YMMV / Kirby Star Allies

• Accidental Innuendo: Flamberge’s pause screen description in Guest Star mode has the line, "Ha, ha, ha! Come on Francisca. Let’s get wild!" While this phrase is most likely meant to refer to the tag team between all three Mages, it's not helped by the implied Les Yay between the two. This gets worse when you remember that they are SISTERS (in name anyway).
• Alternative Character Interpretation:
  • Do the Mage-Sisters support Hyness because they sincerely believe that his Dark Lord will be their savior, because they're brainwashed by his "intoxicating charisma", or because they knew him before he went insane and they hope to see him returned to how he once was? As of Heroes in Another Dimension, the last interpretation seems the most likely, particularly with the reveal that he saved them long ago.
  • How much of Hyness's actions are based in actual evil and how much are caused by his insanity (and whatever inflicted that insanity) is up in the air, especially after the good ending to Heroes in Another Dimension shows him restored to a somewhat normal state through The Power of Friendship.
  • On the subject of Hyness, his Motor Mouth rant before his boss battle has some fascinating implications for his character and the series lore, but as he's a highly unreliable source, it's up to interpretation whether his story is the truth, a heavily slanted version of the truth, a complete fabrication, or just aimless babble.
  • Views on who and what Morpho Knight is and what happened to Galacta Knight and the butterfly to create them depend on this due to how vague the game's details are on it. Part of this was due to a faulty translation, and the more accurate translation in Kirby and the Forgotten Land clears things up; Morpho Knight "casts judgment" on powerful beings by absorbing their souls, and its knightly form is completely unrelated to Galacta Knight.
  • Void Termina has several interpretations of who, what, and why it is. For some, it's the God of the Kirby series. For others, it's Zero. Sometimes, interpretations will even overlap. Yet still, some people think it's not as important as it seems.
  • While the original Japanese description (and translated Chinese and Korean versions) for Marx makes it clear he's only allied with Kirby out of pragmatism, some have interpreted the English version's "he'll be your buddy if you keep him well-fed" quote as meant to be sarcastic regardless.
• Anti-Climax Boss: Due to how the bosses tend to die quickly in this game (usually due to either being bashed by four players at once or from their shrunken health bars when fought solo), the Superboss specifically ends up turning out like this. Despite eliminating Galacta Knight with a single touch and ostensibly being more powerful than him, Morpho Knight suffers from the same problem of having low health like all of the other bosses, and attacks very slowly even when it Turns Red; said attacks lack the intricacy that previous Knight bosses like Galacta Knight, Dark Meta Knight, or even Meta Knight himself in this game have. It's even worse the first time the player sees it, as they likely have heightened speed and power thanks to Guest Star's gimmick, letting them breeze through Partizanne and Hyness with minimal life loss.
• Base-Breaking Character:
  • Morpho Knight. Some like its design and reference to its design originating from the cancelled Kirby GameCube game, while others dislike it for being a disappointing finale to Guest Star ??? Mode, as well as replacing Galacta Knight in a rather insulting fashion. These issues were resolved with its EX form in the 4.0.0 update and its surprise return in Kirby and the Forgotten Land, both of which make it much more formidable, with the latter also making its true nature more apparent. In turn, this has made it more universally liked (or at least respected) among the fanbase.
  • Hyness, especially in regards to the good ending to Heroes in Another Dimension. Some people thought he got off way too easily for what he's done, others think he deserves a second chance, and a third party thinks he's been Brainwashed For the Greater Good (like many characters that get hit with the Friend Heart) rather than actually redeemed.
• Best Boss Ever:
  • Void Termina, the final boss of the game, is beloved for being both the most grandiose and intricate boss in the series, but is even more beloved for all the groundbreaking lore details that can by scryed from both exposition regarding it and its various phases in the fight. Plus, his "True Destroyer of Worlds" form not only throws out even more lore, but also has much harder-to-dodge attacks for those who thought Regular/Soul Melter Void Termina was easy.
  • Despite (or because of) how brutal it is, the Three Mage-Sisters pull off a fitting finale to Heroes in Another Dimension with one of the most hectic battles the series has seen.
• Breather Boss:
  • Surprisingly, Hyness is actually rather abysmal at fighting. At least, for the first half of the fight before you knock off his cloak — then it gets much harder.
  • Flamberge, especially as she's between Francisca and Zan Partizanne. For starters, she has more weaknesses than the other three, and her secondary weapon is easier to avoid and counteract.
  • Due to Morpho Knight being an Anti-Climax Boss even on Soul Melter difficulty, it manages to be an incredibly easy fight before you have to deal with Void Soul. Not so much with Morpho Knight EX though, as it will most likely obliterate your party before you even reach the True Final Boss.
  • Parallel Dedede becomes a lot easier than the other bosses in Heroes in Another Dimension if you decide to take advantage of water's effect on his rotten fruit^note turning it into mid-battle healing items. This even works in Soul Melter EX, where Parallel Dedede is fought closer to the end than his base self and can provide a much-needed health boost.
  • Soul Melter EX difficulty in The Ultimate Choice contains the hardest variations of every boss in the game (including ones seen nowhere else) and revamps the mid-boss rounds to be tougher. It also includes Goldon and Silvox, who are already at their strongest and aren't very tough to begin with. They don't provide a great breather since they're fought early on, but they're widely considered the easiest bosses in Soul Melter EX.
• Broken Base:
  • Unusually for a Kirby game, the fans are divided on this one. Critics of the game consider it one of the weakest entries due to its straightforward puzzle design, short campaign, and being easier than usual (this is a series known for its below-average difficulty, so that's saying something). Fans of the game enjoy its massive array of abilities, bringing back long-forgotten characters, and the return of multiplayer after being absent in Triple Deluxe and Robobot.
