 The magazine considered the game's special effects expertly integrated into the gameplay, and described the developer's handicraft as having an "attention to detail that few games can match".Reviewing the Game Boy Advance release in 2002, Craig Harris of IGN wrote that "Yoshi's Island" was "the best damn platformer ever developed".While acknowledging the game's roots in the "Super Mario" series, he said the game created enough gameplay ideas to constitute its own franchise.