneous game, I mostly played it by myself, and I beat every one of the main levels first as Toad.\u00a0 It was a bit challenging on some of them, but I did it!\u00a0 Mario 3-D World is also significant for Toad because it first introduced the puzzle Captain Toad levels.\u00a0 I loved this part of the game and I even wrote a Miiverse post that they should make a whole game out of these levels.\u00a0 Did Nintendo really take my advice?\u00a0 I thought that if Super Mario 3-D World ever had any DLC, it would be extra Captain Toad levels.\u00a0 But I\u2019m glad they made a whole game out of it instead.<\/p>\n

3. Super Mario Bros. 2<\/strong><\/p>\n

I know a lot of people say this isn\u2019t a TRUE Mario game, but Miyamoto made the game this is based off of: Doki Doki Panic, and he did say he used a lot of ideas that he would\u2019ve liked to have used in a Mario game.\u00a0 So maybe it\u2019s more related to Mario than we think.\u00a0 At any rate, I\u2019m glad that we got this game instead of the REAL Super Mario Bros. 2.\u00a0 I think that if we got the real one, most American kids would\u2019ve sworn off gaming for good, as it was ridiculously hard.\u00a0 I know it\u2019s a bold statement, but I actually like Mario 2 more than Mario 3.\u00a0 Don\u2019t get me wrong, Mario 3 was fantastic, but I just liked Mario 2 a little more.\u00a0 When I was a kid and didn\u2019t realize that Toad was my favorite Mario character yet, I wasn\u2019t quite as good at 2-D platformers so I usually picked Luigi or Peach for their jumping prowess.\u00a0 But later on, as I began to appreciate Toad more, I usually picked him instead.\u00a0 Sure he didn\u2019t jump as well, but he sure was fast in picking up enemies and veggies and running with them.\u00a0 Even though you saw Toad in every castle in the first Super Mario Bros. game, it was really Mario 2 that put Toad on the map.<\/p>\n

2. Wario\u2019s Woods<\/strong><\/p>\n

Everyone on the Internet is all like, \u201cOh, Captain Toad is Toad\u2019s very first game with him in a starring role!\u201d\u00a0 But it\u2019s actually not!\u00a0 Back on the NES and SNES, Nintendo made a puzzle game called Wario\u2019s Woods.\u00a0 Sure, Toad wasn\u2019t in the title, but he\u2019s who you played as.\u00a0 Toad was made famous for picking up and throwing veggies the best in Mario 2, so maybe that\u2019s why they used him here.\u00a0 In the puzzle game, you must match colored bombs to same colored veggies and monsters to make them disappear, and you moved them around by carrying and throwing them!\u00a0 I had the SNES version (the NES one is significant for being the last Nintendo published NES game, though).\u00a0 It\u2019s a really fun puzzler but it has a steep learning curve because of the controls.\u00a0 You could pick up and throw bombs and monsters, but could also run up the sides of them, pick up and toss whole stacks or just individual pieces, and even kick ones next to you.\u00a0 But once you got the hang of things, it was really fun.\u00a0 Nintendo did make a touch screen version of Wario\u2019s Woods that you could play on the 3DS Brain Age game, but they took out Toad and Wario.\u00a0 Anyway, when I was in college, my roommate and his girlfriend played two-player Wario\u2019s Woods a lot and even got in fights over it, so it was pretty entertaining.\u00a0 But don\u2019t worry; they\u2019re both happily married now!\u00a0 I wish I could see them more than what I used to, though.<\/p>\n

\u00a01. Captain Toad: Treasure Tracker<\/strong><\/p>\n

So even though this isn\u2019t Toad\u2019s first game, it is significant to have him as the title character.\u00a0 If you\u2019ve played the Captain Toad levels in Super Mario 3-D World, you know what to expect here.\u00a0 I love how they even have little patches of grass for you to pluck up and carry and toss turnips from them!\u00a0 Really the best way to describe Captain Toad: Treasure Tracker is that it is a \u201cCary\u201d kind of game.\u00a0 So if you want to see a good example of the kinds of games I like, and want to see how the inner workings of my mind work, just play this game!\u00a0 It\u2019s a really fun action puzzler that makes good use of the Wii U\u2019s unique capabilities.<\/p>\n

I guess before I stop, I should say a couple of things about Toadette, too.\u00a0 I never really liked this character because it just seemed like they made her as a counterpart for sports and kart games, kind of like Waluigi or Daisy. Plus she looks like a Strawberry Shortcake reject character. \u00a0But she does have a couple of significant roles, too.\u00a0 You can play as her in certain parts of Captain Toad.\u00a0 It kind of reminds me of Adventures of Lolo 3 on the NES.\u00a0 In that one, you could either play as Lolo or Lala, but about two thirds of the way through the game, one of them would get captured and you had to play the rest of the game as the other one.\u00a0 But my favorite Toadette role was in Paper Mario: The Thousand Year Door on GameCube.\u00a0 In that game, Toadette will come out at various points of the game to teach you a special skill you just obtained.\u00a0 What\u2019s funny is that once you learn all the skills, Toadette will come out to tell you about the last skill. Then she says, \u201cWell, you\u2019ve learned all your skills *sniff*.\u00a0 I guess this means I\u2019ll never see you again!\u201d Then she runs off crying!\u00a0 Aw!\u00a0 How sad!\u00a0 The GameCube Paper Mario game really was brilliant.<\/p>\n

Conclusions<\/strong><\/p>\n

And that\u2019s all for now!\u00a0 In the comments section, let me know what you think of my list, and tell me your favorite Toad moments.\u00a0 Do you even like Toad?\u00a0 Tell me your favorite Mario characters and other Nintendo stars, too!\u00a0 Later!\u00a0 –Cary<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Toad is my favorite Mario game character.\u00a0 And he\u2019s probably one of my top five favorite Nintendo characters overall, alongside Kirby, Samus, Princess Zelda, and Captain Syrup.\u00a0 So in honor of that and the new release of Captain Toad:\u00a0 Treasure Tracker for Wii U, here is a top five list of my favorite Toad moments […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":12878,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-12879","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-miscellaneous"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.gamerdad.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12879","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.gamerdad.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.gamerdad.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.gamerdad.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.gamerdad.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12879"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"http:\/\/www.gamerdad.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12879\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":12882,"href":"http:\/\/www.gamerdad.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12879\/revisions\/12882"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.gamerdad.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/12878"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.gamerdad.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12879"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.gamerdad.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12879"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.gamerdad.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12879"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}