    • The addition of the far more difficult Heroes in Another Dimension mode on top of the addition of Soul Melter EX to The Ultimate Choice in the third wave update attracted praise, but the difficulty of the main story mode remains up for debate.
  • The game running at 30 FPS instead of 60 FPS. Defenders say that the lower frame rate allows for more Visual Effects of Awesome, while detractors argue that 30 FPS is less than ideal for side-scrolling and/or platform games.
  • Among more hardcore Kirby fans, this game is infamous for its English, French, Dutch, Italian, German and Spanish localizations, which mistranslate many of the smaller aspects in the Japanese, Chinese and Korean versions of the game and led to confusion and debate about certain elements of the lore. For example, one side of the fanbase widely speculates based on the English localization that Kirby is somehow related to Void; the other side of the fanbase points to the Japanese, Chinese and Korean versions indicating that this is not the case, as Void is influenced by the emotions of those who summon it, and it merely took the appearance of Kirby because of that. The vauge phrasing of the English, French, Dutch, Italian, German and Spanish localizations also caused conflict about whether Morpho Knight is a reincarnation of Galacta Knight or not, which wasn't cleared up until Kirby and the Forgotten Land.
• Catharsis Factor: If you ever had trouble with or were disturbed by Marx, then being able to play as him with all of his moves from his debut is really satisfying. The fact that he is a Game-Breaker doesn't hurt the catharsis, either. And you even get a "boss fight" with him in the credits of Heroes in Another Dimension. This extends to the other Promoted to Playable boss characters like Dark Meta Knight and Magolor.
• Common Knowledge:
  • Although fans often believe they are actual sisters, it's unknown whether the Three Mage-Sisters are related, though their Soul Melter EX descriptions heavily imply that they are not.
  • The Japanese, Chinese and Korean versions do not explicitly say that Susie pulled a Heel–Face Turn. They instead have Susie say "We provide harmony in families and happiness in life through the power of science... based upon this ideal, I'll exterminate you savages!", suggesting that she's still up to her old ways and just putting a friendly face on it.
• Contested Sequel: After Return to Dream Land, Triple Deluxe, and Planet Robobot, each considered better than the last, critics gave this game mixed reviews for not offering any significant overhauls to the core gameplay, not having the creative level design sported by the aforementioned games, and for being overwhelmingly multiplayer-oriented to the point of making single-player too easy even by series standards. And while fans have been generally more receptive to the game than critics, it is still often debated whether Star Allies stacks up to the aforementioned games.
• Crosses the Line Twice:
  • Hyness sucking the life out of Francisca, Flamberge, and Zan Partizanne to replenish his own? Disgustingly callous. Subsequently using their inanimate husks as makeshift clubs to clobber you with? Hilariously callous.
  • Taken even further with Super Smash Bros. Ultimate, as the Mage Sisters show up as a spirit battle in the story mode, and their spirit attribute gives them "Battering Items +".
• Difficulty Spike:
  • "Heroes in Another Dimension" completely turns around the Sequel Difficulty Drop of the main game. The stages are more dangerous and have less healing items, the puzzles are trickier, your ability and ally selections are limited, and the bosses crank up their attack density to the maximum. It's also worth knowing that Corrupt Hyness's fight comes first, followed by FIGHTING ALL THREE MAGE-SISTERS AT ONCE. If you don't have a Game-Breaker with you, you're good as dead.
  • Thought Soul Melter was a bitch? Soul Melter EX introduces not only all the bosses of "Another Dimension", but also Morpho Knight EX, then Void Termina, True Destroyer of Worlds, and then Void. Your reflexes, health, controller, and sanity wish you the best of luck, especially when Void Termina starts throwing multiple laser-spamming Master Crowns around, as well as when Void pulls even more attacks from previous final bosses.
• Enjoy the Story, Skip the Game: In a bizarre twist for a Kirby game, the game itself (prior to updates) was considered fairly lackluster by Kirby standards; the game came hot off the heels of Planet Robobot, considered one of the best games in the entire franchise, and as a result many wound up calling Star Allies too easy by comparison, being extremely unbalanced in the player's favor, and being too simple. However, in terms of plot, Star Allies is considered a Wham Episode for the series' surprisingly dark lore and a culmination of everything the series has led up to thus far, with the last leg of the game simultaneously introducing one of the darker plots in the series and a Final Boss thought to be one of the most important characters in the entire franchise due to potentially revealing the origin of Kirby and implying a connection to Dark Matter, the villain of the Dream Land saga. The abundance of Epileptic Trees has never been higher for a single Kirby game.
• Ensemble Dark Horse: Plugg, despite being unremembered beforehand, has been getting lots more fanart◊ and praise ever since his comeback.
• Epileptic Trees:
  • The Final Boss, Void Termina, is quickly becoming famous among the Kirby fandom for opening an entire can of worms regarding the backstory of the entire Kirby series of games as we know it. Everything, between Hyness's insane ranting to its various attacks and forms, seem to link it to many, many past Kirby endeavors, and as a result, Wild Mass Guessing has started to erupt at a rapid pace.
  • One of the biggest growing questions surrounding the boss revolves around the fact that the game strongly implies that Void Termina and Kirby himself are closely linked in some way, almost to the point of literally shoving it in your face. Not only do the two share identical sound effects and voice clips, the true form of the boss even takes on an appearance identical to the latter, and the True Final Boss's theme is a Dark Reprise of Green Greens, a song which is very heavily associated with Kirby. This has caused even more speculation to rise, since the same boss is also theorized to be related to Dark Matter, which would cause a hell of a chain reaction concerning Kirby's true nature.
