Platform

Game Boy Advance

Kirby Japanese name legend:

Hoshi no Kirby (Star Kirby, Kirby of the Stars) = original Gameboy game

Hoshi no Kirby NES ("") = Kirby's Adventure

Hoshi no Kirby 2 ("")= Kirby's Dreamland 2 (Gameboy)

Kirby Super Deluxe = Kirby Superstar

Hoshi no Kirby 64 (Star Kirby, Kirby of the Stars)= Kirby 64: The Crystal Shards

Surely we've all had the experience of taking one of those classes that revolve around literature or writing and being forced to see things in other things...that we'd rather not see. Well, at least I'm very familiar with that feeling. There's a weird of sense of interpretive irony about what has happened to Kirby in his newest adventure.

Kirby began life as a black and white hero on the original Gameboy, blowing away other mascot competitors, being major league successful and securing a name for himself that would last till even today. Later, there was a spiritual sequel of sorts to Star Kirby that was made in color on the NES. Kirby's debut in color was quite brilliant and far eclipsed his earlier outing. Cut forward to the future several years, and that original Kirby adventure in dreamland got remade as part of several games in Kirby Super Deluxe, with incredible graphics and sound and brand new abilities and such. Now, Kirby's Adventure has gotten remade on the GBA, being taken back from his days of excelling on a console to being the superstar on a handheld. It feels like the colorizing of a black and white classic that was never black and white in the first place, with "color" that resembles Kirby Super Deluxe, which itself used that graphics style to redo the original, truly black and white game. Anyone see the irony in this? Ultimately, that's what it comes down to, Kirby: Fountain of Dreams is a far reaching remake of Kirby's Adventure on the NES that feels kind of dirty, like coloring a black and white classic movie and taking away some of its charm and beauty on the process, but really what made the movie great (acting, plot, characters) is still in tact. I think that accurately describes what this newest Kirby is, because beside a few small points, content-wise its almost an exact port of the NES adventure.

Kirby's Adventure is to the NES what Yoshi's Island was to the SNES. That is, it was an exceedingly awesome platformer that seemingly got everything right, went far beyond just about any of its competitors on the NES and benefited from its late release with gorgeous style and great graphics. Adventure was a huge leap over the original. Whereas in the original game, there was only five stages, in Adventure there are seven main worlds that link together dozens of stages, similarly to the world maps in SMB3 and SMW. Rather than being overhead though, these worlds are sidescrolling and are pieced together by various doors that lead into places like bonus games and levels, with the level of the world being able to have secrets and play mechanics like a real platforming level just without the enemies. Also, this was the first game where Kirby could gain the powers of the enemies he defeats. And except for maybe, possibly, Super Deluxe, Kirby has more powers and the powers are the coolest in the series.

The reason the game is called Fountain of Dreams (though as you'll understand later, Knightmare in Dreamland may actually be a more accurate title) is because the strange race Kirby belongs to is a dreamer's race and their planet (Popstar) is punctuated every day with a nice afternoon siesta. One day, as Kirby was having nice, hot dreams about sexy she rolly pollies, with their huge circular "assets" he noticed the dream was interrupted and nobody was able to dream that day in their afternoon nap. Soon, the people of Popstar became irritable and grouchy and were about ready to revolt on The Man (which man? I dunno...maybe the Sandman?) for the lack of wet dreams on a sexually frustrated planet of pink puffballs when Kirby said, "No sweat! I'm the only guy who ever actually DOES anything about our problems, so you just sit there and look dumb and I'll go save the world again." So Kirby goes to the Fountain of Dreams, and see King DeDeDe frollicking in the water with his Playboy Penguin Playmates and says, "Yo, where's the damn star rod, you asswipe? It should be in the middle of the pond!" King DeDeDe replied, "In one of our more, err, frisky moments, it broke in seven pieces and flew out to seven of my friends." Kirby thoroughly cussed out King DeDeDe and decided to travel over the land to piece together the Star Rod and return it to the Fountain of Dreams so the residents of Popstar could get their dreaming game on once again.

Unlike the NES version of the game, which for a cutscene, had a really cute demonstration of how to draw Kirby, the GBA version begins with a nicely drawn cutscene of all this plot exposition and as you know, the actual game is less, "Look, 'tis Lolo in the west and Lala is the east!" and more rock 'em, sock 'em action layered on top of solid, fun platforming. The best part about the game are all the abilities Kirby can get, but the huge worlds, the fun way they are put together and the great amount of secrets are secondary sources of the amusement factor and no less a part of what makes the game an absolute joy to play. How many games have you played were its fun just to walk through the level and experience the level design? Where the action of hoping from one platform to the next is fun enough in itself alone to justify playing, or swimming through an expertly designed corridor? There was something very Feng Shui about the design of Kirby's Adventure's levels that I don't think was ever eclipsed or anticipated by any of its sequels ever, except perhaps Super Deluxe. I can't explain why, but it was just giddy, candy land good fun to even move Kirby around in the decidedly non pretentious NES original. You know the developers have accomplished something fundamentally sound when its fun just to move around in the world. And if you find the Kirby type of atmosphere appealing to you, I'd imagine its a pretty contagious feeling.

