Game Review: Kirby's Dream Land 3
2018-Jul-22, Sunday 19:43![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
dorchadas
In times of trouble, Kirby's cuteness is a healing balm.
Kirby is my favorite Nintendo character but I know almost nothing about the Kirby mythos. I played Kirby's Adventure and Kirby Super Star, and eventually the original Kirby's Dream Land, and that's it. So when I followed a bunch of Kirby tumblrs and other blogs out there on the internet, I had no idea who all the Lovecraftian abominations were. Watching the Kirby anime, with its backstory of Nightmare conquering the entire universe except for Popstar, only explained a bit. In the games I played, Dedede was the enemy and Kirby fought him to bring peace back to Dream Land, and that's just how it was. When I watched the beginning of Squeak Squad and saw that Kirby immediately rushed off to confront Dedede over his stolen cake, it made sense to me. Dedede is the great enemy, right?
I guess I'd still think that if I hadn't gotten the secret ending in Dream Land 3. Was the Kirby anime right, and Dedede is more of mischevous bumbler than the real enemy? Are there things out there that lurk in the darkness between the stars, hungering for the light and life of Planet Popstar? Was there a secret hand behind Dedede's actions in those earlier games? Who is the true enemy?
Who would have thought that there were such depths to a Kirby game? How deep does the rabbit hole go?
I guess that's tangental to the actual game, though, which is mostly cute and fun.
Forest Friends.
The big gimmick of Kirby's Dream Land 3 is the same as that of Kirby's Dream Land 2, which is that Kirby has animal friends who follow him from stage to stage and let him perform additional actions. There are six friends, and I'll just copy the list here from wikipedia:
Kirby has his normal copy abilities, though a lot fewer than in Kirby's Adventure. In exchange, every copy abilities has six mutations applied to it, one for each of Kirby's animal friends. For example, using the fire ability normally turns Kirby into a fireball and makes him charge forward briefly, but using fire with Chuchu spews a continuous short-range flame like a blowtorch, and using fire with Rick launches fireballs. There are none of the really interesting powerups from the earlier games, no hammer or UFO or high jump and not even the sword. But for most of the game, I didn't feel their lack. Spinning around in an umbrella with Chuchu was basically like a top copy ability, and Nago turning Kirby into a cloth and running him along the ground was very similar to previous game's Wheel. Since animal friends can be carried from level to level, and since almost every level has two or more animal friends, there is plenty of copy ability diversity. And I remember constantly having to go back to find a hammer and bring it forward in Kirby's Adventure, which I never had to do in this game. At first I thougth only having eight copy abilities would feel incredibly dull, but the number of copy abilities isn't indicative of the number of Kirby's abilities. Turning into a stone in Kine's belly and ramming enemies doesn't really map to anything in previous games.
Plus, the animal friends are just so cute. Look at that picture of Nago above, rolling Gooey along like a ball. That alone is worth the price of admission.
Kirby using the florist copy ability.
Every Kirby game has additional challenges to get 100%. In Kirby's Adventure, it's finding all the secret exits and clearing out each of the worlds. In Kirby's Dream Land 3, it's finding the heart stars. Every level has a puzzle that, if completed, awards Kirby and his friends with a heart star. Collecting all the heart stars in all the levels lets you fight Dark Matter and Dark Matter's master(?) Zero after defeating Dedede at the end of the game.
It is nowhere near as easy as that makes it sound. There is no one who explains what's going on and no hints other than a small picture displayed on the level select screen and occasionally a tone that plays during an area where the puzzle begins. Some of them are easy, like the picture above of watering the flowers. Some just require finding a particular item somewhere in the stage and then getting to the end. But a lot of them require specific animal friends, sometimes in tandem with specific powerups, and no way to know that without going through a level more than once. One level requires an animal friend not found in that level, which brought back memories of hammer-hunting in Kirby's Adventure. There are a lot of matching puzzles, and one puzzle based on sound. One level has a room with a miniboss behind an invisible door in an auto-scrolling section. At least there's a lot of diversity.
In the days before the internet, I'm sure I would have found this maddening. Going through a level multiple times, having to restart if I took the wrong door or stepped on a flower once and ruined a level attempt. Having to keep a notebook or something with maps and per-level notes. Fortunately, these are the days of the internet. I looked up a guide and used that to get all of the heart stars without having to redo the levels repeatedly.
Too many games to play.
After getting to Zero, I'm surprised it made it into the game without changes. An eye in a white cloud that attacks by opening red slashes in itself, out of which blood explodes toward Kirby? When defeated, the eye burst out in a spray of blood and starts chasing Kirby around the screen? This is where the secret horror of the Kirby games comes from, isn't it? The monsters that lurk out in the night. At least they're vulnerable to the power of love.
Boing.
