It devours everything in its path and there is no way to stop it. Kirby and the Forgotten Land is already among us and if the pink creature is capable of swallowing a car completely, we cannot imagine what its limits are. The new Nintendo Switch work has arrived as the first main game of the saga completely in 3D, which is a considerable qualitative leap.
A challenge that HAL Laboratory and Nintendo itself had to face during the development of the game. For this reason, the company has shared an interview with several of its main managers regarding how they have faced the work. Explains Shinya Kumazaki, director of the game, that “when I started planning the difficulty level of this game, I imagined a 3D platform game easy enough that even a three year old could play.”
That adaptation hit certain hurdles, like making it clear visually where Kirby stands. Tatsuya Kamiyama, responsible for the overall structure, clarifies that “Kirby’s character design didn’t fit perfectly with the full 3D game. Kirby’s silhouette is perfectly round. When you’re controlling him from behind, it can be hard to tell which way you’re looking at a glance.” Therefore, the change in perspective forced us to “improve our shadows and lighting, place a lot more objects in each stage, etc.”
Tricks to reduce stress
Trying to reach a large audience, Kirby and the Forgotten Land He has used different stratagems so that the adventure is not too frustrating. Kamiyama details that for Kirby’s Blowout Blast an arrow was chosen that indicates where you are going in 3D space. However, “always pointing an arrow forward made it look like you were controlling the arrow, not Kirby”, changing his mind.
In this sense of avoiding greater frustration and taking into account the difficulties when playing in 3D, HAL Laboraty managed to make our punches connect, even when we miss. This video shows a clear example of it.
Kirby devs demonstrate how Kirby’s attacks will hit the enemy as long as it looks like it should on camera – even when it doesn’t in 3D space!!https://t.co/TRUyUMwIDQ pic.twitter.com/gNcaLCp7do
— greeny (@dvdfu) March 24, 2022
Kamiyama relates that “the game takes into account the player’s perspective by tracking Kirby’s and camera positions, then plotting a range at which attacks can appear to hit. If an attack is within that range, the attack will hit. By doing so, even people who are not that good at 3D action games can attack enemies without stress.”
We find another example of this when Kirby is about to hit the ground after a fall. Due to the position of the camera, the exact reference of when the pink character’s feet touch the ground can be lost. If we don’t hit the right moment, wanting to jump again, Kirby will inflate and start to glide.
To avoid this issue, the team took it upon themselves to adjust the drop so that even though you didn’t hit the ground, you can jump back immediately if the distance is already too small. Once again, video with the demonstration.
Another example is what they call Fuzzy Landing, which is about how perspective can trick the player into starting to float unintentionally. They fix this by reducing the margin in which Kirby can start floating on a jump. pic.twitter.com/l7Qm9PwjyS
— Fountain of Dreams 💫 (@FuenteDeKirby) March 24, 2022
Along with the automatic camera we have another classic that has been used a lot naughty dog, like in The Last of Us. The yellow tapes that, surreptitiously, indicate the main path to follow Kirby and the Forgotten Land. These are all ways to make an adventure reach a high level of satisfaction.