YMMV / Kirby 64: The Crystal Shards

• Awesome Levels:
  • 2-4, in which you get to travel through a massive spaceship. The detailed backgrounds and scrolling segments make the place very fun to explore.
  • 3-2, which inverts the usual reputation of water stages, by letting Kirby skim through the water on a fast boat, run down a waterfall, and fight back up with solid platforming.
  • 5-2, which is a very colorful sky stage where Kirby's floating is put to good use. The abundance of Ice powers and health make it much more forgiving than the other stages on Shiver Star, the placement of the shards are very straightforward this time around, and it's all scored with a lovely atmospheric cover of the classic Butter Building theme.
  • 5-3 is memorable for its unique shopping mall setting that you would otherwise not expect in a Kirby game. The idea ended up being revisited in Kirby and the Forgotten Land, which has two mall stages.
  • 5-4, the factory, is very memorable thanks to the chilling music, the challenging-but-still-fun level of difficulty (from its conveyor belts, giant hammers and other tricky traps), and the setting and atmosphere being much more sinister compared to a good chunk of the game.
• Breather Level: 6-1, the first stage of Ripple Star, is an actual carbon copy of the game's very first stage. And it's just as easy save for a few tougher enemies. Probably for the best, as the previous factory stage is one of the more difficult ones, and the next two, while not that difficult, are still unnerving.
• Complacent Gaming Syndrome:
  • Spark+Cutter (the twin-bladed light saber), Cutter+Bomb (the exploding shuriken) and Cutter+Burning (the Flaming Sword) tend to see the most use among players, as they are powerful abilities whose fast and stylistic attacks cover a wide range. If nothing else, they look really cool.
  • As far as Stone+Cutter goes, good luck finding anyone that doesn't solely use the Pitch form and ignores the others^*Outside of using the Rick form only once for its wall jump to get the third shard in 3-3. Said form is not only the most mobile of all six Stone+Cutter transformations, but is by far one of the most reliable and quickest methods of movement in the game.
• Cult Classic: It's not the most well-known Kirby game and tends to be overlooked compared to other games in the franchise. Nevertheless, it enjoys a highly dedicated and passionate following amongst the fandom due to its interesting ideas, wonderful presentation, the gimmick of combining copy abilities and memorable bosses.
• Ensemble Dark Horse:
  • Adeleine is the least prominent of Kirby's partners, as she only makes brief appearances across stages to give Kirby items, whereas the others are all playable during select stage segments. However, she is massively popular, due to her cute design and being the Token Human of the series (making her stand out amongst the cast) as well as partly due to her expanded role in the webcomic Brawl in the Family. She makes a grand reappearance and is Promoted to Playable in Kirby Star Allies.
  • While she's a relatively minor character who only properly appears in this game^note though she makes a cameo in Kirby Star Allies as a drawing in the post-credits image you get when completing "Guest Star ???? Star Allies Go!" with Adeleine and Ribbon, Dark Meta Knight, or Daroach, the Fairy Queen undeniably has a following amongst the fandom due to being an adorably awkward Meganekko, as well as her Surprisingly Creepy Moment in the ending if you don't get all the shards.
• Fan Nickname:
  • The game is sometimes dubbed "Kirby's Dream Land 4", due to the game sharing its director and many elements with Kirby's Dream Land 2 and Kirby's Dream Land 3, like Dark Matter as the main villain.
  • The queen of Ripple Star - who has yet to recieve any sort of official name - is often called the Fairy Queen. Alternatively, some fans call her Queen Ripple, after her homeland.
  • Spark+Cutter gives Kirby a light saber similar to Darth Maul's, leading to the ability being commonly referred to as "Darth Kirby".
• Fanon:
  • Although it's never been confirmed nor denied, many fans interpret Shiver Star as being a future post-apocalyptic Earth. Largely due to it looking exactly like Earth, possessing the same continents in the same locations (just grey and white because of the cold) and even having a singular moon like ours. Plus, going onto the world shows places like a mall and even some sort of factory/lab, showing this world was once inhabited by a civilization similar to humanity, if not humanity itself.
