Retronauts - 522: Kirby, Part 4

Episode Date: March 27, 2023

After an uneven 2000s, the Kirby series found itself in a real sweet spot during the following decade. Yes, the 2010s signaled a brand new era of Kirby, one that saw HAL returning to their beloved brand to be more hands-on at a time when the wildly popular New Super Mario Bros. made 2D platforming cool again. On this episode of Retronauts, join Bob Mackey, Stuart Gipp, and patron Andrew Oliveira (who sponsored this episode) as the crew explores this highly fruitful time for Nintendo's spherical hero. Retronauts is a completely fan-funded operation. To support the show, and get two full-length exclusive episodes every month, as well as access to 50+ previous bonus episodes, please visit the official Retronauts Patreon at patreon.com/retronauts.

This week on Retronauts, we're going to Magoland. Hello, everybody. Welcome to another episode of Retronauts. I'm your host for this one, Bob Mackie, and welcome to one, Bob Mackie, and welcome to once again, another entry in our Kirby series, this time we're covering what I consider to be the Kirby Renaissance as we explore where the series was in the 2010s. And once again, this episode is brought to us by our top tier patron Andrew Olivera, who has proven his love of Kirby by paying us to talk about it. So that's why we're here. Please check out our previous three episodes. We've been going in chronological order. And the next one we'll be talking about will

be the next series of games we'll be talking about will be the Kirby side game. So we have not forgotten anything. Do not worry if you are a fan of Kirby's blockball or whatever, because we will be talking about it next time. Before I begin, though, who is here with me today? Top-tier patron. Please introduce yourself. Hey, it's Andrew Olivera, and I'm ready for Dreamland because daylight savings stinks. That's true. We are recording this on a very special day, and that is Daylight Savings. And who else do we have today? Oh, hi, I'm Stewardship. I'm a Retronerner also. And when Bob actually mentioned to me, it was Daylight Savings, I was like, it's not Daylight Savings. And I looked it up and it turns out that it's in America.

So I was like, that's just America. It doesn't matter to me. And then I remembered, of course, it does in fact matter to me quite significantly. So, yeah, that's my, that's my day today. Once again, we're ruining the entire globe with our weird rules and laws. And it's also Oscar Day. Okay, now, refresh my memory, Kirby has not won an Oscar. Not yet. Not yet.

But did Kirby win a Grammy? Was there, Kirby did win a Grammy? We covered that, right? I don't know. I mean, maybe Elubination will make a Kirby movie at some point. Andrew, you seem to remember this. It just popped into my head. Some sort of Kirby Grammy was going on.

Some sort of remix, I'm thinking. I already forgot all the details, but I think we did cover it last episode. Yes, in case you're forgetting, Kirby is the only Nintendo character to win a Grammy Award. And it happened last year. So, yes, I did remember that correctly. So Kirby is one-fourth of the way, too, and Egot, and we wish him the best. But still no Oscar at this point. And I don't think Mario will be winning one.

Although we don't know yet because this episode is going live before the new Mario movie. Yes. So, yes, we're here to talk about the Kirby games, obviously. And a special note to everyone out there is that all of these titles are currently available on the 3DS and Wii U.S. For about a week, because if you're listening to this on the Patreon, those two stores will still be online for about a week. If you're listening to this on the free feed, on the day it comes out, this is the final day. otherwise you'll have to find other ways to get them maybe I'll sell you my copies at an extremely high markup rate

now that supply and demand has changed but yes you have very little time to buy these and they are all available thankfully on those e-shops or at least they were if you're listening to this far into the future all of the box copies are going to skyrocket and price as soon as that goes down yes I am actually in these final weeks I'm going on and trying to find the box copies of things that are

the exact same price for the digital copy just to have a hard copy because who knows what will happen if I lose those digital copies. Before I begin though, just to refresh everyone's memory, I want to ask you, Andrew and Stuart, where you were during this period of Kirby, the 2010s. I've told my story in which I really had tuned Kirby out for a long time until recently and I feel deep regret for missing out on his games in the 2010s, but this is an area, an era in which still not having a lot of money, Still thinking Kirby games are too short, too easy, and not worth the $50 to $60 and missing out on a lot of great stuff. And not getting to review a lot of these games, actually.

I think I'm pretty sure like Jeremy, when we work together at One Up and U.S. Gamer for a lot of these games, the release of these games, he would end up taking these. So I played precious few of these as a games reviewer. But, Andrew, let's start with you. You were already on the Kirby train at this point, I take it, correct? Oh, yeah. I mean, around this time, I picked up Epic Yarn and played it for a bit. But, you know, the next one returned to Dreamland. By then I had my first kid. So didn't get around to that until much later. And Stuart, how about you? Where were you in Kirby in the 2010s? Well, I didn't have a wee, so I just had the Dolphin Emulator. And I played Epic Yarn and Returns Dreamland on that with friends. I now own them. So please don't. arrest me um i was mad as hell that dream collection never came to the UK never came to

europe um but everything else it was just yeah as soon as they come out either pre-order or buy them day one i was just an avowed fan of the beautiful boy by this point i was just in yeah i should tell people that uh i had some controversial opinions last last time because we covered the kirby games and the aughts and i think people 10 years younger than me have a good a great affinity for those games and i really didn't i feel like it's a troubled period for kirby kirby trying to figure out what it should be, but these games are all very, very good, and they're all mostly led by the same person, and we'll talk about him. Before we start talking about games that were released, we can start with talking about games that weren't released. And, you know, there was

no core Kirby GameCube title. Yes, Kirby Air Ride was directed by Masahiro Sakurai. It is a side game, we'll be talking about it. But there was never a core side-scrolling Kirby game for the GameCube, but that doesn't mean they didn't try. Because, there's a lot of material about this online I'm sure there's some stuff from the 2020 Giggly you can dig up but there were three canceled Kirby prototypes

in the works at Nintendo during the GameCube era and this was in the works as late as 2005 which is when it was revealed to the public and there are three different variants of these prototypes Andrew has some great notes on these

one of the prototypes was a Kirby experience in which up to three helpers could be controlled at once, controlled by other players or the computer. The second game would have been a 3D platformer, which, according to the basically one screenshot I've seen of it, it looks a lot like forgotten land from that era, not nearly as big in scope. And then the third prototype is a 2D side-scroller with polygonal graphics, and based on the widescreen format, this looks like it could have been either a late widescreen GameCube game,

and there were wide-screen GameCube games. There was like widescreen Nintendo 64 games even. But this might have been a Wii game in its final stages, but none of these made the cut to release. And yeah, some of the assets for these games can be found on Return to Dreamland and Return to Dreamland Deluxe, but to date, nothing else really has come of these. Do either of you have any experience with these following these in previews,

being excited for Kirby during this generation, the GameCube generation was very troubled for Nintendo. I mean, I remember seeing screenshots for the side-scroller one that looks pretty much like Return to Dreamland. The description of the one with... I mean, these games that have been sort of described here have more or less all been made now in some form. Like the one with the four different friends.

I mean, that sounds like Star-Eilites to me. So they're probably... They may be sitting on those ideas and then bringing them in when they could actually sort of execute them. As far as sort of... The 2D one was the... most promising looking, but it essentially looked like an expansion of kind of his appearance in Smash Brothers melee to some extent.

But nothing really, I think there's a little bit of footage that I've seen, but other than that, there's not much I can say about it. It just looks like another Kirby game, really like Kirby 64, but with slightly nicer visuals, I suppose. And Andrew, were you following these at the time, these potential Kirby games for the GameCube? I remember seeing, like, pictures of, like, Kirby games in, like, GamePro magazine and stuff. you know, anxiously awaiting them, and of course they never came. But, you know, I think Stewart pretty much nailed it on the head, especially with the stacking feature that's in like pretty much every Kirby game now. And, you know, they were just waiting to sort of get in a groove

with the 3D, I think, just trying to transition to 3D. Yeah, I feel like Nintendo never throws anything out. And you're correct that we eventually saw like versions of these games in some way. So I feel like they were just holding on to them. My own thoughts are that they were holding on to these games. They couldn't figure out how to make them work, A, but probably B, this was not a good time for the GameCube. Anything past maybe 2003 was not a good time for the GameCube. And, you know, go back to our GameCube episode. It sold miserably.

Nintendo was trying to cut ties as soon as possible. And I can see them saying, okay, these potential Kirby projects save them for the Wii, save them for whatever portable system we're working on next it's not going to happen this time and that's my own take on it it does feel very likely to me though that they just wanted to cut bait with the game cube i mean i can believe it considering what was coming out towards the end of that thing's life it was just mario party after maria party yeah especially uh when when the when the we is coming out in 2006 and you're showing off a kirby game in 2005 uh most of your audience has already left uh i i don't know what i was doing with my game cube in 2005 maybe getting ready for

for Odama or something, I don't know but definitely I was just playing Sonic on it all the time I think I was jealous about people who could play the Donkey Kong the non-musical Donkey Kong Bongo game but I never touched the Bongo so I think that's where I was in 2005

with my GameCube Okay, now let's move on to where the renaissance begins with a Kirby game, that is only kind of a Kirby game, but hey, it counts. yarn. And this came out in 2010 in fall of 2010 for both Japan, United States. Stuart had to wait until February. But hey, that's not too long of a wait. Right, Stewart? I just downloaded it anyway, so I had it. Very small file sizes on these Wii games. So this is co-developed by Goodfield, who is, by the way, they are not Fuel Plus. Do not get them confused. And of course, Goodfield would go on to make the Yoshi's Woolie World series, Yoshi's Crafted World. There's led the 3DS version.

They moved on from Kirby. I think they found Yoshi to be a more fruitful zone to play in when it comes to these mechanics. And it does make a little more sense for Yoshi, in my opinion. They made Wario Shake It, right? Did you say that? Yeah. Wario Land Shake It. Yeah, I feel, I don't know, you guys can weigh in on this, but I feel that there are a few outsourcing houses Nintendo uses.