  • The final update has taken the above to its zenith, as the True True Final Boss of Soul Melter EX, Void, appears. Void Soul was described as being on the cusp of being reborn someday as something new, Void is on the threshold of that, and the descriptions head in a very particular direction, both enlarging and bolding that he might become an "ally of the stars", suggesting he'd dream of "gentle breezes, naptimes and tasty treats", all with the new epithet of "Astral Birth". As if all this wasn't enough atop everything until now, to top it all off, as the final blow is struck — he smiles. And it's not the warped, wide laughing of before, it's the exact same happy face that is Kirby's most commonly seen expression, as he bursts in dazzling light, colorful stars erupting off his form. Void Termina is taking a new life, and somehow, someway, it appears that form is Kirby himself.
    • It's also mentioned in the Japanese, Chinese and Korean versions' description for Void Termina, True Destroyer of Worlds' 2nd phase that he is the origin of "Matters of Dream, Dark, Soul, and Heart," which only creates even more possibilities regarding his true nature.
    • And then there's how Void's main palette is white with red eyes, confirming that this thing is somehow tied to none other than Zero.
  • The bonus boss, Morpho Knight, is no slouch in this department, either. Galacta Knight was already fairly enigmatic on his own, so when an encounter with an apparently-innocuous butterfly somehow creates an even more fearsome warrior in a flash of light, it's no wonder the fans have been losing their minds. Oh, and said butterfly bears a striking resemblance to the one seen in the opening cutscenes for many recent Kirby games, raising even further questions.
• Evil Is Cool: Hyness himself is beloved due to being a brilliant balance between a remarkably goofy, crazy antagonist and a violently insane, incredibly dangerous antagonist. His boss battle is also fondly remembered, showing him sucking the energy from his Mages and tossing them around as weapons, his own variation of the Friend Circle, and its overall higher difficulty than most bosses; especially with said Friend Circle flying about in unpredictable directions.
• Fandom-Specific Plot:
  • One that is becoming increasingly common is the idea that the reborn Void Termina is another iteration of Kirby, generally the original design from Kirby's Dream Land.
  • Despite the fact that they are Token Evil Teammates in-game, many fans like to go with the idea that Marx, Dark Meta Knight, and Susie have all made a full Heel–Face Turn.
• Fanfic Fuel: Who are the other Four Heroes of Yore? It's all but stated that one of them was Galacta Knight, but the other 3 have zero hints towards their identity. Which has caused fans to come up with all sorts of ideas for new characters or theorizing that they are previously established characters. The Fairy Queen from Kirby 64: The Crystal Shards and Landia from Kirby's Return to Dream Land are popular candidates.
• Fan Nickname:
  • Zan Partizanne has earned the nickname "Thunder Thot" thanks to her implied feelings toward the cult's leader, Hyness. In Japanese, she's instead called "Parmesan Cheese", a play on her name.
  • Some fans refer to Morpho Knight as "Beta Knight" due to being mistaken to be a scrapped design for Meta Knight. In actuality, it was a new character that was intended to appear in the cancelled Kirby GameCube game.
  • Before release, Hyness was often called "George" due to lack of information.
  • The 3 mages are called "saury fish can" in Japanese, due to how it and "Three Mage-Sisters" can be pronounced the same way ("Sanmakan").
  • The unlockable 1992 alt costume for Kirby from the Wave 3 update is commonly referred to as either "Classic Kirby" (in much the same way as Classic Sonic) or "Kirb" (after a meme involving an old derpy-looking Kirby plush).
  • Multiple people have called Void a "0⁰" due to the implications surrounding his design.
• Fanon: While not confirmed, many fans interpret Classic Kirby as being a reincarnated and redeemed Void. It helps that you unlock him after beating the Ultimate Choice's Soul Melter EX mode, as well as the many hints in both the pause descriptions and the fight proper that Void is related to Kirby.
• Fan-Preferred Cut Content:
  • One of the unused colour schemes for Parallel Meta Knight was white with blue eyes; this colour scheme proved to be decently popular with fans, to the point of having fan art and a Return to Dream Land mod dedicated to it. The icy colour scheme being more fitting for his Boss Subtitles of "Otherworldly Frost Blade" probably has something to do with it.
  • At one point during Star Allies development, Hyness was planned to be a Dream Friend, but was cut at some point before the waves finished, with the Three Mage Sisters being the only reps to come directly from Star Allies. Many fans lament his removal due to how cool his moveset could have been as well as the possibility of teaming him up with the Mage Sisters. Other cut Dream Friends such as Drawcia, Elline, Shadow Kirby, and Galacta Knight also has many fans lament their removal from the game, wishing they could have created team ups like pairing Drawcia, Elline, and Adeleine together or letting Galacta Knight take revenge on Morpho Knight.
• Game-Breaker: Has its own page.
• Good Bad Bugs: There was a glitch where you could use Kirby in Guest Star. Kirby wasn't able to use Copy Pedestals (or take a floating ability hat) to gain powers, though he could still inhale and throw Friend Hearts. The Wave 2 update ended the glitch by changing how Guest Star save files work (people who try to carry over a Guest Star Kirby file to the update will find that it gets auto-deleted).
• Growing the Beard: The general fan consensus is that Star Allies was underwhelming at launch, but gradually improved across its updates, which added new playable characters, new areas in Guest Star mode for said characters, and quality-of-life improvements such as more secret areas and some Easter Eggs. It hit its apex with the final update, which added substantial extra content via the Heroes in Another Dimension mode and overall brought in extra challenge to compensate for the low difficulty of the main game. It's still a divisive game, but it gets warmer reception in its "finished" form.
