How come dreamland 2, dreamland 3 and 64 are so different from the rest of the series?

*second best

Why did dark matter fan become the majority?

Same and I'd add Amazing Mirror in there for a top 3.

They were not made by Sakurai and was instead all spearheaded by a different director who wanted to make his own arc. It's weird how what is arguably the most influential series/arc in the franchise that would shape the tone of the games weren't made by Sakurai.

Not to shit on Sakurai though. Super Star is a amazing game that is just as if not more so more influential on the franchise in terms of gameplay and core structure.

Dumping the theory someone posted about Zero-two/Shinichi's disappeance. A little dated, but still a good read.
>First is that Sakurai, although the original 'creator', was not the one who actually truly defined the setting. In fact, Kirby is more of a multi-creators creation, with Miyamoto having quite a bit of a hand in the creation of the character. The one who truly defined the setting though was Shimomura, who took over the games when Sakurai lost interest (which was *very* early ; after Kirby Adventure, the second game in the serie). Sakurai then worked on side-games only (Super Star was originally a side-game, not a main game).

>The big problem is that after Kirby 64 and Kirby Nightmare in Dreamland, Shimomura died in a car accident*, leaving the serie without a 'head'. Shimomura was the one who created most of the cast, introduced Zero and the Dark Matters, defined the light/dark contrast of the setting, and gave basic characterization to the characters (likewise, notice the contrast between the self-aware borderline parody-like portrayal of Kirby in the early Sakurai games and his portrayal in, say, Dreamland 3).
*Supposedly this isn't true.

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>After he died*, the serie was thrown into the hands of random companies who then decided to copy and emulate the most popular entry in the serie instead of actually using the setting. This meant emulating Super Star... despite Super Star being extremely simplified and personality-less compared to the main games. And this led to the big crash in creativity in the serie as every game became an emulation of Super Star (notice Kirby stopped evolving once Shimomura died ; it took them 6+ games to even update Kirby's sprites).

>A big part of the changes is that with Shimomura gone, the Dark Matters were mostly relegated to the background while Zero was watered down; her symbolism (with the blood) was removed and she was given a bunch of 'semi' appearances through the serie. Likewise, instead of using the full cast of characters, the cast was reduced to just Kirby and Meta Knight (with Dedede thrown in) and the setting was reduced from Pop Star and the solar system to just Dreamland again.

*Again, he probably didn't die, just left on his own terms.

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>With Kirby Super Star Ultra, Kirby Mass Attack, and Kirby Return to Dreamland, it appears that the serie finally got a new permanent dev team at the helm and is starting to reverse the decay that begun in the GBA period. But the franchise is unfortunately still very heavily 'Super Star-ized' and stuck in the past, as you mentionned with Magolor (and also with how the abilities copy the insanely game-breaking and flashy Super Star ones instead of going for the more original and situational combos and mechanics of past main games).

>Frankly, I know that many like Super Star for being fast-paced and really flashy but I always found it to be quite shallow in terms of gameplay and rather personality-less. I find myself prefering vastly the Shimomura era games and hope the games will revert to trying to expand the setting, atmosphere, and mechanics again instead of aping Super Star endlessly.

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>The big point and why I liked the Shimomura games is because, although they were still simple plot-wise, there was a very strong emphasis on cuteness vs darkness and light/dark contrasts, with some very nice symbolism regarding Zero. It also help that the games were on the more serious side.

>Kirby, as portrayed in the Shimomura games, is a young adult (not a child) and stand up to the various threats to his world because of empathy (and not because he's a "Star Warrior" or some kind of destined hero). Likewise, one primary reason I like Zero so much is that in contrast to other Kirby villains, including Marx, Zero is not merely deeply evil but is so in a serious way not unlike Giygas and Porky from the Mother serie, who are some of the most beloved villains not just among kid-friendly settings but in all of video gaming and with good reason.