There's, sorry, it just refresh my memory. Is it next level games that makes? No, sorry, retro studios. right? Yeah, next level is Luigi's Mansion, I think. Yeah, so like there's retro, there's next level,

and then they have Japanese outsourcing studios and I feel like Goodfield is their better outsourcing studio and I don't like... Sorry, as I think that formerly there was Skip

who did Chibi Robo but I think they might have thrown them in the fire now. I think so, yeah. I was an Alpha Dream they got to Alpha Dream as well. That's right, that's right. But in terms of like

making sequels to their platformers, their classic ones, there's Good Feel and I like their stuff obviously not as great as Nintendo's internal stuff but then there's Arzest which I feel that they don't make bad games but I feel like I'm not ever a fan of anything they do

and Arzest has made New Yoshi's Island and Hey Pickman but good feel I feel they do make the better non-Nintendo Nintendo sequels I got a cape for Yoshi's New Island because I'm the one guy who liked that I thought that was really good but the rest of them I'm not going to

really go to bat for You know, I have a lot of new Yoshi's Island left to play, and I think it's perfectly fine, but I also think it's unfair to ask anyone else to make a sequel to Yoshi's Island. It's just not fair to the developer. I like it better than Yoshi's Island DS, which was just, like, brutal, but it's fine. I will say it's much, much better than that. But yeah, good feel, hey, good feel, good company. And Epic Yarn, I remember the discourse for Epic Yarn. It was probably why I didn't play it. it. And that was, you know, Nintendo's, the Wii was now a laughing stock. It was very successful, but by 2010, everyone had gotten tired of it. And, you know, you would hear the discourse about like, oh, it's just for kids. Everything that's coming out is very kiddy. And suddenly you have a Kirby game that's even more like soft and fuzzy. And you can't die in it, really. So that was really most of what I heard about it. And maybe that's why even then I was still susceptible to, to that. kind of talk and I didn't I didn't really play it then I went through it um in co-op the whole game uh I didn't really bother with any of the extra like um bonus games or anything but I really had a great time playing through it I think it's strength and this sounds like I'm sort of dissing older Kirby

because I you know I love the boy but I think this was the first Kirby game that had more traditional um stage design in in the it didn't just feel like they'd made some environments and just put enemies in it. It felt like they had actually, no pun intended, kind of crafted it. That's not to say that it isn't craft in older games, but this felt a lot more like a straightforward speaking to end, secrets off the side.

I don't know how to explain exactly what I mean, to be honest, but it definitely has a different feel to a traditional Kirby game. It's a lot more precise. You can't really... Because while you can't die, that means you can kind of dick around, but you don't have this huge surplus of powers. You can pick things up

and throw them, or you can just whip them to death, you don't transform really except for certain set areas, so you don't have Kirby's like copy abilities except for these little mini-games. So it becomes a lot more about finding secrets and hidden things by opening, pulling down zippers, pushing aside pieces of fabric. The way it uses its gimmick is incredibly strong, I think. I think Woolly World, the Yoshi one, is probably better, mostly because of the aesthetics, but they did a really good job out of the gate first time here, I think. Well, Stuart, maybe this sounds crazy.

And Andrew, you can weigh in on this too. I like to hear your thoughts. But when I was playing this for the first time recently, it did feel kind of like a very slow Sonic game. I'm not saying that to insult it, but just in terms of how dense the stages are and just how many levels there are to every stage in terms of just verticality. And also, when Kirby does get hit in the game, he loses rings, basically. drops all his rings.

Yeah, yeah. And I think the one thing missing from that discourse of the era was that the point of the game was not to stay alive. The point was, like, performance. And performing well meant you got to hold on to your beads. And, you know, if you didn't perform well... Bees? Yes.

I was thinking of rest of development as well. Sorry. Sorry. During... Well, I totally understand. It was in my head, too. But the point is to hold on to all of your beads and the more beads you can hold on to, the higher your score at the end. You get a medal and everything. So any

three-year-old could find their way to the end of the game. But if you want to be a mature 40-year-old playing it like me, you will say, aha, I will platinum all of these bead trophies, my friend. And that ain't easy at all. I think that might be the problem that I have, because I'm going to be more sour than you guys about this game.

You know, everything about it, the presentation is so beautiful. The, you know, level design and music. Everything's so great. It's one of those games that, like, I feel like I should love, but I can't because for whatever reason, it's just something about it. And I think it's that sort of lack of tension, lack of death.

I mean, not to say that having a game where you don't die isn't a good thing, but the fact that you have to collect these things, like you said, it makes you feel like, I'm 30 years old. This is like a game for babies. I should be getting through this and, like, dominating it. Andrew, have you considered this? If you pressed the direction button twice, he turns into a little car. Well, yes.

This little Carl Kirby, man. Yes, that helps speed things up. But at the same time, it puts you in a position to make a lot of mistakes. And it's very easy to get knocked and lose all your beads while you're climbing up a vertical shaft or you're over a pit or something. And you just lose, you just have to restart the whole stage from scratch. And you're just like, this is a bummer. This is aggravating. I should be doing better.

I kind of get it. I kind of get it because it's the reason I don't go back to Yoshi's Island. on the SNES, even though it's amazing. It's clearly amazing 10 out of 10 game. And I can't play it anymore because I always want to get 100 points. And if I fail, I'm just like, oh, I've got to start over. I've missed this admissible thing. So I kind of get it.

I do. And it's worse. Because if you're not, yeah. In Kirby games, that tends to be a thing anyway where like, oh, if you don't have the right power, you can't do this portion of the puzzle and you got to make a second pass. But that does, you know, Epic Yarn does it with. the collectibles as well as, you know, just losing those beads and just like a double smack in the face. I'll credit that while they do still use the whole thing in these later games of come,

you need to have this specific power. I think these next few games are very, very good at making sure that you have access to it without having to restart. Like, I don't remember in stuff like rubber-bought triple deluxe star allies getting to points where I was just like, oh, I've got to start this level over and bring this power. I think they got better at it after this. but yeah no i do see where you're coming from i think it's fair enough yeah absolutely i can see why they turn this into a yoshi series steward especially with uh how yoshi's island as much as i love it it's also overwhelming to me where it's like oh i miss that flower well i can play 35 minutes of a stage again or i can just go on with my life and i feel like uh some of the earlier kirby games are like that's like oh

i didn't find one of the treasures well i have to restart the stage and even even like some of the early 2010 Scurbies, you might have to restart a stage to get everything. And they find a way to refine that in the future. But it's still like a common thing, I guess, as late as 2010, to say, okay, redo it. There's not going to be a checkpoint for you just to redo one part. You're going to redo the entire stage until you get it right. One thing I would like, which I thought, which I really found quite funny, to be honest, is I'd like to play this game on my switch, you know. I'd like an HD version of this game. And what I find funny is that when they did re-release it, They put it on an even lower res screen.

They were just like, okay, here comes Kirby, extra happy on. Everyone's like, yes, on 3DS. No. It's not even 3D. And I'm not, yeah, I love the 3DS. It's one of my favorite systems of all time. And I'm glad this is on it. But my God, I wish it was on the Switch instead.

Oh, me too. Yeah, I mean, I was playing it on Wii U, the original, and actually I bought the 3DS version for this podcast for $40. And there was a crazy era for Nintendo in which they were like, just put everything on the 3DS, even if it can't run well. Yeah, we need to...

Louis just mentioned. It was crazy. Yeah, and... Highroll Warriors. That too, that too. Yeah. Just a ton of things on there. I originally had Highway Warriors on the 3DS,

and it was borderline intolerable. I heard it. They shouldn't have even sold it, but yeah, in like Mario Maker, things like that, just everything. I wish they had...

I mean, they kind of do have the same approach for the switch, but not with everything. But I wish they did. But, yeah, it's on the 3DS. And Andrew and I, were talking about this before the show and he was wondering if he should make it like a separate entry in the notes because it's technically there's enough differences in it to make it a

kind of a different game. But to me, I don't know how you folks feel if you played this version, but I kind of like the 3DS one better. I mean, even though, you know, the graphics are not quite as distinct, even compared to a SD Wii game, I think the addition of Kirby's Powers makes it a little more fun, although I do appreciate them sticking to the bit with the Wii U version in terms of like Kirby can only do these things

and that's how he interacts with everything. In the 3DS version, you have the copy abilities, but not really. You just pick up power-ups, but Kirby has a sword, Kirby can get an umbrella, etc. But the way he wields those weapons is the same way he interacts with enemies and objects with his normal weapon.

It just gives you a little more versatility. Would you say that it makes the game extra epic or does it remain the same level of epic? I think it makes the game extra easy actually. Fair enough, yeah, because that game was a bit challenging it needed to step up, isn't it? Which, if you're looking to get all the beads, I mean,

it's easy to make your way to the end of the stage, but if you're looking to get all the beads, having that sword really helps too. Does it even, does it support multiplayer? Can you link up and play with Prince Fluff like you can in the original? You know what? I wasn't able to test that, but I didn't play any of these games. I thought they took it out of the 3DS version. Maybe I'm wrong.

That's very possible. I should be said that I played all of these games except for one single player and most of them have multiplayer but yeah the Wii game had the Prince Fluff multiplayer and I guess we have to move on but to wrap up this game discussion like it really is not a Kirby game outside

of how it looks in terms of the graphics and the enemies because you can't float there's no copy abilities and the levels like you said Stewart they're not laid out like Kirby levels which in this case is a benefit because just a fun different way And I would ask you, Stuart, do you find the level design, at least slightly European? Is that why you like it?

I don't know. I mean, the Kobe games before this, the mainline ones, even though as much as I love them, I feel like they can kind of wash over you. And you're so powerful that you're just kind of blitzing through every end of everything and not really paying much attention. Because many of the games don't even have hidden things really worth looking for. But from here on, from here on out, they start to get much more interesting than level design, much better games, I would say.

Like for me this is like the Kirby Imperial phase We're about to go into like god tier Kobe shit man I'm loving it Absolutely yeah I would not I would definitely recommend everything that comes after Epic Yarn I would still recommend Epic Yarn But if you're looking for core good Kirby games They're all coming up in the 2010s

A great decade to be alive I'd suggest with Kirby Epic Yon I know I've mentioned it but if you can play it with a friend You really should because it really does make it more fun The fact that you can You know you can stand on one another Throw each other around to get items a lot easier and you'll blitz through the game

you'll breeze through it in like two or three hours and you'll never play it again but you'll have had a good time so that's what I would do see I'm on the complete opposite end of the spectrum where I would rather just play it alone because I have no patience for this game and I'd rather play it on 3DS

because I can do it in small like installments this is the beauty of diversity yes well I mean Andrew you're talking to me off air and you were saying you were trying to play some of these games with your kids but they just got too frustrating and that's how I kind of feel about most Nintendo platformers

that are multiplayer, especially the Mario ones. I feel like the Kirby ones are a little more manageable, but I'm not like playing Kirby to have a multiplayer experience, even if they all at this point have multiplayer options. Yeah. I mean, this is, this is sorry, this is the multiplayer Kirby game where

you can, you know, interfere with other player. The other ones, your interaction is limited to, like, making out with each other to give each other health. But, because you can't, like, pick up, throw, attack. It's not like new Super Mario Bros. where you're just pissing each other off the whole time. But Epic Yarn, kind of you can do that. So your mileage may vary on whether or not that's, you know, tolerable, I suppose.

