You know, it’s funny: us Kirby fans lauded 2011’s Kirby’s Return to Dream Land as a belated return to form, siphoning the best of Kirby’s Adventure and Kirby Super Star to provide a full-fledged modern adventure after years of remakes, spin-offs, and outsourced entries. Yet over a decade later, with Triple Deluxe and Planet Robobot further perfecting the formula and Forgotten Land successfully paving the way for a 3D future, I gotta admit: Return to Dream Land is rather…well, ordinary.
Not that is new criticism, mind; critics and non-fans alike wrote off Kirby’s Wii adventure as an inoffensive, if not boring, venture that rounded out the dying Wii hardware. Yet where college freshman me championed how Return to Dream Land unapologetically modeled itself into a humble 90’s side-scrolling tribute – a veritable time capsule true to its localized name, earning it the No. 1 spot as my 2011 GOTY – this commitment to tradition leaves the game spinning its wheels. Much of the boilerplate settings breed tedium in their familiarity (Grassland? Check. Beach? Um, yay. Desert? Yawn.), and while the game’s punchy combat carries it through, Return to Dream Land’s momentum doesn’t take off until the late-game stages. The Super Abilities roar with excitement, but the emphasis on Kirby leaves it ill-suited for multiplayer sessions. The Extra Mode offers little more than a souped-up challenge, with the precedent of playable secondary heroes relegated only to the Arena.
And yet despite all that, it’s all tremendously meaty, with this Deluxe edition proving itself a bona fide buffet of collectibles, mini-games, and a much-needed epilogue. Really, us Kirby lore enthusiasts could’ve simply made do that with that last one – the Shinya Kumazaki era’s drive for riveting mythology surrounding a pink marshmallow is an astonishing gift unto itself – yet Deluxe goes above and beyond in what should’ve just been a competent remaster, right down to introducing two new Copy Abilities when it didn’t need to. The forgettable motion controlled mini-games are replaced by Merry Magoland, a Best-Of selection riding the climatic high of the series’ 30th anniversary, with each game complete with their respective badge-rewarding objectives. The Magolor Epilogue, a hi-score-styled episode emphasizing thrilling combos and a peek behind may well be Kirby’s most tantalizing character.
It’s all enough, even, that I’m still chugging away two-and-a-half months later, ready to tie the ribbon on Magoland’s hidden challenges. Granted, this was also the case with the tepid Kirby’s Dream Buffet, but whereas overeating was merely the duty of a Kirby completionist, Return to Dream Land Deluxe is a delectable smorgasbord I gratefully partake upon every time. That’s gotta count for something.
There is something to be said about opinions fluctuating through time, or games being more than the sum of their parts, or whether such remasters are worth the $60 entry tag. True to its humble 2011 release, Return to Dream Land Deluxe didn’t spark much discussion, so I shall rise to the occasion and say I’m simply grateful it exists at all. This commitment to tradition means Masahiro Sakurai’s design ethos of prioritizing the fledgling gamer is preserved for a new generation – a lifeline for those who cannot keep up with Mario’s platforms or Sonic’s speed, buoyed by Kirby’s infinite flight and Return to Dream Land’s multiplayer teamwork. (That, and well, it’s heartening how we bookend the dawn of a new era with the blueprint of modern Kirby: a sign that its 2D roots shan’t be uprooted and disposed away…as if there was any doubt!)
Such speaks to Return to Dream Land’s beating heart: there are no grand designs at play, merely a proud mission statement enduring three decades and counting. This delicate balance in satisfying all demographics isn’t without its stumbles – a patronizing Squeak Squad misstep here, an imbalanced Dream Land 2 see-saw there – but whereas Return to Dream Land is indeed ordinary, it’d difficult to imagine the Kirby of today divorced from this pledge to the familiar. Framed within Deluxe’s personalized glee in running around with a Waddle Dee mask (the cries of “Wanya!”, as so lovingly dubbed by Japanese fans, echoing with every input) and a nostalgic send-off to yet another anniversary, this remaster is a generous package I treasure.