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>I feel that the sheer horror of how badly Zero outsmarted you and made your entire quest futile in Kirby 64's bad ending is a far bigger punch and a far more effective proof of Zero's cunning than Marx's gloating after football tackling Kirby in front of Nova. The fact that Zero never bother to speak to Kirby and is so extreme in her methods make her far scarier and effective in my opinion as it also, in a way, showcase her contempt for Kirby (as she doesn't even regard him highly enough to bother gloating).

>Another example is how Zero responded to Dark Matter's failure in Dreamland 2 by taking up a battleship (the Hyper Zone) and ramming the barrier that Kirby had created at the end of Dreamland 2 before proceeding to basically tear the life out of Pop Star, enslaving everyone and beginning to assimilate the entire planet leaving only tiny pockets of survivors over the planet's surface, the game involving Kirby helping the survivors in each stage and booting out the Dark Matters out of his home, part by part. Despite not saying a word, I felt that Zero's glare at Kirby from inside the Hyper Zone after making a mess out of his homeworld established her in a far more effective way than Yin-Yarn or Marx's gloating, the main point being that while other villains spoke about being evil, Zero simply *is* evil.

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>The symbolism behind Zero (before she got watered down) was extremely nice too, with her tears of blood representing her infinite, all-consuming hatred of all living things and her white color representing how she is such total darkness that she loop back into 'nothingness'. The very name is significative. And of course, there is her second appearance as a fallen angel, one of the most impressive and iconic bosses in the serie (with a matching battle theme).

>All of this while portraying Kirby as genuinely innocent and empathic and with a cast that was definitely geared more toward the friendly, cute side than Meta Knight's rather hit-and-miss emphasis on coolness.

>It made for a very interesting and frankly, unique contrast as Zero and the Dark Matters were not merely the villains, they were the outright antithesis of the setting ; there is a reason why the conflict between Kirby and Zero is often compared to Ness's own struggle against Giygas. The contrast is similar, in a way. And it is one that should have been embrassed in my opinion ; most series either choose to be completely cute or completely dark. I found that the contrast made the Kirby serie feel much more unique, fresh, and magical.

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>I find myself really disappointed when games like Squeak Squad and Epic Yawn abandonned this route to go for the generic cute 'for toddlers' atmosphere (Epic Yawn was especially bad, with Yin-Yarn being so incompetent and harmless he has no idea what to do with the lands he conquer). At times, I felt that those games felt like parodies even (especially Squeak Squad and its portrayal of Kirby as a mindless glouton who doesn't even notice anything around him). In short, I wish the serie would be not unlike the Mother serie once more (which I believe anyone should try at least once).

>In a way, I guess I'm part of the minority as I prefer the more contrasting, in-depth entries to the faster-paced, simpler 'flashy' entries. But still, I indeed wish they'd realize that Kirby is more than just about being cute and that they'd, if not expand the plot, at least bring back the contrast that used to define it back then.

/autism, headcanon, faggot, etc.

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Non-Dark Matter fans. And that was mainly due to HAL constantly spamming Super Star every game afterwards. It took years for them to even acknowledge the Dark Matter trilogy proper, so the obvious result was the old direction to lose its impact.

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amazing mirror and air ride, the best kirby games by far in terms of gameplay, came out during the gamecube era

I was moreso referring to the change in demographic over time. Most Kirby fans weren’t even born when the final Shimomura game came out. To exacerbate the “issue”, 17 out of those 19 years, Zero wasn’t ignored but actively avoided by HAL (for obvious reasons). The mid 2000’s caused the Kirby fandom to get displaced as hell, you had the people still clutching their pearls about their dead games, people that started with the DS games and had no idea what’s going on, the Right Back at Ya only fans these ones were aight ignoring the fact that they were all Meta Knight fangirls/fujo weebs
It’s actually funny, I see the DS kids now going through the same thing with the Robobot-fan lorefag boogeyman

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I was born in '91 and grew up with the Shimomura games and coming off Crystal Shards, seeing that anime and Kirby's portrayal was...jarring. Squeak Squad was also a very weak title, especially considering how good the GBA games were. I think what the original writer of that theory I posted went through what I'm seeing with Kirby now; continuous rehashing of one specific title which also takes cues from Super Star. He's still right that Super Star is still hardwired to the series. On the other hand, Rainbow Curse was a bit of an iffy title, but I get why it may have its fans (Fuck skipping the boss fights, that's too juvenile even for Kirby).

