Kid Kirby
Image: via Kirby Wiki / DMA Design

A major discovery has been made on the cancelled Super Nintendo Kirby game, Kid Kirby. This unusual title, which was being developed by DMA Design (who are now Rockstar North — yes, that Rockstar North), the game was meant to use the Super NES Mouse to launch Kirby across the levels, but slow development and poor sales of the mouse caused the project to be cancelled.

Given the scarcity of information on the game, @KidKirbyArchive has been set up by @Meeper12346 (who formerly ran @FactsKirby) to document as much as possible on Kid Kirby. And in creating this account, brand new information, including manual scans and some story details, has been discovered.

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Steve Hammond — former DMA Design writer — has shared these new tidbits with Kid Kirby Archive. This game, featuring a much more youthful Kirby, also would've seen King Dedede make a younger appearance. In Kid Kirby, he would've been known as Prince Dedede, and Hammond shared a much cleaner render of the soon-to-be-king, including new artwork of Kirby himself.

Also documented are some sketches of Kirby by Hammond from 1995 which show that this little Kirby would communicate using fruit and vegetables. The doodles also highlight the game's unusual control scheme.

A few pages of the game's manual have also been posted, presumably summarising the events before the game's story. The best part of these scans is on page seven, where "The Dreamland Tribune" can be seen. This mock newspaper spread includes a snarky mention of Hammond ("We interview him and find out just who he thinks he is...) and a cheeky reference to real-world events.

The last thing Hammond sends over to Kid Kirby Archive is a document that contains an outline of the start of the game's plot. The game would start with Kirby sleeping, then he's awoken by something happening at the Dream Spring. The Spring stops working, and Kirby decides that he needs to fix it, so he goes on an adventure to do just that. You can read the text for the intro right here.

Before today, so little was known about the game, and we're hugely grateful to Kid Kirby Archive for sharing these details online, and to Steve Hammond for providing the information.

Cancelled Kirby games have been creeping out of the woodwork lately! Just a few weeks ago, more footage of the cancelled GameCube game was shared on YouTube. So it's an exciting time to be a Kirby fan what with Kirby and the Forgotten Land and all of these new details emerging.

We're excited to see what other details Meeper12346 can find out about Kid Kirby. For now, let us know what you think of this cancelled game in the comments!

[source twitter.com]