Usually the music is one of the best parts of a Kirby game for me, and I was surprised that this time it wasn't the case. I barely remember any of the sounds from Kirby's Dream Land 3 other than the cheery song in the friends room and the tone that plays when Kirby stumbles on a puzzle sequence.
The visuals, though, are really pretty. It's cartoony, looking a bit like it's drawn in crayon. It reminded me of Yoshi's Island, which I remember a lot of people disparaging as childish back in the day but which holds up much better than any number of the games that tried to be realistic because art direction beats chasing the changing technological edge any day. Remember all of those early Playstation games we saw, and we told ourselves that no game would ever look better than this? Oops.
Anyway, the crayon style really adds to the cuteness, which is one of the most important parts of a Kirby game. Kirby and the Waddle Dees (Waddles Dee?) especially benefit from it in their roundness. And it's not like they used it as an excuse for substandard graphics, either. The transparency effects look great, especially in the ice level or the various levels with water or fog. While the other graphics are sometimes fuzzy, as befits the crayon aesthetic, the transparency is sharp. It's all deliberate and it fits the game perfectly.
Welcome to my nightmare.
Outside of the animal friends and the heart stars, the other mechanics are all the same as other Kirby games. Inhale enemies to gain their copy abilities, progress through the levels, defeat mini-bosses and bosses at the end of each world, and enjoy the cute gameplay. The heart stars made this the hardest Kirby game I've ever played, though. Even when I knew exactly what to do, some of the levels, such as the aforementioned invisible door level, required multiple attempts to get right. Any of the levels with flowers can be ruined simply by stepping once on one flower, requiring a restart, and that happened more than once too. By going for the good ending, I set myself up for a lot of extra frustration. But there's no other way. It's the completionist in me.
If I hadn't, Kirby's Dream Land 3 would have been a lot like Kirby's Dream Land--a cute and fun way to pass an afternoon. The heart star puzzles added that additional element to keep my interest over the longer levels, and while it's still not as good as Kirby's Adventure, I really like the game.
Kirby is my favorite Nintendo character but I know almost nothing about the Kirby mythos. I played Kirby's Adventure and Kirby Super Star, and eventually the original Kirby's Dream Land, and that's it. So when I followed a bunch of Kirby tumblrs and other blogs out there on the internet, I had no idea who all the Lovecraftian abominations were. Watching the Kirby anime, with its backstory of Nightmare conquering the entire universe except for Popstar, only explained a bit. In the games I played, Dedede was the enemy and Kirby fought him to bring peace back to Dream Land, and that's just how it was. When I watched the beginning of Squeak Squad and saw that Kirby immediately rushed off to confront Dedede over his stolen cake, it made sense to me. Dedede is the great enemy, right?
I guess I'd still think that if I hadn't gotten the secret ending in Dream Land 3. Was the Kirby anime right, and Dedede is more of mischevous bumbler than the real enemy? Are there things out there that lurk in the darkness between the stars, hungering for the light and life of Planet Popstar? Was there a secret hand behind Dedede's actions in those earlier games? Who is the true enemy?
Who would have thought that there were such depths to a Kirby game? How deep does the rabbit hole go?
I guess that's tangental to the actual game, though, which is mostly cute and fun.
Forest Friends.
The big gimmick of Kirby's Dream Land 3 is the same as that of Kirby's Dream Land 2, which is that Kirby has animal friends who follow him from stage to stage and let him perform additional actions. There are six friends, and I'll just copy the list here from wikipedia:
Before reading that, I had no idea that Chuchu was an octopus.
- Rick the Hamster, who can only jump once but can stomp on enemies, run faster, doesn't slide on ice, and can scale walls.
- Coo the Owl, who can fly quickly (even against strong gusts of wind) and can let Kirby inhale in mid-air.
- Kine the Ocean Sunfish, who can only jump once but can stomp on enemies, swim more efficiently in water (even against strong currents), and can let Kirby inhale underwater.
- Nago the Calico Cat, who can stomp on enemies and triple-jump.
- Pitch the Bird, who has more versatile copy ability variants than the other Animal Friends, but cannot fly against strong winds like Coo can and is much more limited in flying due to his small size, only being able to fly like how Kirby can float.
- Chuchu the Octopus, who can only float for a limited time before gradually descending, but is able to cling to and walk across ceilings and can grab items with her tentacles (identically to Gooey's tongue; in both cases, this function is only usable without an ability as it replaces Kirby's inhale ability).
