PAX EAST 2016 | Kirby Goes Mecha In "Planet Robobot"
For the past few years Kirby has gone through some interesting phases, ranging from looking clay-mated in Kirby and the Rainbow Curse and stringy in Kirby's Epic Yarn. This time around the round pink hero is aiming to boost his strength in his latest 3DS adventure Kirby: Planet Robobot.
At Nintendo's PAX East booth the demo for Planet Robobot consisted of two levels: one the more straight-forward, another focused on the robot mechanics. Its first level felt more akin to past Kirby titles, where you go from Point A to Point B whilst taking out enemies, sucking them in and either taking their powers or spitting them out in hopes of landing an attack. As I was playing I was rather impressed with the 3D aesthetics in the game, where some places had you being launched into the background in order to lay out more attacks and collect more items. In the past, this aspect would be very hit-or-miss, as characters looked too small to make out the action, but here I felt they were able to get it just right.
When it came to the second level, watching as Kirby pilots a robot game me a feeling that was somewhere between badass and adorable. Surprisingly this new gameplay element managed to flow well with the mentality of Kirby's past games. It's more destructive, yes, but it keeps to the spirit of things. One of the key elements -- the Copy Ability -- carries over when you ride the robot, with the machine mimicking enemy attacks in more powerful ways.
The one downside to the demo was its boss battle in the first level. What could've been a challenging and fun fight wound up instead being just a run for Kirby's life. With that being said there was a lot to like from this demo. If the entire game has most of these things intact during its run-through, then fans of the Kirby series will have plenty of great moment to expect in the round pink adventure's newest chapter.
Kirby: Planet Robobot hits American shores on June 10.