Sentences written about this title, gathered by type from the Japanese and English Wikipedia articles (as of 2026-8-30).
Its sprites were featured as "Stamp Out Famous Faces" in the stamp feature section of the Nintendo Player's Guide for Mario Paint (1993).
In North America, the "early 1993" release date was moved to September 1993 in April.
The Associated Press praised its "excellent" animation, "detailed original background graphics, and big character graphics".
Data Carvey of GamePro admired the colorfulness, Mode 7 effects, multi-layered scrolling backgrounds, and the "distinctive details" and personality of the "somewhat stiff-moving" character sprites.
Carvey and Nintendo Power praised the challenging gameplay; Nintendo Power highlighted the use of secret items and places, and Carvey commended its "imaginative enemies and some big bad bosses".
Moon of Game Players criticized "real action scenes" like the tornado sequence and Dorothy's visit to Munchkinland being reduced to either brief cutscenes or levels featuring elements not from the film.
Hickman noted the munchkins and "jolly singing" was replaced by enemies like "a few dumb looking cats" and that Dorothy looked more like Ma Larkin from The Darling Buds of May (1991–1993) than the "dainty young teenager” in the film.
Moon said The Wizard of Oz left the SNES's capabilities unfulfilled, and Hickman assumed it would fail to attract its young demographic due to its scarcity of short-term rewards, its high difficulty, and its lack of appealing details.
Positive comments have been sparse, with Paste magazine claiming in 2015 that the game was "pretty good by 1993 license tie-in standards".
In a July 2011 feature for Retro Gamer, Richard Burton labeled it "A playable and enjoyable arcade adventure" with "sickly sweet graphics" that were "pleasant and attractive enough"; however, he also said that the game would be forgotten if not for the Oz license.
The Associated Press praised its "excellent" animation, "detailed original background graphics, and big character graphics".
Carvey and Nintendo Power praised the challenging gameplay; Nintendo Power highlighted the use of secret items and places, and Carvey commended its "imaginative enemies and some big bad bosses".
The film license was criticized; Billy R.
Moon of Game Players criticized "real action scenes" like the tornado sequence and Dorothy's visit to Munchkinland being reduced to either brief cutscenes or levels featuring elements not from the film.
Johnny Reynolds of The Things and Brett Alan Weiss of AllGame were baffled by Tin-Man's inability to jump in a platform game, and Weiss also criticized Dorothy's ineffective kick.
In Europe, the game was originally planned to be released in early 1994 and was moved to April, but ultimately was not released in the region.
Hickman noted the munchkins and "jolly singing" was replaced by enemies like "a few dumb looking cats" and that Dorothy looked more like Ma Larkin from The Darling Buds of May (1991–1993) than the "dainty young teenager” in the film.
Moon said The Wizard of Oz left the SNES's capabilities unfulfilled, and Hickman assumed it would fail to attract its young demographic due to its scarcity of short-term rewards, its high difficulty, and its lack of appealing details.
Other criticisms included the gameplay, for its lack of variety and being reminiscent of THQ's video game adaptation of Home Alone (1990); and the "annoying" and "muddy" music making the famous songs difficult to identify.
SETA first presented the SNES game at the 1993 winter Consumer Electronics Show (CES), and the finished version at the 1993 summer CES and 1994 winter CES.
Just before its North American release, it was previewed in VideoGames & Computer Entertainment and GamePro.
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