-SPOILERS for both Gintama the show as well as just the game we're talking about, gintama rumble.-

Honestly I don't know what I was expecting, it is an "anime tie-in game".

So a couple weeks or so prior to playing, I finished a long journey of watching all of Gintama with a friend. It was a wonderful time, and Gintama pretty easily became one of my favorite things ever after finishing. I love it's mish mash of a setting combining edo japan with a modern day to futuristic setting with aliens, I love a good chunk of it's cast, some just becoming some of my absolute favorites put to screen, and it's ability to get the most out of combining oddball comedy with soul-crushing drama is something I really admire about, similar in a way to why I really like Like a Dragon stuff.

It's a really great show with a lot of amazing moments, so with my brainrot in hyperdrive, I really wanted to get the one game I knew I could get my hands on that just so happens to adapt Gintama into a game. And uhh... it's indeed an anime tie-in game.

Usually the vibe I get with a lot of the ones I play is they are able to facillitate the series respective moments, but mainly through slide-show CGs with the occassional in engine cutscenes that, while looking good, can also be a little uncanny when their outfits or their looks or whatever else is off from the original. And that can somewhat sour the appeal, even worse when a lot of dialouge that makes the fight interesting is said within gameplay, which can be a little easy to not pay attention to.

But alright, let's get into the game proper, because for a musou type hack n' slash (like dynasty warriors basically), I think it's alright. I say dynasty warriors, but it seems to vibe a little more closely to something like Sengoku Basara. That's basically Capcom's answer to Dynasty Warriors. It usually puts you in the shoes of one person throughout a mission rather than swapping around, but in turn, it varies up the mechanics a bit to make the exprience a little more thoughtful, which I feel they capture fine enough here.

Your main controls are a light and heavy button for combos, a jump that can be followed into attacks, a guard that when done at the right time can guardbreak enemies and bosses, though the timing strict, a lock on, a boost mode that doubles as the activation for the musou attack (in this game called awakening mode and awakening rumble attacks), and lastly are hurricanes. Dashes that don't deal damage on his, but can stagger opponents, be cancelled into and from attacks other than hurricane, and can be used in QTEs called hurricane clashes that are mostly style over substance. You get a flashy clash animation, and guaranteed damage on a boss, and that's about it. Kind of cool though.

You also have access to skill that are unlocked by upgrading. Two of them are basic ones done by holding either the light or heavy button, and the last is done by filling a meter under the health bar that requires different methods to fill, but when full, pressing guard and any attack button will activate it. Characters also gain access to things called Silver Orbs, which are essentially assists you can equip to characters that give them some kind of passive ability as well as an active ability, like an assist attack or on the spot healing.

Silver orbs can be found on the field by beating captains or finding specific boxes, or be bought in the store. You can also find healing and buffing items on the field, and get access to something called Ginpachinko. Completing side objectives like killing a certain amount of enemies or doing awakening rumble enough times will get a spin at the slots that will usually give you some temporary buff, restore meters, or give you free EXP or Pachi orbs, the currency used in the store.

Characters as mentioned before, can be upgraded via the EXP gained from completeing missions. EXP will build level which will give you points to upgrade 3 categories of stats. Spirit that increases how fast the Awakening Gauge fills and how big it is, Strength that buffs defense and health, and Skill that upgrades attack, as well as unlocks skills to use and silver orb slots (of which are three).

I'm not a big fan of how the upgrading it done, and that's not because of the categorization, I like that it just groups stats like health and defense, but more because it's way to forward leaning into upgrading Skill. That's because you have to put points into so you can unlock the skills. Now I get it for silver orbs, and arguably the last skill tied to a new meter, but I really don't like it makes you have to spend points just unlocking your first couple skills. Listen, I already find musou gameplay to be... kind of mindless already because of all the effect and numbers going up from mashing buttons, so having any way to make the exprience a little more interesting by adding more options I feel is a step in the right direction.

I say this because without the two skills to add some more intrigue to how a character fights, all I have to go off of is their basic combo, heavy attacks, and rumble attack. And I feel in most character's cases, it's really not enough to get a feel of them, especially those who I feel have too slow or clunky of combos to make work as much. At least without going to other modes to sink a bunch of time into leveling them up, which i'm sorry, i don't really feel the need to go and do, especially since most of the story is done playing 3 characters, with a few peppered in depending on the case.