Like I've mentioned before, Kirby's Adventure is structued somewhat like Super Mario World or Super Mario Bros. 3, except all sidescrolling. It is like Super Mario Bros. 3 in the feel of the worlds, in that each stage feels very unique in its premise and theme, and you feel like you're getting a lot of variety and many very fun takes on platforming. It resembles Super Mario World in that there are secret exits (similar to the devilishly hidden secret doors in the original Star Kirby) and secret switches (similar to switch palaces or the keys in Mario World) in each stage that open up new stages or secrets, and that a lot of extra fun comes out of searching out these secrets. Often times it will require the cunning use of one of the powers Kirby can steal from enemies. At the beginning, its quite simple and usual, at the end, it involves a lot more effort. Luckily, its all fun effort since powers needed are rarely far away (often in the same level) and its just a matter of keeping the power long enough to use it. For instance, Kirby can turn into a tire that can race its way through enemies on the level, but reverts back into Kirby whenever it hits a wall. Thus, one switch in a level challenges you to race past enemies and not hit walls, while racing against a fuse that will blow up the way to the secret exit should you be too slow. Its extremely fun and adds a lot of variety to the platforming movements expected of Kirby, and also adding some challenge to the regular vanilla flavored easiness of this Kirby game.

Of course, the at the time new dynamic of swallowing an enemy and pushing down on the controller to inherit its powers is the most fun thing about the game. A lot of the powers seen in Kirby's Adventure were for some inexplicable reason never duplicated again, or at least "just didn't have the same feel." A good example is the sword Kirby can get and become knight Kirby. While you can get it in most other Kirby games, in this one, there's a special physic to where Kirby will bounce around when he hits enemies just right, so you can play around with a kind of pinball knighted Kirby if you whack enemies just right with the sword and its hella fun. From that moment on, it was never quite the same again in the series. The cutter and fireball (one of my favorites, where Kirby turns into a comet and rushes down on enemies in a fiery flame as he charges forward) also just "feel" right in this version more so than any others. Its comparable to how some fighters just feel slick and well designed and others hacked shallow imitations. You know how Plato or some other smart Greek guy (I always forget) theorized there was some divine, perfect world and all things in this world were a mere imperfect reflection of them? All Kirby games after Adventure, in my opinion, with the sole exception of Super Deluxe, have been mere shadows of Kirby's Adventure's perfection. While it's the Yoshi's Island of the series in terms of technology and when it came out and how it plays, its also the SMB3 in terms of just doing everything SO RIGHT that its hard for its sequels to ever surpass it, no matter how good they are and the pure balance of everything has a lot to do with that. One power that never appeared again, for instance, was for you to be able to control Kirby as a superball that can bounce against surfaces and enemies at different trajectories and propulsions depending on when you push the button at the right time. That was idiot grin fun to mess around with.

So it is in my great dismay to report to you that this great balance and feeling of getting everything right has been royally screwed in its transition to the GBA. Granted, what you get here is largely the same game, most of the gameplay differences are minor. However, these end up making all the difference in how it just FEELS to play. Something can be technically awesome and yet somehow feel "off." And if you ask me, Fountain of Dreams epitomizes that feeling. Its not just nostalgia speaking, I played the original on the NES for the first time AFTER I'd gotten a PSX and became more interested in gaming, and thus gaming history. And I decided to play the NES original again after winning this, and the feeling was still there in the original where it was missing in the port.

There are several reasons for this and the most glaring one is this graphics. Make no mistake. This game is utterly, smackdabbingly, reach out and grab you 2D art in a way that we haven't seen since the last glory days of Nintendo's last SFC platformers. Before this Rockman Zero was my vote for the best looking GBA game, but its been completely knocked off its rocker. The style is somewhat like Super Deluxe in that the backgrounds sometimes communicate a sense of depth and 3Dness. The difference is that Super Deluxe still felt cartoony, while Fountain of Dreams' graphics are often too realistic to feel cartoony or manga-like. The background often has an undoubtedly unique, but somewhat strange and unappealing look of having been colored on digitized photos, while the foreground is trying for a Yoshi's Island type of crayon feel, but feels more like a crusty or pixellized (it isn't really) overly complex rendition of the original worlds. The sprites are huge, colorful, easy to see and curiously enough scaled very badly to the original, an area where Nintendo usually shines.