  • To go alongside the "Shiver Star = Earth" theory, a lot of fans go with the idea of Adeleine being from this planet, as she's the only human seen on Planet Popstar (that is, if she and Ado are the same person), not counting cameos like Samus Aran and Professor Hector in Dream Land 3. This is backed up by the guidebook saying Adeleine is visiting Popstar, rather than hailing from there.
  • Alternatively, some fans also interpret Shiver Star as being one of the planets owned by Haltmann Works Co, due to the industrial settings in the later stages and the company's tendency to mechanize planets. This ended up getting indirectly Jossed by Word of God, as they stated that planets taken over by the company usually have a giant H to mark the planet as theirs; which Shiver Star lacks. Of course, that doesn’t stop fans from interpreting it as such anyway.
  • The Waddle Dee that joins the main group is generally agreed to be Bandana Waddle Dee — who's been a main crew member since Kirby's Return to Dream Land — minus the bandana and spear. This was the first time a Waddle Dee joined on your side and in Star Allies, we see Bandana Dee alongside Kirby, Dedede, and Adeleine and Ribbon when the latter were revealed to be in the game. That being said though, sometimes one of those interactions in-game could use a Parasol Waddle Dee instead.
  • Despite it never being stated explicitly, several fanworks interpret Ribbon as the Fairy Queen's daughter and thus the princess of Ripple Star, usually as an explanation as to why Ribbon would go to find the queen during the game's intro cutscene and why Ribbon is at least one of the fairies trusted to protect the Crystal.
  • Plenty of fan art tends to give Ribbon legs, which she lacks in both this game and Star Allies.
• Game-Breaker: For the few useless powers and joke abilities, this game has a plethora of absolutely devastating powers that will allow you to mow through enemies and bosses with ease^note well, except for Miracle Matter, whose gimmick will quickly force you to ditch any copy ability you bring to face it, and 0², which forces you to use Ribbon's Crystal.
  • Cutter+Bomb gives Kirby the power to throw explosive ninja stars. It's extremely rapid-fire, hits almost instantly, kills practically all standard enemies in one hit — complete with the blade satisfyingly impaling them before it explodes — and lets Kirby stay in one place in mid-air to repeatedly and easily hit the weak points of bosses. Needless to say, most of them go down very fast.
  • Burning+Burning basically turns Kirby into a huge comet that allows Kirby to soar for long distances, destroying everything in his path. He can also fly for much longer after Kirby has used his breath up, allowing him to soar for great distances past whole stages. You can't control your flight as the comet, but that's rarely a concern.
  • Ice+Ice turns Kirby into a giant, almost-indestructible snowball. All enemies become absorbed in his path, and he smashes right through destructible blocks. At least until you come up to a wall, the player doesn't even have to do anything most of the time. Just tap the button, grab some popcorn, and enjoy the mayhem.
  • Stone+Cutter turns Kirby into a stone form of one of his past companions. In stone form, Kirby is invincible, plowing through most enemies while at worst losing his stone skin if he hits a Gordo or other similar spiked item (without losing health or the power). Now, just mash B until you get Pitch (the small bird), who can fly almost indefinitely, and you'll pass through most stages easily. As a bonus, Kirby won't be affected by water currents in this stone form, which helps immensely in a certain water stage.
  • Burning+Cutter. In addition to looking really cool and carving through most enemies with all the ease of a holiday ham, this BFS can be dragged behind Kirby, swung around him, held above his head, and thrown forward as a projectile (with Kirby able to summon another afterwards if desired), allowing Kirby to cover every angle but directly below him. It especially helps when fighting Acro and HR-H/E.