(That all said, I’m gonna come out and say it: you can’t just take the exaggerated proportions of Dedede’s Forgotten Land motif, forcibly jam it into a small model, and not have it look, well, hideous. There’s brand consistency, and then there’s forcing a square peg into a round hole. Blegh!)
Not that is new criticism, mind; critics and non-fans alike wrote off Kirby’s Wii adventure as an inoffensive, if not boring, venture that rounded out the dying Wii hardware. Yet where college freshman me championed how Return to Dream Land unapologetically modeled itself into a humble 90’s side-scrolling tribute – a veritable time capsule true to its localized name, earning it the No. 1 spot as my 2011 GOTY – this commitment to tradition leaves the game spinning its wheels. Much of the boilerplate settings breed tedium in their familiarity (Grassland? Check. Beach? Um, yay. Desert? Yawn.), and while the game’s punchy combat carries it through, Return to Dream Land’s momentum doesn’t take off until the late-game stages. The Super Abilities roar with excitement, but the emphasis on Kirby leaves it ill-suited for multiplayer sessions. The Extra Mode offers little more than a souped-up challenge, with the precedent of playable secondary heroes relegated only to the Arena.
And yet despite all that, it’s all tremendously meaty, with this Deluxe edition proving itself a bona fide buffet of collectibles, mini-games, and a much-needed epilogue. Really, us Kirby lore enthusiasts could’ve simply made do that with that last one – the Shinya Kumazaki era’s drive for riveting mythology surrounding a pink marshmallow is an astonishing gift unto itself – yet Deluxe goes above and beyond in what should’ve just been a competent remaster, right down to introducing two new Copy Abilities when it didn’t need to. The forgettable motion controlled mini-games are replaced by Merry Magoland, a Best-Of selection riding the climatic high of the series’ 30th anniversary, with each game complete with their respective badge-rewarding objectives. The Magolor Epilogue, a hi-score-styled episode emphasizing thrilling combos and a peek behind may well be Kirby’s most tantalizing character.
It’s all enough, even, that I’m still chugging away two-and-a-half months later, ready to tie the ribbon on Magoland’s hidden challenges. Granted, this was also the case with the tepid Kirby’s Dream Buffet, but whereas overeating was merely the duty of a Kirby completionist, Return to Dream Land Deluxe is a delectable smorgasbord I gratefully partake upon every time. That’s gotta count for something.
There is something to be said about opinions fluctuating through time, or games being more than the sum of their parts, or whether such remasters are worth the $60 entry tag. True to its humble 2011 release, Return to Dream Land Deluxe didn’t spark much discussion, so I shall rise to the occasion and say I’m simply grateful it exists at all. This commitment to tradition means Masahiro Sakurai’s design ethos of prioritizing the fledgling gamer is preserved for a new generation – a lifeline for those who cannot keep up with Mario’s platforms or Sonic’s speed, buoyed by Kirby’s infinite flight and Return to Dream Land’s multiplayer teamwork. (That, and well, it’s heartening how we bookend the dawn of a new era with the blueprint of modern Kirby: a sign that its 2D roots shan’t be uprooted and disposed away…as if there was any doubt!)
Such speaks to Return to Dream Land’s beating heart: there are no grand designs at play, merely a proud mission statement enduring three decades and counting. This delicate balance in satisfying all demographics isn’t without its stumbles – a patronizing Squeak Squad misstep here, an imbalanced Dream Land 2 see-saw there – but whereas Return to Dream Land is indeed ordinary, it’d difficult to imagine the Kirby of today divorced from this pledge to the familiar. Framed within Deluxe’s personalized glee in running around with a Waddle Dee mask (the cries of “Wanya!”, as so lovingly dubbed by Japanese fans, echoing with every input) and a nostalgic send-off to yet another anniversary, this remaster is a generous package I treasure.
(That all said, I’m gonna come out and say it: you can’t just take the exaggerated proportions of Dedede’s Forgotten Land motif, forcibly jam it into a small model, and not have it look, well, hideous. There’s brand consistency, and then there’s forcing a square peg into a round hole. Blegh!)