• Heartwarming in Hindsight: Magolor's moveset includes him pulling out his own variation of the Ultra Sword. While this was initially nothing more than a nod towards the Super Abilities from Kirby's Return to Dream Land, the remake Kirby's Return to Dream Land Deluxe reveals that the sword played a crucial role in Magolor's Character Development, specifically when he uses it to destroy the Master Crown at the end of Magolor Epilogue to cement his redemption.
• Ho Yay:
  • This bit of official art◊ has Poppy Bros. Jr. looking at Kirby with hearts for eyes and rubbing up against Kirby's cheek. The tutorial for the game's Friend Heart power has Poppy Bros. Jr. as the test subject, with the same result.
  • The animated intro to the game does this to Burning Leo as well. A few other bosses upon having thrown friend hearts at them (like Pon & Con) also do this.
  • The "mouth-to-mouth" food transfer is back, and thus you'll see your (mostly male) player characters kissing each other to regain health from food stuffs.
• I Knew It!:
  • Before she was officially revealed as a Dream Friend, folks figured Artist Kirby was a sign Adeleine was making a return.
  • In a similar vein, many people were able to tell that Magolor, Taranza, and Susie were going to be Dream Friends and were going to share a wave together.
  • People had already figured out that an incarnation of Zero was going to make a comeback in this game, namely because the game fell upon both the series' 25th anniversary and Kirby's Dream Land 3's 20th.
  • Even before they were revealed to be Dream Friends, many fans called the Three Mage Sisters making a Heel–Face Turn at some point in the future.
• It's Easy, So It Sucks!: While the series as a whole has endured this criticism for most of its run, Star Allies in particular gets flack for being incredibly easy even by the standards of the whole franchise.
  • This is a common criticism for the Ultimate Choice Soul Melter difficulty mode, the game's equivalent of the True Arena (where the true challenge shows up for the otherwise easy Kirby games). The premise is supposed to be that you get one life, a shorter health meter, and a limited number of recovery items to complete a gauntlet of all the boss fights in the game, but the addition of partners significantly tilts the balance in favor of the player. Adding another human player undermines the challenge significantly, as it removes the hard restriction on dying: if one of the other players can reach the leader within a few seconds, they can be revived with half health.
  • Soul Melter EX gives those who thought Soul Melter was easy a much bigger challenge, fixing this. Even though you get a full health bar and plenty more healing items than what you got in Soul Melter, you get to face down the much-harder bosses of Another Dimension, much harder miniboss rounds, Morpho Knight EX, and the Soul Melter EX-unique "True Destroyer of Worlds" Void Termina, and the true-true final boss, Void.
• It's the Same, Now It Sucks!: One of the main criticisms of the game among both critics and fans. Star Allies gets flak for largely playing the same as its predecessors, and the game's distinguishing features such as the Friend system, Ability Mixing, and Dream Friends are often dismissed as minor gimmicks that don't alleviate this problem.
  • The game's awesome art direction gets mostly undermined by some very lackluster level trope choices, as the game spends most of its time retreading old ground on its environments rather than introducing more experimental locales compared to Triple Deluxe's fairy tale or Planet Robobot's sci-fi theming. This game's vanilla level tropes being sandwiched between Planet Robobot and Forgotten Land doesn't do it many favors.
  • Far-Flung Starlight Heroes has been criticized for being too derivative of Super Star's Milky Way Wishes, as the game's sudden call-back to that mode leaves the villain's final fortress very underutilized compared to the very praised climax worlds of both Triple Deluxe and Planet Robobot.
  • This game's roster of bosses has been criticized for mostly sticking in reusing old characters instead of creating new designs, compared to Planet Robobot's variants which modified the reused bosses in a more significant manner. While King Dedede and Pon & Con are viewed more favorably, the fights with Whispy Woods, Meta Knight, and Kracko stick out for making their boss battles not change their characters aesthetically, and generally retreading the same ground older games had done.
• Just Here for Godzilla: There are many mixed opinions about the game's overall quality. However, the majority can agree that the Dream Friends are awesome, given that by the end of the game's DLC support they include 18 characters from across the entire mainline series, many of them returning after a long period of absence. And they're all Promoted to Playable.
• Les Yay: When Flamberge is first fought, she's angry at Kirby over the fight with Francisca. During her angry rant, she refers to her as "sweet Francisca" and says that "if you've harmed a single blue hair on her perfect head..." This seems less like a Mage-Sister concerned about her fellow Mage-Sister and more like that Flamberge is in love with Francisca.
• Low-Tier Letdown:
  • Artist, while popular in concept, isn't a very strong ability. Its main drawback, aside from not having enough moves in comparison to other abilities (barring what Painter can summon), is that its strongest attacks have long animations before they deal damage, which is a problem when setting them up for bosses (one of those attacks, Sculpture, can also produce a useless pot instead of a real sculpture). Its only options outside of the charged moves are short-ranged brushstrokes. The only major boon it has is being able to heal with Still Life, but even then it's outclassed by most other abilities in Guest Star ???? and Ultimate Choice. Adeleine and Ribbon are distinctly an upgraded version of Artist (Adeleine's painting attacks come out much faster and have more versatility than Artist's, and she has other moves to fall back on), so there's little reason to choose Artist over her.
  • Cleaning has great utility in its moveset by being able to apply both wind and water effects, but it's another fairly slow ability, without the attack strength or variety to make it stand out for bosses or enemy gauntlets. Dealing good damage with it requires a lot of Friend Super-Vac spamming, which is nearly off-limits if you're going solo in The Ultimate Choice.