  • Spark+Cutter gives you a double-ended laser sword that you can spin around yourself. What it lacks in the versatility of the fire sword, it makes up for in speed and attacking range. Cutest Sith ever.
  • Not only does Spark+Stone — which lets Kirby throw a large boulder surrounded by an electrical field and tethered back to him with a long bolt of lightning — look cool, but you can hit enemies from every angle if you let the rock bounce around on its electric cord. You can casually walk through some stages with this combo.
  • Stone+Needle allows you to fire a rock drill that destroys every non-invincible enemy in its path. Also, you can plow through enemies while holding on to it, making you an unstoppable projectile of doom. Also, if button mashed while in the air and holding a horizontal direction, you can float insane distances, because activating the drill stops you from falling. Platforming and fighting help all in one.
  • Ice+Spark. It turns Kirby into a refrigerator and pops out three food items. And it can be used in boss battles. That's right; this power lets you heal at will against the bosses! Even though it's hard to actually attack with it, you can still outlast everything until you get enough lucky hits in. Just don't take too long against HR-E...
  • Spark+Spark surrounds Kirby with a huge ring-shaped forcefield that instantly fries any enemy or projectile that touches it — and even while moving, only decreases its range to about the size of a regular Spark shield and returns to its normal size when you stop moving — making it a great asset for defence.
  • Burning+Bomb. Kirby jumps, spins, and shoots fireworks all around him. Usable three times before you have to land, and the blasts get bigger with each use. You keep all of your momentum and mobility when attacking, making it great for moving through stages quickly and as a handy Double Jump.
  • Bomb+Bomb equals a Spread Shot of homing missiles. Said missiles fire off in a wide fan-shaped pattern and track all on-screen enemies to blow them up, making them ridiculously good at crowd control.
  • The Bomb ability in of itself is damn effective. Covering a good distance if held, it's also easy to use close up, and thanks to the animation, is very easy to mash quickly with the B button. While not the most powerful, the practical use in almost any situation more than makes up for that.
  • Needle+Bomb lets you temporarily turn into a Gordo; holding down the B button to float through the air and then explode while firing spikes outward upon releasing. A great offensive and defensive move — due to its range and most projectiles stopping and enemies dying on contact with you while you're transformed — that also serves as a good additional mid-air boost when you're out of breath from hovering. It can also be fired rapidly in place, letting you quickly stab your way through most bosses from any angle.
• Goddamned Bats:
  • Yariko is often considered the most annoying enemy in the game, and for good reason. Yariko is often perched up on high places, and when you get close, will throw her spear at you with excellent accuracy. And what's worse? There's a lot of them in World 4-1, and they can especially be a real hair-puller when you're climbing upwards, making it harder to avoid their spears.
  • Burnis and Frigis are also quite a pair of pests. They fly around fairly quickly, dropping fireballs/ice balls down as they go, and if you're unlucky enough to be under them when they're dropping their projectiles, you're most likely going to get hit. Burnises tend to throw out many fireballs at once when they're spawned by Magman during its boss fight.
• Hilarious in Hindsight:
  • Seeing a giant Bouncy as a mid-boss may make some players think of the Bouncy Sis enemies, and seeing a giant Galbo as a mid-boss may make them think of Flame Galboros.
  • Flutters, Pretty Butterflies which appear in the first stage of the first and penultimate levels of the game, are listed as enemies. Come Kirby Star Allies, and a butterfly does become not just an enemy, but a Superboss.
• It Was His Sled: The existence of 0² as the real final boss is one of the most well-known things about the game.
• It's Short, So It Sucks!: The game's biggest issue is its incredibly short length. A normal playthrough only takes about four or five hours, and trying to go for 100% Completion might add an hour or two to that depending on whether you get stumped by a couple Crystal Shard puzzles/hiding spots.
