Has a lot of potential but ultimately undone by some pretty significant problems. First off, the animal friends are a great concept, which was fully realized in Dreamland 3 but not so much here. They're incredibly cute, and the idea of using them to expand Kirby's move set is a good one, but there are just way too many animal friend copy abilities that are utterly useless or decidedly inferior to their kirby-only counterparts. Level design is okay - about on the same level as Dreamland 1 but a bit harder. This game, however, is significantly longer than the first Dreamland and does get monotonous rather quickly.
Biggest gripe is with the rainbow drop collectibles required to get to the final boss, which is really what dooms this game for me and makes me never want to replay it again. These require you to utilize one or more copy abilities to reach a secret area with the collectible. This is fine when only one copy ability that can be found in the level is required, but the vast majority of them are far more complicated than that. Most of them require multiple copy abilities that you need to use in a specific sequence and often require that you replay multiple levels to obtain and bring said copy ability to the secret area you're trying to reach. It can also be quite difficult to determine which copy ability you need to use due to the sheer number available when you factor in the animal friend variants. Combine all of these and you get a situation where you need to replay levels multiple times just to try a new copy ability / animal friend combo that might not even work. It's incredibly annoying and tedious and unfortunately required to beat the game. This would probably be more tolerable if I were playing this on a Gameboy bit by bit and over the course of several weeks as a kid, but I have far less tolerance for this sort of tedious time wasting as an adult. Replaying levels to try a new copy ability combo doesn't add anything of benefit to the game and just serves to waste the players time.
Another point: this might not be a negative for everyone, and I feel rather neutral about it, but this game has one of the most insane difficulty spikes I've ever seen. Apart from some ridiculous screw you player moments where death is unavoidable without luck or trial and error the game is mostly easy up until the final boss level where the difficulty ramps up significantly. You have to fight three bosses in a row, two of which are legitimately difficult with no healing items and no checkpoints. Its honestly insane for a Kirby game. Its not a bad fight once you figure out a decent strategy, but it was truly shocking. I personally didn't mind the difficulty spike but I'm sure it will turn some people off this game - especially given how unexpected it is for a kirby title.
Overall this is a game with a lot of potential - which was thankfully realized in the far superior Dreamland 3 - but a lot of significant problems that make it an absolute slog to get through.
Biggest gripe is with the rainbow drop collectibles required to get to the final boss, which is really what dooms this game for me and makes me never want to replay it again. These require you to utilize one or more copy abilities to reach a secret area with the collectible. This is fine when only one copy ability that can be found in the level is required, but the vast majority of them are far more complicated than that. Most of them require multiple copy abilities that you need to use in a specific sequence and often require that you replay multiple levels to obtain and bring said copy ability to the secret area you're trying to reach. It can also be quite difficult to determine which copy ability you need to use due to the sheer number available when you factor in the animal friend variants. Combine all of these and you get a situation where you need to replay levels multiple times just to try a new copy ability / animal friend combo that might not even work. It's incredibly annoying and tedious and unfortunately required to beat the game. This would probably be more tolerable if I were playing this on a Gameboy bit by bit and over the course of several weeks as a kid, but I have far less tolerance for this sort of tedious time wasting as an adult. Replaying levels to try a new copy ability combo doesn't add anything of benefit to the game and just serves to waste the players time.
Another point: this might not be a negative for everyone, and I feel rather neutral about it, but this game has one of the most insane difficulty spikes I've ever seen. Apart from some ridiculous screw you player moments where death is unavoidable without luck or trial and error the game is mostly easy up until the final boss level where the difficulty ramps up significantly. You have to fight three bosses in a row, two of which are legitimately difficult with no healing items and no checkpoints. Its honestly insane for a Kirby game. Its not a bad fight once you figure out a decent strategy, but it was truly shocking. I personally didn't mind the difficulty spike but I'm sure it will turn some people off this game - especially given how unexpected it is for a kirby title.
Overall this is a game with a lot of potential - which was thankfully realized in the far superior Dreamland 3 - but a lot of significant problems that make it an absolute slog to get through.