The Kirby series is known for its all-ages appeal, with bright colours, accessible gameplay, and the simple fact that Kirby is just so round and squishy.
With Kirby and the Forgotten Land launching this week, we're seeing a lot of advertisements for the new entry, including a recent trailer that highlighted the wonderful 'Karby'. But Nintendo's advertisements for the long-running series haven't always been all sunshine and rainbows.
As highlighted by VideoGameArt&Tidbits on Twitter, back in 1995 Nintendo ran a two-page ad for Kirby's Avalanche and Kirby's Dream Course for the SNES. But this advert didn't focus on the fun, cute side of Kirby — instead, it showcased a more grizzled Kirby about to be booked at the Metro Police Department.
Despite NOA's preoccupation with giving Kirby angry eyes, this print ad showed a side of the character we rarely, if ever, see elsewhere, with the advert even referring to the character as a "mutant marshmallow" and "his flabbiness". Charming!
It's certainly a striking advert, and we're pretty confident the Nintendo of today wouldn't go down such a route for the Kirby franchise again. Nevertheless, it's a neat little insight into how the company worked back in the '90s! This TV spot that we covered in our Best and Worst Nintendo Commercials feature shows a gruffer side to the character, although it doesn't quite have the 'grim crim' vibes of the print ad:
Kirby and the Forgotten Land will launch this week on March 25th - will you be picking it up? What other quirky Nintendo ads have you come across? Let us know!
Further Reading:
[source twitter.com]
Comments 20
The more stuff I learn about Kirby, the more I'm convinced that he is the real villain, and we're all just subjects forced to witness his acts of mass murder.
Kirby's days of war crimes...
...never ended.
I'm surprised you didn't mention the Dream Land 2 ad. That one is.... a trip.
@StarPoint My head-canon has always been that Kirby has no clue he's saving the universe. He just goes on eating sprees and happens to stumble into saving Dreamland.
I love the North American ad for Kirby's Dream Land 2, where Kirby (and friends) basically eat a whole biker gang.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EqVVG4FCq7w
Man, old Nintendo commercials were something else...in a good way. My favorites will always been the Game Boy Advance and Gamecube ones.
Gotta love those edgy 90s ads. Kirby with stubble is pretty hilarious. He just needs a smoke hanging out of his mouth.
Man, I kind of miss some of this 90s humor.
As I said before this is called American Kirby is hardcore.
What’s with America wanting everything to be so edgy?
I remember reading that in a monster rancher game
They actually REDESIGNED SOMEONE BECAUSE SHE WAS TO CUTE!!!
@Pak-Man I believe the same. Most of the games start with the villain stealing his food, waking him up too early or inadvertently kidnapping Kirby
https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/AmericanKirbyIsHardcore
This is a call-back to Kirby's creation.
His model is a placeholder and was meant to be replaced by a character that would be called "ポポポ". This is a Japanese onomatopoeia equivalent to "pow pow pow" or "bang bang bang". Although the early art ... honestly doesn't look that different from Kirby, he was going to have details that made him more "gritty" like the angry eyes and scowl seen here, and start with a gun.
Sakurai had trouble with pixel art, and when he asked Miyamoto for help he told him to just leave the placeholder in and colour it ... yellow.
Although he didn't go with exactly what Miyamoto suggested, he played around and eventually feel in love with the pink Kirby we know and love.
Shortly after that, the game was changed from "Twinkle Popo" (little Japanese language craziness happening here that I don't fully understand. The game used "ティンクル", which is actually "Tinkuru" or "Tinkle", but all the Romaji at the time and all references Nintendo has made to it seem to point to it being intended as "Twinkle", There is probably something in the Kanji that makes this make sense ) to "Kirby of the Stars" and took on a much lighter, cuter style.
Of course Kirby is a psychopath: he has a game that is called Mass Attack!
I for one am glad we are MOSTLY over this edgy time in advertising Kirby. Kirby's allowed to just be his cute self in ads now. Was done with that insecure nonsense about manning up a pink ball. Just play the games if you like them and don't worry about it. Kirby is awesome!
@Kirby_Girl IKR hopefully this whole “everything has to be edgy for the US” garbage stays dead.
Peak badass-ness was Super Star. Possibly OG Smash Bros.
Then after that "The Softening" happened.
Seems in line with existing Kirby lore. He's toppled kingdoms and slayed gods, getting arrested isn't that surprising.
@HeadPirate - It's a trip how some of the most endearing characters in gaming came from some level of restriction that the developer had to make use of what they had in creative ways.
Mario had a moustache to show the player which way he was facing, Mega Man being blue to utilize the other color palette more, even Minecraft had limitations that made Notch use the graphics he used.
@Paraka
You're right. There are so many great stories out there, and I've been collecting them for a while. A lot are rumour or unconfirmable, but that doesn't make them any less fun.
Did you know why Mario is a plumber? In Japan he's a construction worker because that's the "go to" job to give a character when you want them have a respectable job but still be the "any man". When localizing, the rumour (that OBVIOUSLY has never been confirmed, but has a lot of weight behind it) is that Miyamoto ask a friend what he thinks of when he thinks "Westerner" and he said "They smell bad and are full of *****".
What I've always heard is that the moustache is actually just his mouth; the team could never get it to stop looking like a moustache and eventually just gave into it. But really either, or both, could be true.
@SpeedRunRocks Kirby Super Star is my favorite Kirby game and that game is still cute and has soft spots like Kirby feeding baby birds and healing his friends 😘
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