Kirby Kirby Kirby! Three Cheers for 3D! (Thoughts on Kirby and the Forgotten Land)

     Kirby and the Forgotten Land caught the eye of many a few months ago when it was announced as the first Kirby game to have a full 3D perspective. Just for that feat alone, I've already been very hopeful for the game as a whole, but we got a new trailer for it this week, emphasizing some new and returning power-ups, as well as the return of co-op! There isn't a whole lot to go off of just based on these two trailers, but I will do my best to help point out some things that I noticed from them so far, and give some hopes and predictions as we go along. Let's all get on our warp stars because we're headed to a new land of speculation and magic!

Kirby's got some new tricks!

    Kirby is a great Nintendo franchise with a long history, but he's never shown up in full 3D, save for a few shorter minigames or experimental titles like Kirby's Blowout Blast on 3DS or Kirby Air Ride, which is hardly even a Kirby game, still fantastic though, make no mistake. With this being the pink puffball's first outing in the new dimension, people have been curious as to how his copy abilities would change to suit his new environments, or how many of them would even make the transition. In the first trailer, we only saw a handful of returning powers, such as Sword, Cutter, Needle (or Spike), Fire, and Ice Kirby, but with this second trailer, we see quite a few more, some returning, and some brand new. Tornado Kirby is back for what may be the first time since Nightmare in Dreamland back on the Game Boy Advance (though I may be forgetting some appearances along the way), along with Bomb, Hammer, and possibly Crash Kirby (who just blows up the entire area). The new abilities shown in this trailer are Drill and... Gun Kirby? Maybe Explorer is the name they'll go with since he has a little Pith helmet on, but either way, these two new abilities look like they're going to be a lot of fun to use! As I said earlier, the returning abilities will surely feel pretty different with the new 3D landscape to use, and I'm still hoping for the inclusion of Wheel Kirby. I bet like it would feel great to roll around in all of these new levels!

Kirby isn't alone in this land!

    This new trailer also shows some other characters, the biggest being Bandana Waddle Dee who returns as a Co-op partner to join the puffball once again! Will we see other returning companions such as Meta Knight and Dedede as other characters? Only time will tell, but we do see Meta Knight in this trailer, dashing towards Kirby in what looks to be a lead in to a boss fight. It's nice to see some characters that we recognize here as the main characters I remember from the first trailer were the giant gorilla that seemed to be leaping around the city area and the little green floating mouse that we saw for a second in the original. He is shown off more extensively in this trailer, but we don't get much of an idea what his function is, if he had one. We still haven't seen any sign of King Dedede, but I'm sure he must be around somewhere, especially as we get a first look at the story of this game in this trailer. It's not much, but it already looks to be a slightly more interesting story from the traditional Kirby fare. We see Waddle Dees running away from these monsters, and then they get picked up and trapped in these flying cages that seal them away. Kirby's main goal so far is to save all of the Waddle Dees and return them to their little Waddle Dee village, which we briefly see in this trailer as well. All of the Waddle Dees have their own little habitats, and there's even a Diner Dash style mini game where Kirby has to feed as many Waddle Dees as possible. there's a Capsule Toy machine in the town that will let you get new collectible figurines, there's a fishing mini game, the list goes on! It's a cute touch, and I hope the Waddle Dees are able to contribute and grow the town as Kirby continues to find more and more as the game continues along!

Structure of the game

    Of course, it's always hard to tell at first glance from these trailers, but it appears that this game is not going to be an "Open World" game, and I don't think most people have been expecting one. There's a Warp Star at the center of the town and Kirby and his Green mouse friend jump on it to take them to what looks to be a world map, seemingly proving that the game operates on a level system, which is basically what most people expected I think. There's not much to say about the overall structure other than it seeming like a Kirby game, but translating the areas into 3D! I will say, I'm interested in the "dilapidated city" aspect of it that we see in these first two trailers, especially the area in the first that looks like an amusement park, because that just seems really awesome! Of course, if you've read my blog before, it shouldn't be a surprise that I would bring up a theme park, but I would be remiss to not mention how beautiful all of the different terrains look! In the new trailer, we saw a grassland, a desert, a tropical island, amongst many others! We did get a little sneak peek at a few bosses with one looking like maybe a wolf and the other one being a Tropical version of everyone's favorite living tree, Whispy Woods. There's also the aforementioned appearance of Meta Knight, so that's another boss somewhere along the way, though there is always a good chance of Meta Knight being playable later on. My fingers are crossed for another Meta Knightmare mode or Dedede Tour mode, but we'll have to see if those are added alongside the other Sub-games that we saw in this new trailer! Honestly there's not much else for me to say here, but so much of the game looks really impressive so far and I can't wait until March 25.

    Kirby is never extremely challenging, but in spite of that, they are always a lot of fun. My personal favorite has to be Kirby Super Star Ultra for DS which was an updated version of Super Star for SNES, but all of them are a good time I think! With this year being Kirby's 30th anniversary, it seems like a fantastic time for the Pink Puffball to finally enter the 3D space in a core game. Kirby and the Forgotten Land looks great so far, and I'm happy that there's not much time left to wait.

    Thanks so much for reading this, friends! I hope you're as excited as I am for this new game that's coming out shockingly soon! Before now, they only gave the "Spring 2022" window, so I sort of assumed that it would be delayed past that, but I'm very happy that they're giving an actual date. I hope you're all doing well and staying safe during these rough times. Until next time, this is your Self-Proclaimed Star Warrior, saying, Puyo!