Kirby and the Rainbow Curse: Video Game
At first glance, this game is gorgeous. At second, third, fourth, fifth and all subsequent glances it is still gorgeous. It is quite possibly the most beautiful game on the Wii U so far. In fact, the biggest problem I had with this game was that the control style pretty much keeps your eyes on the gamepad instead of the television where the graphics could be appreciated. They claymation look and feel are stunning right down to the fingerprints in the clay. The good folks at Nintendo did their very best at putting together the look and feel, it’s like a Wallace and Gromit movie on steroids.
The one thing that I feel hasn’t been looked at enough for this game is the soundtrack. The score for this game is fantastic! You get the sense of fun in the levels that are more laid back and you get a sense of true urgency from the levels with time limits. The music of the boss fights is truly epic, especially the final boss. Sometimes you just want to pause the game and listen a little bit.
The gameplay is pretty fun, there is a bit of a learning curve that you might not get used to as drawing Kirby’s pathway of rainbow rope and tapping him to attack is interesting. There were several times when I got hurt because I’m used to platformers where jumping on landing on an enemy defeats them. You have to roll into them or use one of the other abilities you pick up along the way.
That being said, multiplayer makes the game a quite a bit easier, but still fun. I played through most of the game with a good friend and anyone playing in any position other than first player gets a traditional control scheme. They move, jump and stab with Kirby’s pal Waddle Dee. Our strategy quickly became: Kirby makes sure the level progresses and keeps from dying while Waddle Dee fights and collects items.
It’s a pretty simple campaign that we got 93% completion on with our first run, but the challenge mode is considerably more… well… challenging. Once you get the hang of playing with the stylus and mastering the rainbow rope’s many properties the game is incredibly fun. One thing you must understand though: player 2 will enjoy the game’s greatest strength more than you.
Jonathan Thomas Jones is a speculative fiction author and founder of geekhavenreviews.com. He has been passionate about all things geek for his entire life. See more about him at jonathanthomasjones.com and follow him on twitter @jtgloryjones.
