After thoroughly enjoying Planet Robobot earlier this year, my interest in the other 3DS Kirby game was thoroughly peaked. It's not quiiiite as good as Robobot, but it's still a damn fine game. For reference I got all the sunstones in the Kirby mode.
King Dedede has been kidnapped by scary sky invaders, and it's up to Kirby to rescue him! There are a lot of references to older Kirby games in this. Partly because the keychain collectables you can get are all sprite art from all the other platforming Kirby games, but also in terms of enemies and powers. One thing I really appreciated was all the old, crappy powers that they made good. Powers that i avoided like the plague back in Super Star Ultra like Bird and Ninja are now actually good and fun to use. Circus is still a bit fiddly, but the new Beetle power kicks mad ass and is a great joy to use.
The game is pretty easy, but it's always fun. The level design is impecible HAL work as usual, and the game controls perfectly. The Hypernova gimmick stages aren't quite as fun as Robobot's mech segments from a mechanics and gameplay perspective, but they're much better than the mega-power sections from Return to Dreamland: For all intents and purposes, this is basically a single-player game made with a lot of the RtD assets and improves on that games ideas in basically every way, sans a co-op campaign mode. Especially the "Three Little Waddle Dees" segment made me laugh far more than perhaps it should have X3
The presentation is fantastic. This is a damn pretty 3DS game, and they the 3D Kirby aesthetic looking as stellar as ever. The music is fucking fantastic. Kirby games always have great music, but this might be my favorite Kirby music yet. Tons of funky remixes of old tracks that make me love 'em all over again. The bosses are well designed, and they all have at least two phases (some of which are pretty damn tough). Kirby's health bar is really generously huge, or at least you don't take a lot of damage, really. Especially with the later bosses, their patterns are so tough to take advantage of at time, I found it much easier to just ditch my power and fight them old school-style because of how mobile they were. The final boss especially has a million forms and is fucking epic shit that gives a very satisfying ending to the experience.
Verdict: Highly Recommended. It's not quite as good as Robobot, but you can easily pick it up for well under half the price of that nowadays, and it's a fantastic Kirby game for that price. A kind of love letter to the many Kirbys before it, this is another fantastic entry in the series, even if it will come off as a bit easy for most Kirby veterans.
King Dedede has been kidnapped by scary sky invaders, and it's up to Kirby to rescue him! There are a lot of references to older Kirby games in this. Partly because the keychain collectables you can get are all sprite art from all the other platforming Kirby games, but also in terms of enemies and powers. One thing I really appreciated was all the old, crappy powers that they made good. Powers that i avoided like the plague back in Super Star Ultra like Bird and Ninja are now actually good and fun to use. Circus is still a bit fiddly, but the new Beetle power kicks mad ass and is a great joy to use.
The game is pretty easy, but it's always fun. The level design is impecible HAL work as usual, and the game controls perfectly. The Hypernova gimmick stages aren't quite as fun as Robobot's mech segments from a mechanics and gameplay perspective, but they're much better than the mega-power sections from Return to Dreamland: For all intents and purposes, this is basically a single-player game made with a lot of the RtD assets and improves on that games ideas in basically every way, sans a co-op campaign mode. Especially the "Three Little Waddle Dees" segment made me laugh far more than perhaps it should have X3
The presentation is fantastic. This is a damn pretty 3DS game, and they the 3D Kirby aesthetic looking as stellar as ever. The music is fucking fantastic. Kirby games always have great music, but this might be my favorite Kirby music yet. Tons of funky remixes of old tracks that make me love 'em all over again. The bosses are well designed, and they all have at least two phases (some of which are pretty damn tough). Kirby's health bar is really generously huge, or at least you don't take a lot of damage, really. Especially with the later bosses, their patterns are so tough to take advantage of at time, I found it much easier to just ditch my power and fight them old school-style because of how mobile they were. The final boss especially has a million forms and is fucking epic shit that gives a very satisfying ending to the experience.
Verdict: Highly Recommended. It's not quite as good as Robobot, but you can easily pick it up for well under half the price of that nowadays, and it's a fantastic Kirby game for that price. A kind of love letter to the many Kirbys before it, this is another fantastic entry in the series, even if it will come off as a bit easy for most Kirby veterans.