Kirby's Epic Yarn

I remember when my co-worker Josh and I first heard about the new Kirby game planned for the Wii (it was amid a series of other announcements Nintendo made). We were fairly excited; Kirby games have always been a source of pleasant platforming. And, the title even promised great things: Kirby’s Epic Yarn. It would be epic, right?

Josh picked it up to play before me, and promptly brought it to my desk and disgustingly tossed it towards me. “You can play this, if you want,” he said, looking at the game box as if instead of Kirby’s Epic Yarn, it actually read Sing-a-long with Justin Beiber. I couldn’t figure out his revulsion, so I asked what was wrong with it.

“You don’t eat people.”

WHAT? What do you mean, you don’t eat people? You’re Kirby. That’s what you do. Making a Kirby game where you didn’t eat people is like making a Sonic game where you don’t run. I had to see it for myself, so I launched my Wii in the first time in months and it updated for three or four hours while I read the manual suspiciously.

There was no mention of not eating things, but I figured it was a lie. Written materials often lie.

The updated Wii was finally ready and I started the game. There was a story introduction – and let me go off for a second here – there are games in which story is important, and highly contributes to my love of the game. Platformers are typically not the medium for that. I don’t care about Mario saving the princess. She will get kidnapped again, and I’ll be off to find more fucking stars to save her. This isn’t Bioshock. I don’t care how coins got into these weird yellow blocks with question marks. The mechanics are designed for fun, not for an overarching purpose.

Anyway, there was a story. Its purpose was to tell us why you can’t eat people (spoiler, it’s because you are turned into yarn). So now, not only am I kind of upset that I lost a few precious minutes watching a story that I cared about, but I really hate the story because it represents a loss of the entire gameplay mechanic the name Kirby on the front of the box had promised.

The game itself is fun enough. You jump onto platforms and there are puzzle-like moments where you have to do one of three things to proceed. Each level challenges you to collect a certain number of beads, which are scattered throughout the level and also dropped by unraveling yarn enemies. However, I can’t shake the feeling that pushing the 1 button (you hold the Wiimote sideways) should cause Kirby to eat someone.

And before I continue to criticize, I will say it’s got a stunningly fun style to it. It reminds me greatly of Super Mario World 2: Yoshi’s Island. The game’s fabric motif opened a lot of design opportunities, and they were well taken care of. The Wii has a limited capacity with graphics, and this game embraces it, rather than fighting against it.

However, the game gets monotonous in its simplicity pretty quickly. As a nod to this, additional challenges are unlocked if you are able to decorate the apartments of other residents of this yarn-filled existence by collecting trickier to get items from the levels. However, the decoration concept is wasted and introduces further levels of childish gameplay. I wish it’d just give me the additional challenges.

I made it through the first few worlds, each of which culminated in a “boss battle” which involved employing one of two or three strategies. I became disenfranchised, and haven’t played it since. In the end, I just felt as though I was playing a game that was excellently designed and crafted, and then slapped with an intellectual property to garner sales. And my feeling isn’t far off from the truth; according to an article discussing conversations between the development team and Nintendo CEO, Satoru Iwata:

One of the big revelations from the column is that Kirby's Epic Yarn originally wasn't a Kirby game. Good Feel developed the game with the desire to try something new, and so they started from zero. The Japanese name for Kirby's Epic Yarn is "Keito no Kirby," or "Kirby of Yarn." Instead of this, the game was originally set to be called "Keito no Fluff," or "Fluff of Yarn" and would have starred a character named Fluff in a world known as "World of Yarn."

The greatest weakness of the game, in my opinion, is the very thing the development team felt they needed to secure a character with more recognition. How disappointing, as this likely delays having a new actual Kirby game, wherein the gameplay mechanics we love will finally return.

The Game: Kirby’s Epic Yarn

The Cost: Should be easy to find at Gamestop for around $30-$40. A new version will still set you back $50.

Worth It? For non-Kirby enthusiasts: It’s a fun platformer, and would probably be a hoot for kids (there is co-op play, which I didn’t review), but why not spend it on a better game, like Super Mario Galaxy? For Kirby-enthusiasts: purchasing this game probably has the unintended cost of weeks of therapy, buy Kirby Superstar Ultra for $25 instead.

Best Parts: Design. Collecting beads is disarmingly addictive, since the game judges you at the end of every level based on your success in doing so.

Worst Parts: Kirby not being able to eat people and have their powers.

Overall: Playing this game was like getting a chocolate éclair from the donut shop, getting home to eat it and realizing it isn’t filled with custard.