E3 2010 Hands-On: Kirby’s Epic Yarn

I’ve never been a Kirby fan.  In fact I’ve never played a Kirby game, apart from his appearance in Super Smash Bros Brawl.  It was just too… cute… for my tastes.  I do respect the series though, as I know several friends who’ve loved Canvas Curse and Superstar and can debate me on their merits.

However, when Nintendo showed the trailer for Kirby’s Epic Yarn (double entendre, woot!) I was instantly captivated.  I’ve always loved the denim & yarn aesthetic of games like Defend Your Castle and Little Big Planet.  I hurried to the Nintendo booth Wednesday morning to give the game a whirl.

The latest iteration of Kirby trades in the familiar pink puff for a ball of yarn.  The world is comprised of layers of denim, cloth, and tweed, as if it was sewn onto giant tapestry. Kirby can unzip buildings to go inside, or open pockets and slip under the layers of material, creating a moving lump.  The stage I played, a town, allowed me to become one of these lumps and avoid a troop of orange enemies before I popped out the other end.  The animation of things zipping and unzipping is terrific, as if sheets of paper were falling over one by one.

It’s incredibly cute, like Nintendo scrapbooking if scrapbooking was fun.

It’s clear that the developers, HAL Labs, had a great time creating this game.

Besides the visuals, there are other changes that set this apart from the series. Kirby can no longer inhale enemies, for instance, and instead chooses to whip them with a strand of yarn.  He can also transform into several objects, such as a car to speed across (instead of running), a UFO, and a dolphin-submarine.  It was novel, although ever-so-slightly gimmicky.

The game also has co-op play, which I didn’t get a chance to try, but seems to be the du jour with Nintendo’s platforming games recently (Donkey Kong Country Returns also incorporates co-op).  It’s refreshing to see that though DKCR and New Super Mario Bros Wii are refinements of mainstays, Kirby’s Epic Yarn is a completely new take on the series… one that I’m now looking forward to once it releases this Fall.