Oh yeah, the story mode. So like a lot of anime adaptations, you just play through arcs being retold in the game's style, where you are to explore areas, capture camps, get intel out of enemy captains, and fight against bosses either starting, ending stages, or just being the stage. They adapt 8 arcs, Benizakura, Yoshiwara in Flames, Four Devas, Thorny, Courtesan of a Nation, Shogun Assassination, Farewell Shinsengumi, and Battle on Rakuyo. They also have an epilogue teasing Silver Soul, and side stories that tackle other character's perspetives within each arc. That's also how you unlock the majority of the other characters in the game.

I'd say that they adapt the arcs fine enough, at least they get enough context to explain why the arc is happening. They cover all the major beats, certain ones even get animated with in-game models, and it's neat. I don't have a whole lot to say about it, because I think they're like fine, I just massively prefer watching them in the anime, because it's not just anime screenshots telling the story. I can be a bitcj and pick all the nits of every little scene not showing things exactly like the anime that slightly bug me, but like, that's also because I have the brainrot. Just... why did we not get a costume with Hijikata not wearing his shinsengumi jacket in the arc that happened. It's fucked up.

I only really dislike it because they so heavily center it on Gintoki, with a little bit also from Hijikata and Kagura. I get why they do when they do, but there's a lot of characters that get introduced through large levels and sometimes boss fights right off the bat, hell they do that for Kagura, for all 3 of her appearances in the story, technically four times but they make her yato blood frenzy state another character, so I don't super count it. I mean they're doable typically, it's just more annoying than anything.

Aside from the story stuff, they also have free battle, where you can play story scenarios with anyone without caring about story, and Kabukicho Ultimate Rumble, which I did try a bit, saw it was like 11 levels of just random objectives and bosses with double the health of story bosses at the lowest difficulty, and I said audibly "no thank you" after getting my shit kicked in after trying to unlock Sakamoto. It's not that I can't just sit down and do it, I just don't want to do it, especially since getting Sakamoto means doing it with Katsura, and he's like my least favorite to play. I'll probably come back to it later though...

Let's see... you got the edo mart which is a store to buy costumes, cut-in cgs and lines for combo meter stuff, and even silver orbs you can only get in the store, all using in game currency. There is DLC for this game, but I think it's just more silver orbs and I really don't care.

This game has also fucked with my sense of pressing buttons on a menu, because for most things, especially in PS menus, it's x to confirm, and circle to back out. But here, it's reversed. Confirm is circle, and backing out is x, and it has fucked up my muscle memory so fucking much when trying to play other games. Granted it's not a big deal, I just think it's funny, but like still, fucked up.

And uhh.... I think that's it. I think this game is pretty fineeeee. Like it's ok as a musou, it's pretty alright as a Gintama thing, especially with the voice actors breaking the fourth wall in the cutscenes opening side missions, but we honestly don't get a lot of it, just the direct re-telling of the main arcs. It again reminds me why I really appreciate the show's smaller arcs. Sure they are usually pretty funny or heartwarming, but I mainly say it that a lot of that small stuff is what helps build the backbone of the show, adding more depth to the characters and the world around it before we see these serious arcs show them at their most focused. I'm not really saying they should do that for the game, I get why they probably wouldn't, for multiple reasons, I say that more as just a general gintama fan thinking about why I like the show again.

For the game itself, it's like ok to sit down and play, it's fine, but I feel like I really only got value in this because I'm a gintama fan, and that's kind of it. Such is the life with most anime tie-in things I suppose. Even Kamui says as much in his side story cutscene. It's got some neat ideas to it though, I really like the idea of how Hurricane is as a mechanic, both as a movement tool, and as a combo tool. I also liked how to fill the rumble attacks, you had to combo while you were in the awakening mode, making you think a bit about when you pop it, and I like a lot of the character's moveset. If not because of their playstyle (Gintoki, Hijikata, Okita), but because I like seeing them in action (Tsukuyo, Katsura, and both the yato kids especially).

I might come back for Kabukicho Ultimate Rumble to see what Sakamoto is like, but I don't think i'll be coming back to it unless I really feel like it.

I was following this game on and off, but more off I guess since I was kind of shocked to see it released on the Eshop, and even more so to figure out it was only a little over 2 weeks ago. But hey, for a game with the vibe of "DMC in a Metroidvania", this is really fun.