You know, it's important to note that this didn't start as a Kirby game. It was retrofitted into a Kirby game. Yeah. And I think that's another one of those problems of, you know, this doesn't feel like a Kirby game, you know, the lack of abilities, the lack of mini games. Like this, it isn't until Epic Yarn or Extra Epic Yarn where, you know, they add the ability.

abilities. They add the mini-games and it feels like a full-fledged Kirby game. Yeah, I'm sure it helped the game sell, but the extra Epic Garma made it feel more like a traditional Kirby game as far as much as it could. And this was one of the cases of a company coming to Nintendo and them saying, make that a Yoshi game or like make that a Star Fox game or whatever. Like just in terms of sales, it would help the thing sell more than if it was like Prince Fluff's Big Adventure or whatever they were planning to make it. But moving on, we got to move on to But moving on, we got to move on to Kirby's return to Dreamland, a very late

Wii game releasing in America and Japan in October of 2011. Europe only had to wait one month. Stewart was a happy boy then. And it was called for some reason Kirby's Adventure Wii. They changed the name. My God knows why. Okay. That's, okay. I guess there was never a Dreamland game in Europe? No, there was. We had Kirby's Dreamland and Dreamland too, but for no reason whatsoever. They changed this game's name to Kirby Adventure We. I think it was just some localizer who was just getting up themselves and you know just doing what they wanted there was a liability maybe he was like adventure sounds uh more marketable no one wants to dreamland well i don't know what it is maybe there's some maybe in the uk there's like a strip club called dreamland or something

and they weren't allowed to it's like yeah it could be like uh it could be like a star wing kind of thing yeah star swing connection it's really weird the random name to it's kirby's fun pack all that stuff just really odd kirby's fun pack i think we discussed this last or perhaps before, but it does sound a bit dirty. I like Kirby's Ghost Trap. Yeah, yeah, Kirby's Ghost Trap. But yes, Kirby's Return to Dreamland. This is actually, as of this recording, also the newest Kirby game,

because we have Kirby's Return to Dreamland Deluxe on the Switch. In my opinion, $60 is too much, considering there's a very, very good $40 Metroid Prime ports slash remake. It's totally a remake. What am I saying? This is a perfectly fine game. It should have been 40 bucks on the switch. That's my only upfront little argument.

But talking about the original game. Oh, Stuart, go ahead. Sorry. Oh, I was just going to just literally argue with you, but I decided I probably shouldn't. I mean, the level of, it doesn't look it in screenshots and videos and things because it's how you remember it. But playing this remake recently on Switch,

like the amount of polish they've given it is, like, it's on the level of Metro Prime remastered, I would say. It's such a beautiful looking, beautiful running, game. The only thing that I think brings it down, if I can get into that, and this is not really an attack on Return to Dreamland, which I really like and had a great time with, is the fact that Planet Robobot is so much better, and so is Triple Deluxe, and so is Star Allies. Those three games are like the Holy Kirby Trinity, and this was the game that set the foundations, and it set brilliant foundations, but then everything that built on them just went to the moon, as far as I'm

concerned. Oh, yes, Stuart, you're absolutely right, and I have a funny little story here, because I played a bit of this and then I went on a trip and then I came back thinking okay I only played the first set of stages let's try more of them and then I saw oh wait I played the first two sets of stages so this game has a problem

like penetrating my brain and then I go to my Wii you thinking I've never played the Wii version of this I want to see how the Wii version looks I turn it on I boot it up I played through most of the Wii version at some point in my life so this game I remember triple deluxe

I remember Robobots I remember Star Allies This one, I think just because it's setting the foundation, but it's not playing with it as much. It's not as memorable to me. I still think that it's a step up from what they've been doing to some extent. It's a very confident sort of game, considering it's the first one that's like this.

The idea is like this game's big gimmick is the whole, I don't remember what's called super abilities. The supercopy abilities, is when you can get, for example, in the first stage, a huge sword, which you can then, you know, waggle to swing the sword, destroy most of the environment. And, you know, it's kind of cool, but the problem is, in the original version,

whenever you use one of these things, the game stops for, like, 10, 15 seconds, while you watch the same thing happen. And they didn't refine that, and they got to hypernova in the next game, for example, and that's much more funny and much more interesting, and everything you do with it is always different. It's just they're getting there,

and they're doing a really good job. It's fun. There's plenty to do. There's tons of, like, boss fights, levels, just cool things to see and do. One of my favorite memories of playing this with three players is getting absolutely bodied by the final boss and just laughing the whole time. There's a lot to it. I mean, I don't like the fact that you constantly go into those energy, sort of, those strange zones

that I forget the name of, where you can't use copy abilities and you have to usually fight the same mini-boss over and over again at the end of them. You're being chased by like a wall of like energy or something. I don't remember what they're called. But I think that was this game. That was this game, right? It is this game. Yeah.

And you kind of fight the variance on the same mini boss in those little zones. Yeah. And I didn't hate it. It was fine. I just kind of felt like they were testing the waters for something maybe a bit more coherent. And then we got that, you know, in spades. I don't know how you're supposed to do those parts of the game with four players. It just doesn't seem conceivable.

It's carnage. I mean, it's not like you can really interact with. with each other. You can't suck each other up or anything. So mostly it's just kind of easy. What gets harder as the bosses, because I'm reasonably sure that they add health to them the more players there are up. So fighting the final boss was kind of a nightmare. I mean, to me, with these Kirby games, I did play, well, Star Allies with my wife. But even with just one other person, there's so much visual chaos on the screen, you often lose track of like, okay, which person am I? And, like, where am I? And am I the one getting hit?

things like that but yeah obviously this is for the we the we is built around multiplayer gaming this is the beginning of like every kirby game on a console is probably going to be four players at least but there will be default multiplayer just expected from now on and so going back to the remake stuff steward i i want to say you were right because i went back to the we version and it's like yes i can tell they did a lot of work and there's a new like cell shading kind a filter on the Return of Dreamland Deluxe that I do like. They did really good job, but I also feel like it should be 40 bucks, but

you know, in three years it will be on sale for a week for $40, so just wait for that sale. $45, $45. Yes. Oh yeah, with inflation, with inflation. In defense, you know, they did add a lot more content to it. They added

this whole Magroland thing. They added a whole Magelor campaign, which is actually pretty good. Yeah, I haven't touched that yet. really looking forward to it you know at Metroid Prime yeah $40 for just like some lipstick but they didn't do much as far as you know I would have loved them to track like the item pickups and stuff but they you know I would have paid 60 bucks for that yeah that's true I mean this is not

a Metro Prime episode but that remake from what I hear still has some of the 2002 era TDM the original game had that a lot of people kind of forget about I mean they've brought this game out along alongside Metro Prime, alongside theatre rhythm, you know, this is not a great time to charge $60 for a new, for an old game like this, a remake. Yes. I mean, for Kirby fans, for me, it's a no-brainer. It's just like, as soon as it's an ounce, I'm like,

how much do you want? I'll empty my bank account for this. I don't care. I don't care if I die. Just there's too much going on in the ecosystem right now that it's hard to justify spending 60 for a Wii game remake unless you're expensing it for a podcast that you host, so that's the only

reason I was able to do it. Can I be able to do it? Can I be a bit of a bore briefly? Because I know normally I'm so interesting. Go for it, Stuart. The fact that, I mean, one thing that really holds with the polish of this game, and, you know, I hate to even say this work because it's so tedious. This game brings Kirby back to, oh God, 60 frames per second.

Because Forgotten Land and Star Allies were both 30, and they were fine, but it didn't feel quite right, because Kirby's always been this smooth Nintendo-polished thing. So it feels good to have him back in that kind of, Fidelity. It's nice and it looks amazing. It's an amazing looking game. Yeah, you know, Stuart, not that you mentioned it, I don't think I noticed until you brought it up, but something did feel different to me when I was playing that remake, and that's totally it. And I think, in some cases, I feel like FPSs are important, especially in terms of how the presentation of a game

works, how smooth it looks. And Kirby was always a super polished game, and I feel like, yeah, a 60 FPS Kirby definitely makes a difference, especially after Forgotten Land, a great-looking game that has some performance issues that don't ruin it, but still you do notice them, and that is a bit off for Kirby experience. Yeah, I think a lot of people are kind of short-selling this game because it's not forgotten land. You know, they've seen Forgotten Land. They want more forgotten land, and, you know, anything 2D side-scrolling isn't going to cut it for

them anymore, you know? I was worried about that when, when, when, they did forgotten land when forgotten land came out or was announced i was really negative about it because i was just like why have they done this to my beloved kirby um course what as usual i was wrong and it was great but i was happy when they announced this because it meant like oh good they haven't forgotten about more traditional kirby as well i mean i'd be surprised if this game was cleaning up sales wise i really would but i'd be interested to know how it was doing yeah me too i mean i feel like we're going to see more 2d kirby games i don't think forgotten land is just

the fate of the series. My own experience was I love Forgotten Land, but then going back to playing three new to me, 2D Kirby's, I was just thinking, oh, there are things I like more about this, and there are also things I like more about Forgotten Land. I feel like it could be like Mario

in which you have your 3D Mario, you have your 2D Mario, and there's room for both to exist. Although there has not been a 2D Mario for a bit. It's a shame. I really wish they would do a 2D Mario, but they've kind of wrapped it up, haven't they? Speaking of which, I mean, we'll get to it in Star Allies, but the only issue for me

with a new 2D Kirby is Star Allies did honestly feel to me like the absolute apex of what they can do with this. Like the amount of things that they tied up, the amount of things that they absolutely just like, I mean, if they did another one, it would almost to me

it would just feel like another Squeak Squad, a game that's just kind of there. And I like Squeak Squad, and I'll play another Kirby game if it's just kind of there. But coming off Robobot and Starolize, I mean, what a one-two-punch that is. It's crazy. Yeah, it is really hard to think of where they could possibly go next with the 2D. There'd have to be some big new gimmick or big new change for the series. I want to mention one guy, though, who is, he's the goat of this podcast.

It is Shinya Kumazaki. He directed Kirby Superstar Ultra as much as you can direct that. I mean, the content was there. There's some new stuff, but he was just shepherding a remake, which is, you know, it still takes work. but Shinya Kumasaki is the guy leading the Kirby games throughout the 2010s. He's the director of all of the core Kirby games, and he is also co-director on Forgotten Land with someone else. I feel like he is passing the torch down. He'll be transitioning into a producer role, but we can credit him and, of course, his team for why these games are so good in the 2010s.