• Memetic Mutation:
  • The buff possessed King Dedede is really making the rounds on the internet since he was shown. He has been frequently compared with JoJo's Bizarre Adventure. Because he still has the same stubby feet, jokes about him "skipping leg day" (much like the Sonic Boom version of Knuckles) have also popped up.
    • Plus, Club Nintendo released a set of 6 Valentines cards themed after Kirby Star Allies, one of them being buff King Dedede with text saying "You swole my heart" above him.
  • "With this I'm the most terrible, most powerful villain the world's ever seen." ^{In the dub...}"You puny peewees better be scared, 'cause I'm the baddest dude on the whole planet."
  • Plugg, a formerly forgotten enemy, replaced Plasma Wisp somehow^note presumably because of his floating, but then again NESP and Vividria float; Sparky would be lost in it due to his design. Plugg has been getting tons of memes based off him. "Don't fugg with the Plugg" "Oh fugg thank you Plugg". Including some humorous art!◊
  • Much of Hyness's Motor Mouth rant has been subject to this, but "HAPPY BIRTHDAY, DARK LORD! HAPPY BIRTHDAY!" is a particular fan-favorite.
    • In Japanese, Hyness likes chili shrimp.^note His Angrish in Japanese goes like "VUNGYAMAEVITIRIGOPPOGOPOOOO—!!"; the bolded sounds similar to "ebichili" (エビチリ), i.e shrimp cooked with chili paste. Thus he's commonly depicted with chili shrimp as his Trademark Favorite Food.
    • The Japanese internet likes slapping his face onto random things.
  • The butterfly that casts judgment on Galacta Knight to become Morpho Knight is starting to get portrayed as a Memetic Badass, given that it apparently obliterated one of the series' strongest characters with ease. This gets amplified by the fact that HAL seemingly has been building up to this encounter for over a decade (or even longer retroactively considering the very first game opens with Kirby being attacked by butterflies in a cutscene), as fans point out that he was there all along.
    • Crossing over from The Simpsons: "Nobody suspects the butterfly!"
  • A minor meme about Spider Kirby is that people say that he can "do whatever a spider can".
  • The many faces that Void Termina's core makes throughout its fight have become memetic among the fanbase.
    • First you draw a circle, then you dot the eyes, add a great big smile, and presto! It's...^note After seeing Void Go Out with a Smile, fans started joking about Kirby's Adventure opening with Kirby being replaced with Void. The quote itself is often finished with an image of Void, or phrases like "V O I D", "...It's horrifying", or other stuff.
    • Kirb^note Defeating Void unlocks a Classic Kirby skin, which is hilariously derpy. Fans started nicknaming him like this and, given how unlocking this skin requires defeating Void, many of them think that the skin is Void. It should be noted that the nickname originally stemmed from an equally derpy Kirby plush.
  • In particular, the game seems to have acknowledged the ongoing meme of calling Magolor an egg; when cooked by the Cook ability, fried eggs appear, and Zan Partizanne also refers to him as "Deceitful Egg" in associated Twitter posts.
  • "That says 'the bibble'." ^note A popular fan-made animation of the "bible" scene from Aqua Teen Hunger Force, featuring Kirby as Meatwad and Hyness as Master Shake.
• Moral Event Horizon: Hyness crosses this when he throws the unconscious bodies of the Three Mage-Sisters as a sacrifice to revive Void Termina— which, in turn, would allow him to destroy all life in the universe. That said, this was him acting on the absolute insanity that he developed over time, which Kirby (possibly) cures him of in Heroes in Another Dimension, giving him a shot at redemption.
• Narm:
  • Pon & Con (as well as Goldon and Silvox) use a now-stock Kirby monster sound previously used by Pyribbit from Kirby: Triple Deluxe. It's one thing hearing it from a giant lava frog, but when it comes from marshmallowy raccoons and foxes...
  • In addition, the Soul Melter fight against Goldon and Silvox uses a Dark Reprise of the Castle Lololo theme, previously used in more dramatic battles against giant foes like Dyna Blade, Wham Bam Rock, or Giant King Dedede in Kirby's Blowout Blast. It makes more sense when you realize that Pon and Con's boss battle is similar to Lololo and Lalala's, but it's still quite unfitting.
  • While the other descriptions for the Parallel bosses aren't bad, Parallel Kracko's describes him as "made of the fallen tears and the scattered mists of his enemies" and "reborn from pure hate." Rather than sounding threatening, it makes Parallel Kracko seem like a super-edgy, fanmade OC. This is due to a mistranslation of the descriptions. Parallel Twin Kracko's Japanese pause screen (and the translated Chinese and Korean versions) state that he was born of the tears and rebellious hearts of Kracko's fallen brothers while Parallel Big Kracko's description makes it clear he's Kracko in a new form.
• Nightmare Retardant:
  • For some people, Hyness' second form looks like a combination between Hypno, Squidward, and Mung Daal colored purple. To others, he resembles a smurf.
  • Not to mention that Void Termina's initial form looks remarkably like Ro-Man.
• Nintendo Hard: The True Arena might be gone from this game, but in its place is something just as brutal. Meet Soul Melter EX, the final difficulty added to The Ultimate Choice in the final update. You better hope you still have some health items left hanging before you inevitably have to face down the Astral Birth himself...
• Older Than They Think:
  • This game isn't the first time that some dark force possesses King Dedede and turns him into a far more buff version of himself. In Kirby: Right Back at Ya!, there was a demon frog that would turn anything it attaches to evil, and turned King Dedede very buff◊. From that matter, the same anime was also the first time that Cleaning and Cook Kirby were presented with an expanded moveset.