I think the main mechanics are really solid from the combat to the traversal. I specifically like moving around more in this game, as you progressively get more and more tools that let you just break the environment, but they still find ways of making it fun. Just the way you can wall run and combo it into dash jumps, or even early on with wall hikes followed by using the upward aerial charge slash to gain some meager distance to reach a ledge. Oh and the ledge grab is really snappy. Another favorite is sliding, especially when you get water sliding later on, it's just satisfying to be able to cross a long hallway with a ton of extra momentum because you slammed down on a slope.

These also help play into the combat mechanics, which they give you a surprising amount of freedom to customize your build between a mix of technique, stat buffs, or some mix of the two. Your main moveset is tied to your sword, where you can do basic attacks with it, do unique attacks called pulse attacks that cost some of your pulse meter to use but successfully landing hits will heal you, and spells, of which you can have four equipped at a time. The sword and pulse moves have aerial and ground up, down, forward, and neutral attacks as well, but you can also charge the normal attack for charge attack variants of all attacks.

Those are really important as they can let you break enemy's poise, which if you break all of their poise, they will be stunned and you can wail on them with combos for a bit. This is actually a really neat way to frame it for enemies and bosses alike, where with poise they will rarely flinch, but without poise, you can style on them like the ragdoll they are. You can also knock stunned enemies into another to break their poise a bit.

Your defensive options lie not just in your evasion (though I feel something is off about how long the invincibility frames last for), but in blocking where you can counter attack, or eventually just a parry. Both are handy, but a little hard to make full use of in this game. You also have projectile deflection on all attacks when you get it, and those are good when you mix the dash attack, so you can win by turning enemy projectiles on them so long as you can deal with the I-frames.

I keep saying "when you get to it" and that's because a lot of your upgrades are through memory discs that contain the given abilities, from main abilities required for completion and 100%, to essential battle abilities, to the fun stuff you can equip like an attack from taunt or time stop on footstooling enemies. This also applies kind of to spells, though they're treated as a separate resource, and they mainly help in diversifying your moveset, like helping break poise easier, or have extra dps. My personal favorites were cutter, searing knuckle, piercing ray, chaser, upper sword, and especially timebomb. That one creates sticky bombs that break two bars of poise, making them pretty handy in encounters and boss fights.

You got a lot of options to work with, and your enemy variety is pretty good all things considered. You got flying birds, normal guy, speedy mantis guys, giants, tall faust lookin' motherfuckers with axe hands, axe guys that are the worst to fight in the game, reapers, spell sage monsters, and the three church aloe types of knight, mace tanks, and white mages. Knights are my least favorite of them all though, because that stupid dropkick somehow always clips me. I also like the green coating enemies like normal guys and birds can have because they help clear the field a little easier if I lead their attacks near other enemies. They explode, that's why I like them, they explode.

I think the overall combat is actually pretty well done, and I only really have a few nitpicks. One is the dash, because I feel like the I-frame count is kind of strict but I might be stupid, blocking and parrying don't feel all that worthwhile to do, so aside from the few times I blocked and counterattacked, and very few times I parried to get the trophy, I didn't feel much doing it, and I think poise can be a bit more cumbersome of a mechanic than fun, especially when it's a group of hard-hitting enemies that are really fast and they all have immense poise pools so it's just a lot sneaking in charge slashes and hoping I don't get grazed, which I inevitably do. Also more a presentational complaint, but I wish there was like a combo meter or something that made getting into the heat of the action feel a little more satisfying. I'm not even just saying that because of the DMC inspiration, but because while combat is fun to figure out, if there was more to incentivize getting into those combos more and improving them, like a combo count to see how high the number can go, then i'd have a little more interest in trying to perfect them. It's small, but it would be cool.

The bosses overall were fine. I think a few of them are pretty cheap at times with most attacks that lock-on to you, especially the ones where they'll just stick to you like glue and do some kind of really damaging attack (the last two fights are very guilty of this), and I did have to retry plenty of times to get patterns down, but that's nothing new to how I play these kinds of games. This is where timebomb really helped a lot too, since you can just stick them on multiple times to a boss, and not only will they take a chunk of their health, but the boss's poise will be at best, 6 bars gone, letting me focus a bit more on sneaking in hits and dodging the patterns before going ham. And hey, since I have the ability that builds pulse more when you're waiting for the mana to recharge, you still can have at least enough for one pulse attack when you eventually break their guard.