And, you know, reflecting on the 2000s, there's some up, there's some downs. But I feel like they were just getting a little too experimental, but here, they're returning to what is a core Kirby game and how can we play in that space instead of trying to reinvent the Kirby game Yeah he does a lot to flesh out the story as well Like he seems to actually have a plan

Or at least a concept Like loosely tied together And we start seeing that here in this game mostly So it Was this the first game or one of the earlier games Where fighting certain bosses You can get law by pausing They bring that in where boss fights

the only place you can see it and if you pause the game you'll get like a screen of like text that's sort of explaining who this is and where they come from and that's where the whole Kirby Law even came really begins to take any kind of shape at all I'm not really on top of the Kirby Law because it's not really what I play the games for

but I do get a kick out of the kind of fan service stuff like certain characters turning up I think in this game I want to say Galactanite the sort of lesser known Metonite sort of mirror image character is the bonus boss in the arena, but I could be wrong about that. That's just the kind of thing that Kirby fans kind of dig, I think, is seeing how this all comes together in some

way. Yeah, Andrew was saying off Mike that there's sort of a Dark Souls thing happening in this era of Kirby in which there's a lot of lore. Whenever I'm playing one of these games, I don't think there's a lot going on because every game starts off the same way. Kirby's asleep, some God crashes on his planet, turns everyone to the Borg or whatever. There's always some world-destroying calamity happening while Kirby is asleep and he's got to go save his friends. But then when you get to the final boss, there's all this dialogue all of a sudden and you're like, oh, so this is what

the game was about the entire time? And then you realize like, oh, okay, there are things happening that I just took for granted. And yeah, Stuart, there's a lot of fan service, but you don't necessarily need to be into that to enjoy these games. But if you play them back to back, you'll notice like, oh, if I was playing

this at the time, I'd be like, oh, hey, Marx is back or this guy is back. And it's like, it's a big moment in the game, but if you're just playing it superficially, you're just like, oh, it's a new character, but you can see them really building a roster in this era, and it's really great. Yeah, one of the major through lines that is so easily overlooked is this little orange butterfly that appears in all the cutscenes and stuff, and you just don't even think anything of it. But then it turns out to be morpho night, which we all got to see in Forgotten Land,

which is like another one of the like galactanite tier knights and he's been around since now, crazy. I had no idea. Yeah, and every single thing, I just think about the Venture Brothers, to be honest. There is also that, yeah, nobody suspects the butterfly, of course, yeah, yeah. It's a Simpsons reference too. Speaking of like gameplay in this game, though, it's really kicking off what I love about this era in which we talked about with Kirby's Epic Yarn

where it's like, oh, I need to restart the stage because I didn't perform well enough for the game standards. In this one, we're really kicking off the era in which the games are saying, okay, there's one, two, maybe five secret things in the stage and maybe there's a slight amount of friction when it comes to getting them. But if you play, you know, somewhat skillfully,

you can find all of them. And I feel like there's just enough pushback to make that satisfying. Although in this game, when I was playing it again, there were a few moments in which, oh, I hit the wrong switch. I have to leave the stage and come back and hit the right switch to get the,

the trinket and they would they would really refine that in the future where things were limited to like puzzle rooms or you could retry a challenge if it involved getting one of those special objects it's i mean it's also the the seeking of 100% completion again is i hate saying this because i know it's obvious but it is optional you don't need to get all the gears to finish the game i don't think but you're not a real gamer though it's true it's true i mean the thing that's the thing with kirby you've got the surface level kind of challenge of like casual blow through, and I don't use casual as a dirty word. Then if you really want to, you know, get the high level,

if you want to get 100%, then you get in the true arena and you win it with no powers, you know, that stuff is all there for you if you want to do it, and you will be rewarded for doing so. But it's just you get what you want out of the game, and I think that's just something really cool about Kirby. Anyone pretty much can play it for whatever reason they want. I would say that playing with four players is the real hard mode because trying to get all of the collectibles with four players

seems like a fool's errand. Yes, actually, this is a different game, but with Star Allies playing with my wife, we had to make sure to plan out very carefully, okay, we can't miss this thing. Don't go in that door, don't go in the door! And then, you know, they're required a lot more conversations to happen in order to get all the trinkets.

No, I keep my friends on a tight leash, man. I think it was I say. They know what happens if they miss the collectible. They get hit. Yeah, I mean, I am not a completionist guy, but I feel like the Kirby games are, with just enough work, you can actually complete every little challenge. There's actually some stuff I don't even touch in the games, but in terms of the core game, I feel like you can have a very satisfying experience. I'm going to get every one of the gears or the chips or whatever, whatever the new trinket is in the new game. And you can satisfyingly get 100% and walk away, you know, having a good challenge and having, you know, a lot of time with.

the game although with forgotten land there are a few things i need to go back and get because they are a little too hard for me at this point i'm with we'll get to it but i'm not crazy about how forgotten land handles it's uh the missions you have to do because it doesn't reveal them until you've done the whole level uh and then you'll reveal like one and i just kind of get like i mean yeah you could look it up but i just feel like it's a little bit cheap a little bit like they're just stretching things out but the whole forcing you to replay that much combat going on There's not really that much content. So they're kind of stretching out what they have.

And I love that game, but we'll get to it. We'll get to it. Sorry, what did you say? Totally agree. I'm just saying that they're forcing you to replay the stage again, just like usual. Yeah, I really dislike that. It's one of my most disliked things. I really don't like it when you have to do it.

What I want is to be able to get everything in one pass. And if I don't manage that, that's my fault. But if it's along the lines of you can't get this because you need the ability to swim or something, you haven't got it yet. you know what I'm talking about like the kind of Crash Bandicoot thing where you need to get like you can't finish the level because you haven't got this green gem which is in like a level 50

that bothers me but Kirby's usually pretty good at avoiding that so yes that was Return to Dreamland again it is out it's new for the switch right now if you don't want to pay 60 bucks wait until Thanksgiving it might be 4799 and you can save save a bit although hey that voucher system is pretty good

I've been taking advantage of it for upcoming games on the switch you can save like 30 bucks. Then think about how many vultures I've actually bought and I start to feel like a fool. Before we get too far off from Return to Dreamland, have the new abilities. Do you guys have a favorite?

Ooh. You know what? Let me look these over because I should apologize. I should have apologized up front in that. Because a lot of these games are built on similar foundations, the ones we're talking about, a lot of the details run together for me. And yes, we probably will miss some details here and there just because there's a lot to talk

about. But I'm looking... playable characters, DDD, Metanite and Bandana, Waddle D here. Though in Dreamland Deluxe, I think you can all be Kirby. Am I right about that, I think? Yeah. But, yeah, of the new abilities in this game, I mean, I want for jokes, I want to say the whip, but, I mean, really, it's the spear, because twirling the thing around and using it like a propeller is really, really cool. Yeah, and I was going to say, with these abilities, are we at the beginning of Kirby controlling,

like a Smash Brothers character in terms of, you know, up and B, down in beach, charge. I think what it is. Kumazaki recognized that everyone's favorite Kirby game was Kirby Superstar, where he does have this repertoire of moves. And they just went, why is this not the baseline for every Kirby game

that we can do this? And that is now the case, thankfully, you know? Okay. Yeah, it was Superstar, but here it definitely, he just feels like so Smash Brothers character in terms of just there's so much versatility. Whenever you get an ability, make sure you pause and you can just page through like three pages

of moves for that ability. And Yeah, it's great. I think another thing that sells that feeling is, and it was backported into the deluxe version, is the ability to dodge. Oh, yeah, when you block and tap, you do a little dodge, right? Yeah, so convenient.

Yeah, despite there only being basically two buttons are using in the game. I mean, there are a few more. There's a lot of versatility to what Kirby can do. And I forget, is the sand ability new to this one, Andrew? Or is that an older title? The sand and the Mac are new to deluxe. Okay, I do like sand. I'm not sure what was new to the original game, though.

Yeah, sand, in my opinion, is probably the best of the bunch, simply because you can guard, and when you guard, you become completely immune to attacks. They just, like, go right through you. And it's the only ability that I've noticed that lets you attack coming out of guard directly. You don't have to unguard and then attack. you can just attack straight out of guard. Oh, yeah, actually, I never tried that.

I just like pretending Kirby is a bully at the beach. He's just kicking sand at people. Making sand castles. I don't like sand. It's coarse and rough and irritating, and it gets everywhere. I knew where you're heading that direction. Yeah, that's it happen. I just found it very effective, just like shooting sand at bosses and just taking

them out very quickly. Pocket sand. Yes, that is in pocket sand too. That's my preferred sand reference. Pocket sand. It's great. good tactic but yeah return to Dreamland Deluxe good

I it's available and hey if you want to play the original Wii version you have precious little time to download that unless you have the box copy moving on really briefly here we can just touch upon this there was a 10th anniversary Kirby collection called a Kirby's Dream Collection and this was not in Europe

okay yes not released in Europe it was a bad day for Stewart yeah and yes it's like Nintendo was doing a few of these at the time, I think it wasn't released as a separate title, but there was a Mario All-Stars collection. I think that was just a bundle, though, but they were playing around with that idea. The Mario All-Stars was, and again, I don't like saying stuff like this, but it's true. It was essentially the S&S ROM on a disc. Like, it just booted straight into the game. There's nothing added to it. It was just the SNES game sold for about 30 quid. There was a booklet

with it, I believe, which said, like, Mario is great. We are the best. or something. Yeah, it was very no frills. There are frills here, to be fair. It's not like when they did Mario 3D, Mario 3D All-Stars, which was just a lot better in terms of celebration by making something available

that previously wasn't. But here it's just like, here's the SNS game we made, which isn't really not that good a way of playing these Mario games. But here it is again anyway. I don't know. But this is better than that, though.

Yes, it is. And it was actually released as the original title that you could buy was not just a pack-in game. And yes, included Kirby's Dreamland 1 to 3, Kirby's Adventure, Kirby Superstar, and Kirby 64. So yeah, presumably

these were all on virtual console by this point in time, I'm guessing, but if you didn't buy them... Yeah, they were. Yeah. And if you didn't buy them, it's just a way for you to get them all on one disc, and I assume there were no emulation issues or anything like that, although it could be wrong. But they did include some new stuff. Challenge stages

that were basically built from the parts of of Return to Dreamland. Yeah, that, to me, like, that says it all because, like, they really didn't need to do that, but they did, you know, that, that is Kirby all over, just like, we've put, we've bundled as much as we can in here for you. It's like a box of fun, uh, just completely unnecessary, a fun pack, if you will. A fun pack, exactly, yeah. But when they could have called it Kirby's fun pack too, why didn't they just do that?

I didn't get it. Missed opportunity. Anything else to touch upon? Yeah, it comes with three episodes of the anime, can be right back at you, and you don't have to watch them. You have the option to not watch them, so that's great. Right. That's true. We talked about that last time, but it was like very widely released, too.