• Memetic Mutation:
  • Kirby 64 is a Rated T Game^ExplanationWhen the game got announced for Nintendo Switch Online, the first thing that showed in the trailer was the ESRB Rating as "T" for blood and violence (which applies to the service overall, not just Kirby 64, as the rating can only be as low as the highest individually rated game). This didn't stop people from joking how the game was more hardcore than Kirby and the Forgotten Land, which was also noticed for having a "Fear" warning on its rating.
  • Kirby jamming to some tunes^ExplanationThe game's Sound Test mode features an animation of Kirby bobbing back and forth while wearing a set of headphones, with his expression changing depending on the mood of the song. The default version of the animation, depicting Kirby with his standard smile, caught on among fans in later years; sped-up versions became popular reaction gifs for enjoyable music, and the animation at its original speed became a widespread subject for redraws.
• Moe:
  • The queen, who is a Meganekko Cute Clumsy Girl, and combines it with a hefty dose of Adorkable. In the bad ending she is a lot less cute, though...
  • Ribbon. Brave, cute, never lets Dark Matter absorbing her homeworld slow her down, and staying cheerful throughout the adventure.
• Most Wonderful Sound:
  • The little jingle when Ribbon collects a Crystal Shard. Particularly if it's a really obtuse puzzle.
  • The satisfying thwock! when you take out an enemy. More so when you destroy multiple enemies at one time through a stack or a miniboss summoning hordes of them to destroy. Especially true with the loud ZAP sound whenever an enemy runs into a Spark+Spark field that's already up.
  • The little clicks when blocks turn grey and fall off the arena in Checkerboard Chase. Provided you made it, of course.
  • The BLOO-WOP sound when Kirby dives in some water. Not only does it sound really cool, but hearing a delicate drop of water instead of a splash really highlights how adorably small and light Kirby is.
  • "(giggle) Hai!" upon selecting a stage. Always adorable.
• Nightmare Fuel:
  • The True Final Boss, 0². It is implied to be a reincarnated or reborn version of Zero, the final boss of Kirby's Dream Land 3. Not only does it look like an unholy offspring of a fallen angel and a Boo from the ''Mario'' series, but it bleeds from its eye when you shoot it.
  • Adeleine when possessed by the Dark Matter, along with the suspenseful sting near the end of the cutscene "Art Attack". The face she makes at the end of it certainly doesn't help.
  • If Stage 5-4 wasn't bad enough already, it's got Creepy Awesome music and one area full of what appear to be medical experiments.
  • The transformed state◊ of the Scarfy enemies. Especially considering that, in this game, all one has to do to get it to transform is look away from it. Much like Boos, but much, much scarier.
  • King Dedede, in his boss fight when he exposes the Dark Matter. You thought it was bad when he was the final boss of Kirby's Dream Land 2 and 3? Now you get to watch as his stomach splits open to reveal an eye or a mouth full of razor sharp teeth in 3D!
  • Sure, Stage 6-2's theme is a bit creepy-sounding, but it doesn't sound so scary after you get used to it, right? Wrong. The simple chords won't let up, having to endure the same repetitive notes progressively assaults your ears until you're desperate to finish the stage, if only to make it stop. This goes double for those playing for the first time, particularly for the target audience, and those who are unnerved enough by the stage's dark underwater caves and tunnels or areas hidden by the foreground.
  • Stage 6-3's music. Jazz has never sounded so "oh God, something is coming, something bad is going to happen, HURRY HURRY", especially combined with many enemies coming after you at once.
  • The bad ending, when you realize the queen is glaring at you, not Ribbon, YOU, with evil eyes, almost mocking the player for not getting all the shards. Said glare is accompanied by a Last Note Nightmare, made even more effective by the rest of the ending playing out as if everything was fine beforehand, giving no indication that you'd not completed the game before this point.
• Nightmare Retardant: When fighting the True Final Boss, the vulnerable locations are its blood-red eye (the bleeds more when you shoot it), its halo of power, the bandage covering where 0²'s eyeball (might have) first burst out from, and... its cactus-butt. Additionally, the fact that the supposed eye burst wound is covered by a comically large bandage makes it seem more like a big boo-boo as opposed to what it correlates to.