Moving on from the mechanics into the greater world, the levels you explore are all sky islands that all have some kind of unique thing about them, whether they're towns, the wilds, abandoned labs and ruins, or just raiding a fucking airship, there's a lot of cool stuff to find in the world, not just in mini-games or side quests, but through the locales unique oddities or in the times you can enter Unreality, which is basically the void, to knock out some unique endeavors, ending up frazzled in different places. A lot of the game's objectives are also left mainly up to how the player wants to tackle them.

After meeting Chervil and getting your ship, Vernal's main goal is to find out more about the whereabouts of her father's location, but you don't know where to go. You got a bunch of islands, but nothings in specific is being pointed to. It's all on the player to get a baring for the world by exploring each locale, even getting wrapped up into a little story with whoever is in the locale. Like chasing a treasure hunting Aloe Knight who I'm 30% sure is corrupt until the treasure actually makes him corrupt, or challenging essentially tower coliseum so you can meet with an old friend. And that's just the early stuff. After what is basically the midpoint where you are properly introduced to Unreality traversal and get the new Bloom ability (which is basically a super attack), you have even more places to visit in the hopes of unlocking the final island containing the final boss, but the order you do most of that in is up to the player.

There's a lot of freedom in how you do things. There are technically required objectives to explore the islands, but how you do them is up to you, and honestly for someone doing this for the first time, it certainly added to the feeling of charting my own course, and trying to make progress where I could to get the answers I needed. It did unfortunately make things feel a little less cohesive by the time we actually got to the plot beats, but it was still pretty fun, especially since aside from a few islands, most of them tell their own little tale or build a bit on the overall story which helps makes these little random objectives feel fun to work through, especially since finishing them yields my ultimate objective at the time. The only downside I did have was finding the last few things in an area with a fine toothed comb, but that's typical for these kind of games, and only exasperated by the fact that this game is only 2 or so weeks old, so barely any resources are there to help find those items. The one that caught me the most that I actually really need help for was the 11th treasure in the airship. On the right of the elevator shaft above the main monitor room, there's a breakable wall that has the item. I dunno why'd you figure that out from a random review on backloggd but there you go.

Probably also helps that the characters we took through that adventure, Vernal and Chervil, were both pretty neat. Vernal comes off as a very hotheaded and stubborn, the kind of person that prefers to get shit done, and ask questions when it's convenient to her, and raise hell if she doesn't get those answers. Not without reason though, as much as she loves to fight, and even is ready to take on a bunch of people, she is still caring enough to help with people's needs and hear them out on their troubles. Though sometimes, she's the trouble, like climbing someone's already broken windmill and pissing them off, standing in front of someone's still drawing session and progressively pissing them off, and constantly trying to be a thorn in the side of the Church of Aloe, the current ones in power of the islands. They do get pissed at her antics, but they're also corrupt officials more than an actual church so fuck them. While she has cases of being a smug little shit, she specifically gets a kick out of causing trouble for the church, and again, fuck them.

Chervil on the other hand, the amnesiac scientist turned robot who pilots the ship, is a lot more reasonable, a lot more wise to the world (though a little uncertain due to his amnesia over the span of time from the rise of the islands to now), and is usually the one supporting Vernal through advice, knowledge, and well, piloting the ship. He mainly comes off as pleasant to be around, and very intent to right the wrongs he helped all those years ago. He and Vernal are pretty neat to see chat with one another. They got some good gags, Chervil's knowledge mixing with Vernal's exprience or lack of knowledge can be endearing and very insightful to the events or state of the world, and it's overall fine.

I think the one character I didn't really feel anything for was probably Saffron. He vernal clash a couple times, he runs into the void the first chance we got, and he's gone from the story. He clearly meant something to Vernal, as it's mentioned the two trained under the same master sometime after Vernal lost her mother and he lost his kingdom, but it feels like such a nothing beat since nothing really comes of it. He just pops up for a couple worlds, he's the boss in one of them, and that's it. I kind of wish they delved a bit more into him, because I feel he would've been interesting, but they just kind of show and drop him. Kind of disappointing.

But uhh.. yeah that's Vernal Edge. It's a really fun mish-mash of DMC and a Metroidvania in a 2D plane, with a lot of cool traversal and puzzles, a pretty good combat system with some good depth, some neat characters exploring both the world and the void it's attached to with a lot of neat lore, settings, background, and a lot more I wish we went into a bit more. It's a pretty fun game. I will definitely come back though once I hear that the game gets a patch for consoles.