If you ever wanted physical copies of the Kirby anime, there was a lot of it. It was on the 3DS as well, the theater that they had. You watch like almost all of it on there. Oh, wow, that's very strange. If you wanted to watch incredibly low-res, like, terrible sound versions of a bad anime, then, yeah. It might cover up the bad 2D, 3D integration in that series. Who knows? But, yeah, that was the 10th anniversary.

Sorry, that was a 20th anniversary of Kirby. I guess for the 30th anniversary, we got Forgotten Land. I don't know if Japan, Japan probably got like a concert or something. I recall like a video last year of people singing, yes, there were people singing happy birthday to Kirby, and it was very adorable at some live event. Thank you. So moving on, we got to move on to Kirby Triple Deluxe, and I will admit, up front, I totally ignored this game.

I totally underestimated this game. My own thoughts at the time, being very snotty. I don't know why. I don't know why, but I was like, yeah, you just made a 2D Kirby game with 3D effects. And I just took it for granted that it was a very, very good game that was building off of another very good game I didn't play at the time. And this one is fantastic. It feels very similar in the way it controls to return to Dreamland. But there's some very interesting choices in there and a lot of content to play around with in there.

And I believe, what is the Kirby special? Is it hyper? Hypernova. Hypernova. but there we go. And like you were saying earlier, Stuart, that is playing off of the idea from the last game in which

let's have a fun big screen clearing effect and like puzzles to work around that. In this case, the screen clearing effect is a giant Kirby. And I feel like... Here, it's used to better effect, I would say, than just repetition because the stuff you're doing

is so totally OTT and insane at times that it never gets old. I don't think. I mean, it's kind of just watching. in a cutscene. It's sometimes, but it's such an entertaining cutscene. Like you are, you swallowing an enormous eel for some reason.

Yes, yes. It's very QTE, but it is very fun and there are so many custom animations built in. And you mentioned swallowing the eel. I will say, Stuart, that's the one time I felt bad about Kirby eating an enemy because that eel knows it's going to die. You can see the look of fear in its eye as you're sucking it in. And I'm like, I need to start questioning what Kirby's doing to these enemies

and where they're going. But yes. And it's fair in its eye and it's going to die that's a moray. Hey, I like that. That describes it while. Hypernova is the main gimmick here. And there are little sections of the game built around this giant Kirby. And it feels like how there was a power up in New Super Mario Brothers, at least the first one in which it made Mario very big.

But that was just kind of it. They couldn't find anything fun to do with that. But here I feel like they found a way to play with that idea of making the character huge. And so many games have had a power up like that, but they really couldn't do. anything fun with it, but here it really works out well. Is it less so that he becomes huge that he just gains insane amounts

of suction power, like way more than usual. Oh, right, sorry. Yeah. I mean, he looked at this last year. His mouth obviously is massively expanding. Right. But I don't think he physically grows rather than just that his power is ridiculously enormous, which makes it all the funnier that this tiny little pink guy is just

destroying the world. I mean, that's kind of the appeal. Yeah. I was misremembering it. because I did play this last year. But, yeah, the size is the same, but the destructive power is as if he's, like, a huge character. And it's sort of like... It's huge in his heart. Yeah.

And it's kind of like... I mean, Kirby does have his version of the Invincibility Star, but it's more fun than that, I think. Yeah, yeah. That's point. It's called the hyper lollipop or something, right? Yeah, yeah. And I feel like you don't see that as much in these games

because they found more fun ways to play with the idea of just you being an unstoppable killing. machine that can just mow through everything in your path. I feel like this game gets overlooked a lot being on the 3DS and not being planet robobot. But, man, I'm just a sucker for 2D games where stuff happens in 3D, where things are coming at you from the background or, you know, things are happening in parallel, you know, just more stuff like that, more thinking outside the box and adding more.

depth to a 2D experience goes a long way I mean I would say I tend to play with my 3DS without 3D on when I first play this I had 3D on but this game one of the only things that brings it down and it's not really fair to say it brings it down because it's the hardware it's designed for is when you're not playing it in 3D it can be kind of like rough in places because you are almost guessing the depth of stuff. It's a little bit like trying to play Mario 3D land in 2D where you go into those bonus rooms and you can't see how the blocks are laid out because it's like an illusion, you know? But that said, if this is like, if Robobots are 10, which it is, this is like a 9.5,

like it's really, really good regardless of that, I would say. I did play it on my new 2DSXL obviously does not have 3D and I noticed some sections where I thought, okay, this would be a little easier if I did have 3D on or if I had 3D period but ultimately it's still a Kirby game and you can kind of figure it out without that little boost. It's not going to stop you getting like 100% or anything. It's just you might take a hit. That's pretty much it. I was more annoyed by the motion control stuff but that's because they're just total like gimmicks. They're fine but I don't really want to do tilt controls. I just want to run and smash things. Oh I forget like it's been a bit what were the tilt controls in this in this game there'll be like a sort of a gondola hanging

on a rail and you jump in it and then you tilt and it'll slide along and it's just a little bit lame but it's fine it's fine it's not like huge problem or anything it's just a little bit lame i only remember when you have to blow into the thing so i just maybe forgot about that but yeah always unnecessary and actually the one thing i like about uh going back to kirby's epic yarn the the 3DS one takes out the motion controls you can just play everything with the remote which is great yeah yeah absolutely

but yeah like you Stuart I think this is a very good game but it's you know in comparison to what comes after it pales in comparison a tiny bit but I do feel like this is Return to Dreamland but made with the hindsight of having

produced that game I feel like this is the game that return to Dreamland should have been but it really couldn't have been because they needed to figure out the path for Kirby first. And if it just seems like, oh, just Kirby on the 3DS, it is that, but it's also like one of the best 2D Kirby games that is not trying for some big gimmick, like you know, you're in a robot suit or whatever. The, yeah, I mean, for sure, the fact that it is single player again really sort of revitalizes the focus, because the level designs, as good as they were in Return to Dreamland, they were spread out for four players. And here, it's just you. And they set

pieces just come thick and fast like almost every screen there's some cool thing happening that's new some interesting thing to see so you never feel like it's just washing over you um like the design has just gone up a notch and it's going to go up another notch somehow amazingly um we're just we're just there folks this is like pete kirby we're in it we're about to get into the really amazing like the next two games man i just i can't just too good yeah there's a lot to talk about i mean I think this is also the era, and it's in your notes, Andrew, that they are also selling the Kirby's sub-games on the e-shop, which makes it an incentive to buy the complete game because it's like, oh, you could buy the day-to-day's drum dash for $5, or, hey, it's just part of this Kirby game you're already buying. So we're in that era in which the minigames are being flashed out enough that they can be sold independently. though to be fair the mini games they sold separately do have additional content additional like songs for ddly drum dash additional uh powers for kirby fighters and stuff so they are fleshed out a little bit more than just as they were but yeah otherwise absolutely yeah and is kirby fighters is that the basis for the the two kirby kind of brawler games that are coming up in the future or did they set down the foundation for that earlier i think that's a start yeah i mean kirby fighters is just like and this is going to be a bit this

is a bit crass but to me it's just kind of a crappy smash brothers like um it's not that fun to me uh without the sort of various sort of accoutrements whatever the word is that makes smash brothers what it is you've just got basically a bunch of kirby's and it doesn't really amount to anything um it's an interesting like minigame for sure but it's not ddd's drum dash which is something that i hadn't ever seen before or since and has a lot of depth to it that you wouldn't expect while not being over long and outstaying it's welcome. The fact that you're hitting both the beats and the offbeats for extra points, you know, making your way through without missing any beats in order to unlock

like harder versions of the songs or retro versions of the songs. There's a lot to do there. So they are interesting mini-games and they are more fleshed out than the usual ones, like Megaton Punch, which is just two button presses or three, I should say. Yeah. The fact it's amazing, obviously, but it's three button presses. And it's not like quick draw where you're just hitting A button once. Yeah.

As fun as that can be. Yeah. It can. I mean, my favorite Kirby minigame is the one where you're eating loads of eggs and then closing your mouth when the bombs get thrown out. Oh, yeah. That's a lot of fun, too. They finally brought that back in Returns Dreamland Deluxe. But these fleshed out many games are cool as well.

I just personally have no incentive to play Kirby fighters because it's just not that good to me. It's a bit of like of a Smash Brothers demo, but it, it's a bit of like of a Smash Brothers demo, but it, It's enough to, like, just tinker with. But, yeah, there are better many games. We're talking about favorite special abilities that are new to the games. I think, I don't think, I don't find it very useful. But I do like the circus ability just because Kirby turns into a new stupid thing every time you hit a different button combination.

I do appreciate that. I like the bell because Kirby just walking in time with the bells as he swings them. It's just really cute. Yeah, he's like an aggressive town crier in that. Any favorite abilities in this one for you, Andrew? Any of the new ones? I'm always a fan of the Beetle because it simply just combines cutter with suplex. It makes it a lot faster and a lot easier to use than suplex on its own.

So that replaces Bugsie's usual power-up. They replace suplex with Beetle. I don't know if it necessarily replaced it. Well, I mean, in this game it replaced it entirely, but I definitely think it's an improvement in general because its suplex was very limiting because it was such a physical, like, close-range ability. And Beetle makes it a lot easier to deal with when you're stuck with enemies that don't match up well against it. Yeah, it's got a lot of versatility in terms of interacting with the levels as well. As you've noted here, we can cut the ropes and it can pound the stakes into the ground, which we all need to do.

Cut and pound. You can't do that with anything else, you know. I could have sworn that Archer was in Kirby's an amazing mirror but I'm thinking of like Cupid or something Yeah Yeah

Archer is very similar Archer is much better than that At least in name alone Yeah yeah So anything else about this game I was going to ask Is this the Kirby game In which the final boss battles

Start getting extremely long In multi-part Or had they already reached this level I just remember I played these all recently So it could be just like Recency bias But I remember playing

This and Star Allies and they're just being like, I thought the final boss is over, but that was three phases ago. I mean, for me, I would say, yeah. There is a two-phase final boss in Return to Dreamland Deluxe. Sorry, just return to Dreamland,

but I'm pretty sure that it was just, sorry for the spoilers, Magalore and then Magalore's soul. Whereas here, you've got Queen Sectonia just like over and over again in different forms as memory serves, and then if you're playing on Arena, you've got Sectonia's soul as well. so yeah i mean i remember the the finale for this game being absolutely unbelievable like just constantly

going and going and going but then even that they top they top in the next game as well so yes i'm not complaining i just think when you get to those boss fights you just kind of forget you're playing a kirby game you're like oh i i didn't realize this i was this was in store for me Moving on to Kirby Planet Robobot, named after my favorite games press personality, Jessica Robobot. This game was released in June of 2016, in April of 2016 in Japan, and, hey, Europe, got a simultaneous release. How about that? No, good for lucky us Day one, day one.

