Kirby & the Amazing Mirror (GBA, 2004)
A unique Metroidvania-like that pays homage to Kirby Super Star.
Nostalgia Factor: High. I’m a massive Kirby dweeb.
Difficulty: Easy to Medium. There is notably more challenge in this one than in other Kirby games.
Wow. I love this game. I don't know how I missed it growing up. This was the Kirby game I was waiting for after Kirby 64 derailed me from the franchise. You can tell they were clearly trying to “go back to what works.” They have successfully managed to capture the feel of Kirby Super Star (KSS). It's not quite as smooth as KSS (is anything?), but it's very close.
After championing Super Smash Bros. (N64) and Super Smash Bros. Melee (GCN), Masahiro Sakurai (creator of Kirby) blessed us with a few more Kirby gifts before leaving HAL. He gave us the odd but lovable Kirby Air Ride (GCN), he helmed the GBA remake of Kirby’s Adventure (Kirby: Nightmare in Dream Land), and he served as “Special Advisor” for Kirby & the Amazing Mirror.
Since the GBA tech from Sakurai’s recent remake was already available, Kirby & the Amazing Mirror was poised for success from the start. Using Sakurai’s boilerplate, HAL, Flagship (a subsidiary of Capcom), and Dimps worked together to give us a unique and well-crafted Kirby game. Kirby must navigate through a maze of interconnected worlds full of hidden doors and secrets. It’s fully non-linear, filled with puzzles, mini-bosses, respawning enemies (Big Waddle Dee!), and items to collect. There’s some debate about whether or not this label is accurate, but some refer to The Amazing Mirror as the “Metroidvania Kirby.”
They reduced the move sets of some of the classic copy abilities unfortunately, but they improved a few others, and added some great new abilities – Missile, UFO, and Smash. You can fight Master Hand and get a simplified version of Kirby's move set from Smash Bros! It’s unclear just how much Sakurai was involved, but I have to imagine he contributed to the Smash copy ability.
I love how enemies literally fly across the screen and explode when you attack them with certain abilities. Gameplay feels very kinetic. The visuals are fantastic for a GBA title. A few of the worlds have absolutely gorgeous pixel art backgrounds. This is a Kirby game, so it’s definitely no Dark Souls, but it was nice to play a Kirby title with at least a little bit more challenge than usual.
GBA has never been known for it’s audio quality, but The Amazing Mirror soundtrack has some great tunes from two Dimps composers who would later go on to make contributions to Smash Bros. Ultimate, Hironobu Inagaki and Atsuyoshi Isemura. Sometimes I’ll just listen to the track from Candy Constellation on repeat.
The four player co-op is a huge plus, though getting four GBAs, four copies of the game, and four link cables together in one place may be the greatest challenge ever offered by any Kirby. The Amazing Mirror would be a great candidate for NSO’s GBA collection. I’m sure there are emulation solutions as well.
One complaint, which is true of almost any Kirby game, is that this game is just too short. It just ends too soon. If you know where you're going, you can beat the game in just an hour or two. If you get completely lost like me, it takes about five hours, haha. In spite of the short length, this is a fantastic Kirby game, and I highly recommend it.