Bam (Day 226)

I'm not saying I'm embarking on a quest to complete all the Kirby games I've missed. That's the kind of grand declaration I might make about oh, say, marathoning the entire Final Fantasy series. It's not going to happen. I am, however, planning on completing two Kirby titles in succession, one of which I've already done. Kirby and the Amazing Mirror was a different take on the formula from what I'm used to--but Kirby Mass Attack doesn't particularly even feel like a Kirby game.

Like Canvas Curse, Mass Attack experiments with the Nintendo DS's touch screen and is controlled entirely through it. In Canvas Curse you guided Kirby through levels by drawing a line for him to slide around on. It was an interesting concept but I personally found it grew tiring over the course of the game, but that's probably just because I have somewhat of a vendetta against games that make heavy use of the touchscreen. Mass Attack does not entirely abandon the line concept, but it does allow you to order Kirby to run around as usual--or rather, 10 Kirbys.

It seems Kirby has been split into 10 by evil forces that I won't discuss here. You start off each major level with access to only one Kirby. By acquiring food, you will gradually be able to bring more Kirbys into the fray. Unlike other flagship titles of the series, Kirby does not possess the ability to copy powers--although I think it would have been interesting if he could. Imagine the possibilities of having powers that scaled with the number of Kirbys currently under your control. Instead, combat is primarily conducted by violently assaulting foes with your stylus, which will provoke your Kirbys to pile up on them and beat them to death. In other cases, you'll need to fling your Kirbys skyward in an effort to rack up damage or knock foes down.

To progress to new stages, you need to have access to a certain number of Kirbys. The final boss stage requires the full 10 to be under your control. I've only played through the first major level and the final boss was the series classic Whispy Woods, although it was a much more complicated encounter than usual, with spiky projectiles falling from the top to bottom screens and different segments to destroy. The strategy still mostly amounted to frantically poking at the screen until my opponent was dead. Admittedly, it was more than that, and it was pretty engaging despite the touch screen requirement.

But still, it just doesn't feel all that much like a Kirby title when I can't suck up enemies and steal their powers. I don't know; maybe I'm a purist, but I feel like this game could have been an original IP with any other character you could think of. It seems to me like Kirby was thrown in just to sell copies. But maybe I'm too cynical. I'm still going to play through it--and I'd like to play Kirby's Epic Yarn too, which I know wasn't originally intended for our little pink fluffball.