What a surprisingly amazing game. I picked it up with the intent of it being a couch co-op game with my girlfriend, kind of thinking it would just be pretty mundane other than that, but no. I loved the Kirby games as a kid but each new entry really didn't bring much new to the table, so after playing Super Star Ultra I just didn't feel like any of them were worth my time as a grown ass man and didn't bother with the games.
This game brought the series to 3D and waiting until now definitely paid off because they nailed it on their first go. The level design is fantastic with tons of secrets everywhere - there are far less abilities than the other games but they're more integrated into the levels and each one has some significant interaction with a puzzle or your traversal. The combat works really well - the boss design is hilariously enough very clearly Souls-inspired but it works super well, especially for a few of the genuinely pretty difficult postgame bosses.
There are two complaints I have that feel obvious to fix
-There should have been some way to get the upgrade stones other than doing the Arena over and over. There's a glitch that allows you to get a stone every 30 seconds or so and I'm glad that exists because grinding out stones would be really monotonous otherwise if you're going for 100% completion.
-The couch co-op could have used splitscreen although I get why they didn't given how weak the Switch hardware is, this game is pushing it pretty hard as is. Your co-op partner gets the short end of the stick, they play as Bandana Dee but the camera doesn't follow them, enemies don't aggro them, and they're stuck to one ability that is exclusive to them (Spear). While the Spear is actually really cool, they end up getting left in the dust if Kirby has an ability that makes him too mobile for Bandana Dee to catch up like Tornado. I also get why Bandana Dee can't use abilities since that could break the level design but they could have given him some better mobility to keep up.
This game brought the series to 3D and waiting until now definitely paid off because they nailed it on their first go. The level design is fantastic with tons of secrets everywhere - there are far less abilities than the other games but they're more integrated into the levels and each one has some significant interaction with a puzzle or your traversal. The combat works really well - the boss design is hilariously enough very clearly Souls-inspired but it works super well, especially for a few of the genuinely pretty difficult postgame bosses.
There are two complaints I have that feel obvious to fix
-There should have been some way to get the upgrade stones other than doing the Arena over and over. There's a glitch that allows you to get a stone every 30 seconds or so and I'm glad that exists because grinding out stones would be really monotonous otherwise if you're going for 100% completion.
-The couch co-op could have used splitscreen although I get why they didn't given how weak the Switch hardware is, this game is pushing it pretty hard as is. Your co-op partner gets the short end of the stick, they play as Bandana Dee but the camera doesn't follow them, enemies don't aggro them, and they're stuck to one ability that is exclusive to them (Spear). While the Spear is actually really cool, they end up getting left in the dust if Kirby has an ability that makes him too mobile for Bandana Dee to catch up like Tornado. I also get why Bandana Dee can't use abilities since that could break the level design but they could have given him some better mobility to keep up.