Round Knights Peeves
And now, a short pause to air some grievances. Okay, okay. It's far from short. In fact, it was such a bloated mass that I didn't even want to post it on this page. It was far too distracting and, at times, bitter to include previously. So, here is a complete analysis of the contest with no quarter or feelings spared.
The most noteworthy oddity in the contest was the waves of problems. It'd fit one classification and then abruptly stop. They could be nicely, temporally packed into segments. As one head fell off, another head sprung up in its place. It was like some sort of evil Hydra. 'Cuz, you know, the original multi-snake was totally a good guy.
Not a Mini-Boss
Despite having it listed on all postings that I was not seeking a mini-boss, many continued to show up until the last legs of the contest. Taking tons of damage, being unable to be inhaled (fine for Masher and crew, but they weren't technically Meta Knights), and being way over the top in action, even by Mini-boss standards, were all perpatrated. Some actually went as far to say, "He's more like a mini-boss than a regular enemy." No kidding, directly said those words. Of course, since this was a confession to rule violation, such and entry was never posted. You're welcome.
What finally and strangely nailed that coffin shut was saying not to make the Knights like a mini-boss in Ask the Kirby Gurus. It was listed in the guidelines, it appeared in any of my evaluations of a mini-boss-like submission on the rating page, and it was sitting at the top of the received page. But, putting an outside reference to it no where near the entire contest is how it got noticed. Huh.
Pay Attention to Me
I linked to all of the Meta Knights' individual and concise Kirbypedia entries. Javelin Knight spins around while bouncing around or throws a flaming spear. All of them are like that. They're set, they're constant, they work when in a batch. That's what they were suppose to be, a cog in a militia machine. Together, they made up a mini-boss battle. Rather, entries seemed to want to be the big dog in the yard that didn't play well with others.
It's like a firework display. A series of rockets are blasted off in succession and bang out loud in the sky. They are all about the same and work in harmony to light up the night. If one were, say, to be a super fancy, thrice exploding, specially shaped burst pattern, and extra loud, it'd drown out all of the others. It would pretty much be the show. That's not good. Then there's no point to even have those other sticks even there. That's pretty much how the Knights went. Some were just too much and brought down the army attack formation by taking all the focus on their own shoulders.
En Guard
Also, how hard was it to think up an actual weapon? A lot towards the end (many which were never seen) started getting to "a knight based off an ability" or some type of energy or force. These weren't "knights". They were just enemies that used that power. Some compared their behavior to existing enemies that offered that ability. "Plug Knight acts like Plugg." That's not even a fan creation. It's a fan theft. I guess bad precedent was set by Jet. It might as well have been Capsule J.
I said it at the start: there's a lot more weapons than just swords and axes. I would say it seemed like people didn't want to step on another entries toes by doing a weapon they did, but the list started with "torch" and "jet", two far from ordinary or first-choice armaments. Back to weapon repeats, the only time they seemed to happen was about when they came at the same time. Which, really, that makes it an even more bizarre turn of events.
They Might Be Giants
Why were so many entries bigger than Kirby? Not just a little bigger but two, three fold? What knight looks like that? "Round" was in the title, not "bowling pin". Blade and Sword Knight were used as auxillary reference material, and instead people seemed to pick those less-than-prime examples' animated series counterparts to base an entry's appearance on. Totally missed the point.
The Meta Knights don't even include those two, and they never were in the animated series. Where this case of gigantism came from, I haven't a clue. I did say that they came in a variety of shapes, but that was since I feared every one would be a ball. I meant more like egg, peg, bean, and other mostly round forms. Instead, it looked like bowling pin/generic animated series shape dominated. The knights stretch out wide before they get tall.
Affirmative Action
I thought at least one person would pull out a robot, something like Javelin Knight. Rather, the closest it got was something being described as "robotic". When that's armor, it doesn't mean much. From all the LED eyes to the empty helmets, entries seemed, if anything, more fleshy than the existing knights. I think Drill Knight made an effort to be mechanized, even having wheeled soles in his feet.
Who's "Red Knight"?
This one got to me just because of the ridiculousness that it surged. The contest's front page had a little gimmick to it. A new big bad was rounding up an army of his own soldiers to counter the Meta Knights. It was just a little, fun include to give it something. However, since it was on the contests front page, which no one ever went to, it was never really seen. People pretty much just hopped to the accepted entries page and then headed off to the guidelines and submission. The single mentioned stunt was entirely by-passed. It didn't matter, though.
There was only really one consideration I would have liked to have seen. The Meta Knights are all purple, so if a submission wasn't a violet vision, it would have been nice to coat them in crimson. I think before a certain point in time, one was stated as purple and one was said to be wearing red. Rather, they came out in all colors of the rainbow. Now, the first thing I'd consider for a Meta Knight would be a fitting uniform. They wouldn't line up and be purple, purple, purple, light blue, and purple. My initial examples completely skipped color. Their images were monochromatic. The Meta Knights themselves come in a variety of colors, although purple is the default or standard. None of that stops the jelly bean color scheme.
As time went on, the first batch of submissions were pushed forward in a giant mess of "Meta versus Red Knights". Even with this picture, no one really paid attention to just why they were called "Red Knights". However, sometime later, Dedede-Daimyo made a buried comment to teh effect of, "Hey, who is that knight guy on the main page?" After this, it was like the flood gates broke open. Suddenly, "Red Knight" started to appear in the Knight's description. Several started to be red, whether by coincidence or choice.
Whew. Alright, I feel better now.