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BaD Ep 22: Kid Kirby: the Kirby game that almost was
Published on February 22, 2014 6:52 AM
Part of the Series - Blog a Day (BaD) 2014
4 minute read
2585 Views

Gotta love his cowlick...

Alot of you know who Kirby is, the little round, adorable, super tuff pink puff from Dream Land. It seems Kirby has been destined for greatness ever since Masahiro Sakurai created him, look at every game he has. Every Kirby game sometimes tries a new idea or it revamps the formula a bit and the game turns out fun and great. Look at Kirby's Adventure, sure there have been platformers before with power-ups but Kirby really took his own spin at the formula. The games were simple for younger gamers but have enough content, secrets, and challenge for the more experienced gamer. Kirby has had his own share of spin-offs that just seem more fun than the last, from pinball to golf to his own take on kart racing. Each simple, but challenging yet fun.

What most, if not all people know is about a little known Kirby game that got cancelled. Sure there have been many cancelled Kirby games over the years but the most obscure one of all is one I'm going to talk about: Kid Kirby.

              http://img3.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20100324022638/kirby/en/images/f/f6/Kid_kirby.jpg

                                                  Don't you just love his cowlick?

Kid Kirby was originally a game in the 90's that was sort of a prequel to the series, which is why he's called Kid Kirby, or the fact that he looks like a baby. It's plausible Nintendo wanted to cash in on the idea of making him into a kid in a similar way how popular cartoons then had spin-off series with the characters as kids. But the game itself is a mystery, it was intended to be the killer app or showcase if you will, that was supposed to sell the SNES Mouse. The game never saw the light of day since the game didn't work well and the fact that the mouse add-on didn't sell well. There were some ads about the game that showed screenshots of what the game could have been.

                                        http://www.unseen64.net/wp-content/uploads/2008/11/3451534.jpg

Judging by the barely visible text, the text describing the game seems to be spanish because "juegos" means games in spanish which you can see to the left. Kirby is pointing at it, though it is missing the letter "j" if you can see it clearly.

But how did the game play? Well from what I remember hearing, the game had either Kirby move on his own and it's your job to guide him with the SNES mouse to either avoid obstacles and danger. Kirby is either a kid/baby which means he doesn't know any better, hence why you had to guide him. I'm not sure but the game Pac-man the New Adventures worked in the same way, minus the Pac-man doesn't know any better like Kid Kirby, but he must of gotten into a jam if you have to guide him. Another thing I remember reading is that you controlled Kirby with the mouse itself in a similar fashion like how you controlled Kirby in Canvas Curse. It's probably possible that Canvas Curse was influenced by Kid Kirby, or that Kid Kirby eventually became Canvas Curse at some point. Another interesting thing is that some of the color palette looks like something you would see in Kirby's Tilt and Tumble.

But perhaps the most interesting fact is that thi game was in development by DMA Design, that company eventually became Rockstar North. Think about it for a moment, the company that made this...

                                   http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-lyxOq6PKRgU/UVsOo3Ewu9I/AAAAAAAAK4k/EHJwnLEXF_s/s1600/GTAVBOXARTCOMPARISONS.jpg

                                 If you squint really hard, you can actually see Kirby

Were working on a game about this...

                                   http://img2.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20140218020456/kirby/en/images/c/cb/Main.png

                               Oh, you can tell by the look of his eyes he's a murderer

That is such a huge contrast isn't it? But sadly the game never came out. The game was most likely scrapped, and that was it. The premise seemed interesting but who knows if the game might of sold, I mean the idea of popular cartoon characters as kids were big at the time, so maybe Nintendo was on to something.

 

                                                  [?IMG]

                                             Kirby was never good at Grand Theft Autoing...

Or maybe not, but hey, Kirby with a gun. So what do you think of Kid Kirby? Would you have loved to played this? Thanks for reading and later.

Comments
0
Posted on February 22, 2014 7:00 AM

Thanks for the info, I never knew this game existed nor the fact that the company that makes Grand Theft Auto was behind it. Some craziness right there!

Of course Kirby is a murderer, poor Sonic found that out the hard way

 

Posted on February 22, 2014 3:06 PM

.;...

Posted on February 22, 2014 5:13 PM

LOL! That was halarious!

Posted on February 22, 2014 12:12 PM

And suddenly City Trial in Kirby's Air Ride takes a dark turn....

Posted on February 22, 2014 1:34 PM

whoah never heard of this.  It's too bad. 

Posted on February 22, 2014 3:10 PM

I don't know that I'd ever buy a mouse for SNES, but it is cool to see that ad again, which I vaguely remember. 

Posted on February 22, 2014 3:55 PM

Never heard of this one.

DMA Design made a lot of games before GTA that may surprise you.  They were responisble for Lemmings, and they made a SNES game called Uniracers.

Posted on February 22, 2014 8:12 PM

Didn't know of this one like some here. What could have been indeed.

Just like DMA went to become Rockstar North, it's very curious to see the early works of some companies. Like knowing Blizzard made Rock N Roll Racer, Bethesda made NES Where's Waldo and Atlus made some of the infamous LJN licensed games.

Posted on February 22, 2014 11:32 PM

Never heard of this game, thanks for the info.

Posted on February 23, 2014 4:21 PM

Great read. :)