Yoshi and the Mysterious Book preview: Charming fun, but lacking something

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It’s been seven years since Yoshi’s last game, Crafted World, but the beloved green dinosaur is returning with a new adventure, Yoshi and the Mysterious Book.

I recently had a chance to try out the newest version of the game at Nintendo UK. I enjoyed the experience, but I left wanting a bit more from it.

Mysterious Book revolves around – as you might guess – a strange and enigmatic book. The character Mr. E acts as a walking encyclopedia, brimming with knowledge about all sorts of unusual and fascinating creatures.

Yoshi’s job is to go inside Mr. E’s book, meet the creatures living there, learn everything he can about them, and write down what he discovers on the book’s pages.

For instance, one of the first creatures you’ll encounter looks like a flower. You get to name all the creatures you find, but if you prefer, the game will assign a default name.

In Mr. E’s world, Yoshi has many playful interactions with a special creature. He can help flowers grow by bringing the creature near buds, playfully hit it with eggs, cover it in mud, or wash it clean with water.

Mr. E meticulously documents nearly every encounter with these beings—and there are many—with each stage of interaction leading to a significant revelation.

After playing the first 45 minutes or so, I wasn’t immediately hooked. The initial levels just didn’t grab my attention.

Thankfully, this felt like a helpful learning experience, and as I progressed, it became increasingly engaging – even puzzling – to uncover how everything connected.

Once we completed this part, the game jumped ahead, and that’s when the core idea of Mysterious Book truly began to shine.

It’s so cool how the more creatures I find, the more they pop up throughout the book! I noticed the flower creatures I discovered earlier, and all the others from the beginning, were showing up again on different pages. It really feels like a living world!

Now, though, you can use these tools to communicate with the creatures you find, and they can interact with you too, making things much more complicated and opening up a lot more possibilities.

This is when Mysterious Book really got its hooks into me. Before, I was just going through the motions, trying to finish each page. But these later levels? They started throwing in clever little puzzles and interactions that were genuinely fun to figure out. It wasn’t just about completion anymore – it was about discovery!

When we started adding more challenging levels – with things like tricky jumps and platforming sections – it finally felt like the game was really coming together.

Because my time with the game was limited, I constantly had to stop playing levels before finishing them just to experience everything it had to offer. I would have gladly played through all of those later levels if I’d had the chance.

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Let me clarify two things about Yoshi and the Mysterious Book to make sure everyone knows what to expect.

This isn’t like other Yoshi games. If you’re expecting something similar to Yoshi’s Island, you might be disappointed. It focuses more on collecting items than on traditional platforming challenges.

Also, this game is clearly designed for, or at least takes into account, children.

It’s not surprising to see Yoshi getting more attention. After playing a bigger role in The Super Mario Bros. Movie, Nintendo clearly wants to take advantage of Yoshi’s popularity with new toys, team-ups, and, naturally, more games.

Mysterious Book is designed for kids, so while adults might have fun with it, it’s not very challenging. If you’re looking for a difficult game, this probably isn’t it.

Even when secrets are hard to find in the game, there are plenty of clues to help guide you.

Mysterious Book seems like a great game for parents and children to enjoy playing together.

What I am less sure of, is whether this game is perhaps too simplified for an older audience.

Whether you’re a kid or an adult, I’m confident you’ll find this game enjoyable and worthwhile.

Yoshi and the Mysterious Book is a charming game that shines with Nintendo’s signature quality. Its lovely hand-drawn art style and inventive gameplay make it a delightful experience.

I’m confident this game will be well-made. I’m just hoping it has enough depth to match its appealing look and feel.

Yoshi and the Mysterious Book launches on 21 May 2026 for Nintendo Switch 2.

Authors

Alex RaisbeckGaming writer

Alex Raisbeck writes about video games for TopMob, covering both popular, big-budget titles and smaller independent games. He’s also contributed to well-known gaming publications like VideoGamer, GamesRadar+, PC Gamer, and PCGamesN.

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2026-04-22 17:09