Kirby 64 doesn’t utilise its mechanics very well

Kirby 64 has some interesting game mechanics, unique from every other Kirby game. Unfortunately, it hardly makes use of any of it.



Unlike other Kirby games, Kirby can combine two abilities together. This is achieved by spitting out an enemy of one ability into another, and swallowing the resulting star.

There are seven base abilities in the game:

Fire, Ice, Spark, Cutter, Bomb, Needle, Stone

And each of their combinations results in something different.

For example, Bomb + Fire gives Kirby fireworks.
Fire + Rock gives Kirby a volcano.
Needle + Rock give Kirby a drill.
And everyone’s favourite, Ice + Spark gives Kirby the power to turn into a refrigerator.

How cute!

The purpose of these abilities is mostly for fun, and for accessing the hidden Crystal Shards, which there are three in each level. Usually, the shard is hidden behind a block comprised of two colours, and the colours indicate which combination of ability will break it.

This brown and yellow block in World 2-1 is broken by the brown and yellow abilities, Rock + Spark.

The actual utility of these abilities throughout the game is mostly limited to one or two useful ones.
For moving quickly through the stages, Fire or Fire + Fire give Kirby the fastest horizontal speed possible. (which is still pretty slow, to be honest. …this game is very slow-paced).
 Ice + Spark gives novice players a chance to generate healing items, in exchange for a rather awkard-to-use attack.
Cutter gives a nice long-range attack,
Needle gives a nice close-range attack.

Most of the abilities are an action where Kirby stops in place to perform some kind of attack.
They’re all different-looking, but the effect is mostly the same between them all – an attack that defeats enemies if you hit them with it.
The main reason to swap around abilities is to have fun seeing the results of mixing them.
And this is fine for the most part. The design philosophy behind Kirby games was always to allow different players the freedom of choice in how they approach the game.

Some players may want to wield Fire + Cutter, which gives Kirby a cool flaming sword he can throw.
Some players would prefer to slide around and do pirouettes with Ice + Cutter, which gives Kirby a set of ice skates.
The freedom of choice, allowing players to tackle levels in their own personal ways, is one of the most important aspects of Kirby games in general.

However… this game doesn’t really do much with its extensive powerup system besides giving all these ultimately purposeless choices.

There isn’t any REASON why Spark + Rock is required to get the Shard in Level 2-1, other than the fact that it is the only combination that can break the yellow and brown barrier. It feels like a very static, limited way of going about creating puzzles to solve.

I’m going to compare this game to the previous Kirby games, which I felt implemented the powerup system in a much more interesting way:

in Kirby Super Star, there’s a door in Mallow Castle that’s blocked off and can be reached by hitting a bomb block. This block is too low to hit normally, however, so Kirby must try various abilities to see which ones work.

Mirror doesn’t seem to do it.

Many times in Kirby Super Star, there are blocks above Kirby, and blocks below Kirby. Some abilities have attacks that can reach them, while others can’t. It’s up to the player to figure out the best way to reach them. They’re not just outright told precisely which ability to use where.

Sword, though… now that’s effective!

Kirby’s Dreamland 2 also has blocks that are only destroyed by one specific ability, but for the most part, the puzzles presented in that game are actually just managing to reach these areas with the ability intact, and not so much just purely whether or not you have it.

This door is…. actually kind of tough to reach without losing Spark.

But if you hop on Rick the Hamster, his version of Spark makes things easier!

But in Kirby 64, the only puzzle behind most of these scenarios is to just look at the colours of the blockade, and use the corresponding power to open it. It’s not as involved, and it feels like a rather artificial way of handling it.

I don’t really like it.

The game also contains an entirely overlooked mechanic where Kirby has the ability to hold an enemy over his head – and surprisingly enough, the enemy will actually help Kirby in some unique way. Glunk will fire shots upwards. Kany will snip at things around with its pincers. Bumber will slow Kirby’s descent. Pteran will allow Kirby to glide through the air.

Weeee… this is pointless.

Absolutely none of this is useful in any way. There are zero scenarios where holding an enemy above your head will help you go through an area in a different way than to just defeat them normally and carry on. 

Video:

This is me trying my hardest to make this game mechanic useful in some way. I really have to go out of my way, and it ultimately ends up pointless.

It’s interesting, but one part of the problem seems to be that this is the only Kirby game where there are no doors.
This means that everything in each level must be strictly linear – there are no side-rooms with puzzles where it may make sense to utilise an obscure enemy interaction without compromising the simple flow of the main level.

I think that that’s the main thing this Kirby game is missing – interesting interactions.

Despite being one of the most rich Kirby games mechanicwise, this is the most sparse game in the series contentwise, with nothing really there that uses any of the existing mechanics in an interesting way. Most of the time, you just have to walk forwards, and all of the levels are beaten fairly simply.

This is all in the past though…I’m just really glad that 2011's Kirby’s Adventure Wii introduced the Ability Challenges. Now there’s an amazing example of the game taking the existing mechanics and making interesting use of them! :)

I would love to see a future Kirby game where you can mix abilities together. So far, Kirby 64 is the only one that did this.

Just as an aside, I also want to take this opportunity to complain about the Enemy Info cards in Kirby 64. There are 22 levels in the game, and at the end of each, you have a chance of acquiring an Enemy Info card, which shows an enemy, its name and its power. There are 81 cards in the game – meaning that in order to collect them all, you need to replay the same levels over and over and over. At no other point does the game reward you with a card other than at the end of a level.

I personally spent an entire hour beating level 1-1 over and over and again just to complete the collection. I was listening to a podcast, though, so it was okay.
I think it would be better if there were either more levels in the game, or more opportunities to obtain cards from other sources.

…perhaps they could have instead given out enemy cards as prizes to some potential new challenges that used the mechanics in an interesting way?

Whatever though. The game’s pretty cool.