Kirby in Crystal Shards to me is the best his character has ever been and that kiss Ribbon gave him made me feel fuzzy inside. I almost gained a third gaming crush that day.

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>And that was mainly due to HAL constantly spamming Super Star every game afterwards.
What? If anything people were complaining for years due to the lack of a proper Super Star follow up.

Dreamland 3 had single powers again and basically ignored Super Star outside of a couple of enemies and 64 only followed DL3 too. Then we go the Adventure remake... It wasn't until Amazing Mirror that we got movesets again and even so many powers were limited compared to Super Star. The actual proper gameplay only really returned in Super Star Ultra itself, with "Return to Dreamland" being the first original follow up to Super Star's gameplay.

The Shimomura games had their fanbase, but tons of people disliked how Super Star seemed to be just ignored for more than a decade.

I'm gonna say it:
Kumazaki games > Shimomura games > Flagship games > Sakurai games

Every director has 2 games that I like and 1-2 that i’m meh about. The only exception is flagship, I liked neither of their games

so what WAS that cactus thing?

I will always wonder what was the original idea for Kirby 64 that Shimomura and HAL worked on before the disk drive fiasco, we have gotten a few interesting things here and there, but I also wonder if there was anything in the story that was drastically changed or in the general flow of the game

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His tail probably
or it could've been his penis

I think you mean the best.

The Zero thing? Some user once said it was a Japanese thing, something about cactuses symbolizing lack of love or something like that, of course it was speculation

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KIRBY KIRBY KIRBY THAT'S THE NAME YOU SHOULD KNOW

DEDEDE HES THE KING OF THE SHOW
YOULL HOLLER AND HOOT
HELL GIVE KIRBY THE BOOT
DEDEDE IS THE ONE and only redeeming factor about that garbage anime

I guess that makes sense

I loved his games, but I also liked Robobot a lot, so I do have hope the next Kirby game will feel more “complete” than Star allies

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you didn't like tiff?

Tiff shouldn't have existed, just let Kirby talk and not be an infant for petes sake

Shimomura did his own thing compared to Sakurai
Flagship and Kumazaki pretty much just follow the Sakurai formula, but Shimomura brought some unique things to the table even if a lot of them weren't that great in my opinion and I fully think both Sakurai and Kumazaki are better overall directors of the franchise

I found her to be quite annoying, what did you like about her? design? voice?

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just thought she was cute

Something about this image seems cursed.

you just KNOW

A different direction.

that a .gif but it does not move? That is always quite annoying

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it’s been too long since somebody has shared this sentiment about Zero. People like to meme Zero up as this eldritch parasite hivemind. But Zero is so more than a mindless force of destruction, a lot of Kirby antagonists have a catch to their badness, ex: Dedede is just greedy, Star Dream is working from a purely logical standpoint, Dark Matter Blade was lonely Zero is evil, full stop end of story.
Let me use 64 as an example, Zero had a goal and it wasn’t to attack Ripple Star because he’s depressed or some shit. It was to raid the fairy planet and seize the planet’s legendary crystal for himself.
When that plan misfired, Zero used 3 of his minions to salvage the situation, the minions fail and now Zero knows Kirby is on the path to murder his ass again. However, Zero was crafty enough to not only make a fall guy in the form of Miracle Matter, but also a fake hyperzone to really build that facade of “You did it! You beat Dark Matter and saved the day!” you can also notice that when you don’t have all the crystal shards, the decoy darkness merely retreats like the 3 popstar scouts when “defeated” so not only does this buy him the time that he needs, but he was able to do it without wasting troops he was able to play the role of the Fairy Queen well enough to even fool Ribbon. And like the post said, Zero is smug, his plans are fool proof on paper and he knows it. He has the slimiest smile when he’s bested you, that’s why DL3 and 64’s bad ends are so great. Dream Land 2’s bad ending is really subtle, as a kid I thought it was simply leading into the next game. DL3’s and 64’s endings convey that it’s a Game Over, rather than The End