I played this on switch, and not only did I experience a couple audio bugs, a bunch of random crashes, mostly after talking to NPCs, and one time where the game kept thinking I was in battle mode for awhile. In fight mode, you can't check spells. items, and memory discs, and after one experience with unreality, it just kept me in fight mode until I died. But the major one is that two things are bugged so I can't really finish them. Firstly is one town says it has 16 collectibles, it only has 15. And secondly is you can't unlock the palette change achievement if you accidentally open a chest in the same area you get the achievement in, so I couldn't get the palette swap. Looking it up, I did see the creator is gonna patch those two things out after Nintendo gives him the ok to do so, so I'll come back and maybe replay it on vicious difficulty. That'd be fun.

Oh and if there is one more complaint, I really wish that resetting the game didn't reset the controls so I had to rebind them over and over. I wouldn't normally mention this kind of thing, but resetting the game over and over because of random crashes sort of started to get on my nerves a bit.

It's still worth the purchase, just keep those things in mind until a patch drops.

This game took awhile for me to beat just because I either had stuff to do or got overly anxious with Mr. X chasing you, but I buckled down and finally beat both Leon and Claire's playthroughs.

Survival Horror isn't exactly the kind of game I play often, but I feel like I get the appeal more. I like being able to plan my routes from room to room, all the while trying to preserve my ammo or use some other tactics to get through unscathed.

With Mr. X on my tail, the game's chaser basically, it made things all the more tense, but I've come to appreciate that about him, especially in the Claire playthrough where he's present not even 10 minutes into her story, which makes getting through the first section nerve wracking. Considering this was my 2nd playthrough, that makes sense.

Between the two, I think I like Claire as a character just a bit more than Leon, but I still love the two of them. If I had to say which campaign I liked more though, it would probably be Leon, just because I think his diversions throughout the areas were kind of neat, and I like Ada's hacking stuff more than the stealth section with Sherry.

Overall, I like this game, it looks as pretty as it is grotesque (and honestly some gorey bits are just fucking appalling), I like the story at hand from both character's perspectives, though I don't think it's a lot to ride home about, and uhh, yeah I had fun. Glad I broke out of my comfort zone, especially since the game I played before was Kirby, which is much more my jam.

I will say, I really do wanna play the RE 3 remake sooner or later because I know that still centers around Raccoon City, specifically with Jill getting out before it gets destroyed, and I wanna see what she's like. I also wanna play 7 and 8 eventually... Probably won't be for a bit, especially since I wanna play the RE4 Remake first, but whatever.

So part of the thing going into this "Kirby 100% marathon" was mainly just an excuse to replay Planet Robobot, as I have a lot of connection with it over the years. Never did 100% it though since I didn't get past the final final phase of the True Arena and the stickers. But I also just wanted to come back and see if it's still as good as I remember it being since it has been... a few years I think? I don't think I've touched this since sometime in my last year of high school, which uhhhhhhhh.... fucked up. That was around when I got my switch too, so I guess that checks out.

The biggest revelation playing this after Triple Deluxe however is just wow, this game is if that game was actually really cool. Now as I said before, that game is still good, just not very standout, and a little exhausting to play through, but I had to think for awhile why that was. What clicked with me was finishing the first world.

Hell, the first couple levels of each are very on point. Triple Deluxe's first 2 levels start with a tutorial followed by Kirby being introduced to the game's gimmick ability, the Hypernova ability, and then a pretty standard cave level after. It's not bad, they're fine levels, but they don't really do much interesting outside of introduce the fruit, which even then is just "oh hey look at this fruit that just appeared, cool."

Planet Robobot is still under the context of Popstar being invaded by a mysterious invading force that mechanizes the planet. So the first level doesn't actually show the new gimmick form that kirby relies on, but is instead a tutorial followed by a chase by a rampaging robot drill tree. And like yea, you can beat it for a rare sticker, but it's the vibe of unfamiliar hostility that it creates that gives some texture to the adventure more than normal, like this is out of Kirby's range of normalcy, and you kind of feel that with this first level. The following stage then is the robobot armor introduction, where Kirby is attacked by one of the robobot mechs and has to fight it. Only after beating it does kirby think to get in it, and just like that, we got the new game's gimmick ability.

