Ask Guru Gobbo #62

0) The second I confirm naming, they'll be put to the website, trust me. I'm not going to horde this information.

1) The questions are answered by myself, Bimblesnaff. Squeaky Bogg is just the adorable mascot that sits to the side to spice things up. It's imaginary. Of course it doesn't have any knowledge on the situations referenced in the questions.

2) It depends on how inclusive you want your guide to be. If it is focused, you'd only want exclusively important characters, such as from the games and/or animated series. However, if more broad, you'd want all characters with association to Kirby, including the odd foreign comic, cameos, and Super Smash Bros. fighters.

3) Blopper is awesomeness in its purest form. It's entirely comprised of the element awesomonium.

4) Monsters are demon beasts. That unique terminology was only used in the original Japanese. America was too lazy and even had the King say "I need a monster to get that Kirby" in the opening theme song. It's a synonym, and I don't limit myself to just naming from one side of the Pacific. I dabble in both to keep things well mixed.

5) There's no saying that the Kirby of the Stars section will remain unfinished. Someone with an admiration for the show could come by and wrap that up. I won't be since... I don't know anything and wouldn't care to, but someone else could.

6) The Kirbypedia is not open to public membership, yet. Most of those mass information depositories are publically upkept. Kirbypedia basically has, oh, me. I can only update so much of the site as there are only so many hours in a day. Even then, there's only so many pages I can knowingly and accurately contribute to. Most of your favorites are, I'm guessing, new stuff. Dems I know nothing of. I'm trying to, tho', crawl up chronologically.

7) Buu-robot doesn't even have much references to what its name even is. I think artwork, official or fan, isn't even as wide spread as what it is called. That's pretty bad.

8) The Crystal Shards enemies are labeled as unmemerable since there were so many of them that did so little and never came back. They weren't even liked by HAL!

1) Thanks to the magic of horrible delay, the Bill has been vetoed, or something witty to that effect. **

*) I cried twin waterfalls when I learned that Cappy was just replaced with some other type of fungus. I can't really cast any evil eyes upon HAL, however, since the whole Revenge of the King held a darker theme, and cupcakes just don't fill out that motif too well. Or in any way well.

2) The helpers are both nods to the animated series and functional in purpose, which I kind of like. It would have been a little odd to deprive Meta Knight of a helper, and having the Meta Knights all custom coded just for that part would have been a little bit of a waste (although Trident Knight would have been awesome to summon). He uses Sword, effectively, so it made sense to have him call up Blade Knight. I don't really understand the appearance of Sword Knight, which to my understanding is only some of the time. I guess they just wanted it there to mix things up and, yes, reference the show.

The cloak wrapping, too, would just be a jab of the elbow to remind all of the cartoon, too. Kirby became a whole new sprite when he went in the cart, and I'm sure Meta Knight's more expanded body probably looked funny sitting in the mining box. Slimming him down by a body wrap seems like a decent enough way to get it done.

3) This apparently isn't the first time such went down. I touch the forums or the accounts there. Disk Master is the power that be in that field, and if something is wonky, I assume he's on the case. Of course, I can't remember if something a-sploded on the forums that day. Anyhoo, such delicate and intricate inner workings of the Rainbow Resort account system is far out of reach for a lowly staff member such as myself.

Hey, Gobbo, did'ja see the Fan Art Gallery is back up?

** This question has a follow up in Session #65.

While I can't say for certain, my gut tells me no. The game was not widely well received. It's reception was tepid at best. Seeing as it took so long for them to even get it out in the first place (I'm looking at you, Wii title!) mixed with the general public's view on the game, I'd say neither side was in strong liking to it. Kirby doesn't spawn off the many non-platformers like he use to. All these factors combine to make the possibility of another Air Ride unlikely. Of course, what Kirby hetero-game has ever had a direct sequel? Tilt 'n' Tumble 2 was canned and Kirakira Kizzu, basically Super Star Stacker, saw only limited release. They tend to stay one-shot fun-shots, like those of the Jell-o variety. All these games seem to have a formula: use once, enjoy, don't revisit, move on. That is not like the Jell-o. You can go back to those quite a few times in a night.

1) Yeah, that's strange. To find out if he was or wasn't in it, I went to the Kirbypedia and saw if he had separate Games and Anime pages, of which I did not notice the first time. Then, come the next, bam! No clue why. Anyhoo, it appears the page was improperly awarded. Mr. Frosty, as far as I can tell, is just one of the familiar faces shown in training in a quick shot at Nightmare Enterprises. He does nothing, has no name, and is quickly skipped over. At least, that's what a source says.

2) Heavy Lobster, I believe, was the final monster used by Nightmare. It came, shot lasers, was impervious to attack with its armor, and got frozen. I'm sure the episode was a little more interesting than that, so I'll mention that it shot lasers. Already covered? Well, shoot.