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Nah, it's a bunch of Kirby girls in lolita-styled clothing giving me bedroom eyes with heart-pupils and Adeleine wearing nice striped stockings.

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>she

This is cute.

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Yeah, I love how even though Ribbon role was extremely minor in star allies, it still got her again in a good amount of fanart

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It just hit me that this is the 3rd kirby thread in a row we’re i’ve ended up spontaneously breaking into a character thesis I can’t tell if it’s because i’ve pavlov’d into writing essays when tired and it’s leaking here, or if i’m just going insane

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Now if only the fairy queen had gotten at least a little bit of new fanart...

Will her design ever be topped?

I think you should keep doing it. Everybody appreciates the autist that writes essays about video game characters.

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For how small her role is Ripple Queen actually gets a really stream of fanart especially counting Queen Zero-Two art the issue is that literally nobody knows what to tag that shit, so it’s basically a scavenger hunt for Fairy Queen fan communities and the nicknames/tags each artist uses for her

>Really consistent stream
computer ate a word

You are just going insane.

I like Adventure for its simplicity.
I like Dreamland 3 for its puzzle design when it doesn't require trial and error. The ROB-parts level is pretty neat.
I like Triple Deluxe for providing little fun tilt controls and how magical it looks when you dance alongside Sectonia during her teleport phase if you dodge midair.
I like Kirby.

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Bump

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youtu.be/lygA5c3J0do
Posting this to ask a question, i’m not the only one getting Newgrounds faux-nostalgia from this, right? It’s hypnotically and nostalgically cringy

based

I hooe they do something experimental next game, literally anything would be nice

>the only times they'd deviate far from main style was Epic Yarn
Canvas Curse/ Rainbow Curse

You guys deserve a better essay autist, one that knows better than to make an argument while drunk from tiredness almost want to go back and rework it once i’m more lucid
this is the right answer, I went stir-crazy from being unable to discuss anything Kirby related for months.

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it was a time when a sequel meant a new game, and not a $60 expansion pack

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Why the fuck is a physical DL3 cart so expensive?
What the fuck

I miss when Kirby was creative and respected its players desire to play creatively. The little we've seen of GCN makes it look like it would be the best by far and I'm not just talking about that trailer.

Shimomura was actually a NASA supercomputer loaned to HAL in order to shit out Kirby game ideas. I miss it.

I still find it too weird how we pretty much fought the precursor to Zero in the form of void. If void can exists in all dimensions than who's to say that there aren't more Zeros out there

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That's pretty cheap and lame and only devaulues characters. Make new stuff instead Hal.

And these are the only good ones
Coicidence?

>Dream Land 1
>Adventure
>Dream Course
>Super Star
>Tilt n' Tumble
>Air Ride
>Epic Yarn
All really good games user.
Also fun fact, Shimomura worked on 3 of the games I listed too, but not as a director.

>Thread still up
Nice. I shouldn't be up at all, but my insomnia says otherwise.

Good post and a very good take on that particular part too.

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Shimomura's style>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>Hackurai's style. So fucking sick of him shoving anime bullshit into Smash as if Knuckle Joe and Kawasaki are remotely relevant at all.

Don't talk shit. Every character is somebody's favorite.

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Of these my favorite is actually Mine, Kine's wife. According to a character bio she's actually a very busy and motivated person in contrast to the extremely laid-back Kine.

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