There is always something that can be said about parents. Sure they may not know what you always want but there is that rare occasion that they will surprise you; such is the case for a very rare day when I was nine. It was the end of the summer, camp was over and soon we would be heading off to my family in Rhode Island. It was a seemingly unbearable trip at the time except for the fact that I had my Gameboy Color, the clear purple savior from the boring game of looking at the white lines of the lanes on the highway. Every so often my parents would deem me good enough to pick out a portable game for the road trip; however, this time my parents would do something unexpectedly awesome. One day after coming home from a yard sale my mother came home with a surprising gift for me. She had picked up three original Gameboy games: Super Mario Land, Mega Man: Willy’s Revenge and Kirby’s Dreamland. Although all three of these games are excellent in there own right only one really stuck with me after all these years and that was:
Now for those of you who don’t know Kirby’s Dreamland was the first Kirby ever, although it was not until Kirby’s Adventure did we see where the series would become fully realized. What do I mean by this? Well Kirby does not have the ability to copy to powers of his enemies. Although looking back this seems completely bizarre but at the point the game was first released we saw Kirby as a white puffball (or evergreen if you played on the Gameboy Color like I did) but don’t let this game fool you as Kirby still as some punch…or suck. Yes Kirby can still absorb and shot his enemies and he can still float in the air. Kirby games have always have had responsive controls and this game is no slouch in that category. There is never any slowdown, even when character sprites litter the tiny screen and Kirby himself seems to glide with the ease due to what would be the start of line of simplistic control systems. In addition, Kirby can still find power ups which allude to certain abilities that Kirby will get in Kirby’s Adventure: the microphone which kills all enemies on stage, the mint leaf which allows him to fly faster and shoot puffs out of his mouth without complete deflation, spicy food which causes Kirby to spew fireballs and a lollipop which makes Kirby invincible. Still these powers are shot lived as all last for no more than thirty seconds. Despite the lack of powers, Kirby’s Dreamland is still a full-fledged Kirby game.
The stages in this game are classic Kirby, enemies flying at you from all sides, jumping and squirming in irregular patterns to try to knock you out. There are giant gaps, which you must fly over, and walls of blocks you must break through. There are inventive mini bosses and regular bosses that each has a predictable pattern that is easily exploited to win. At the end you find yourself fighting King Dedede, who has stolen all the food from the denizens of dreamland, and beating him means you heave completed the game. Sure the game is short and easy but this game is like a tech demo for Kirby’s Adventure. The entire game has that stenciled look that all 2D Kirby games have, which at the time seemed really original against the other titles on the platform. The enemy sprites were varied, each with their own unique design and mannerisms. Unlike in games like Kirby Crystal Shards these enemies were not so cute that you felt bad for killing them, nor ugly enough so that they didn’t fit in with the level design. The music was design by now long time Kirby composer Ishikawa Jun. It was here we see the first time we see the delightfully, but not annoyingly catchy, tunes that we would associate with Kirby for years to come.
It is in this game here we first hear the charming effects of a Kirby game, the familiar vacuum of air and the puff exhaled wind. It is the first game we experienced Wispy Woods with its now well-known tree boss, the familiar enemies such as Waddle Dee are present, and King Dedede is still as laughably silly and yet slightly menacing and the stages are all whimsical, what a dreamland should really be. To be clear the game is only five levels long so it is extremely short, shorter than most Kirby games (this is probably due to the inability to maximize the cartage space at the) and this makes the game even easier than it already is. But that is what Kirby is, a true game for beginners, heck even my grandparents have played and beaten Kirby’s Dreamland. Kirby games have always had a simplistic control scheme that is almost instantly embedded into the heads of those who play his games. There is never a point in a Kirby game when you have to memorize a code, or pull off an unbelievably complicated move to progress. Instead it’s the sheer ease and multiple ways to get Kirby from A to B that has kept him in our hearts. That is the exact idea when Sakurai Masahiro created Kirby, although Kirby wasn’t his first idea.
You see Kirby was originally a fill in sprite to be removed later for another character model; however, Sakurai had become enamored with his original design and kept the marshmallowy munchkin. In addition, the white Kirby box art for both the cartridge and box for the American version was due to an argument between Sakurai and Miyamoto as Sakurai wanted Kirby to be as we know now (Pink), while Miyamoto desired him to be yellow.
I have always believed that people defend what is familiar to them, so we all are naturally biased when we look at these pictures of Kirby. Still, I don’t think you could go wrong with either one.
As you might know (or it have been pointed out to you by numerous people on the internet) that most games that have the E rating now are cakewalks compared to the games of older generations (specifically NES and SNES). Now the Kirby series, for most, has been a way to ease younger gamers into playing and why wouldn’t you want your kids to be playing with the adorable plush ball of happy (wow…that was a sentence a friend once used to describe Kirby, it is so bad). But Kirby’s Dreamland had added a slight incentive to those who wanted an extra challenge. Once you beat King Dedede for the first time you were given a code (Press Up, Select and B) you were treated to a harder difficulty. The levels are the same but now you must play with half your health, more enemies and most importantly a different array of enemies. These new enemies had a more aggressive programming and were harder to beat, giving what was a fairly easy romp through the game into a more intense one. Now to tell you the truth when I first unlocked this stage it was by accident. I had beaten the game before but always restarted the Gameboy rather than wadding through the credits. I was, like a child, mashing the buttons and excited by another game of Kirby. When the game began I was puzzled that I only had half my health bar full, and later on in the level when I got my ass handed to me I began to get insanely frustrated. I wondered why a game I had beaten by that time ten times before was now insanely hard. Still even after I learned about the code for the game I continued to play it. I must honestly say this game was my Mega Man or Contra a game I constantly played until I mastered it.
Looking back and playing it now this the game, while slightly irritating in this mode is not very hard compared to the aforementioned games, but it is still fun. Sure, I know most of you have played a Kirby game but the reason I wrote this review is just to tell you of a game that is near and dear to my heart (wow I am tearing up). It really reminds me of my childhood and although I am not the oldest nail on the board (I am not the best at allusions) I still feel a need to look back, to know what I have done, so that I know where I have come from, feel proud of my accomplishments and make the road ahead a little easier. Maybe I am too much of a softy, and maybe there can something to be said about being passionate about something, but I love playing videogames, and there is something to be said about that some other time (wow that last sentence has some baaaaaaad grammar).
As always I hope this was a good read.
-AceofOpus
PS: I am off this week so I will have more time to write. If you want to vote on what review comes out next. The link is bellow; just scroll to the bottom and post your comment here or in that post (now I must punish myself for the shameless plug).
http://screwattack.com/node/16986
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