This is the one I need to play more. I played the first two worlds of it and I did really like it and again I did feel bad that I didn't purchase it in 2016 but this one I feel my own stance on it is a lot of the Kirby games

in the past relied heavily on mixing abilities in order to solve puzzles in order to find things and I feel like this is the one that really gets it right because you're mixing abilities to have fun, first and foremost. And those mixing ability areas are really, like, in a bubble.

And by that, I mean, you are in a mech suit, and the mex suit is what makes the transformabilities into different things. And that's what the gimmick is in this, is that Kirby can occasionally jump into a mech suit, and it's very cool. Well, it's like they played Mega Man X, and they went, hey, these right-armabits are amazing, let's make that the whole game. very clever in my opinion and of course

what it allows for again is much more discipline level design because when you're in that meck you're powerful as hell but you can't fly you can double jump which means you can platform which means there's actual platforming again the puzzles are usually completely reasonable they've now started marking

which doors are one way and which ones aren't as well so you know when you're going in door whether or not you can be able to go back up the same one again so that's very nice of them I think they mark that with a dark orange star above a door means you can reuse it they're just being as friendly as they can be here

which means they can push the boat out and make it a bit more challenging like the boss battles in this game are just it's got the best Whispy Woods ever you know and that's a hard competition because Whisby Woods is my favourite body I don't know what Kobe's problem is

but we've talked about that I'm sure but yeah I mean this to me is this is almost like, I can't decide between this and Star-R-Eylies. I think this is a slightly better game. I think it's Pete Kirby. I think all the levels are brilliant. All the bosses are brilliant.

The story is interesting. The fan service is just like off-the-charts level of, oh my God, it's that guy from that thing. There's so much to do and see. The mini-games are probably some of my favourites as well. I don't even know way to begin praising it. It's just every level is great. All the powers are great.

All the mecsuits are great. The arena is great. The rewards for the arena are great. It's just top tier. I also have a theory about this game, which is that it's kind of a rebellion game from Hal, and this makes no sense, but the fact that the villain is called President Haltman,

you know, where you've got Hal in there, and it's about how they're making everything uniform and mechanical, and part of me wonders if maybe it's some kind of, like, really, like, not subtle, but, like, light auto-criticism of the fact that all their games are ending up in the similar kind of engine and similar kind of gameplay. I mean, if this is what you get out of it,

then great, I don't care. But, nah, it's fantastic. One of my all-time favorite Kirby moments, and again, I apologize for the spoiler, is when the Axisark turns around and you see that it's Nova from Superstar. You have not seen since Superstar. It's just an absolutely outstanding piece

of visual storytelling. You know, it's top tier. I love it. I'm going to stop going on about it now. Yeah. No, I mean, there's so much to love about this game, and I was sad I didn't get to play more of it. I'm going to keep playing it after this podcast, because now I can easily, I have access to every Kirby game now, and there's only a few left I need to play, but really impressed

by what I saw on this. The aesthetic is very cool. I made a joke about it up front. It's sort of like the Borg is taking over Kirby's world, so everything has a neat, like, cybernetic aesthetic to it. It's something. they played with a little bit like in individual stages but here it's layered throughout the entire game

and they find new and eventive ways to play with enemies you know everything is new in a mechanical sense and the cyber suits the mech suit or whatever you want to call it is very neat because the abilities that you absorb don't just give you new attacks they also change the way you can move around

like I believe the getting the parasol with a mech suit basically turns you into a giant like helicopter of death yeah yeah yeah really really cool stuff And great animations, super inventive. I assume a lot of people miss this because 2016 where the 3DS is kind of being phased out a little bit, the switch is just around the corner. There are later Kirby games on the 3DS, but this one, it feels like people might have missed this one. And if you did, it will be worth the $40 that Nintendo will charge you on the final day of the 3DS shop.

I mean, surely the 3DS has the most single Kirby games ever released for a single system. It must be. Ooh, I'd have to do the math, but... Maybe the Game Boy? Maybe? But, I mean, it's Triple Deluxe. Two games spun off from that. That's three already. Rubber Bot, two games spun off from that. Rumble, epic yarn.

We're up to seven. I'm sure there's more than that. It's like Fighters Clash or whatever. Yeah. And Kobe's Adventure 3D. All sorts. It's just it never ends. Yeah, that very well could be And then you can play I mean if you want to kind of virtual console A lot of them are on there too

So yeah yeah 3DS was a very good home for the The Kirby series The Switch is really turning into a good home as well Especially if we see more ports I would like them to port this And Triple Deluxe in a two pack to the switch With really not much change

Other than improved visuals Because the Planet Robobot does not deserve to be locked To a 240p screen on a dead handheld. It deserves better. Yes, absolutely. Yeah, I was thinking the same thing. As much as I love my 3DS, these games don't require two screens at all. And a lot of games on the 3DS I love do, and they're fine being there, but I really feel like get these on a switch, get these on Switch 2 or whatever,

a new Kirby collection perhaps. And I'm going to assume a lot of people might have missed these games, and this one especially just because of how Lay came out. Andrew, what are your thoughts on this one? Again, we're in love with it. Oh, I am too. It's probably one of my favorites, which is funny because like you, Bob, I kind of waited on playing it until, I think, last year. And, you know, I thought the whole mech thing was just another gimmick. Oh, yeah, okay, whatever. But man, it's so much more than a gimmick. It's integrated so well into everything you do, all the puzzles, all the fighting. Like, it just, it just works so well. And it feels like it shouldn't. But it does. I love it. Yeah, like I was saying earlier, Andrew, I think it works well in here because it's just used for you to have fun. I did like playing around with the different ability combinations in Dreamland 3 and Dreamland 2 and even the N64 game. But I feel like a lot of those eventually turn into a pain in the ass where it's like, okay, go to this stage, absorb this enemy, go to that stage, absorb that enemy.

Now go to this other stage and get to this part without losing that ability. So it took all the fun out of what should have been a fun experience, you know, fun with experience. It's, you know, fun with experimenting. And I feel like this... Sorry, my Brutus whistling. I feel like this really gets it right. Bird loves it. Let them whistle. I love it.

Yeah, hopefully Louis's being edited out, but he's screaming profanity about his love of Kirby. Yeah, I just realized they probably shouldn't draw attention to Louis. Sorry, Louie. No, it's okay. I was going to say, listeners, if you hear a small, cute thing eating apples in the background,

it's not Kirby. That's my parrot, because I'm recording from home today. The abilities, the new ones are kind of lackluster, though. I mean, aside from maybe ESP, there aren't really a standout bunch of ESP that's got I mean I only clocked this the other day

when I started playing this again but ESP is totally a Ness reference right he gets the hat and everything and he basically controls like Ness does in Smash Brothers I didn't really like I know I couldn't remember if ESP had been in previous games but I don't think Kirby actually dressed up like Ness in previous games Oh yo-yo kind of looks like Ness

Yeah that's what I was thinking of probably because yeah Ness can use a yo-yo and I think that the reference they were going for then but yeah there's there's some fun new abilities uh again sometimes I like an ability even if it's kind of useless I like the doctor ability just because I think it's fun that in a 2016 game Kirby can throw pills at people kind of fun I'm surprised they didn't change that but uh sure it's just kind of cute and I like his little laugh it does feel like dr. Mario reference as well I mean the double tap attack where he just throws a clipboard out is one of the funniest things in a Kirby game to me.

He has all the doctor weapons, it's true. And I didn't get a chance to check out the side content yet. Tell me what's going on with this stuff in terms of like the side games. So this is when like you first really get a feel for a 3D Kirby game with the Kirby 3D Rumble where you're actually like moving around in 3D inhaling enemies and you can kind of see, okay, well this is this could work. this is a thing that can happen. It's very much a sort of score attack kind of dry run rather than about really navigating I say space

that there is combat, there is dodging and things like that, but I'm trying to remember the other mini game was the one where you fight a giant boss like Monster Hunter's style, wasn't it? It was Kirby Clash or something. I can't remember if, I mean, I know they made this a free-to-play game. I don't know if they made this a complete box product, but when I tinker with the free-to-play game,

I was surprised like, oh, this is just Kirby Monster Hunter. And if I had time for a free-to-play game, I would definitely sink time into this because it's cute, it's fun, it's very grindy, but that's how far the Monster Hunter tentacles have reached, even they grabbed Kirby and pulled them in. The side game version of this and the sequel, if memory serves, the way it works is you have to buy,

you have to use apples to get energy and you only get a certain amount per day. But you can buy more. I think if you, like with real money, if you buy, I want to say $40 or $50 worth, of them, it never charges you again and you have infinite. It's like, okay, so there is a top limit on the microtransaction

which makes me think that Nintendo just don't quite understand how to rinse people. Like, they do not understand. Like, that is not how you exploit people's gambling addiction, you know? You don't give them stuff. Yeah, I think they eventually learned how to do that in our modern era

with like the Fire Emblem Wifu game, but back then it was like them just getting their toe in the water and then being a little too humble about it. Like with that Rusty's real deal baseball game, there's a max amount of money you can spend and it's it's not hard to gain the system to find the the minimum amount to spend and then you're basically paying for like a $10 or $15 game and it's totally worth it but that was just them saying like how does how do microtransactions work and then once they found out they're like give me give me give me but this is a very cute era for them rusty's real deal baseball that's going to become non-functional completely isn't it when that thing goes down surely yeah unless you've already done all of the buying actually I forget if you can add money to your 3DS accounts I forget how that works you can

