Look, I love the Kirby games. They've been a part of my life for basically as long as I can remember. They always look and sound great, have charm from here to eternity, and almost always play really well. They are, however, with a few exceptions, almost always a very solid 3-3.5/5 experience. They are extremely loveable, but I feel like very few manage to stay interesting and have enough unique ideas spread out over the whole game, which leads to them starting to feel a bit uninspired by the end (though never the final bosses, mind you), with me feeling sort of like I'm just going through the motions.
Planet Robobot should feel the same way. It's a fairly short experience, but it's still pretty clear that the game runs out of gimmicks by the last two worlds and doesn't really iterate on those in any particularly interesting way or even really upping the difficulty, rather just doing basically the exact same thing as in previous stages.
Thing is, none of this really matters when every component of the game is as good as they are here, but also thanks to the developers being extremely smart about always shaking things up at the right time, even if it means recycling something I've definitely done before (and often more than once).You have your regular stages that are standard Kirby, i.e. a fun, fast-paced time through a colorful (this is a beautiful game, by the way. Frame rate can't really handle the 3D at times, though) platforming stage with a good mix of action and actual platforming, and they're a good time since the developers at HAL have done basically the same kinds of stages since Sakurai directed Kirby's Dream Land way back in 1992. Not top tier in the genre or anything, but made by people who have a formula down that they'll always play well, and good enough art directors for every game who can make them feel distinct and fun. Feels like this manages to come up with a few more and more interesting stage gimmicks than usual, like the train or Waddle-Dee traffic. That might just be because the last Kirby I played was 64 , though, which is a 3/5 game I truly love (also loved the surprising amount of references to it in Planet Robobot), but also one where the levels barely have anything going on for almost the entire journey.
What really elevates the game from simply being another "fun, but unremarkable" Kirby game is its main gimmick, the Robobot itself. This era of Kirby had issues with their main gimmicks, especially Triple Deluxe's Hypernova ability which is cool once, but then gets less and less interesting as it keeps showing up since it's basically just a win button and a way to give the player a cinematic experience where Kirby just becomes an indestructible killing machine, which isn't really needed in a game of this kind. The Robobot feels so much more thought out, getting its own copy abilities and puzzles to solve throughout the stages, plus giving HAL an excuse to throw in vehicle stages where Kirby either drives in fast-paced, almost race-like stages, and shmup stages that gives something completely different from the rest of the game. It's not just walking in a straight line and killing everything in sight, but it actually builds upon the regular Kirby gameplay, and tweaks it just enough to always be a welcome mix-up whenever the robobot appears. The added firepower also does give it that satisfaction of something like the Hypernova, but it never really diminishes since I am always the one controlling the action rather than it feeling so scripted and more like a pseudo-interactive cutscene. Really impressed by the restraint HAL also showed, not constantly using the Robobot on each stage, but seemingly very deliberately giving one to you at just the right time, when I'm feeling "This sure is a Kirby game" the most.
The final boss is also among the most insane things I've seen in a video game, so, you know, even if the rest of the game had been pretty mid, it'd probably have been worth the playthrough just for that experience alone. No, wait, the latter half of the final secret stage might honestly be the highlight for me. One of the best power trip sections, like, ever in a video game and it's somehow in a Kirby of all franchises.
Planet Robobot should feel the same way. It's a fairly short experience, but it's still pretty clear that the game runs out of gimmicks by the last two worlds and doesn't really iterate on those in any particularly interesting way or even really upping the difficulty, rather just doing basically the exact same thing as in previous stages.
Thing is, none of this really matters when every component of the game is as good as they are here, but also thanks to the developers being extremely smart about always shaking things up at the right time, even if it means recycling something I've definitely done before (and often more than once).You have your regular stages that are standard Kirby, i.e. a fun, fast-paced time through a colorful (this is a beautiful game, by the way. Frame rate can't really handle the 3D at times, though) platforming stage with a good mix of action and actual platforming, and they're a good time since the developers at HAL have done basically the same kinds of stages since Sakurai directed Kirby's Dream Land way back in 1992. Not top tier in the genre or anything, but made by people who have a formula down that they'll always play well, and good enough art directors for every game who can make them feel distinct and fun. Feels like this manages to come up with a few more and more interesting stage gimmicks than usual, like the train or Waddle-Dee traffic. That might just be because the last Kirby I played was 64 , though, which is a 3/5 game I truly love (also loved the surprising amount of references to it in Planet Robobot), but also one where the levels barely have anything going on for almost the entire journey.
What really elevates the game from simply being another "fun, but unremarkable" Kirby game is its main gimmick, the Robobot itself. This era of Kirby had issues with their main gimmicks, especially Triple Deluxe's Hypernova ability which is cool once, but then gets less and less interesting as it keeps showing up since it's basically just a win button and a way to give the player a cinematic experience where Kirby just becomes an indestructible killing machine, which isn't really needed in a game of this kind. The Robobot feels so much more thought out, getting its own copy abilities and puzzles to solve throughout the stages, plus giving HAL an excuse to throw in vehicle stages where Kirby either drives in fast-paced, almost race-like stages, and shmup stages that gives something completely different from the rest of the game. It's not just walking in a straight line and killing everything in sight, but it actually builds upon the regular Kirby gameplay, and tweaks it just enough to always be a welcome mix-up whenever the robobot appears. The added firepower also does give it that satisfaction of something like the Hypernova, but it never really diminishes since I am always the one controlling the action rather than it feeling so scripted and more like a pseudo-interactive cutscene. Really impressed by the restraint HAL also showed, not constantly using the Robobot on each stage, but seemingly very deliberately giving one to you at just the right time, when I'm feeling "This sure is a Kirby game" the most.
The final boss is also among the most insane things I've seen in a video game, so, you know, even if the rest of the game had been pretty mid, it'd probably have been worth the playthrough just for that experience alone. No, wait, the latter half of the final secret stage might honestly be the highlight for me. One of the best power trip sections, like, ever in a video game and it's somehow in a Kirby of all franchises.