Kirby Canvas Curse
Brilliant
Tags: Kirby Canvas Curse Categories: GBA Reviews, Reviews
Posted by Jake McNeill on Jun 27th, 2005
| Title | Players | ||
|---|---|---|---|
| Kirby Canvas Curse (title page) | 1 | ||
| Developer | Publisher | Genre | Online |
| Platformer | No | ||
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Kirby: Canvas Curse is a game that succeeds beautifully on multiple levels. It’s the first must-have DS game that’s not just a port (like Super Mario 64 DS and Puyo Pop Fever) or a mishmesh of minigames (like Wario Ware Touched! and Feel the Magic). It’s the first DS title that delivers a full game (and again, not just a bunch of minigames) that simply wouldn’t be possible without the DS’ touchscreen. It’s both one of the most original titles this year, as well as a return to classic old-school gameplay. And, quite simply, this is a damn fun game well-deserving of a spot in any DS-owner’s collection.
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I’m sure many are a bit skeptical when it comes to Nintendo’s pink cream puff. I know much of our staff swore him off for good after the mind-numbingly simple Kirby’s Air Ride, and even at his best, Kirby never was a “killer app” (although I’d say Kirby: Nightmare in Dreamland and Kirby Super Star are two of the finest platformers ever made). However, it would be a mistake to dismiss Kirby: Canvas Curse as a platformer with a silly gimmick. This game is so much more than that.
The “gimmick” in question is much like that in Yoshi’s Touch and Go, in that you don’t really control Kirby himself, but interact with the environment to guide him through his adventure. While Yoshi’s Touch and Go took this idea and made it a one-note tune, Kirby’s unique gameplay mechanics give players more control, more stuff to do, and more variety, and the game’s level design has been crafted with this mechanic in mind, making for a more deep and involving adventure.
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Players guide Kirby (turned into a ball by a curse) by drawing lines on the screen using a “magical paintbrush”, and unlike Yoshi, who just went through the motions as you set things up for him, Kirby is far more dynamic. You’ll use lines to bounce him back in the opposite direction, and he’ll automatically follow any path you set for him, even going saight up or upside-down or spinning in loops.
You can tap him to make him dash, you can tap enemies to stun them, and after this, Kirby can absorb their abilities, which change the way he attacks and moves. The stone power-up replaces his dash with a drop, and also gives him necessary weight underwater. The needle power-up lets him cling to walls while your paint fills back up (you can only continuously draw lines for so long before you have to charge, which often makes you use your lines conservatively).
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While the variety here is great, what really makes it all work is the fact that even though you don’t directly control Kirby, you always feel in complete control of his actions… although just barely. Much in the same way you’d often find yourself flinging Sonic the Hedgehog haphazardly through dangers while you made the occasional jump to keep from plummeting to your death, often players will have Kirby speeding through the level to an extent that has him riccocheting off walls and barreling through obstacles while you try to make sure he doesn’t kill himself in the process.
In fact, I think the comparison to Sonic the Hedgehog truly is key here, because while the gameplay mechanics in Kirby’s Canvas Curse are completely unique, the level design and sensibilities often seem inspired by Sega’s speedy mascot, and if you turned Kirby blue and spiky and gave him a bit more speed, this game would make a fine entry into the Sonic series… and we can only hope Sonic DS itself is this good (in fact, Sega, if you’re reading this, please use this game as a guideline for a DS sequel to NiGHTS. Please!). Kirby’s platformers have always been great titles, but this is the first time one has ever had this degree of action and intensity.
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The levels are broken up with various “boss” encounters, and the term is used lightly because all but the final boss play more like minigames than boss fights (although, for the record, the final boss encounter is truly phenomenal). One has you drawing trampolines to get Kirby bouncing around in an almost puzzle-like series of rooms, another is kind of like Simon Says meets Connect the Dots, and a third is a race between Kirby and King Dedede. All three are very fun, but looking at how awesome the final boss was, I really wish the game had other traditional bosses as well.
Giving the game even more longevity is a plethora of bonus features, new playable characters, and extra stages you can unlock by acquiring medals, which are either found squirreled away within the levels, or earned in the game’s time trial and line trial modes (which challenge you to beat areas of a level in as little time as possible, or using as little paint). All this extra content really stretches out the longevity of the game, and doesn’t feel pointless like so many “collect fifty thingymajigs” goals some platformers have. In fact, the only real complaint here is that, unlike other recent Kirby games, Kirby: Canvas Curse doesn’t have any form of multiplayer mode. However, I do give them props for including an option to make the game Pictochat-aware. Really, every DS game should do that.
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The game’s graphics are some of the finest ever to be seen in a 2D game. While the the game’s refusal to use the DS’ 3D capabilities may fail to impress those that measure graphical quality in polygons, it’s otherwise hard to complain about the way this game looks. Kirby and the game’s enemies all feature amazing animation, but the real star here is the levels themselves, which look like one of a variety of painting styles, from beautiful watercolor landscapes to chic art deco, darker levels that seem to channel the works of Dali… every new level in the game is a feast for the eyes. Oh, and for what it’s worth, the paintbrush lines themselves look really good, too.
Kirby: Canvas Curse may not be a title people could take seriously as a “killer app”, but in every other respect it fits that description pretty darn well. It’s the first game to have come out on the DS that truly makes the system worth owning, and is easily the best game on the system so far. It looks great, plays great, and will have you coming back for more. In virtually every way possible, this game succeeds with flying colors.
| What Works | Score |
|---|---|
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+ Extremely fun + Original gameplay + Beautiful graphics + Plenty of extras |
9.2 |
| What Doesn't | |
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- It's a 2D game starring a little pink ball. That doesn't exactly scream "you must play me" to the Grand Theft Auto crowd. - No multiplayer and only one traditional boss battle. I want more! |
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| Under the Shrink-wrap | |
| If you bought a DS, odds are you bought it for games like this. | |
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Tags: Kirby Canvas Curse
Posted by Jake McNeill on Jun 27th, 2005 and is filed under GBA Reviews, Reviews. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can post a comment, or trackback from your own site.