I wonder if this is the callback to the server maybe stop working you have to buy the cards yeah and you better hurry up too yeah get on the WiiU and get all those those GBA games absolutely but any other any other things to say I mean again a lot of these games are built on the same fundamental technology and the same sort of sense of design

so as we go further down the list there's less to say outside of what they're doing differently and I hope we're not doing this a disservice but this is a very, very good game and I'm very excited. I'm very excited there's like 80% of a Kirby, an amazing Kirby game I have to play still on my 3DS and I'm going to get to that after this. This, it's not

on the notes so I could be wrong but the previous game 3D Triple Deluxe its bonus mode was called DDDTor that is in the notes where you're playing as DDDD playing through the whole game a bit like Meta Nightmare Ultra in the later games and that's Meta Nightmare I think returned for this one

because I remember playing through these levels as Metanite and it's a full game time attack where you can collect much like in Kirby Superstar Ultra you can collect points to then use powerful attacks to make things a bit breezier but you do have to ultimately play through the whole game in I don't think it's one sitting anymore I think you can save now but finishing that there's another there's another bonus boss at the end of that I think it's either Glactor or more finite I forget

but just even more content the arena the true arena, it's all there. I mean, the template is well and truly baked in now. They're just going to be iterating on it. And that's what they've done here to arguably the best the Kirby series has ever been. Like, I, a lot, people nowadays will still say Superstar is the best game, but I think this is much better than Superstar, and I love Superstar. Are you talking about Star Allies, Stuart, or Robobot? Oh, no, Robobot. Sorry, I mean, Star Alize, I love, but this, Robobot for me is Pete Kirby, I think. I mean, the fact that Star Allies has multiplayer really does elevate it for me,

but I think it's just that little bit sloppier in its level design because it has to accommodate four people, whereas this is just absolutely the most technical Kirby's been, the most imaginative it's been, and probably the coolest boss fights in the series, it feels like they're going to town on the boss fights here. I loved it. Fantastic game. You can definitely feel the shortcomings of a four-player game when you're playing it by yourself when they have to like give the screen a ton of real estate when you don't really need it

when you're playing by yourself but that's just one of the drawbacks. Okay, moving on to Kirby Star Allies, released worldwide in March of 2018. And this game, like I played it in 2022. And in reading about it, my research told me that this is very harshly criticized at launch because it was not rich in content. And a ton of updates came out. And I learned that the hard way because if you play this for the first time,

when you turn it on you will be like attacked by I don't know three minutes worth of like this is now available this is now available over and over and he realized like wow they really they really try to dig themselves out of a whole when it came to people criticizing this game how the way it ended up is just an absolute tidal wave of stuff like I'm reasonably certain this is the game that has the absolute most copyabilities I think it's something like 28 um it has the most it has basically the most of everything, it has the most individual boss battles it's probably the best looking Kirby game to date taking aside the frame rate thing we talked about

it looks incredible it's beautiful this game the sheer variety of the different locations is incredible the number of different characters you can play as from across the entire series and how they all have completely different movesets how they all

there's a bonus mode where you're playing as them going to the whole game and a lot of them have completely unique extra levels added in extra segments of levels like there's just no one has been there's no like half measures basically it's I mean when it launched you could say there were but they really polished it up into a big deal this one I think it's the best presentation in terms of like even and then this is a bit of a silly thing to highlight but like the menus with all the

different art on them and stuff like when you you play the arena or the ultimate choice and you turn up the difficulty and Kirby's little meal gets increasingly spicy and his expression changes, little cute things like that. Yeah, there's, there is just like an absolute ton of stuff here, which kind of makes up for the fact that when you first play through it, you will walk it, you will not die ever. It's so easy to finish, which frustrates me because it's the only Kirby game that I can think of that I haven't beaten the true arena on it because I can't do the. final boss, which is a complete different gameplay

until all the rest of the game. And this is also the game where the Kirby Law went to the moon as well, like even harder. Like, it's crazy the stuff that happens in this game. Yeah, again, it's one of those games where I got to the end and I thought, well, this is what it's about. It's very Evangelian, in

some ways, very heady, very based around religion, and lots of fun boss monologues. It's got a jump scare that actually got me as well. this game when hyna takes his hood off and heinous hood gets knocked off and he turns around and he's just got this really weird goofy giant nose face and it's just it's like almost like a jump scare i think my favorite thing about this game and i'm sorry because this is kind of a bit off topic but the three mage sisters who are the sort of servants of highness who's like this mage guy the mage sisters uh leon or francisco is like the ice one flamburge is the flame one and the lightning one is called zan podazan it's like guys like we have a naming convention going on here and what are you doing?

And he's like, nope, I'm named Zan Pardazan because it sounds absolutely awesome, shut up. Somebody wanted to be different. Yeah. And of course their bosses, their base is called the Jam Bastion. How good is that? One of the coolest things you talked about, Stuart, is in this game, you can play as basically any enemy.

I mean, there are some limitations, but you can play as any enemy. The way it works is you basically throw a friend heart to an enemy. They follow behind you. You can switch to control them. Another player can control them. And they each have their own movesets. And then sometimes you can combine abilities. That's a tiny bit clunky.

It mostly works out, but you basically hold up. And if an enemy can combine their ability with yours, it will happen. But it's just like the tiniest bit clunky. Like there's a bit of control, like math to juggle in your head. Like, okay, I want to control this character. Get rid of that one. When you come across a puzzle that requires, if it's just you and three AIs, nine times out of ten, they know what to do. That's very impressive.

One time, they'll be like, no, sorry, got no clue, mate. I don't know what's going on here at all. And that's very frustrating when that happens. I think Star Allies is almost a victim of its own excess, because it really is completely crazy and over the top and wild. untamed maximum Kirby like when you fight Void Terminator at the end which is this giant resurrected Dark Souls boss

thing which you're fighting in a completely different gameplay style when you're skidding around using this little ship thing locking on and firing like it's Panza Dragoon or some shit and then you get inside its heart at the end and when it appears it's got Kirby's face

and it's like what does this mean what is happening like what does any of this mean the implication that you found another, like the void might be Kirby, maybe, or something in Kirby's like species or something? It's a genuinely unsettling sequence, I think. They haven't followed up on it, because how can you? Yeah, this is really, I mean, to go with Kirby terminology, it's a Kirby buffet, basically. A dream buffet. Because of that, not everything really completely meshes together

just because they can't account for all of that. There's just too many variables floating around but it's like total fan service if you're into these characters if not it's just like

oh all these fun people I can play as all of these guest characters you can play as like basically everyone who's appeared so far is a playable character not just enemies

we've not seen them for long time like Rick Kyn and Koo they've not been playable for such a long time yeah and like the artist character I think from the 64 game is in this yeah Adeline yeah

and Ribbon the it's just it's such a huge love letter to everything kirby which is what makes me think is this the last is this the final like 2d kirby is this their apex is it just going to be all remex all the way down from now on like because where can you go from here once you've gone look here's everything ever here's everyone they're all completely unique they're all great fun they all have different levels it's all there it's so insane it's so wild yeah i do want to here, Andrew's thoughts. My final thought about, like, the game up front is that it, like, based on what you're saying, Stewart, it does feel a bit like Mario Maker. You're not making

stages, of course, but it's basically like, here is every Kirby variable accounted for. We put them all in one game, and we don't know what to do from here, because it's hard to think of what they can do with 2D Mario at this point as well. Yeah, I think Kirby has kind of eclipsed the whole 2D Mario thing. I hate to say it, but, like, you know, after like Mario World, 2D Mario is a kind of meh, especially when you have a series like Kirby that, granted, they're all pretty similar and pretty easy, but at least each one kind of really expands upon it in a meaningful way. Whereas, you know, we were just talking about, you know, the Wii new Super Mario Brothers where it's like, oh, well, I'm just big plowing through. That's not very interesting.

But, when Star Allies in particular, you know, it's so dark and, you know, it's so dark. The references to religion and everything are just so surprising to come from this game. It's kind of mind-blowing. And with all the characters showing up at the very end, Avenger style, to take out the final boss, it's just so epic. Like, I agree. Like, where do you go from here? But, you know, I think it really solidifies this overall concept of, you know, Kirby is kind of like this, like, force of good or, like, the heart of. of, you know, everything good in the universe fighting against, you know, dark matter or void or whatever you want to call it, which is basically like evil Kirby, you know?

So it's like these two super powerful godlike forces, you know, fighting each other. And luckily Kirby keeps coming on top and, you know, saving everyone. So you should all be thankful. Thank you. Yeah, it's, it's been very hard for me to care about 2D Mario games. I like when they turn into Mario games but the new Super Mario Brothers games have never really mesh with me

except for maybe the second 3DS one but that was built around a fun gimmick and I think they found a way to make that more exciting but yeah I just feel like there was more room to play around with Kirby just because there's a lot more going on mechanically and more abilities to build off of as well but this one has some fun little gimmicks in it

including friend actions in which you basically join with everyone following you in your party to form different formations like a circle which basically turns you into like a rolling donut of death a friend star which is essentially that's like the shoot-em-up portion of the game is that correct yeah pretty much yeah the bridge you basically use to solve puzzles the train is another like kind of auto-scroller kind of a stage you basically form a train with your friends and you just keep going forward and plowing through things And we also have the final ability

Which is unlocked in the final boss stage Yeah, the front train is just so funny and so cute looking They're just kind of conging along Just hilarious to look at Up the wall, over the ceiling Doesn't get old And just like absolutely destroying everything in your path Wouldn't be Kirby if they wasn't

But I think like Triple Deluxe This one was overlooked Especially as everyone was being very excited about the Switch and what it was doing. I'm sure this sold well, but I don't think this had enough of a gimmick to get people into a 2D Kirby game at this point in time,

but I hope people don't overlook this one. And before I've quite forgotten land, I think that it was the highest selling Kirby, but that's probably more of a testament to the Switch is like install sort of rate, you know? But also the fact is among sort of enthusiasts, this game launched pretty light on content and it launched at 30 frames per second.

And this was the first 30 frames per second Kirby game. And gamers don't like that. They get very upset. So there's a lot of people saying like, yeah, I'm not buying this because it's 30. You know, when you go on the classic always correct genius forum that is reset era. Oh, boy. Well, you know, I don't think it reviewed that well for a Kirby game either because of the lack of content upfront. But again, when you downloaded in 2023, you will.

just be attacked by minutes of updates before you can start the game and you'll see just how much they added. But yeah, very great game. Don't overlook it. I totally think it's worth playing through and there's a ton of content and a ton of a great fan service if you're a fan of these games. It really builds off of at that point 28 years, sorry, 25 years of Kirby, Kirby lore. Two things I want to mention, though, real quick. One, Swole DDD, absolutely iconic. cannot you know and two you can make friends with wispy words which almost made me cry after years and years of constant abuse of beating the piss out of wispy words every day all day you can throw a friend heart at wispy words and for the first time in its entire life it smiles at

you and i was like oh my god we finally recognize the abuse kirby's inflicting on that poor tree who's just hanging out and dropping apples on the ground he's just like hang on lads i have to go and kill this tree again it's not a robot this time I guess we do have a little bit of time to talk about forgotten land I mean it's not a new game it came out last year but we can just touch on it a bit because I feel like it is kind of like the Super Mario 3D world

of Kirby games in that it's not really like a true open 3D world and that's fine but I feel like there's just enough broadening of the Kirby concept to make it fun but still keeping it rained in to not get a little too crazy. Like, I don't think I can't really see like a Mario Odyssey style Kirby game that feels like it wouldn't really work. But there's so much going on here. And I feel like you can just jump right into this and immediately start playing it. The concept behind it is not different than

the overlying concept of a 2D Kirby game. As I mentioned earlier very briefly, I was not looking forward to this because I really don't, I really didn't want Kirby to not be 2D anymore. because I like 2D like high, well-made 2D platformers and that was a good source for them. When I did finally play this, and I say when I say when I finally played it as if I didn't pre-order the thing,

I had a ball, I really enjoyed it. Now, my overriding thoughts on this game to date, I would recommend it to almost anyone, but I would say this is a dry run. I think the next 2D Kirby game is not going to be particularly different in terms of structure, But I think it's going to be an absolute banger because they're going to take what they got here and they're going to really push the boat out like they did with RoboBot.

