A Review: Kirby Super Star

Hey! Time to do a throwback. Kirby Super Star is one of my favorite games... EVER. Definitely right up there with Pokemon Diamond & Pearl (although Platinum is the better overall game) and ESIV: Oblivion. I have a lot of memories with this game, and all good memories. What holds this game up for me is that when playing it 10 years later, I still get that excited feeling I had when I first played as a kid.

Now before I do my best attempt at a review, I need to just give my brief history playing it. My cousin and I would always play it at my grandpa's house during the summer and winter breaks growing up. Since it was a two player game, I would always play Kirby and she would always play the "helper." We would venture through the different levels, enjoy the music, use our little growing brain to figure out the (relatively) simple puzzles. It was a lot of fun. Nintendo remade it for DS with just slightly upgraded graphics and some new content. On the Wii U, they had the original game on the eShop and we would have the same fun playing it 10 years later, albeit on a bigger screen.

The main menu with the different game modes

The game's greatest strengths is that it isn't just one game but instead a bunch of mini stories. Spring Breeze, Dyna Blade, The Great Cave Offensive (GCO), Revenge of Meta Knight (RoMK) and Milky Way Wishes (MWW) are the five stories that are in the game (pictured left). There are then a couple of mini games like The Arena and Gourmet Race. Having five different stories instead of one means that for each one, the player(s) gets to experience a different setting for each one.

Ice Kirby (Left) and Helper, Poppy Bros. Jr. (Right)

The inclusion of "helpers" is the game's second greatest strength. Kirby has to swallow his enemies to gain their powers, but in Super Star not only can he do that, he can also create a helper that the second player controls. I think that's why my cousin always played the helpers, because some of them were really cute.

The Computer Virus boss, a parody on RPGs

The greatest benefit of having a five different games in one is that the stages and bosses are all unique and different. The Spring Breeze stage is the smaller, updated version of the original Kirby's Dream Land stage. Probably my favorite stage, GCO, has oodles of amusing bosses and stage designs. The story begins when Kirby falls down a hole and now he has to find his way out. Along the way, he can collect treasures he finds along the way like a saucepan, a triforce, a lucky cat and many more that are often easter eggs from other Nintendo titles. The bosses are all very unique, let me just name the four of them: Fatty Whale, Computer Virus, Chameleo Arm and the final boss, Wham Bam Rock. Each boss, level, design, enemy, music and helper from the game are all extremely memorable and enjoyable. 

Kirby Super Star is not that hard of a game either. It's an enjoyable side scrolling Nintendo title. It's Super Mario's cuter, brighter and exciting sibling.