Kirby and the Forgotten Land Review: cute, simple, drab

That’s what my favorite professor in college told me once My neighbor Totoro is the cutest thing to look at without throwing up. kirby and the forgotten land robs Totoro of cuteness—but what happens when cuteness runs out?

What begins as a new adventure of wonder and discovery quickly turns into a grind of sorts forgotten land, and I found myself using simple and familiar powers to solve simple and familiar puzzles. In spite of Kirby and the forgotten land‘s new 3D camera perspective, its creepily cute Mouthful mode, and its adorable art direction, the game couldn’t show me anything new past its opening hours. Even Kirby’s gorgeous world couldn’t save him from monotony.

forgotten land begins with the titular pink puffball being transported from the planet Popstar to a planet more akin to Earth. But this isn’t New Donk City, and there aren’t any oddly realistic people crowding the sidewalks. No, this is an Earth-like planet well past its prime – urban buildings overgrown with plants, factories overflowing with unused lava, a slightly haunted amusement park. And hiding in every corner is one of Kirby’s friends: the recently kidnapped Waddle Dees.

This mysterious level design is where Kirby and the forgotten land really works, at least in short bursts. Navigating a new area and finding all of the optional objectives hidden within it kept me focused and eagle-eyed throughout each level. Unfortunately, the hidden nature of these quests — some of which are only revealed after completing a mission — meant I would occasionally reach the end of a level only to learn I’d missed something, leading to an instant, sweet replay. When I finally gave up trying to fully complete each stage before moving on to the next, I fell in love with every hidden alley I came across. Some lead to puzzles while others lead to powerful upgrades.

The post-apocalyptic setting also gives forgotten land Levels have an oddly calm sense of place. Using air blasts to push a boat around a half-submerged building makes for an unexpected scene when combined with the game’s cute art style. Because it’s Kirby, the post-apocalypse is never sad; It’s just a bright shot of a planet where some went wrong. Kirby doesn’t seem to care what happened here (other than his friends being kidnapped), and neither do I really. Nature has reclaimed the world from the society that built these structures and Kirby and the forgotten land finds the colorful beauty in it.

Explore Kirby and the forgotten land is compelling, but going from encounter to encounter is not. Kirby games have always kept gameplay simple to make it easier to juggle the hero’s diverse powers – for the most part, Kirby’s abilities only have two movements, depending on whether you’re airborne or on the ground. It stays that way Kirby and the forgotten landbut with a drastically reduced power level.

Kirby has access to only 12 copy abilities, and two of them disappear after using them once: Sleep and Crash. The others are mostly classics, with only a few new additions. Sword, hammer and bomb are all here, but so is the new Ranger ability that gives Kirby a weapon. Some popular and iconic powers like plasma, wheel and even beam are missing.

In other Kirby games, I rarely encountered an opponent I couldn’t absorb power from. But in Kirby and the forgotten land, these powerless enemies are the norm. Enemies with powers are rare enough that I almost always absorb them just to try something different. Without the variety I’m used to from a Kirby game, simply pressing the A button to slice through the 10 enemies in a fight quickly wore me out, especially in marathon sessions.

Part of this power vacuum is complemented by the new vehicles in Mouthful Mode. These are something like giant copy skills, where Kirby sucks up a car or a large lightbulb, usually to solve an environmental puzzle. However, since the items are too large, Kirby can’t fully absorb them, so they act more like temporary vehicles than powers that can carry you through the level – for those familiar with 2016 Kirby: Planet Robobot, they’re like far less flexible (but cuter) versions of Kirby’s mech in this game. It’s an adorable and hilarious image, Kirby’s little feet trailing behind a moving car or stretching out on the sides of a stairwell. But as with the copy skills, there are too few mouthful moments. And from the third world forgotten land had shown me almost every new object I could inhale. What started out as an exciting feature quickly became stale.

In 2017, Nintendo’s own Super Mario Odyssey – arguably the best Kirby-like game in years – kept delivering new enemies to conquer, even in the final levels. And other Kirby titles have employed a massive set of abilities to provide a consistent dopamine drip across their various worlds. So this forgotten land stumbles the hardest. The moment-to-moment gameplay is so monotonous and simple that it kills the pace. With nothing new to look forward to and such a small number of tools at my disposal, I can’t focus on the majesty of the world or how cute its protagonist is.

every time Kirby and the forgotten land showed me something new, i loved it. I smiled from ear to ear the first time I saw Kirby becoming a traffic cone or throwing his lump over a water tower. I loved that opening moment in each new area where I could run through the overworld and peek into the new areas I would venture into. The cutscenes are beautiful, and watching Kirby and his friends take a nap in his tiny house is adorable (as always). but Kirby and the forgotten land burns too bright, too soon, and that initial joy was hard to remember as the credits rolled.

Kirby and the forgotten land will be released on March 25th Nintendo switch. The game has been verified on Switch using a pre-release download code provided by Nintendo. Vox Media has affiliate partnerships. These do not affect editorial content, although Vox Media may earn commissions on products purchased through affiliate links. you can find For more information on Polygon’s Ethics Policy, click here.