Kirby was always a cute looking character that I was interested in but never had a chance to play any of the games in the series back in the day. I chose to start with the second game in the series which is Kirby’s Adventure for the Nintendo Entertainment System. It was originally released back in 1993 and developed by HAL Laboratory and published by Nintendo. Kirby’s Adventure was the first game in the series to have the ability to gain an enemy’s power which has became a staple of the series.
The story of Kirby’s adventure starts off with the inhabitants of Dream Land upset because they have lost the ability to dream due to the Dream Spring has drying up. A magical rod called the Star Rod originally created the Dream Spring and Kirby believes King DeeDee has broken the Star Rod so he sets out in search of the broken pieces of the Star Rod.
The first thing I noticed about Kirby’s Adventure is how awesome the graphics are especially since it’s on the NES. They’re colorful and the sprites and animation are great. There is some slowdown when there is a lot going on during gameplay but it didn’t happen enough to really annoy me.
The controls are good and Kirby’s actions are tight and respond well to input. You can fly/float by pressing the up button, inhale/devour enemies to gain their power by using the B button, jump and swim with the A button, and release a power by pressing the select button. If you pause the game after gaining a power the screen tells you all about the power you can currently use.
At first I thought the game might be a little to easy but as the levels went on I definitely encountered some challenging boss character and sections of levels where it took some skill. It was fun inhaling different enemies to see which power I would gain and how well the power would work against various enemies and bosses. I also liked the mini games in between levels. There’s several different mini games you can play such as a claw mini game, a quick draw mini game, and more.
I had a great time playing through Kirby’s Adventure and I also think it does a great job of showing off the graphical capabilities of the NES too. If you’re into platformers and haven’t yet tried this game out I recommend you give this game a shot.
