Hi! as someone who played Nightmare in Dreamland before he ever played Kirby's Adventure and is an avid lover of Kirby and the NES alike, I'd like to take a moment and offer a second opinion review for the folks here at Nintendoworldreport.com to read and draw on their own conclusions on. After all, I own Kirby's adventure at least 5 different ways at this point.


Kirby: Nightmare in Dreamland is a remake of Kirby's Adventure that was released to coincide with the Anime that had started getting rolled out in Japan and would later be localized under the watchful eye of 4Kidz Entertainment, who had also adapted the Pokemon series and would go on to also do Sonic X and the F-Zero Anime. with the extra frames of animation to kirby, enemies, and the addition of hats, the game takes on a graphical style that resembles Kirby Super Star more than Kirby's Adventure, and the backgrounds in particular are all amazingly drawn and should have special attention drawn to them. what would be solid colors or abstract patterns in Kirby's Adventure are elaborate painted landscapes of rolling meadows and sparkling sunset oceans, or impressive palaces. Nightmare in Dreamland is an impressive looking game to say the least. Also, I just really like the idea of Kirby copy abilities having hats. it's an easy and quick go-to and adds to the style and flair of the character.

This game is easy. even on the hard difficulty setting, it's easy. that was also true of the original. there are a couple of minor engine tweaks that make this even moreso the case than the NES original, such as abilities like Burning, Hi-Jump and Tornado getting true invincibility frames Vs. grabbing enemies like Phan-Phan and Flamin' Leo. Tornado in particular also feels easier to control, making in the true go-to power to cheese anything and everything in one's path. What IS a bit more difficult though is finding hidden rooms that were obvious in the NES game and are now more obscure thanks to to the more organically drawn backgrounds. what was once a black square in the NES version signifying a potential door is now a little hole in a rock that doesn't look like Kirby could squeeze through until you take a shot in the dark and hit up. there's also a point where Paralax makes a star formation that's supposed to mark a hidden door not line up quite right and cause a bit of confusion.

The Mini-games are honestly more enjoyable than the NES suite. I was NEVER good at the Dedede hurling eggs band bombs from the top turnbuckle mini-game, and the strategies for the rail grinding and the returning Kirby SUper Star mini-games are a lot easier to understand. The original game dished out just as many lives for successful attempts at the crane game and wild gunman mini-games, so that's not an issue i'm concerned with.

also, I would be absolutely remiss if I failed to mention the unlockable Meta Knightmare mode! for a hard mode 100% and Boss Rush playthrough, a time attack mode is unlocked where Meta Knight is playable, feeling much more like a Kirby Super Star ability with multiple moves depending on directional input while swiping at foes with Galaxia, his trusty sword! His faster flight, high attack power, and low health give Meta Knightmare mode a sense of speed that the original Kirby's Adventure lacked, and I used to play Meta Knigtmare ALL the darned time when I was a kid...! THIS FEATURE ALONE IS WORTH PICKING UP THE GAME!

That being said, if you want my recommendation, either play this, or play the 3D Classics version on 3DS. this is a case where I don't feel purism is the route to take.


+ Amazing art direction that revitalizes an old adventure
+ Still a fun romp with plenty of personality
+ Unlockable Meta Knight mode adds lots of replay value for speed running minded people
+ Music re imagining is great, even if the audio quality is a bit hissy thanks to the GBA Sound chip


- Very easy and unchallenging
- Broken Multiplayer functions
- Art sometimes muddles clues into hidden areas

8.0/10