The difference lies in how much you can see in one area between Fountain of Dreams and the original is far more dramatic than in any of the Super Mario transitions. Kirby is a larger sprite, the cute little interface window at the bottom of the screen has been removed, replaced with a Donkey Kong Country style display that is somewhat transparently overlaying the action. Gone are the cute pictures of what Kirby looks like in his each of his transformations, as is the adorable little sprite of how he feels with differents health bars. Its now much more perfunctory and dull. Its been taken out, obviously because it would take up too much of the GBA screen. Now Kirby wears different hats to tell you what power he is and there's a bland vanilla label at the bottom that tells you what power you have. Many of the most hectic areas in the game are no longer so hectic and the pace is slower than the much faster NES version. A lot of little things, such as boss encounters and animations and the overall visual style have changed around every corner. Fetching little details that can make you fall in love with a game are mostly graphical and it doesn't seem as lovingly polished as the original. Make no doubt about it, the graphics are certainly a sight to behold and some of the stages DO have this inspired sort of Nintendoish creativity to their graphics design that you really don't usually see in other platformers. (The transparent flashing will o' wisps that look like shining suns really took me for a surprise in one stage.) Light filters in through trees and watery caves tell of haunting dark Dreamland passages. For all this greatness though, the game is most appealing when it uses far simpler graphics, like the beautiful pastel dreamy shades used at the end of every level bonus where Kirby tries to rocket up past platforms to different bonus items or in stages where the foreground uses simpler, more NES like building blocks to create its world. Overall, it feels a lot more like Rayman than Kirby and for a lot of time I didn't even feel like I was in a usual Kirby game for all the visual creativity. Also, there's a lot more pixellization than there should be. Simpler was better and like I mentioned above, it feels like a classic colorized and losing much of its original visual charm despite the "superiority" of the new technology.

If you've played Hoshi no Kirby 64, longtime Kirby fans may have noticed a more lethargic and slower pace to the game, that, at least in my opinion, made it a lot less fun. If you've play Star Kirby 3, you may be of the opinion that the new graphic style in that game and the feel of the characters wasn't as appealing as Nintendo cartoon characters usually are. This one continues that weird feeling of Kirby malaise, where a certain timing and pace and style is just not as frightfully on as the earlier games. After all, I believe it was this very sense of polish, wit, humor and style that made the original a classic despite its great ease, lack of innovation and short play time. It was just too well made and too much fun to deny.

The three mini games of the original have been axed in favor of three new mini games that are possible to be multiplayer through a single cartridge link. As the graphics transition, despite their excellence, is the single least appealing area of the game, the multiplayer elements are the most appealing. The first mini game is Samurai Kirby, where you face off against an enemy in a staring match and must push your button as quickly as you can once the signal on the screen flashes. The first to knock the other down wins. Its humorous, it keeps in style with the Kirby mythos, its tense and in multiplayer with friends, it hilariously nerve racking. If you've played the original, its just a redoing of the Cowboy Kirby now with samurai themes insteads of guns and cowboy hats, I must say, since I played this in Super Deluxe, I liked the cowboy theme better, but that's nitpicking too much.

The second is by far the most fun mini game ever made in the history of the universe. Okay, so I exaggerate, but I do believe I could play this in its own game if it were expanded upon and would buy it in a second. Basically, its Uniracer Kirby, where he skateboards on stars, and you hold down the A button to accelerate on this Uniracer style, Mode 7ish tracks in the sky that go all over the place! You release the A button to make Kirby jump. Your timing must be perfect, because there are these ramps that will major league slow you down should you hit them and will give you a boost if you bounce off them at the right time. With four players, its an absolute blast and really fun.

The last game is Bomb Kirby, where you have to pass a bomb around, like a hot potato until somebody blows up, again with up to four players. Finding secret exits usually nets you a play in one of these bonus mini games for fabulous Kirby prizes, like a vacation in Orange Ocean! You can also play them at any time on the main menu or for multiplayer fun. As it only takes one cartridge, its great a way to mess around for a few lighthearted minutes and somehow, inexplicably the mini games never get old and aren't annoying at all.

But the real multiplayer splooge will be easily understandable. If everyone has their own copy of Fountain of Dreams, you can play up to four player Kirby co operative mode.

This.

Is.

Insanely.

Incredibly.

Indescribly.

Chaotically.

Ass kicking.

FUN!

