Ok. This has been bothering me immensely, so I need to get the word out there.

Kirby and the Forgotten Land is a piece of gimmicky, pandering garbage. It exists just to sell merch and nothing more. It does nothing different from the past four main series Kirby games aside from being in 3D. I was already considering not buying it before, but now I know I’m skipping this game because of ‘Mouthful Modes’, yet ANOTHER forced gimmick, except this time they waited until the last minute to mention it. It takes up space that could be occupied by more copy abilities (there’s only 10 abilities shown so far not counting Crash and Sleep), it’s unoriginal and redundant, and it proves that nothing has changed with Kirby. This isn’t a new era, this is the same nonsense over and over and over again. Not to mention the extreme presence of Waddle Dees, the Kirby equivalent of Toads that take the places of previously established characters. Seriously, why is the Beast Pack ONLY capturing Waddle Dees? From a story perspective, it makes no sense because there’s plenty of other Dream Land residents such as Waddle Doos, Scarfys, Bronto Burts, and much, much, more. From an outside perspective, the answer is clear: They want to push and sell Waddle Dee merchandise. They see Waddle Dee as a ‘marketable, cute’ character like Kirby. The Waddle Dee Town is just that; a town with Waddle Dees and nothing else. Plus the game looks the same as every Kirby game since RtDL. There’s no personality, no charm. And worst of all, there’s no heart or soul.

Kirby's Return to Dream Land, now with 20% more furry characters!

For whatever reason, Kirby fans eat it up (pun not intended) despite the franchise getting increasingly more stagnant and merchandise-driven. Stereotypes and untrue rumors about the series are constantly brought up in the fandom. Like everyone saying ‘ElFiLiN iS eViL’ because SUPPOSEDLY ‘that’s what happens every time’ and that the final boss will be some thing of horror and a god because, again, that’s what SUPPOSEDLY happens every time. This isn’t even bringing up the unfunny, cringey, driven to the ground memes like ‘KIRBY HAS A GUN’. People think these things happen in every Kirby game because the series has been the exact same as it was over a decade ago in Return to Dream Land. It has the same director. Same art style. Same forced gimmicks. Same final boss. The series wasn’t always like this, but because that’s what it’s been like for a decade, people think it ‘has always happened’. As a longtime Kirby fan, it’s depressing, and my hope for the series has pretty much run out.

So to anyone reading this, please, do not buy Kirby and the Forgotten Land. It is not a product of love, but rather of corporate money making. Please also do not buy any new Kirby merchandise that may release in the future, especially merch featuring Waddle Dee; this is what they made the game for, to persuade you to buy merchandise with Kirby’s face on it. If you absolutely NEED to have the game, buy it USED a few months down the line. There’ll be plenty of used copies in the sea of GameStop and online marketplaces as some people lose interest in the game and don’t want to keep it.

There are other games coming soon which you can buy and play instead. Advance Wars 1+2 releases April 8th, just 2 weeks after Forgotten Land, and is a comeback of a franchise that had its last game 14 years ago. Xenoblade 3 appears to be of high quality and a labor of love, although I don’t know much about the series so I can’t judge too much. Mario Strikers is another title that’s making a long awaited comeback.

And finally, for those who still need a platformer game to play, Namco’s Klonoa is returning as well. The two main games are being remade (well, the first game is a remaster of the Wii remake, but still) and thrown into one package, coming to the Switch in July and other systems later. The Klonoa 1 remake for the Wii did not sell well and put the franchise into dormancy, so now’s the chance to make sure that doesn’t happen again! I’ve never played Klonoa before, but it looks fun, particularly the first game.

See that cat-rabbit hybrid creature? Go buy his game.

This isn’t even mentioning all the OLD games you can play right now without worry, or all the other new games coming to other systems!

Two other games I would suggest to avoid are Splatoon 3 and the new Fire Emblem Warriors game, as they appear to have been made in similar circumstances to Kirby.

Otherwise, if Forgotten Land doesn’t sell well (less than a million units) and the merchandise also sells poorly, then HAL might finally shake up Kirby’s formula for the better and bring the series back up to the quality it was during its golden age.

Thank you for reading this. As a bonus, have this Kirby tier list I made a few hours before the direct happened.

Page Created: February 10th, 2022

Last Updated: February 10th, 2022