Kirby’s Adventure is a game for the Nintendo Entertainment System and is now out on the Wii’s Virtual Console for 500 points (5 USD)
Kirby’s Adventure is the first console game in the now famous Kirby franchise. The premise is built behind you playing as a pink puff ball, Kirby with an array of powers. The most obvious and well known power is the copy ability, which
allows you to copy an enemy’s power and duplicate it. Some of the powers include turning into a fireball, wielding a sword, and even becoming a UFO! All of them are enjoyable and built in to the level as a gameplay mechanic (ie: Find the fire shooting ability, and keep an eye out for the fuse of a near buy cannon for some explosive fun!)
However the copy ability is not his only ability. Kirby also has the ability to fly for a limited amount of time, which is crucial to many platforming elements in the game, and over all make the game more enjoyable.
Now on to the gameplay: Kirby’s Adventure is a fun light hearted 2D platformer which is broken up into worlds and then into segregated levels. In every world, there are various stages, mini-games, and at the end a boss fight.The levels are quite simple, you have to get to the door with a star over the top of it without losing all of your health. It may sound easy, but monsters with various abilities will cross your path, but who cares when you can copy their ability to fight against them?! Along the way in some levels are the aforementioned minigames, puzzles, and many hidden places.
The graphics are above average for NES, but the colors are not as bright as an SNES game would be for obvious reasons, however everything is crisp and clear, no major eye sores like in some of the other NES games available on the Virtual Console.
As far as NES games go, the game does not feel dated at all, which is a problem I find with most NES VC games. The difficulty is average, but back in the day it would be considered rather easy. I did die a few times, and the last boss game me a hard time, but it was nothing frustrating, because when you continue, you leave off where you last
played.
To conclude with overall impression of this game, I simply love it. It suited what I needed in a VC game: A game I can jump in to any time and have fun with it. It is among the best platformers of all time, and I would even rank it up with the icons of the genre, Mario and Sonic. It is an underrated gem, a gem worth 5 dollars ten times over.
An instant buy for the VC, and so far the game I have been most impressed with.
Rating: 
July 3rd, 2007 at 1:53 pm
Not to nitpick, but Kirby’s flying limitation didn’t appear till later in the line of games. I remember being able to float across entire levels, and the last boss wasn’t too much trouble–I’d duck in the corner and wait to unleash the pink terror when the opportunity opens up.
July 9th, 2007 at 8:36 am
Kirby’s Dream Land for Game Boy was the first game in the series.