• One-Scene Wonder:
  • Just like in the previous game, 0² causes quite an impression, yet only those who are able to collect every crystal shard in the game will be able to see it.
  • The possessed Fairy Queen, who only appears in the bad ending.
• Scrappy Mechanic: If you're planning to collect all of the Enemy Info cards, you're going to run into duplicate cards. Even Kirby will be disappointed at the result if that happens.
• Scrappy Weapon:
  • Burning+Ice gives Kirby the ability to... transform into a melting ice cube. It has abysmal range, only lasts about a second, and is not needed for any puzzles in the game, making it useless. It's typically assumed to be an intentional example meant to mess with players for thinking combining fire and ice would yield something useful.
  • Spark+Bomb turns Kirby into a walking lightbulb that eventually explodes, which has poor range. It's only useful for lighting up a dark room for one puzzle.
  • Stone+Bomb lets Kirby use a pack of dynamite to blow up nearby enemies. This is very unreliable, as the dynamite takes a long time to blow up if it doesn't make direct contact, and the resulting explosion will hurt Kirby unless the player presses down to put on a safety helmet. If thrown at an enemy at point-blank range, the player won't have enough time to avoid damage.
  • Stone+Cutter is by no means a bad combo and even its reliance on RNG on which Animal Friend sculpture Kirby transforms into is a mild annoyance. However, Kine and ChuChu are by far the worst transformations, due to their lack of mobility. While Kirby can jump in the ChuChu form, the horizontal movement of said jump is extremely limited, hardly moving a few inches from your previous spot. The Kine form is even worse and is stuck in one spot, only being able to turn left and right in place. First time players would think that they could at least swim underwater (referencing how great of a swimmer the real Kine is, as seen in Dream Land 2 and 3), but no matter the environment, you're still not able to move. Even the Coo and Pitch forms can swim, oddly enough do to their flight mechanics being applied underwater.
• Ships That Pass in the Night: Dedede x Fairy Queen is a rather popular ship amongst the fandom, despite the two only interacting in the ending. It helps that both are clumsy royal figures who act as the ruler of their home planet and both get possessed by Dark Matter at certain points.
• That One Boss: The Final Boss, Miracle Matter, is strong even by Kirby standards. It's a Barrier Change Boss that gives little room to damage it, plus several of its forms (such as Bomb and Spark) have attacks that are quite difficult to dodge.
• That One Level:
  • Stage 3-4 takes place entirely underwater, where most copy abilities become downright impractical due to most of Kirby's non-swimming animations being slowed down. It also contains water currents that can make it easy to miss Crystal Shards or just screw with your movement in general. A pretty nasty Game-Breaking Bug made this stage even more difficult in the version included on the Nintendo Switch Online service, but was quickly ironed out.
  • Stage 5-4 is a marathon of a factory full of One-Hit Kill deathtraps.
• That One Puzzle:
  • An Adeleine puzzle in 2-4 requires Kirby to obtain the Bomb+Spark combo in order to brighten up a room to see her drawings, giving the combination of buttons to press in the next room to obtain a Crystal Shard. The Copy Ability combo is not difficult to get in said stage, but the player needs to figure out that there are hidden drawings in the first place — something that can easily be missed due to the lack of any cues from Adeleine herself (she does nothing but merely stare at the wall) — and the possibility of not even knowing how Bomb+Spark works. It's also one of the only Copy Ability puzzles that doesn't hint at which combo to use, making it entirely possible that a player may not bother to experiment to figure it out due to lack of telegraphing.
  • The second Crystal Shard in 4-3 has a puzzle that requires you to break blocks out of a group to recreate the shape of something Adeleine draws (a top hat, an umbrella or a pizza missing a slice). The game doesn't give a good idea on the exact shape you need to go for even with the hint and it's very easy to mess up (especially the umbrella), forcing you to restart until you figure it out or just look it up.