There are times when we'd play with three of my friends (everyone on screen at the same time) and we'd have to pause simply because we were laughing too hard at the absolute chaos that often results on screen. Its been a looooong time since I've played co op anything, let alone four player co op on a platformer as hectic and fun as Fountain of Dreams can get. You can share stolen powers and health power ups and it instantly becomes clear that the redesigned areas were done so to incorporate multiple players. Think of it! Tthe absolute insanity of four Kirbies at the same time, each throwing their powers around on the screen at enemies and messing around! It also requires an eerie level of cooperation, since things like the affirmation tire racing take the utmost amount of co op concentration and teamwork to pull off correctly, since the screen won't scroll unless all four Kirbies are the right place at the right time. It feels very natural and easy to get used to, but I must say on the small screen, with all the enemies and action going on, four Kirbies at the same time...there's just not enough screen real estate for it not to be cramped and uncomfortable to see what's going on. But this is kind of part of the fun. It really becomes quite insane to understand what the hell is happening, when its like four people playing the same one player game with each other at the same time. Multiply the type of multiplayer uproarious riots that happen with the best multiplayer games with the sheer fun of co op, and you've got the single best multiplayer platformer out there. It easily torches even the two player mode in Sonic 2, which I'd say was the previous bar.

Make no mistake about it. This is the primary reason to own the game. If you can find three friends who want it too and have GBAs, this unseats Advance Wars and Mario Kart Super Circuit as the best multiplayer value on the system. Its like Contra The Platformer or something. I mean, not only is it all this fun, but its fun in a Kirby game which for Kirby standards is the SMB3 of the series, length wise (long, cool, varied stages and LOTS of them). For single player, there is a harder mode once you've won the game that is genuinely more challenging, but still won't make you swear as much as Rayman 2 or Super Mario Sunshine will. After that...there is one extremely cool and new single player addition:

*SPOILERS*

you can play as the Meta Knight after finishing hard mode. In a way, its like playing with Sword Kirby throughout the entire game without a chance to lose the power. Because Sword Kirby is easily the most fun incarnation of Kirby yet seen in a Kirby game (especially in this one) its a particularly well chosen addition. It also changes the dynamic of the game and turns it much more action oriented.

*END SPOILERS*

If you've never played Kirby's Adventure you can win Fountain of Dreams easily in a day, which is not to say its short, just really easy. If you have played Kirby's Adventure, then it is far, far, far easier to find secret exits and secret switches than it was in the original. Nintendo made it idiot proof and pretty much took all the satisfaction of finding some of the most well hidden secrets of the original.

As for music, really, for the most part it sounds like the NES original with more sound channels. Its kind of weird to think of this way, but imagine what a NES would sound like if it were full surround sound (with headphones on that is, which is the only way to play GBA if you want to appreciate the music). That means the beeps and boops now have more stereophonic sound channels and such. However, like the graphics, the composition tends to be lower in tempo and remixed rather badly, clashing and not being as catchy as the original tunes. One excellent example is the one of lone standout tracks in the game, which is essentially packing the Orchestral Game Concert CD version used in Super Smash Bros. Melee onto the GBA's sound format. It should sound wonderful, but its woefully out of sync, despite being of impressive sound caliber and generally doesn't evoke near the same type of awe as hearing that old tune rendered in such symphonic ways.

Basically, I'd recommend a buy based on three things:

1) If you have friends you know you can play with and can count on to buy the game too to access the multiplayer and co op sounds appealing, go for it. This is one of the best co op experiences out there, console or handheld. It'd be a shame to miss it just because its on a handheld and not technically on par with playing on a big screen.

2) If you've played the original, I wouldn't buying this one just to have it on the GBA unless the multiplayer sound appealing and you can do it. Unlike Nintendo's other conversions, besides a few neat changes and additions, and drastically "improved" aesthetics, it really doesn't reignite the old glory of the original quite so well. Something is just really off. It might just be some weird pickiness in me, but somehow I doubt it as all my friends who own it commented on the same thing. And most people in this forum know I'm not the type to complain about all the small things in games and more of a "big picture/is it fun?" kind of guy.

3) If you haven't played the original and you can take advantage of the multiplayer, and are interested in a new Kirby experience, I'd say get it. You probably won't notice any "off" ness and just have fun, though I really doubt you'd have as much as you would with the NES version playing for the first time. The charm of somethings just can't be replicated as well and this seems to be one of them. If you can't take advantage of the multiplayer, its worth it to play this version, because its much easier to find I imagine and has more features and technically better aesthetics than the original. Its also a pretty game to showcase your GBA to others. And it has more longevity by far over the original version.

In the end, I can sum up the game best by saying its like Yoshi's Island being remade for the GBA by making it more like Yoshi's Story. No...just, well, no. Doesn't work, Nintendo.

Ijou.



- Shou Suzuki
EMail foxspiritshadow