  • In addition, the very same face that Kirby had when the demonic frog possessed him is used for the Soul Melter difficulty in the Ultimate Choice.
• Play-Along Meme: Thanks to a Running Gag in some of the pause screen lore, many players find it difficult to remember the last Mage-Sister's name. What was it again? "Sans Par"...? No, it was way longer than that.
• Scrappy Mechanic:
  • If you're playing with AI partners, there's going to be at least one situation where they decide to not cooperate when you prompt them to use Friend Abilities.^note This is because the ally may interpret it as the player trying to use a Friend Ability on them. This problem gets worse if you're using an ability with a unique Up move like Friend Bounce, Still Life, or Chumbrella; your Friends will act accordingly to the move, but they likely won't activate their own Friend powers even if they can accomplish something with them.
  • If you throw a Friend Heart at an enemy or use a Dream Rod while you already have three allies, the game will ask you if you want to replace one or just abandon the new ally. It will not do this if an ally touches a Copy Pedestal or an ability hat from an enemy that you decide not to use, instead automatically turning into that type of ally. If the ally that got changed was integral to finding a secret hiding in that level, if it was a reformed miniboss, too bad — you're going to have to go back to get them again. Dream Friends used to be affected by this, but were made immune in the Wave 3 update... unless they're at the front of the Friend Star.
  • Any time you want to do another attempt on Soul Melter EX, the game requires the player to input a cheat code reminiscent of Kirby's Dream Land, that is a lot more awkward on the player's fingers to do on the Switch Controller. If you lose this mode constantly, this can be quite grating.
• Self-Imposed Challenge:
  • Playing The Ultimate Choice without friends, especially Soul Melter EX. While a non-existent decreased attack multiplier makes it so that bosses are still reasonably easy to take out, flying solo significantly tightens the room for error due to having no backup to revive you in case you bite the dust, bringing the difficulty closer to The True Arena in previous games.
  • With the knowledge that Void Termina and his other equivalent forms can be damaged by Kirby's Friend Hearts, it's possible to exclusively^note As in, no other attacks Kirby can utilize and no friends to help him. use this otherwise weak damage output to defeat them.
• Sequel Difficulty Drop: Star Allies has gained a questionable reputation for being easier than its immediate predecessors. Level design is more straightforward, bosses survive for less time due to their low health pools and multiple players, Point Stars are extremely plentiful and dispense extra lives by the dozens, and the friend system more or less breaks the game due to friends being able to revive you and being able to carry around extra Abilities to fights, such as elemental Abilities to power up your weapons (which can THEN exploit any elemental weaknesses that bosses may have, either stunning them, defeating them quicker, or both!) or Abilities that can spawn food items. HAL may have listened, by introducing not only the much more difficult "Heroes in Another Dimension", but also by adding the Soul Melter EX difficulty to The Ultimate Choice.
• Signature Line: "A dark liege was born from the Jamba Heart that King Dedede brought to Hyness!" ^ExplanationA direct quote from the English version of Parallel Dedede's pause description, infamous for its Dub-Induced Plot Hole in the English, French, Dutch, Italian, German and Spanish versions by saying that Dedede brought a Jamba Heart to Hyness instead of being possessed by it. Expect it to come up when talking about the terrible translations of Version 4.0.0.
• Surprise Difficulty: While the game itself is considered fairly easy by Kirby standards, Heroes in Another Dimension and Soul Melter EX took it to the other extreme and are among the most difficult modes ever introduced in a Kirby game.
• That One Attack:
  • Unhooded Hyness has a lot of annoying attacks, but his use of each Mage-Sister as a swinging weapon is especially tricky, since he gets very close to the player during it, he creates an elemental shockwave as a finisher, and said finisher leaves them stuck in the ground that acts as another obstacle. There's also his Mage-Sister-throwing attack, which is tough because his throws are typically quite accurate, and the Mage-Sisters he threw stays embedded in the ground with elemental rocks on both sides of her. This takes up a lot of precious ground space, and even though the elemental rocks are able to be nullified and destroyed, it usually doesn't happen due to their natural disappearance. After he Turns Red, he starts using a Friend Circle attack, where he and the Mage-Sisters spin across the corners of the screen, going forwards and backwards randomly and even launching over to opposite corners as well; and then goes to the center and sends the Mage-Sisters launching onto the floor. This does give an opportunity to attack Hyness, however, since he is dazed afterwards.
    • Don't get us started on Corrupt Hyness. The above attacks are now faster, much more damaging, and far harder to dodge.
  • Remember when Morpho Knight's BFS attack was easily exploitable? Well, tough luck because Morpho Knight EX's version of the attack charges up twice as fast, and deals immense damage, in addition to creating flaming vortexes that suck characters into their path. Not much of a problem for the player, but can potentially obliterate your allies, especially the slower ones.
  • Soul Melter-difficulty Void Termina has the shockwaves it produces in its ground phase and the Master Crown lasers in its flying phase. Hope you've mastered double-jumping and spin-dodging in the Star Allies Sparkler. It's even worse when fighting the True Destroyer of Worlds in Soul Melter EX, as some of the shockwaves are IN THE AIR (for both the first and third phases), and Void Termina loves spamming these attacks. The axe attack in its third phase is made similarly difficult to dodge, creating multiple shockwaves on the ground, air, and radiating out all around the point of impact. As for the Master Crown... Void Termina can summon multiple of them, culminating in a beam attack where you have to double-jump-dodge a stupidly large beam, and hope/pray your Sparkler can move fast enough to not get damaged by it.
