Welcome to the fifth issue of Nostalgia! Let me explain a little bit about what Nostalgia is. Nostalgia is an idea that came from the creative depths of my little mind that lets me bring back one retro game from the past to you guys!  When I say past, I mean anything from the original Pong all the way up to good ol’ Playstation classics. If your one to yearn for the past than you can’t miss an Issue of Nostalgia!

When I think of Kirby, I don’t expect much. All I can see in my simple little mind is a pink marshmallow sucking in air to fly and then blowing it back out to kill his enemies. Until they came out with Kirby Super Star I could not imagine him as anything different.

Kirby Super Star had 8 different Kirby games in one. I remember a time I won $50 bucks off of a lottery ticket that my grandmother bought for me. I took the cash and bought a Super Nintendo as well as Kirby Super Star from SEARS. I had no Idea what to expect. The last time I could remember playing Kirby was back when it came out for the original Game Boy. When I turned on the console for the first time I had no idea what to expect.

Kirby Super Star also known as Kirby’s Fun Pak in Europe, is a 1996 platforming video game developed by HAL Laboratory and published by Nintendo for the Super Nintendo Entertainment System video game console. It was first released in Japan on March 21, 1996, in North America on September 20, 1996, and in Europe on January 23, 1997. Kirby Super Star′s box art states that the game features eight games in one cartridge. Most of these games are platforming-oriented, while some others are mini-games. The different types of games were Spring Breeze, Dyna Blade, Gourmet Race,  The Great Cave Offensive, Revenge of Meta Knight,  Milky Way Wishes,The Arena,Samurai Kirby, and Megaton Punch.

Spring Breeze is the first game in Kirby Super Star. King Dedede takes food from Dream Land, and Kirby needs to take it back. It is based on and is a remake of the first Kirby game from the Game Boy. Dyna Blade is the second game in Kirby Super Star. Dyna Blade, a giant bird, is disturbing Dream Land’s crops, and Kirby tries to stop her. Gourmet Race is the third game in Kirby Super Star. Dedede challenges Kirby to a race to see who can get the most food. It is a race against King Dedede incorporating platform elements. The objective is to both beat King Dedede to the finish line and collect the most food. The Great Cave Offensive is the fourth game in Kirby Super Star. While venturing in a forest, Kirby falls into a cave, in the game you try to get out. In it, the player attempts to collect up to sixty treasure chests strewn throughout the game. Revenge of Meta Knight is the fifth game in Kirby Super Star. In it, Kirby attempts to destroy Meta Knight’s battleship, the Halberd, before Meta Knight can conquer Dream Land. Milky Way Wishes is the sixth game in Kirby Super Star. In it, the Sun and Moon around planet Popstar are fighting. A person about the size of Kirby bouncing on a ball, Marx, tells Kirby he must travel to different planets and defeat the boss at the end of each one in order to reach the giant comet-clock NOVA, who gives Kirby a wish. The Arena is the final game in Kirby Super Star. It is an endurance challenge that requires the player to fight every boss in the game, as well as a Waddle Dee with high endurance, one after the other without dying once. The total boss battles include 26 bosses in 19 rounds.

Samurai Kirby is a timing mini-game similar to Kirby’s Adventure′s Quick Draw. There are five opponents, which get progressively more difficult. The objective is to attack the opponent at the right time without being too early or too late. Megaton Punch is a timing mini-game. In it, the player must punch a stack of platforms by hitting the mark as close as possible in several different timing mechanics, attempting to cause more damage than the opponent. The best score you can get is 201.

Kirby Super Star plays like a standard 16-bit era platforming video game, in which Kirby, the main character, can go left, right, up and down on a two dimensional plane. Throughout each level, Kirby must avoid touching environmental hazards and a variety of enemies, who mostly have their own attacks. Kirby has a health meter, and when this is depleted, Kirby loses one life and returns to a save point. If he loses all of his lives, the game ends.

Kirby Super Star allows Kirby to copy the abilities of his enemies, and then perform a wide range of attacks using these abilities. Kirby wears different hats and changes color according to the ability he is using.

One of the unique features of this Kirby game is the addition of a “helper”. The helper is an enemy-turned-friend who follows Kirby around and helps fight enemies. A second player can use an additional controller to control the helper, making a solo experience into a two-player adventure. The helper also sometimes has abilities that Kirby does not when taken control of by a second player. For instance, if Kirby got a Wheel Kirby power and turned it into a helper, Kirby could ride on the helper. While Kirby would die after falling into a pit, a helper character had no such vulnerability. Most of the mini-games have two-player modes as well.

I can say that one of my favorite parts of this game is sucking in your enemies and obtaining their powers. I always enjoyed the different type of hats that he would get from doing this to different type of enemies. I always and still do think it is a great unique game mechanic that I haven’t seen anywhere else yet.

All in All this game is full of good memories. I guess there is good game play as well. This will be the game that we play for my monthly Retro Game Night. I have also discovered that on Ebay a sealed version of this game is going for $999 and higher. If you want a very used copy it will cost you about $35. This game was very rare and has certain collectors by the horns trying to find a good one.