Like Triple Deluxe to me feels like the dry run for Robobot, which is a much better game, despite the fact Triple Deluxe is still enormous fun. So if this, again, if this was a nine, the next one is going to be a 10 and I'd stand by that. I'd bet real money on that, I think. Yeah, I feel like there are, like looking back at the trajectory of the Kirby series, I feel like we will look back at this one saying, oh, this is not really the memorable one. And we were really in love with it, but boy, the next two, what they did with the Kirby series, they really built off of this. And this is good. But there are some stumbling blocks. There are some things I would change, like we talked about up front, Stewart, that, you know, it's another fine the things kind of Kirby game, which is fine.

But the objectives are not shown to you all up front, and it feels like an artificial way to extend gameplay. And it's already a perfectly long enough game to me. and I feel like it was patched in maybe I'm just misremembering things but there were little challenges you can do on the side that involved the abilities and when the game first release I don't think you could just hit start

and then restart the challenge I think you actually had to die or exit the stage but I think they might have patched in the ability to restart but yeah that was that was my main complaint about the game and they fixed that at least that leads into my other issue with the game which is what makes me think it's quite conservative

is I don't think they know exactly how to make an interesting challenge in this just yet because there's a lot of segments that are timed and they're usually pointless because if you fail you can just go back and do them again anyway so it almost feels like they just were like oh this bit's not interesting let's just stick a 10 second time limit on it thankfully the bonus challenges you don't have to beat the par times to get 100% you only have to beat them once normally but then the challenges they think threw in for the boss fights and one of the recurring ones is beat the boss without taking a hit that's not kirby to me that ain't kirby kirby's scrappy you know it can be difficult but it

should always be scrappy i don't think demanding perfection is very curby thing to do um i mean if we're talking something like sonic where they need whatever they can get then yeah but kirby's better than that to me and i didn't really like that yeah that did feel like a a an uncreative choice and also one that didn't feel Kirby to me I did like the challenges that were like beat the boss with this weapon but yeah that's fine perfection is is not what I consider like the Kirby player is trying to achieve to me it's just not that fun trying to beat like what is genuinely a quite hard boss without taking a hit

you can say yeah get good fair enough but like that to me it just is just padding yeah and it makes it makes it not fun which is not really the point of Kirby, ultimately. Andrew, your thoughts on this game. We know you like it. It's hard not to like. But, you know, with these major Nintendo Switch releases, I always have concern. You know, Thoth of the Wild was great, but it has its faults.

Same with Odyssey. And I was, you know, okay, this is going to be good. What are the faults going to be? But I feel like out of those three, this game has the fewest faults that I feel. It controls so well It does so many interesting things So many good puzzles Where they're just

Not even like using the powers Just like hidden in plain sight Just like going off to the side Oh there's a secret Yeah it's real good at that Like Mario 3D land style It's a good comparison that Bob made I think Because they do the same thing

Just like hidden plain sight exactly You just need to be You need to be curious And reward you for that And the mouthful mode which we haven't really talked about. You know, I go back and forth about it because, you know, Kirby, in all the other games, if you have an ability,

you can't suck up anything else. But in this game you can. But I think it's done in a way that it's meany, but it's actually a lot of fun and there's a lot of good gameplay cases for it. So, you know, I'll take it for what it is and enjoy it, you know. Yeah, the mouthful mode asked the question, what if Kirby couldn't swallow something? And then it has a lot of fun with that. I like, I mean, there's a lot of comedy in Kirby games, obviously.

We don't really talk about it that much. I mean, they're very cute, but I think there's a lot of comedy in seeing Kirby awkwardly waddling around with a staircase in his mouth. Oh, yeah. Just his skin painfully stretched over a car and you could just see his little eyes blinking in the front. It just, I really want to see more mouthful stuff in the future because, I mean, I'm sure that was difficult to implement, difficult to, you know, put in all the animations and stuff. There's not enough of it, but it's always so fun to see him just like a Kirby skin stretched onto an object and his little arms and feet wagging on some part of the object. Plus, the opening with him driving while that vocal song is playing is just so, just ridiculous to cute. Yeah, I was not expecting a vocal song.

Yeah, yeah. it's so good and of course mirrored again sorry for the spoilers the ending with the truck is just crazy absolutely crazy like driving across collapsing

like planets basically to ram a truck into what is essentially the sun unreal you would not expect that game to end the way it does I mean that final stage is insane just law dump as well when you start getting the English voiceover

in the lab it's just whoa it's like what's going on there and I've not really touched the post game content how is that I'm looking forward I mean I need to go back and save all the Waddle D's of course but how was the post game content in this it's cool you were saying other than doing the different rescues of the Waddle D's and the different missions

there's that whole extra mode where you basically do the levels of game you have to collect certain objects within them and then they're much harder as well when you're trying to rescue Leongar or something the Lion guy it's been a while I think that's his name You would think that those parts would be Would overstay the welcome

But they're fun enough and unique enough That it doesn't feel like it drags on too much And other games have done this But I am a huge sucker for any game Especially Japanese ones in which You rescue people And those people form a town that you can visit I love it so much

And I love seeing that in games Oh and this introduced the Being able to store health, right? Oh, that too, sort of like in Mario World or something, like you're storing a power up too? You can do that in Triple Deluxe, I think it's on the bottom

screen, you can put, like, you can collect an item and stick it on the bottom screen and tap it to use it, but I might be wrong about that. No, you're right about that, Stuart. In fact, I think Robobot has that too. It was a street pass feature, like the more you street pass with people, the better that item becomes, but obviously that's going to be hard to do. Robobot, you can use

Amoe as well, I believe. That was the first amoe capable Kirby game. Not that it matters. I bought all the Kirby Amoebo last year Or a lot of them last year Because after doing the June episode But yeah I guess any final thoughts on this era Like I'm really excited

Like we saw the 2010s Perfecting 2D Kirby With 3D graphics We're moving on to a new era I'm very hopeful It started off very well I hope it's not the end of 2D Kirby But like you said Stuart

It's hard to know where they would go after star allies Any final thoughts I'm feeling good about Kirby I wasn't feeling good about Kirby and the odds. 2010's brought me back on. Now I'm looking forward to every Kirby game. I just want to say that the co-op, having player too stuck with being Dan and Waddle D

just kind of stinks. It's not very full features at all. You can't really do much as a second player. Yeah, it was such an after thought. Yeah, that's something I feel like they will work on in the future, especially after Star Allies gave you just every possibility. But any thoughts about the future here? Like, we've covered the 2010s,

and I'm looking forward to what's coming. coming next. I'm fairly certain that the next thing is going to be, if it's not a little side game of some sort. I mean, we're getting a forgotten land too. Surely we're getting a sequel to that on some level. I can't imagine I'll go back to 2D now, or at least if they do it, it won't be before that. I think we've got more remakes in our future, and I'm happy about that too. But the fact is, I don't know, which is actually quite interesting, because it's really the first time in a long time that I could say that about Kirby. We're not really sure what they could do next.

They have so many options, you know. Yeah, it's so full of surprises. And I'm excited to see now that Kirby's in 3D, you know, what's going on Super Mario? I mean, Odyssey basically copied Kirby, let you become different things. So time to do something original with Mario. Yeah, you know, Andrew, that's very true. I'm not sure if we said it before, but I like Odyssey a lot, but I feel like that was not called out enough. And I think when I did call it out, people were confused.

Like, no, no, it's a Mario game. It's like, well, no, he's absorbing abilities. Can't you see? But that has been another episode of Retronauts. Thanks for joining us, folks. We are supported fully by all of you nice fans out there. If you want to support the show and get these episodes one week at a time in ad-free, please go to Patreon.com slash Retronauts sent up there for three bucks a month to get just that.

But I'll tell you folks out there, you want to sign up for the $5 a month level. Because at that level, you get early access. And on top of that, you get access to two full-name. bonus episodes every month. We are now in, I believe, our fourth year of doing these. So if you have not been part of the $5 level, you have missed over three years of bonus episodes covering all sorts of great things. Also on the $5 level, you get weekly column and podcast by our contributor to dive and fight. So again, $5 level helps support the show, gets you lots of bonus content on top of that. It's where you want to be as a Retronauts listener. And you can find us on

Twitter at Retronauts. And yeah, thanks a lot. Again, it's patreon.com slash Retronauts. Andrew, thank you so much for supporting us and, you know, bringing our patrons and our listeners this show. Do you have anything you want to plug? Anything you're a fan of? Anything you want to shout out on the air. I don't think anything... I don't have anything come in the mind. Yeah, I'm pretty boring. Sorry. We could say just Kirby in general. Support your local Kirby. Yeah, why not? Any drinks or snacks or nature walks or... All these games that we've mentioned are just tens. Play them. So much.

much game with content. Play them while you can. Remember that 3DS eShop, Wii Ue Shop, the doors are slamming shuts. Nintendo is setting the house on fire at this point. Stuart, how about you? Where can we find you? What are you working on lately? Well, I'm working on, well, I've got a book coming out through press run, which is called All Games Are Good. That's how, I'm not sure when that's actually, but I'll be sure to let you know. I'm currently reviewing every single Game Gear game ever on the Retronaut's website, and I have begun to realize my folly, but I'm

kind of committed now. And you can find me on Twitter as Tupacabra. Now, normally at this point, I would say don't read by terrible tweets, but I think some of them have actually been all right lately, so I'd give them a look. I support that. I recommend it. And as for me, I forgot to mention that I have written a book.

It will be available in September of 2023. It's available through Boss Fight Books. It's a huge history on Day of the Tenticle, the LucasArts Adventure Game. I believe you can go to Boss Fight Books online and pre-order your copy. There was a Kickstarter. It was very successful. so thank you if you supported it

but if not there's still time to pre-order a copy of my book looking forward to that and I'm also part of the Talking Simpsons network we do shows like Talking Simpsons and what a cartoon and you can find those where you find podcasts we also have a Patreon at patreon.com

slash Talking Simpsons we do mini series there about Futurama, King of the Hill Batman the animated series and we've done series about the critic and Mission Hill as well there's almost seven years worth of content

waiting for you there at patreon.com slash Talking Simpsons but thanks for listening so much, folks. We'll see you again very soon for another episode of Retronauts. You're going to be able to be.