  • Void Soul has a whole lot of them. It's easier to find attacks that aren't hard to deal with, such as the one where it makes mini-clones of itself.
    • Void is even worse than Void Soul. Pretty much all of its attacks qualify as this, though the standout has to be its opening attack: a Touhou-style Bullet Hell followed by three waves of Beam Spam.
  • At the start of their second phase, the three Mage-Sisters (in Heroes in Another Dimension) will use all their signature attacks one after another. For this combo attack, they're specifically not interruptible the way they normally are, so you can't cheese it out. You just have to find the tiny safe spots to stay in. Get hit by any of the attacks, and not only will you take massive damage, but you'll likely be pinballed into the next one for more damage, which, if you're in Soul Melter EX, can end many a run, or leave you with grievously low health for Morpho Knight EX. Hope you still have healing items.
• That One Boss:
  • The Three Mage-Sisters at the end of Heroes in Another Dimension come together for one last battle, and they are strong. Unlike the battles against each of them on their own (which were total cakewalks for experienced players), they’ll tag in and out to attack you in pairs, and while dodging their attacks separately isn’t an issue, dealing with both of them at once is a whole different story. What’s worse is that if you have multiple Dream Friends with you, finding Kirby in the midst of all that chaos is a trial in of itself, and once the Mage-Sisters use their beam attacks one after the other, it’s entirely possible for your Switch’s framerate to tank, making the battle even harder!
  • Morpho Knight EX was a nasty surprise to those who fought its original version. Now it is faster, stronger, and overall more aggressive than its regular counterpart. Its pause screen description states that this is it at full power, and they weren't kidding. Gone are its exploitability and penchant for standing around like an idiot, and in their place are sword and ghostly projectiles, a quick-charging giant sword attack, and sheer bloodlust. The fact that the aforementioned Three Mage-Sisters come before it in Soul Melter EX is even worse.
  • Void Termina, True Destroyer of Worlds. From the ever-increasing shockwave spam (some in midair!), elemental sword swings, Beam Spam using multiple Master Crowns, and the entire final phase with Void. Worse, it comes right at the end of Soul Melter EX, after you've had to deal with the Mage-Sisters and Morpho Knight EX.
• That One Level:
  • While not a particularly difficult stage, Planet Towara has become pretty infamous for its moving wall sections, which will always end up crushing at least one of your allies.
  • The same applies for The Divine Terminus, in which moving blocks are right there when you start the stage and your allies can easily get crushed if you don't move quickly enough.
    • Basically, any stage where you can be crushed counts, as your AI partners typically can't find their way around these threats and will often run into or stand near these areas without a second thought. Naturally, the Heroes in Another Dimension stages are built around moving blocks that can crush your allies with ease.
  • The Friend Circle segment in Dimension 3 is one of the most difficult sections in the entire Kirby series. You have to roll up a series of ramps and make long jumps between all of them. The hard part is that your momentum slows down as you roll up a ramp, making the jumps incredibly difficult to pull off, especially in rapid succession.
• That One Sidequest: Heroes in Another Dimension feature various hearts that are either very hard to get or require precise timing. Additionally, the game is rather unforgiving with these hearts. Bandana Waddle Dee's cannon area with the Waddle Dee balls, Rick & Kine & Coo's key segment, and Daroach's dynamite segment come to mind. Messing these up force you to miss out on hearts, making you either lose a life if you want to try again, or just proceeding forward. In regards to the Waddle Dee segment, messing that up (and you will) means you have to restart the entire stage again, as the cannon that leads to it ACTUALLY CLOSES OFF afterwards (thankfully this is an early segment). Just make sure you have at least 100 Hearts at the end if you want to unlock the Three Mage-Sisters.
• They Wasted a Perfectly Good Character:
  • Grand Mam's exclusion from The Ultimate Choice was disappointing to some, since she was a surprisingly fun Puzzle Boss. This may have been done to prevent The Ultimate Choice from becoming Character Select Forcing Unwinnable if the player isn't playing as Kirby or doesn't have a Friend with the Sword, Cutter, or Fire abilities. A third camp cites frustration that her character design ended up being used only on a Puzzle Boss instead of a main boss, as other bosses that made it to Tge Ultimate Choice got much fewer design tweaks compared to Iron Mam's new design for this game.
  • Given his interesting contributions to the lore and entertaining boss fight, it's a bit disappointing that Hyness follows the same trend as Queen Sectonia and President Haltmann by not appearing until the final stage of the game. It stands out more with him than with other Big Bads because he's explicitly shown in the game's intro, while Sectonia and Haltmann (moreso the former) were meant to be surprises. Heroes in Another Dimension gives his story proper closure, but he's still not seen until the end of it.
  • Many fans were a little disappointed (but not surprised) that the Sleep ability went back to being useless after finally receiving a proper moveset for the first time in Kirby Battle Royale, not even using its healing function from Kirby: Squeak Squad.
  • Some were disappointed that other Dream Friends didn't get a boss encounter like King Dedede, Meta Knight, and the Three Mage-Sisters do. It should be noted that almost all of them were fought as bosses or minibosses at one point in the past, with the exception of the Animal Friends, Gooey, and Ribbon. At least Marx gets to be fought as a boss in the Happiest Curtain Call.
  • While many people were glad to see the return of Ribbon, Kirby's Implied Love Interest, some were disappointed that she was not her own entity, but instead a part of Adeleine. This is mostly because of how many people were looking forward to her and Kirby fighting evil as a Battle Couple. In fact, Ribbon doesn't add a lot to Adeleine's playing mechanics — just her flying support, a combined spin attack, and lending her Crystal Wand to Adeleine to shoot shards. Other than that, Adeleine herself does most of the work.
