odyssey's main contribution to the collectathon canon was the acknowledgement that to make a robust collectathon experience, there needed to be a constant shuffling of verbs to avoid tedium and vary the challenges available to the player. while this has always been a feature of the genre, the usual approach is to overburden the main character with loads of unlockable powers, or to lock new toolkits behind minigames that limit player expressivity within strict spatial barriers or time limits. odyssey's capture mechanic neatly allows temporary changes in player verbs without overloading mario's basic (though very nuanced ofc) toolkit while also bounding capture use organically via locality with a lot of room for the player to experiment.

while the new kirby obviously doesn't implement the open-area trappings of odyssey, it incorpoates the capture via the new mouthful mode, which overlays whatever copy ability he has with a new basic toolkit from whatever he's swallowed. doing this allows the developers to dip into the deep well of alternative verbs without violating the player's choice of copy ability, but at the same time implementing these takes away from the number of copy abilities available. the weird and wild among kirby's long list of ablities over the years have been culled in favor of these limited mouthful abilities, and since the set of mouthful objects becomes well-worn quickly, it can make the second-to-second gameplay feel monotonous.

however, kirby levels are not iterative in the way that mario levels are, where challenge concepts are evolved over the course of a small period to test the player's abilities in more and more demanding contexts. instead, kirby levels have always bounced from idea to idea with more focus on surprising and disorienting the player; each three-star door could completely flip the level's idea on its head, or shift to something else entirely. with this design technique in place, the mouthful abilities really shine as ways to quickly shift a player's attention towards the new limited verbs before shoving them into something different. these are joyrides, not obstacle courses, and the game only gets better and better as it continues to develop the amount of variety for the player into the endgame. the beginning is shallow and rote of course (as all kirby games are to some extent), but quality only scales up as the adventure goes on. the later levels are a whirlwind of mechanics that consistently delighted me; a veritable funhouse of new ideas and environments. the added treasure rooms bolster the experience as well by offering more compelling tests of the player's comprehension of each toolkit, at least when they go beyond simple gauntlets of enemies.

on pop star this would have only pushed the pink puffball so far, but in this new world the developers wring a lot of fascinating vistas and locales out of this decaying metropolis. each world hews close to tried-and-true world themes with the added twist of navigating human-like architecture, which is new territory for the series and novel for platformers in general. at their best, the overgrown foliage and buried structures paradoxically make the land feel more alive than many of kirby's previous retreads of familiar territory. at worst, they make the engine sputter while simultaneously limiting the scope of the world outside the explicit frame of the camera. while the on-rails approach suits kirby's overall hurried design, it also means that true hidden paths and secrets cannot truly lie outside of the player's view, making them often feel like perfunctory methods of handing out additional coins or ablities. to further develop the world, the devs have added the waddle dee town, which expands as the game progresses to offer a variety of optional content and items. unfortunately it's not much more than an interactive menu, but at the very least it offers a beefy package to those interested in content besides the main levels.

what really sealed this as one of my favorite kirby games were the bosses, all of which really thrive in a 3D space. there's much more room for interesting patterns and dynamic encounters when you aren't limited to 2D, and the developers did a great job overall designing bosses that smartly harness the space (besides sillydillo, who is undercooked and not particularly interesting to fight). with the added bonus of kirby's new witch time-esque dodge ability, trying to take down each boss as efficiently as possible is more interesting than it ever has been before in the series, even if some of the new weapon upgrading can trivialize encounters. in fact, it works so naturally that it fits the kirby series in an odd way: older games have a reputation for secretly housing stellar beat-em-up mechanics, and this game seems to have snuck in its own little character action sequences.

to that end, what this series really needs to shine in 3D is to lean into those aspects. let me carry multiple copy abilities at once and swap between them for combos. give me more enemies with complex attack patterns that don't go down in a single hit. strip out some of the platforming and give me better mini-bosses instead (the variety for them here is noticeably poor). provide an option for a true nightmare difficulty from the beginning. this game is quite good on its own merits, but what truly elevates it is the joy of combat, especially when that final gauntlet of bosses hits absolutely perfectly. another game in this style won't cut it, give us the action game kirby we deserve...

the fact that it leans into those strengths at all at least illustrates that the designers have more confidence in their level design abilities than in star allies, where the combat was again very fleshed out but placed in levels that never even vaguely attempted to leverage the character's strengths. for that alone forgotten land would be up there on my list of kirby games, and given the solid size of the package (ever more important now that the series retails for $60 a pop), I'd say it's worth trying out for any switch owner. it's the first game I've played in a while where I'm actually looking forward to playing a bit more of the post-game content, even if I'm not compelled to do every optional objective. this is about as polished of a kirby experience as we've ever gotten.