Kirby has his normal copy abilities, though a lot fewer than in Kirby's Adventure. In exchange, every copy abilities has six mutations applied to it, one for each of Kirby's animal friends. For example, using the fire ability normally turns Kirby into a fireball and makes him charge forward briefly, but using fire with Chuchu spews a continuous short-range flame like a blowtorch, and using fire with Rick launches fireballs. There are none of the really interesting powerups from the earlier games, no hammer or UFO or high jump and not even the sword. But for most of the game, I didn't feel their lack. Spinning around in an umbrella with Chuchu was basically like a top copy ability, and Nago turning Kirby into a cloth and running him along the ground was very similar to previous game's Wheel. Since animal friends can be carried from level to level, and since almost every level has two or more animal friends, there is plenty of copy ability diversity. And I remember constantly having to go back to find a hammer and bring it forward in Kirby's Adventure, which I never had to do in this game. At first I thougth only having eight copy abilities would feel incredibly dull, but the number of copy abilities isn't indicative of the number of Kirby's abilities. Turning into a stone in Kine's belly and ramming enemies doesn't really map to anything in previous games.
Plus, the animal friends are just so cute. Look at that picture of Nago above, rolling Gooey along like a ball. That alone is worth the price of admission.
Kirby using the florist copy ability.
Every Kirby game has additional challenges to get 100%. In Kirby's Adventure, it's finding all the secret exits and clearing out each of the worlds. In Kirby's Dream Land 3, it's finding the heart stars. Every level has a puzzle that, if completed, awards Kirby and his friends with a heart star. Collecting all the heart stars in all the levels lets you fight Dark Matter and Dark Matter's master(?) Zero after defeating Dedede at the end of the game.
It is nowhere near as easy as that makes it sound. There is no one who explains what's going on and no hints other than a small picture displayed on the level select screen and occasionally a tone that plays during an area where the puzzle begins. Some of them are easy, like the picture above of watering the flowers. Some just require finding a particular item somewhere in the stage and then getting to the end. But a lot of them require specific animal friends, sometimes in tandem with specific powerups, and no way to know that without going through a level more than once. One level requires an animal friend not found in that level, which brought back memories of hammer-hunting in Kirby's Adventure. There are a lot of matching puzzles, and one puzzle based on sound. One level has a room with a miniboss behind an invisible door in an auto-scrolling section. At least there's a lot of diversity.
In the days before the internet, I'm sure I would have found this maddening. Going through a level multiple times, having to restart if I took the wrong door or stepped on a flower once and ruined a level attempt. Having to keep a notebook or something with maps and per-level notes. Fortunately, these are the days of the internet. I looked up a guide and used that to get all of the heart stars without having to redo the levels repeatedly.
Too many games to play.After getting to Zero, I'm surprised it made it into the game without changes. An eye in a white cloud that attacks by opening red slashes in itself, out of which blood explodes toward Kirby? When defeated, the eye burst out in a spray of blood and starts chasing Kirby around the screen? This is where the secret horror of the Kirby games comes from, isn't it? The monsters that lurk out in the night. At least they're vulnerable to the power of love.
Boing.
Usually the music is one of the best parts of a Kirby game for me, and I was surprised that this time it wasn't the case. I barely remember any of the sounds from Kirby's Dream Land 3 other than the cheery song in the friends room and the tone that plays when Kirby stumbles on a puzzle sequence.
The visuals, though, are really pretty. It's cartoony, looking a bit like it's drawn in crayon. It reminded me of Yoshi's Island, which I remember a lot of people disparaging as childish back in the day but which holds up much better than any number of the games that tried to be realistic because art direction beats chasing the changing technological edge any day. Remember all of those early Playstation games we saw, and we told ourselves that no game would ever look better than this? Oops.
Anyway, the crayon style really adds to the cuteness, which is one of the most important parts of a Kirby game. Kirby and the Waddle Dees (Waddles Dee?) especially benefit from it in their roundness. And it's not like they used it as an excuse for substandard graphics, either. The transparency effects look great, especially in the ice level or the various levels with water or fog. While the other graphics are sometimes fuzzy, as befits the crayon aesthetic, the transparency is sharp. It's all deliberate and it fits the game perfectly.
Welcome to my nightmare.
Outside of the animal friends and the heart stars, the other mechanics are all the same as other Kirby games. Inhale enemies to gain their copy abilities, progress through the levels, defeat mini-bosses and bosses at the end of each world, and enjoy the cute gameplay. The heart stars made this the hardest Kirby game I've ever played, though. Even when I knew exactly what to do, some of the levels, such as the aforementioned invisible door level, required multiple attempts to get right. Any of the levels with flowers can be ruined simply by stepping once on one flower, requiring a restart, and that happened more than once too. By going for the good ending, I set myself up for a lot of extra frustration. But there's no other way. It's the completionist in me.
If I hadn't, Kirby's Dream Land 3 would have been a lot like Kirby's Dream Land--a cute and fun way to pass an afternoon. The heart star puzzles added that additional element to keep my interest over the longer levels, and while it's still not as good as Kirby's Adventure, I really like the game.
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Date: 2018-Jul-23, Monday 16:37 (UTC)no subject
Date: 2018-Jul-23, Monday 20:20 (UTC)