• Underused Game Mechanic: While Friend Abilities are always helpful in combat, it's mostly adding elements to weapons that gets used for puzzles. Other combination moves (namely, Thundersplash, Zap Splasher, Rising Sizzler, and Rock Painter) aren't needed for puzzling, so it's easy to forget that they exist. Even among elemental weapons, there aren't any puzzles that require Bomb (beyond exactly one time with Zap Bomb), which stands out as the only projectile-based one and thus could've had interesting application.
• Unexpected Character:
  • Out of every character in the Kirby mythos, who would have predicted Pon & Con of all people to come back? They even bring their kids into the fight.
  • Even though Cook is still a simple screen-clearing ability, it's the only one with a Friend — Chef Kawasaki can use his ladle and dishes to help Kirby. Unfortunately, Kirby himself can still only use the main one-use-only move while Chef Kawasaki has a wider variety of moves and a Cooldown when he uses the screen-clear move.
  • A lot of the Copy Abilities got Helpers who either already have a connection with the ability and/or are characters people already recognize. On the other hand, Spider (a newly introduced ability) gets Como, a common enemy debuting in Kirby's Dream Land 3 who didn't have any ability associated to him prior to this game, and Plasma gets Plugg, an enemy who only appeared in one game that was released 18 years ago and didn't even have the Plasma ability in it (it has Spark instead). To really hammer how surprising Plugg's inclusion is, it wasn't even a common enemy in its home game to begin with. Its pause menu description lampshades this:
    "I'm Plugg! What? Never heard of me?"
  • The Cleaning ability was a surprise return enough, but the formerly forgotten ability brings back the Dream Land 3 exclusive animal friends: Nago, Pitch, and ChuChu! No one expected that.
  • As per usual, some of the Stone transformations in this game feature cameos from other Kirby games, and there are a couple that are interesting. For starters, there's one featuring Susie & Ribbon, both of which are one-shot characters, though they are fan-favorites, so their inclusions do make some sense. Then there's one with Meta Knight & Captain Vul, the latter of which is also a one-shot character, but he does have a connection to Meta Knight, so he's also not too out of place. The real surprise here is one that features Gryll, the main antagonist and Final Boss of the SNES version of Kirby's Star Stacker (which was unreleased outside of Japan), and BROBO, a boss character from Kirby's Block Ball who hasn't made a single appearance since.
  • A post-release update adds more playable characters, including Gooey, Rick, Coo, and Kine, but that's not nearly as unexpected as a playable Marx, who has previously only been used as a boss character. Gooey, in particular, has been missing for decades (Rick, Kine, and Coo have their fair share of cameos before this game and Marx was a pinball boss in Kirby Mass Attack), and is finally back!
  • The final boss of Guest Star ???? mode being a Bait-and-Switch Boss from the oft-occurring Galacta Knight to a scrapped knight◊ made for the cancelled Kirby GCN game, of all things — seemingly born from the same butterfly that first appeared in Return to Dream Land...
  • Of all the Dream Friends in the world, Dark Meta Knight was the last thing people were expecting, even for those who have seen the datamine.
    • Speaking of the datamine, while it did spoil that fan-favorite Adeleine would be playable, what it didn't spoil was that Ribbon would be accompanying her, making them a 2-in-1 Dream Friend similar to Rick & Kine & Coo.
  • Some characters manage to include unexpected characters within their attacks. Adeleine's moveset allows her to summon painted versions of obscure enemies from several earlier games, including Waiu (a ninja midboss from Dream Land 2), Batamon (an odd Kirby imitator from Dream Land 3), Ghost Knight, and I³ (two enemies from Kirby 64). In the same vein, Daroach can get help from the rest of the Squeaks, including Spinni, Storo, Doc, and Squeaker minions.
    • The one painting Adeleine's trailer didn't show, however, is Octacon, the first Monster of the Week from Kirby: Right Back at Ya!. No one could have predicted an anime reference would be in her skill set.
• Unfortunate Character Design: Lord Hyness, the Big Bad, dresses in a white robe with a pointed hood that covers his face, and is a violently deranged priest. While likely meant to resemble a stylized monk's habit, for American viewers in particular, the choice in costume makes him look like a Klansman… which becomes quite awkward when he gets redeemed at the end of "Heroes in Another Dimension" and doesn't ditch the hood.
• Unintentionally Unsympathetic: Hyness is initially presented as a purely despicable, Dark Matter-worshipping lunatic who uses his loyal followers like weapons and even human sacrifices in pursuit of a revenge that would destroy the entire universe. Then the "Heroes in Another Dimension" update came along, revealing (somewhat hastily, even for series standards) that Hyness is actually a tragic Reluctant Psycho, and Kirby redeems him simply by throwing a Friend Heart at him, when previous tragic villains like Queen Sectonia and President Haltmann weren't forgiven for their evil actions and got killed off permanently. This has left a somewhat sour taste in some fans' mouths, who would have preferred it if he were never presented as sympathetic.
• Visual Effects of Awesome: While the majority of the game has to run at 30 FPS to handle its visuals (and occasionally suffers from slowdown as a result), the end result is well worth it; Star Allies is the most visually impressive Kirby game to date, using a complex system of dynamic lighting and shadows. Special mention goes to Whispy Woods raining down hundreds of apples, and Kracko being made of metaballs, giving it an amorphous appearance similar to actual clouds!
• Win Back the Crowd: The game's final update brought in the Heroes in Another Dimension mode and the Soul Melter EX difficulty in The Ultimate Choice, providing more challenge than the main game and recapturing the interest of players who didn't like how easy Star Allies was at launch.

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