NWR Interactive > Podcast Discussion

RetroActive 51: Kirby and the Rainbow Curse

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Lemonade:
When you have a hungry cat waiting for dinner but youre trying to play Kirby

TOPHATANT123:
I've completed the DS game and got all of its medals. I think it's fun, though flawed.

The challenges are quite difficult, demanding precise inputs, but the controls don't lend themselves to that. Short lines won't register, and Kirby loves to bounce off at unexpected angles. It's not always clear when Kirby is in his attack animation so you lose health for not spamming attack. Sometimes you want to stun an enemy but end up drawing a squiggle.

The challenges are there to pad the runtime and sometimes are more annoying than they are difficult. For medals there's no option to restart at checkpoints, instead having to willfully run into spikes to restart.

To mention some of the positives, it's a unique game and it's demand for precision and speed reminds me of playing Trauma Center. The types of challenges feel distinct and all have a completely different pace. From the time trails, to the paint efficiency ones, to the more exploratory main levels. I'd say the time trials were my favourite and you get a sense of satisfaction as you set new fastest times.

Lastly, the game has an option for Pictochat. in which people who use Pictochat are referred to as Pictochatters. You learn something new everyday.

Lemonade:
Ok, just finished it. Im glad the game is short. I dont think I would have wanted to play it for much longer. I finished it in four sessions.

Overall the game is pretty good. I kind of wish I had bought it back when it was new. The art is so nice and as mentioned before, the music is great

It took a while to get used to the controls, but it works well enough after you get the feel of it. Its interesting how they reverse it by making kirby float in water. It has been a very long time since I played Canvas Curse, I think part of the reason I didnt like it was being such a small screen on DS, it was hard to control. The big screen of the Gamepad makes it much easier to draw lines.

As for the gamepad, I think this is the most I have ever played a Wii U game off TV. Its weird having the TV on, but not looking at it to play the game.

As for a kirby game, its a but weird to not have the copy abilities, but I did mostly enjoy the transformations, especially the submarine. The rocket level in stege 6 with the time limit was awful. It took me so many tries. I almost chose the skip level option.

I think by far the weakest part of the game is the bosses. They are repeated and the final boss is really annoying. It took me many attempts. I scanned my Dedede amiibo to get more health, but I still died, then I discover that the extra health only counts for one life. Thankfully on the next attempt, I was able to beat it with one hit point left. I think I was also down to 0 lives.

Seeing Iwata in the credits was nice. I guess this must have been one of his last games.


Im glad this was chosen for retroactive, I would have never played it otherwise.

pPatko:
Thanks for giving me an excuse to check Canvas Curse off my thicc ass backlog! Finished it in 4.5 hours with 11.5% of the medals collected.
The gameplay is pretty unique, especially for the era before mobile games largely took over the portable space. It's quite fun once you get a handle on it and can pull off more advanced maneuvers. Underwater sections can be vexing but are a welcome change of pace for such a brief offering. The end-game difficulty ramps up oddly fast forcing you to navigate narrow spike mazes but, given how easy it is at first, the added challenge is mostly enjoyable. The background graphics are a visual hodgepodge and occasionally a tad gaudy but it fits the theme and certainly is distinct. The music is surprisingly underwhelming for a Kirby game but has a few bangers. The “boss challenge” minigames seem like a total copout and I would've preferred more battles using the magical brush. I guess HAL ran out of ideas or time to implement them!
I had a decently good time with Canvas Curse and I may consider going back for the rest of the medals. But for now, it’s time for the main course... To the library!

TOPHATANT123:
I've now completed the Wii U game with all of the treasure chests collected.

Personally I would say I prefer the DS game. I said that game was fun but flawed, the Wii U game is perhaps less flawed especially in terms of it's controls, but also less fun.

Control wise Kirby is less likely to ricochet around like a pinball, the dash physics are more consistent and the ability to erase Rainbows is a game changer. Kirby feels slower, and this time around you are encouraged to draw multiple lines at once, which gets used for things like waterfalls. The only complaint I would have with the controls is the charge dash, the game would sometimes register it as a regular dash or not at all, killing me a handful of times.

The game has some really interesting gimmick levels, notably the rocket levels and level 7-2. In the main campaign I would say there's greater variety here than in the DS game.

Where I feel it falls short is with the extra challenges and the treasure chests. The time trials in the DS game are the best part of the game, whereas the 15s challenge rooms in the Wii U game are too annoying for me to contemplate 100%-ing. The Wii U game is also lacking the paint efficiency trials which were a great change of pace. The treasure chests in the Wii U game I found to either be too easy, or too obscure without a good balance between those extremes.  While the DS game certainly has some frustrating medals, generally collecting medals was more about exploration.

I'm glad I played it, but I don't rate it very highly.

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