Kirby: Canvas Curse – Final Play

Drawcia’s vision for the transformation of Dreamland into a world of two-dimensional masterpieces has been shattered, well sort of. Through my skill with paintbrush and the help of the little puffball, Drawcia and even her soul have been defeated; however I am happy that there are still some two-dimensional masterpieces left behind to have fun in.

The end of this game was brilliant. I’ve written about it before; however Nintendo has a keen ability to build a play experience where the gameplay mechanics are practiced and employed more and more as you go. The challenge increases, but so does your skill and ability. In the last battle against Drawcia, I was moving, blocking, tapping, spinning and doing everything that I had done during the course of the game all to defeat the final boss. I love gaming like that. Metroid Prime was another great example of how you can become immersed in the game through gradually mastering the new abilities of your avatar. Drawcia had numerous attacks and defenses that required me to think about how to best use Kirby and the magical paintbrush to take her out.

At a certain point in the Drawcia battle, I couldn’t help but smile when the background turned into an undulating swirl of color. It brought back a lot of memories. Two-dimensional gaming when done right can be so much fun and can deliver such interesting and immersive visuals. The choice to base the game around a painting theme opened a big creative door of possibilities and I enjoyed the visuals they created.

As mentioned in my last Play Rating, there is a lot left to explore and have fun with even though I have finished the main game. Often when I finish a game I follow with a “That was cool” and then power down. Once and while, I’ll finish a game and want to keep playing a bit. That’s exactly what happened with Kirby: Canvas Curse. As soon as the credits finished rolled, I went to the sub games to try and go for a couple new medals to unlock some new hidden feature at the “Medal Swap.”

I enjoyed my time with Kirby: Canvas Curse. It is a fun little game and one of the most polished titles I have played on the DS so far.