Jump to content

Kirby Air Ride

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

This is an old revision of this page, as edited by Clyde Miller (talk | contribs) at 22:08, 3 December 2006 (→‎Vehicles: fixing vehicle section). The present address (URL) is a permanent link to this revision, which may differ significantly from the current revision.

Template:Current-GCOTW

Kirby Air Ride
Kirby Air Ride box cover
Developer(s)HAL Laboratory
Publisher(s)Nintendo
Designer(s)Satoru Iwata
SeriesKirby
Platform(s)GameCube
ReleaseJPN July 11, 2003
NA October 13, 2003
EUR February 22, 2004
Genre(s)Racing
Mode(s)Single player, multiplayer

Kirby Air Ride (カービィのエアライド, Kirby no Air Ride) is a 2003 racing video game featuring Kirby, a Nintendo mascot. Rather than racing in cars, the players and computer-controlled racers ride on air ride machines. Originally intended to be released on the Nintendo 64, the game was instead released for the GameCube. The game supports up to four players, and was the first GameCube title to support LAN play using broadband adapters and up to four GameCubes.

Development

Kirby Air Ride (known as Kirby's Air Ride at the time) was originally in development during the early days of the Nintendo 64.[1] The game went through many changes during its elongated development period before eventually resurfacing as a GameCube title in the form of a short video preview in March 2003 at the annual DICE summit in Las Vegas. This preview received a mainly negative reception due to slow speeds and poor graphics.[2] The game was first seen in playable form at E3 in May later that year. The demo contained five playable tracks and three different game modes. The reception to this was slightly more positive than previous showings, but the game was criticised for lacking depth and a sense of speed.[3]

Gameplay

Kirby Air Ride is played primarily through use of a vehicle, many of which are taken from previous Kirby games, such as the warp star. Players take control of Kirby or any of his multicolored counterparts to compete in races or other minigames.

The simple controls are a defining feature of Kirby Air Ride. Unlike most racers, no input is necessary for the craft to move forward. Other than the use of the analog stick to steer, a single button performs all other actions in the game, including braking, charging up for a boost, sucking in nearby enemies and thereafter using the powers absorbed from them. Gliding is also a definitive feature of the game, as the player can control the crafts' altitude when they go airborne.[4]

There are three modes of play:

  1. Air Ride: A basic back view racing mode. The player chooses a machine and races against up to three other human or computer players via split-screen or LAN, or in a single-person time trial. There are nine separate courses total.
  2. Top Ride: An overhead racing mode on smaller, simpler tracks, with two machines to choose from. There are seven courses total.
  3. City Trial: A larger mode where players must navigate a massive city, along with a few more sections such as a forest, cave, and volcano, while grabbing air ride machine upgrade items and hopping on new vehicles. Players can even collect rare machine pieces to fuse together into "legendary machines". This mode also features events such as falling meteors, UFOs, Dyna Blade, rail station fires, bouncing items, and more. At the end players face off in a small competition that tests how well your machine ended up, which can vary from a short race, a brawl, or many others. Some competition modes must be unlocked first to be used.

Courses

There are sixteen different tracks for the player to choose from. These are split between the air ride mode, which has nine, and the top ride mode, which has seven. The air ride courses are quite varied and range from simple grassy tracks to courses located in space. The seven top ride tracks are based on seven different themes: grass, sand, sky, fire, light, water and metal.

Vehicles

Kirby Air Ride features several playable vehicles which off different appearances and abilities. They include the Warp Star, Shadow Star, Glider Star, Swift Star, Triangle Star, and Wagon Star. Meta Knight is playable in the form of a vehicle, which is controlled by the player. King Dedede is playable as well, but only the star he rides on.

Features

The game features incredibly simple controls, using only the control stick and one button.

The game also features soundtracks from the Japanese version of Kirby: Right Back At Ya!. There are also tracks from Kirby Super Star and other Kirby games.

Masahiro Sakurai, the game designer behind the Kirby series, resigned only days after giving a public interview where he openly criticized Nintendo for circumstances surrounding the development of Kirby Air Ride.[5][6]

Multiplayer LAN connectivity with up to four Nintendo GameCube systems.

Reaction

Review scores
Publication Score
GameSpy
3 of 5
IGN
5.2 of 10
GamePro
4 of 5
1UP.com
4 of 10
Revo-Europe
7 of 10
G4's X-Play
3 of 5
Game Freaks 365
6.7 of 10
Planet GameCube
8.5 of 10
Game Informer
7 of 10
Electronic Gaming Monthly
7 of 10
Nintendo Power
4.2 of 5

The game was met with mixed reviews upon its release, many of them praising it for the smooth visuals and orchestrated music, but criticizing it for its overly simple gameplay and lack of extended appeal. Many fans support it for being a fairly easy and quick-to-learn game, allowing the player to have fun in a high-speed racing experience and be able to relax rather than playing games that require ridiculous button mashing to succeed. The game's similarity to other titles released for the GameCube around the same time, such as F-Zero GX and Mario Kart: Double Dash!! resulted in it being categorised as a rather throwaway title.[7]

Anime Series Tie-Ins

Kirby's Air Ride, along with Kirby: Nightmare in Dream Land were both released while the Kirby anime series Kirby: Right Back at Ya! was being aired in Japan and the US. As such there are numerous references between the two.

Episodes 96 and 97 of the original run were a two-part episode entitled Air-Ride in Style (originally Crisis of the Warp Star) in which four of the Air Ride Machines from the game, specifically the Wing, Jet, Rocket and Shadow Stars, were featured. The game's actual release in Japan coincided with an earlier two-part episode that had the characters participating in a race.

The game also had references back to the TV show. Many of the tracks, including the main theme for the Checker Knights course and many of the City Trial events were taken directly from the original soundtrack for the anime scored by Akira Miyagawa.[8] (This was not immediately noticable to fans in the US, as the English dub of the anime had all the original music removed.) Some of the remixes of other Kirby games that appeared in Air Ride were also actually used in the anime first, many months before the game's release.

Other references were more subtle. In the City Trial mode, Whispy Woods appears in a small forest. It is possibly to destroy the surrounding trees. You are then left with a golf course- King Dedede in the anime was constantly plotting to destroy Whispy Woods to build his own private Country Club. Also, one City Trial event has a massive, disk-shaped ship appear overhead. It is identical to ones called Destrayar that appeared in the final episodes of the anime.

References

  1. ^ Mark Murphy. "Kirby Air Ride". Gamers Europe. Retrieved 2006-11-29.
  2. ^ "Kirby's Air Ride: First Look". IGN. Retrieved 2006-11-28.
  3. ^ "E3 2003: Kirby Air Ride". IGN. Retrieved 2006-11-28.
  4. ^ Matt Casamassina. "Kirby Air Ride". IGN. Retrieved 2006-11-29.
  5. ^ "Conceiving Sickeningly Cute Puffballs". N-Sider. Retrieved 2006-11-29.
  6. ^ "Masahiro Sakurai". N-Sider. Retrieved 2006-11-29.
  7. ^ Jeff Gerstmann. "Kirby Air Ride". GameSpot. CNET. Retrieved 2006-11-29.
  8. ^ "Kirby anime music used in the games". Kirby's Rainbow Resort. Retrieved 2006-12-01.
Retrieved from "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Kirby_Air_Ride&oldid=91865676"