It's much more dynamic way of showing Kirby getting access to the ability, and lemme be honest with you, Robobot armor is very easily a more interesting gimmick ability than the Hypernova, and even the Super abilities. Hypernova is an evolution of Kirby's inhale, which is a smart way of showing Kirby's versatility with being part vaccum. And the Super Abilities are flashy, and fairly versatile due to there being 5 of them, but there's a certain formula with them. You'll have one level with them, and one level with out, and a lot of times it's just set up as a designated "use this ability" spot.

The Robobot Armor doesn't really adhere to that fully. Sure there are parts where you'd have to unlock it for some reason, but sometimes you have whole levels where it's nothing but Robobot stuff, some have only a few sections with it, some don't even use it at all. Usually when it's used, it's to one up the stage's hazards or for puzzle solving, but there are occassions where Kirby has to split from the armor to do something only he can do without it, usually travelling through smaller areas to open the door for the big armor.

And the armor itself is cool because normally, it's got a basic but strong moveset where it punches and can break blocks and stuff, but it can also copy abilities like Kirby. There are 13 out of the 27 abilities that can be copied, and they all usually have some kind of applications for puzzle solving, combat, traversal, or some combinations of the three. Some levels are even completely unique for the Robobot Armor because they heavily rely on Wheel for race themed levels or Jet for side-scrolling shooters akin to the landia shooter section from RtD. It's honestly such a neat way to bring that little diversion back, even having a couple bosses to itself. Notable favorites are bomb for it's neat little puzzles for guiding bombs, stone suprisingly for it being an improvement on the punching the main mech could do, and mike because it's visual noise is very satisfying to see in action.

Also inspeaking of that ability list, this is a great list returning and new. Sure a lot of mainstays like fire, hammer, sword, ninja, ice, beam, cutter, and whatnot return, but they also brought back a few new ones from the recent games like archer and leaf. They even brought back older ones that haven't seen use in awhile like Jet and Mirror, both also seeing some small moveset additiosn to make them more fun. I should also just mention, they added back the extra moves to Spark, and it's fun again. Great ability. The new ones in ESP, Doctor, and especially Poison are some of my favorites in the series actually. Poison sticks out to me not only for being a surprisingly good boss killer, but also just being a really novel reworking of water. Poison in games doesn't get much more than the status, so seeing a moveset like this puts a smile on my face.

25 of these abilities are pretty standard, but 2 are stowed away through hidden rooms and completion/amiibo support. Smash Bros., a copy ability from Amazing Mirror that basically gives Kirby a reworked version of his smash moveset which is really cool to see, and UFO, something you most likely won't get until 100%'ing the game, but the fact they hid it just for people to find is really cool.

What helps make these abilties and the robobot stuff be as cool as it is is because the abilties are normally pretty heavily utilized in the myriad of scenarios the game has, like remembering a given path put up on a monitor, which can contain puzzles in itself, or using the stages hazards to aid you like the cyber space blocks acting as platforms or the multitude of things you can slam back with robobot armor moves like large metal cylinders, waddle dees in cars and buses, cue balls, dice, giant cue balls that chase you, the casino levels were kind of fucking wild. Oh the level themes in general are actually pretty cool. Because yeah, it's basically popstar but mechanized, and it thus would take some familiar stuff and just add like, metal everywhere, right?

Well sure, that's kind of what you get with patched plains or gigabyte grounds, basically areas turned into a dedicated sawmill spot or industrial factory respectively, but then you got the water world where it has an ice cream factory for it's ice levels, the water levels, especially the one before the boss (3-5) is basically bioshock with underwater cities, and while you'd expect a burning lava world for the 5th world, it and the 2nd are are just a city and town respecitively, and the city itself is always shining with bright and flashy lights among the rooftops. Both also have casino levels, and they are both kind of the coolest. And the last world of Access Ark, part of it is just working your way through the ship, seeing the halls with Haltmann's faces plastered over them as his troopers and security drones roam the halls, but then you get thrown into the trenches of Cyberspace, and it's just as cool and bizarre as you'd expect. That also happens to contain some of my favorite levels but either way.

Oh and the boss fights. Clanky Woods is one of my favorite interpretations of Whispy Woods for both it's introduction in the first world, but it's fight is also really good. The Holo-projector is neat fan-service fight, Mecha Knight and the Dedede Clones while at first pretty standard pull out some crazy shit like metal scorpion tail or a cannon. They also bring back some smaller fights like against that crackheaded war blimp that wanted you dead from the earlier games, Kabula, and the security drones scouring the hall are just stock versions of the Metal General from RtD, even having the damage number indicator everytime you hit him.

