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Saturday 26 January, 2008
GAMEPLAY
Alright then, my second go with Kirby got me as far as the Fourth World. And no, that isn’t a reference to any sort of regional socio-economic measurement system. Rather, Dreamland appears to have provinces very much similar to those in Mario’s homeland of the Mushroom Kingdom. You have your Forest land, your magical kingdoms, subterranean areas, and airships. Which makes me wonder, Kirby’s world can have all this crazy crap in it because it’s Dreamland and, I assume, consists of people’s dreams, whereas the Mushroom Kingd- oh, yeah, I guess that one makes sense, too.
So apparently King Dedede, for all his apparent regal malevolence, is an equal opportunity employer. The bosses you fight include, but are not limited to, a rollerskating artist whose paintings literally “come alive,” a sapient tree, a walrus, a beetle, the sun and the moon, and an alarm clock. I was particularly fond of dispatching the last of that list, and I think many of my fellows with early classes will agree that alarm clocks deserve nothing more than our collective scorn and rage. It was also nice that each mini-boss offered a nifty, rare power-up for Kirby. Among them is the ability to pile drive enemies, which is more fun than it should be.
DESIGN
The thing that amazed me most about the game was how good it looked. When I loaded up an NES game from the early nineties I did not expect what I saw. Kirby’s Adventure is wonderfully animated and quite colorful. The game graphics-wise is very much on par with Super Mario 4 for the Super Nintendo. Granted, today, that’s like saying, “This abacus is very much on par with the Apple IIe,” the achievement is still quite evident. That an 8-bit game can make me chuckle at its (intentional) silliness is a testament to how well it has aged.
Of course Kirby’s defining mechanic is his ability to absorb the powers of the enemies he eats. Having only one power at a time also adds some elements of strategy in that you need to save powers gained from rare or boss enemies. The powers are quite noticeable although some are somewhat useless (turning into a ball) or redundant (Should I use ice breath or ice aura?). Still many are very nice to have around and affect areas in meaningful ways. In one instance I used Kirby’s fire breath to ignite a fuse to a nearby cannon which he could then leap into to be launched far into the Stratosphere. Which as any veteran of Mario knows is where all the best stuff is located.
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