Kirby's Adventure

This article was copied (instead of imported) from the now-deleted Awesome Games Wiki, with some edits.

Kirby's Adventure
"First you draw a circle Then you dot the eyes Add a great big smile And presto, it's Kirby!" — Intro (NES version)
Protagonist(s): Kirby Genre(s): Platform Platform(s): Nintendo Entertainment System Game Boy Advance Release Date: NES: JP: March 23, 1993 NA: May 1, 1993 PAL: December 1, 1993 GBA: JP: October 25, 2002 NA: December 2, 2002 EU: September 26, 2003 January 27, 2004 Developer(s): HAL Laboratory Publisher(s): Nintendo Country: Japan Series: Kirby Predecessor: Kirby's Dream Land Successor: Kirby Dream Land 2

Kirby's Adventure (also known as Kirby of the Stars: The Story of the Fountain of Dreams in Japan) is the second installment in the Kirby series, and Kirby's first home console game, being a late NES title. It was developed by HAL Laboratory, published by Nintendo, and released one year after the first game in the series, Kirby's Dream Land.

The game was later remade for the Game Boy Advance in 2002, where it was known as Kirby: Nightmare in Dream Land. It was released throughout 2004, and includes graphical upgrades, multiplayer modes, and a new Extra Game where you play as Meta Knight.

Why It's One Tuff Pink Puff

1. The game has some of the best graphics for an NES title truly showing off the graphical capabilities of the system that had never seen before, featuring very colorful, detailed and elaborate backgrounds (for its time, anyway). The graphics are so good, they even pushed the NES to its limits.
   • The graphics are only made better via the 3D Classics port, which adds some extra effects to them (like added gradients) to make them pop out that much more.
     • The GBA remake is, simply put, gorgeous, with the backgrounds being colorful, lush, elaborate worlds that are filled to the brim with detailed background designs. It's little wonder that the next two games (Amazing Mirror and Squeak Squad) kept this aesthetic.
2. The Copy Ability is introduced, which is somewhat like Mega Man's "Weapons Obtained From the Robot Masters" concept, but simplified: rather than keeping abilities forever (which only Milky Way Wishes from Super Star would do), Kirby can drop them at any point to obtain another one.
3. The controls are tight and responsive, as always for a Kirby game, with the new features such as Copy Ability attacks and sliding feeling right at home.
4. Meta Knight is introduced in this game, and he would become a staple in the Kirby series as the series' tritagonist. His boss fight in Orange Ocean is one of the best in the game and would later be reused in Super Star's Revenge of Meta Knight.
   • The "Meta Knightmare" sub-game in the GBA remake is also the first time in the series where he is playable.
5. The game is an expansion on what we had in Kirby's Dream Land, with a total of eight worlds (seven normal worlds and one world for Nightmare's boss fight) and a lot more environmental variety.
6. Great soundtrack composed by Hirokazu Ando, who would later go on to compose nearly every Kirby game's soundtrack.
7. Kirby can even slide by pressing Down and A, which is quite convenient.
8. There are even mini-games for side-entertainment, which include:
   • Crane Fever, where you catch Kirby dolls to gain 1-Ups.
   • Egg Catcher, where you have Kirby open and close his mouth to catch eggs.
   • Quick Draw, which is a duel mode where you must shoot before your opponent does.
9. The Boss Endurance, a mode where you fight all the bosses back-to-back, is pretty cool, but also difficult.
10. An early callback for the series, the last normal non-boss level from Rainbow Resort is a remake of some parts of some levels in Kirby's Dream Land.
11. An early demotion of an antagonist from a true villain to an anti hero (and the start of his evolution into the series' deuteragonist), King Dedede did his "nefarious deeds" to contain Nightmare inside the Dream Fountain, and helps Kirby fight him in the final boss fight.
12. Speaking of which, this is the first Kirby game to use the trope of the final boss being a giant scary foe that you fight with a weapon that can't be found in any other part of the game. In this case, it is the Star Rod, which is a very popular weapon.
13. There's a world map, which became a staple for the series that started in this game, and would later be used in every Kirby game, except Kirby Super Star's Spring Breeze, The Great Cave Offensive, and Revenge of Meta Knight, and the DS remake's Revenge of the King. Besides the levels, there are also other areas you can enter:
    • The Museum allows you to inhale enemies inside of it so you can copy the abilities shown on the banner.
    • The Arena lets you fight mid-bosses and obtain certain abilities from them (such as Hammer, Backdrop, and Throw Kirby).
14. Once you beat the game 100%, you unlock an Extra Mode, where you cannot save and have fewer HP, and must fight tougher enemies and bosses.

Bad Qualities

1. Some bad copy abilities or copy ability decisions, including:
   • Ball Kirby's controls are hard to get used to. However, once you get used to them, you can absolutely destroy bosses.
   • Sleep Kirby does nothing but sleep for about six seconds, making him vulnerable to enemies.
   • Light Kirby is also useless, as you only use it in one section, and it's not even useful in that section, as it only lights up the way.
   • There are two fire-type abilities (Fire and Fireball/Burning Kirby) and two ice-type abilities (Ice and Freeze Kirby), which doesn't make sense. Thankfully, in Super Star, they were combined together.
   • Fire Kirby is outclassed by Ice Kirby, and Spark Kirby is greatly outclassed by Freeze Kirby.
   • Spark Kirby's static field lags the game, although it doesn't happen in Nightmare in Dream Land.
2. Rolling Turtle and Bounder were replaced by Phan Phan and Gip, respectively, in the game's remake for unknown reasons, but thankfully Needlous replaced Spiny/Togezo to avoid regulations with the Super Mario universe.
3. The Meta Knightmare sub-game has a few flaws:
   • Meta Knight may dash faster than Kirby, but his attacks are slower.
   • He only has three hit-points, making it easier for him to lose a life.

Reception

Kirby's Adventure was well-received in contemporary reviews, scoring 84% with GameRankings, and many agreed that it was an improvement over Dream Land. The most common highlights included the new copy feature, tight controls, unique enemy and boss designs, and the hogh-quality graphics and animation. It is retroactively considered one of the best NES games ever made.

Nightmare in Dream Land was also well-received, scoring 81/100 and 8.3/10 from critics and users on Metacritic, respectively. The graphical upgrade, new features (such as Meta Knightmare mode), and multiplayer modes were all praised, but minor criticism was directed at the easy difficulty and short length.

Trivia

• Meta Knight can either help or hurt you in this game, as sometimes he'll give you a Maxim Tomato or Invicible Candy, but other times he'll summon the Meta Knights to fight you, and of course, he is the boss of Orange Ocean.
• The first letter of each world (Vegetable Valley, Ice Cream Island, Butter Building, Grape Gardens, Yogurt Yard, Orange Ocean, and Rainbow Resort) spell a reversed version of the visible spectrum mnemonic device ROY G. BIV.

Comments

Loading comments...