The fights with Susie and Haltmann are both really good, and also something about Haltmann's voice lines, especially when he pulls out the 3d cube laser that torches his own bots are really funny to me. AND THE LAST FIGHT, there's a reason the final fight from Frontiers I immedietly thought of Planet Robobot, because not only do we fight some big cosmic entity in the shape of a planet sized super computer bent on wiping out all life in the name of "prosperity" but also the game turns into a fucking shooter near the end, and yes, it's one of the coolest fights in the series. Also the way that fight ends is just a major fucking Gurren Lagaan reference, infact a lot of fights with the robobot armor are just that, and I very much appreciate it.

We also got some unique fights from Meta Knight's side mode, which are clones of Dark Matter and Sectionia, finally ending with the Galacta Knight rematch, and while that one is cool, I also gotta feel bad for Galacta Knight everytime we see him, because he's either into two perpetual states. Locked away in a crystal, or destroying planets, and it's never not either of those things. Though while I bring it up, I should probably just mention the side modes row quick.

Meta Knightmare Returns is a better Dedede Tour for two reasons. Meta Knight has a points system that gives him a few abilities that can increase speed, attack, or heal, and those are handy AF, and the mode while still around the same length as Dedede's doesn't feel bloated near the end because of Royal fucking Road. Access Arc is still big, it's the last world of the game with the most levels technically, but it's definetly not as draining to run through. But otherwise, I like both Meta Knight and Dedede pretty equally, though I do like shuttle loop into the upward thrust attack a lot, but I also really like hammer flip.

And the Kirby 3D Rumble and Team Kirby Clash Modes are more interesting to me than Kirby Fighters or Dedede Drum Dash, just because that 3D Rumble led to Blowout Blast and that game is lowkey really fun, and Team Kirby Clash inches ever closer to the idea of Kirby just being a full one turn based RPG, and I like that idea a lot. What we got here is a good take on it using the normal gameplay. Hammer Lord and Time Mage are my favorites, especially when you get a party of mages in the latter.

And the stickers in this game do take quite a few notes from the Keychains from Triple Deluxe. Luckily however, there is only 200 including rare and non-rare ones, and they have a better use than the nothing of the keychains, which is cosmetics to put on your Robobot armor. They're still a bit tedious to fully get but thankfully not nearly as much.

Lastly however is the arenas, and they're about as good as the ones from Triple Deluxe. I will say the True Arena in this game can feel a little daunting towards the end since this game also has an extra last boss after the final boss in their EX form, and that boss has two phases of it's own, alongside some near-death attacks that can kill you if you're not ready for them, so if you're for some reason reading this without finishing the game first, well first hi, secondly why are you reading this? And lastly uhh... be careful.

Anyways yeah, that's Planet Robobot. I know I went into this knowing that this was already one of my favorite Kirby games, but I kind of underestimated how much this game would still find ways to surprise or at least keep me hooked for most of the way through. A lot of the game feels like it took a lot of what Triple Deluxe offered from it's structure and mechanics and whatnot, trimmed the fat where necessary, just went nuts with the new themeing or the new abilities, robobot or otherwise. And look, I don't mean to keep harping on Triple Deluxe because it is still a good game to me, and it has more than a few moments of charm or hype to offer. I just felt with that game, getting through completing it was a little uninteresting and honestly kind of exhausting at points.

Robobot just does more with itself, and that's not just in it's fanservice stuff regarding the return of certain old but well-loved abilities or the return of old but well-known bosses. They even brought back Meta Knightmare. But I also mean that it does a lot of cool things with it's setting, taking full advantage of the theme of a mechanized Pop-Star where once green pastures lay natural and undisturbed now lie in wake of being harvested or metalized by the invading company. They also do a bit more story telling than in Triple Deluxe, though mostly done by Susie, who I think is just a slightly better executed Taranza just due to how we get more direct conversations with her from the third world onward, which I think helps keep me caring on what's going on a bit stronger than Taranza constantly trying to get Kirby off his tail by pissing off the local inhabitants.

Planet Robobot just feels like a better executed game, and it's just really fun to play through. I'm confident in saying it's my favorite so far in this little 100%ing marathon, but Forgotten Land might be some tough competition, and Star Allies could surprise me. We'll see. In general though, this is still probably my favorite Kirby game.

Also it made me feel sad for the robobot armor, how did do that??