  • 4-4 has a Crystal Shard hidden under some hardened magma that requires any Ice ability in order to break it free. The problem is, the game doesn't make it clear that you need Ice specifically for this shard, since by now the player is used to the straightforward colored walls that explicitly hint the ability required to bypass them^note the magma is dark with some red cracks, so it's easy to assume that Fire, Fire+Bomb, or Fire+Stone is needed. Not helping this is the fact that the stage does not feature any enemies that can provide the Ice power, so you're forced to get the ability somewhere else beforehand and carry it all the way to this specific section (the penultimate room in the whole stage), contributing to its obtuseness.
• That One Sidequest:
  • There's a Crystal Shard in stage 4-2 that requires you to carry the Bomb+Stone ability all the way to the end of the stage (because nothing in 4-2 itself will give you that particular combination) to blow open a wall. It's widely regarded as the most annoying Shard in the game because Stone+Bomb is easily one of the worst Copy Ability combos, and there's no way to replace it in the stage if you drop it. Add to this that there is an area where the platforms are rather difficult to stay on and you'll get a hair-pulling experience.
  • Although getting 100% on your file only applies for collecting all 74 Crystal Shards, some completionists take it a step further by attempting to collect the Enemy Info cards at the end of each level. Each level ends with a goal bonus minigame where you have to time the direction and distance of Kirby's jump to grab any given item on a picnic blanket. One such item is an Enemy Info card and getting the timing of jumps just right isn't that easy. What makes this even more of a chore is that if you mess up or if you get a card that you already have (indicated by Kirby's disappointed reaction), you'll have to go through the entire stage all over again for another shot. Of course, the former was only a problem for original N64 players, as post-N64 ports of the game have the option to use a save state feature, but the latter remains an issue no matter which version you're playing on.
• Toy Ship: Kirby and Ribbon get this treatment, what with their in-game Ship Teases, the latter appearing to be a Distaff Counterpart of the former, them both defending their respective planets, and even playing Battle Couple for the True Final Boss.
• They Wasted a Perfectly Good Character: The Fairy Queen. Despite being the ruler of Ripple Star, she never actually gets much screentime in the game, only appearing in the opening, the cutscene leading up to Dark Star, and both endings and despite the Fairy Queen being possessed by Dark Matter, you never get to fight her as a boss like you did the others back on Popstar as the restored Crystal simply shoots the Dark Matter out of her.
• Viewer Pronunciation Confusion: "Zero Two" (ゼロツー) is the official pronunciation of 0²'s name, although that hasn't stopped people from pronouncing it as "Zero-Squared", "Oh-Two", "Oh-Squared", or even Oxygen (which is literally O₂). Though with later games like Super Smash Bros. for Nintendo 3DS and Wii U and Ultimate, this confusion may have died down at least a little bit.
• Vindicated by History: This game was originally disliked for the same reason as its predecessor Kirby's Dream Land 3: the mere fact that it wasn't Kirby Super Star. Now, it's enjoyed for its 2½D presentation, the unusual degree of challenge in the stage design, giving Kirby an Implied Love Interest, and, once again, being surprisingly creepy. However, the Kirby series switched back to Super Star-style after that, due to the initial poor reception of these two games. Many fans are eager to see another game like them.
• Visual Effects of Awesome: Considering it's a late N64 game, the graphics are pretty dang impressive, with smoother polygons and a surprisingly high framerate for cutscenes, the latter of which wouldn't look out-of-place among in-game GameCube graphics.
• The Woobie: Ribbon. The poor kid just lost her home planet to the Eldritch Abomination Dark Matter.
• Woolseyism: The rice ball healing items were replaced with sandwiches in the international versions. Curiously, though, Waddle Dee still eats a rice ball during the bonus game in all versions of the game.

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