3) Poppy Bros., now, I know. His part in the show was brief at best. He appeared for a matter of seconds, being shown as, I believe, a demon beast in training, the same situation as Mr. Frosty, I guess, only his I knew of. I guess Broom Hatter and some other folks were there, too. He was wearing roller skates and fell down. Thus concluded his brief stint of face time. Yay! No chance to rob him of dignity.

4) Galacta Knight is the new, more angelic warrior you speak of. He's addressed by name in the game, so he's more obviously known than some other foes. The Sword and Blade Knights are the helpers called by Meta Knight in lue of him being able to turn copied powers into helpers. This is explained, albeit poorly, on the Super Star Ultra page. (Note: the explanation really just is, "He can call these guys to hit stuff, yo. It's wiggy-wack.")

But Kirby isn't alone in his species as is obvious in several aspects of the games, despite HAL trying to retcon things to suggest otherwise. Here's the old scene, with Cap'n, Dee, and good ol' Ax Knight. The most pressing of these proofs is Meta Knight himself. Next, there's Keeby, the yellow dyed Kirby, whether or not he is accepted as canon. But, to your viking, that is not a fellow puffball. Just from hearing the description of the helmet, I can tell you that is Ax Knight. He has a skull for a face but, back view, there's just round black. Unless they wanted to retcon this part, too, which I doubt.

0) First, I obviously know information presented in the session/question combo that you are referencing that refutes your accusations. I find it odd how much that seems to happen. You mention the Master/Galaxia sameness despite two facts: the sword is never called Master in the games and the weapon also not called by Galaxia. "Master" is just the title of the ability Kirby gets when he picks up Meta Knight's blade while Galaxia only appears in the animated series and a single special attack in Brawl. Even further on top of that, said Amazing Mirror fancy art sword isn't even Galaxia's design, as previously addressed, but a third shape.

Anyhoo, I noticed that graphical shift, too, and, really, I see it as just sloppy work. The sword shouldn't change in appearance by right. Changes between in-game cut scenes and walk around graphics are just lazy directing and coordination on the developer's part. It seems like the individual graphics crews weren't briefed equally on how to portray the sword's design accurately. "Okay, cut scene guys, make it the same width all the way up and fanged on the sides. Game graphic people, have it grow wider as it goes up and be straight and unbranched on the edges. Self, continue to stick sharp objects into your ear. You still seem to have some, although very little, brain power left."

While the resolution probably is an issue, as even I said, Sword Knight's blade, or maybe Blade Knight's sword, or possibly both, possesses a set of side spikes, just a single pair, near the top. So, doing such was well within the graphical capabilities. They seem to have some hang up about using the splintered edge in a sprite but do not share the view about making inconsistent graphics. My guess is that the sword looks terrible with that many branches in such a small sprite, although I think this is true even when drawn or highly rendered. And, personally, I think they all have their heads up their moving on, I find it odd that you say, "What do you know?" and credit me as correct in the same paragraph. Pick a side and stick with it, guy.

1) The "last challenge" always split in half. Frankly, I the aftermath of the original fraction is much more bewildering than the Super Man Red/Blue energy being aspects of what was newly introduced. Detective Comics references no one gets! I don't really know how much I should say to folks who don't want the spoiler since you guarded it, so I'll just go with something that may or may not taken as fact. It throws goats! Sure, I could be lying, but there's still the change that could be true!

2) Huzzah, I win! I know I called this. I don't know if it was just a cynical remark or is buried somewhere in the archives, but I know I joked about the ??? star having a big, neon sign pointing to it. Oh, that is just like them to pull that. In truth, since more people know about it now, they should hide and move the Copy star to make people have to really look for it, not make it more obvious. For shame.

But Kirby is real, little Rina. He's alive in all our hearts on every Christmas. At least, until I hunted him down with my twelve gauge and had him for breakfast. Mmm, inappropriately morbid.

Hah. I never thought of the Sonic comparison. Anyways, I do agree with you. Pokémon, like many battling games, suffers from the overpower complex. If you want to keep it marketable, you need to make expansions. The way to make people buy expansions is by making newer, better things to fight with. Also, you have to make objects in the game "just for me", ie: something that a consumer entering the franchise there can relate to. For example, recreating the weak bug monsters with every generation. They sure don't need to, but, yeah, they're gonna. Legendaries, I agree, got to be a little much. Now, I could understand making a new trio every time. That was cool. It was a little lame that the elements were repeated less Flying for two generations, but at least they were on par with one another. The next level of ubers was less appreciated. They jumped from Mewtwo to being two. That really sped things up. Oh, that's right, they went worst and made more levels of Legendaries that got padded out. Power is the magnet for players, so they pumped it out.

Luckily, however, I don't think Kirby will reach this point. For one thing, it's not a battle game. Whew. Secondly, Kirby isn't "yeah, cool!" like Sonic is, so he should steer clear of that whole mess, too. I dunno, tho'. If Meta Knight keeps growing in popularity, depending on how this whole new emergence of Galacta Knight pans out, Kirby could find himself sprouting golden locks and screaming a lot. I shudder to think...

This question has a follow up in Session 67.

... What?