Yoshi's Story/Gameplay

Story
Copied from the instruction manual.

Once upon a time, there was an island inhabited by dinosaurs called Yoshis. The happy-go-lucky creatures took life on with a smile, and they kept smiling by feasting on their favorite food: fruits. But then big, bad Baby Bowser toddled onto the scene. Stealing the Yoshis' Super Happy Tree-the source of their happy-making-fruit, the kiddie Koopa turned the Yoshis smiles upside-down. And to guarantee they'd never live happily ever after, Baby Bowser cursed their island with an ever-unpleasent spell. With a little help from some fairy-tale magic, Bowser transformed the Yoshi's island into a storybook. their once carefree world was flattened into two dimensions (or two-and-a-half, as the case may be) constructed of paper, cardboard, stitches, wood and other bookmaking materials. Trapped inside the pop-up book's pages and without their beloved tree, the Yoshis lost practically all hope for happiness. But something survived in the dinosaurs' lost world.

In a far corner of the island, six Yoshi eggs hatched. The six bouncing baby Yoshis were happy bundles of joy. Their fellow dinosaurs, however, were still unhappy without the tree, so the hatchlings hatched a plan: they'd journey to Baby Bowser's castle and reclaim the tree. Of course, venturing out into a brave, new world was a daunting task for the toddlers (especially considering they weren't even old enough to cross the street on their own), but the six young Yoshis were more than happy to help out the sad Yoshis. And besides, eating fruit along the way would make the journey a happy one.

At least that's what the Yoshis thought. Bowser knew that fruits would keep the Yoshis strong and happy, so he threw every trick in the book at the daring dinos. Booby traps now lurked around every corner of the Yoshis' world while Shy Guys, ghosts and dragons plotted ambushes. Even with six Yoshis on the job, a happy ending seemed far away... until another book-this one-hit the shelves. Now pore over these pages before extinction strikes the dinosaurs, and you'll uncover the secrets to closing the book on Baby Bowser.

Fruit
There are seven different types of fruit found throughout the game. These seven are: apples, bananas, watermelons, grapes, melons, peppers and heart fruit. Each Yoshi has a favorite fruit that gives them more health and points when eaten, although all Yoshis like melons.
 * Black Yoshi likes all types of fruit.
 * Blue Yoshi likes grapes.
 * Green Yoshi likes watermelons.
 * Light Blue Yoshi likes grapes.
 * Pink Yoshi likes apples.
 * Red Yoshi likes apples.
 * Yellow Yoshi likes bananas.
 * White Yoshi likes all types of fruit.

All Yoshis except for Black and White hate peppers and suffer from eating them. The Heart Fruit makes Yoshi super happy, invincible, increases the length of his tongue and gives him infinite eggs for a limiteed amount of time. Also, White and Black Yoshis can hover farther when using the hover jump technique while super happy. Black and White Yoshi's appear later in the game as dont seem to appear in the first few levels.

Items
There are a lot of different items located around Yoshi's Story. Some may help, while others may hinder.
 * Egg Block: This white and spotted box will drop out eggs every single time Yoshi hits it with his head, only if Yoshi doesn't already have six eggs trailing behind him. This will be one of the most handy items, since you need eggs basically everywhere you go. The color of the spots on the box and the eggs will correspond to the color of the Yoshi that the player has chosen.
 * Message Block: This block with a talking face on it will tell you things you need to know about the game if Yoshi hits it. Although, it will generally be talk about how to perform different actions or what something is, sometimes they will tell you where secret things are hiding. Sometimes even the infamous black or white Yoshis.
 * Mystery Crate: These big boxes with question marks on them can be pushed or slammed, depending on what you need to do in a certain area. Most of the time you'll need to push one of the boxes over to another box to make two melons appear.
 * Mystery Block:
 * Coin:
 * Special Heart: Collecting these will increase level selection on the next page.
 * Heart Fruit: This will make Yoshi invincible for a short time as well as increase the length of his tongue and allow him to shoot unlimited eggs. Ground pounding will pop bubbles and convert some enemies to fruit.
 * Surprise Ball:
 * Bumper Ball:
 * Mystery Ball:
 * Mystery Switch:
 * Delay Switch:
 * Chili Pepper: Unfortunately, this will reduce Yoshi's current health and should be avoided. It will only hurt if it is swallowed.
 * Pipe:
 * Warp Vase:
 * Black Egg and White Egg:
 * Power Bee:
 * Power Flower: This allows Yoshi to recover some health by swallowing the petals, which reappear almost immediately and can therefore be used to fully recover health.
 * Power Tulip: