Ask Guru Gobbo #120

0) An imposter? Yeesh, couldn't you at least impersonate some cooler, like the Pope or Summer Glau? They're both on the same level in my book -- heavenly~!

1) I've played a good handful of them, for how many there are out there. KWRPG2, the KCCh demo, some unnamed Dream Land replica that was made in flash perfectly with no real direction to it (the best always are), some literal block ball game with none of the frills in Block Ball, a scroller shooter, Kirby's Dream World MMO, I think another Kirby's Dream World MMO, and then Goo X Moo. There's probably more, but anything skipped over was too horrible to be committed to memory, and some of those are pretty bad.

2) Ometon is blue since blue represents his solemn and weeping nature from never being able to be hugged.

3) Sprite acquisition is accomplished like any sort of graphical download, requiring a simple right click and the selection of "Save Image As..." That's some hardcore rocket science right there.

4) I don't even know who you're talking about, but I assume, since they are named "???" that they don't want their identity known. They can keep it a secret, really. They obviously made zero impact.

5) Why would you assume that I am my own favorite artist? That's an awful selfish assumption you hold of me. If I was anywhere decent at art, then I could understand it. Kirazy, Leirin, Dedede-Daimyo, Wondercrow, Gregeon, and anyone else who doesn't draw in Paint could all draw circles around me. Actually, anyone with a large enough sheet of paper and a pencil could do that... But, anyways, my favorite is Aru. Her style stands out while homaging the ol' Adventure style of looks. Plus, she is sometimes mischief.

6) Well... yeah. Why would you be allowed to vote on something twice? Your opinion on it should be solidified at the point of casting your ballot. This isn't some popularity contest like American Idol. Each vote is an individually held view on a submission. That's how most polls work. It notes that a cast came from your computer, so no more are allowed on that entry. Is this a groundbreaking concept? Do other things allow people to vote multiple times on something?

7) Profit is step number three. Get with it, A.R.M.I., or get out.

1) The truest and most frequently used name is Pep Brew, but, yes, it does have many names. That's the real one, however. A lot of the dud names come from strategy guides and GamePro, if trends have taught me anything, although, like you said, even the game's manuals can't keep things straight.

2) "Maxim" seems like it was meant to be an abbreviation of "Maximum", but they forgot that a "maxim" is something already, a short and meaning utterance like "Who watches the watchmen?" or "Do not drink drain cleaner".

1) I do not support ROMs, their distribution, use, or very existence.

2) I don't even know how anyone here would go about even trying to do that. The game never came out, and I don't think it ever had any releasable copies made let alone distributed for anyone to try to hack 'n' crack. But, ya know what? There's Kirby Air Ride for not N64, which is better than the 64 version ever could have hoped to be if not the exact same thing with better graphics. So, play that. It's equal to or greater than what was never made. It's not like we're talking about Kid Kirby, the old SNES game that never was and has no equivalents made after its cancellation. There's a very viable alternative to Air Ride -- Air Ride!

3) Dream Land 1, if anything, would roll out on the DSi, which has it's own Virtual Console-like library of games to its name a la the Wii. I'd make sense if these included the ol' Game Boy titles.

'Cuz it's a different... game. Does that really need explained?

Questioning why Magic changes between two titles is like asking why Fire and Burning were merged in Super Star, why inhaling changed to be no longer infinite in Amazing Mirror with various stages of strength, why Broom Hatter gives powers in Dream Land 3 but no where else, or even why Kirby couldn't copy abilities in Dream Land 1.

It all boils down to it's a game. You don't make games the same everytime, otherwise you wind up with some rehashed junk that isn't interesting to play. You make progression, change, and improvements to a system as time moves on. Favored elements are expanded upon while less desirable elements are atrophied. In doing so, the object is made better throughout its existence, which, in Kirby's case, is a very long one.

Additionally, in Squeak Squad, all abilities were special. There were no throwaway powers, no one-shots, and no wastes. Even Sleep of all things got the capability to be improved and give Kirby vitality back. UFO lost its "one stage only" handicap and became just a regular ol' power. Magic, as previously alluded to, was an aspect liked from Mirror, but they saw a greater potential in it than an over-glorified Crash. So, it was expanded upon. It could throw doves, cards, and a clown's head. It even still retained the exhaustive execution with a Copy Scroll upgrade so, in effect, wasn't change but just improved between the titles.

They are blue. It's hard to see given their puny size and punier width in most any display, but when his eyes are shown close up, they have a very narrow band of blue on them betwixt the white shine and the black void. It's not much of a color, but if one had to be assigned to them peepers, it would in fact be blue.

Ever since day one, actually months before, it was Round Knights of the Table. It's called a play on words, people. Why does it seem no one ever gets this right? Kirby characters are round, hence they are round knights. Funny joke. Everybody laughs. Curtains fall.

Anyhoo, as the image itself explains, "I can use the same image for both, why not?" The first Bomb Knight was said to wear the ever so descriptive "a helmet", throw bombs, and was armed with a rocket launcher on its back. The second submitted bomber had next to nothing told about it outside of camo, an army helmet ('cuz knights wore those all the time), and attacked with rockets and bombs. Well, with the exception of the cameo, the first Bomb Knight I drew had all those details. Additionally, I didn't feel like drawing out another poorly designed entry to make it seem better than it really was. Nope. Garbage in, garbage given back. If the submitter can't even bother to give a poor summary of its appearance with some basic detail, then I'm going to cut every corner possible in the requisite image.

You know two games that don't have Kirby in them? I can only assume you mean Kirby games that don't have Kirby in them as otherwise I can mention all but a dozen games to not feature the puff. And, even assuming so, it is an outright lie as every Kirby game has Kirby in it as the star. The only thing you could possibly have poorly been trying to get at would be the modes of play in Nightmare in Dream Land and Super Star Ultra that allow the player not to be Kirby for a fraction of the game. The game itself is still Kirby, Kirby, Kirby.

Anyhoo, I agree with you, despite your grammatical nightmare. It would be great to have a Kirby game that had more playable character options to it. The helpers give that chance to the second player, for the most part, and playing as Meta Knight is pretty much just permanent Sword ability. It would be neat to see some other characters get the limelight. Actually, I've bantered on such much in the past.

The Crystal Shards was suppose to have King Dedede, Adeleine, and Waddle Dee (or... Ribbon?) as playable in the actual game-game, not just mini-games, but scraped the concept. Dedede may still inhale and puff up, but what would Adeleine possibly do to attack? Well, outside of use her brush. A great concept? Yes. Would I love to see it? Definitely. Will it happen. Probably not.

Only Meta Knight, methinks, has the star power to possibly carry his own title, and we've already had a taste of that. All of the games have "Kirby" as the first word in the title. It'd be a little odd to have "Kirby: Not Kirby". It'd be like the Mega Man Zero games. Their naming always got to me.

The only chance, I'd say, of finding a Kirby game sans Kirby would be in a fan game, but most of those have "omg my fan character darksword!!!111337" rather than any real Kirby characters, which cheapens the value on multiple fronts.

Off hand, I have no idea. I've never heard Marx' new voice, since I know they re-voice-a-mafied all the pseudo-talking in Super Star to be less noise and more vocals, nor have I ever heard Invader Zim ever speak.

So, I 'Tubed them both. Just now. Gotta say, no similarities whatsoever. Marx has a distinct, bubbly pitch to his cackle while Zim is... wholly... different. Unless the invader's voice changed throughout that show (I only bothered with the first episode), then I see no grounds to think they are the same voice actor. Zim is voiced by Richard Steven Horvitz while Marx is talented as ... I don't know. I can know, however, that it isn't Dick. He's not shy about saying what work he has done, and lists all his involved video game projects, including Psychonauts and Destroy All Humans. Besides, I think that's a Japanese voice actor. For non-words, translation and dubbing isn't necessary.

Dang skippy you should get permission. If it were something slight like a simple picture or brief cameo, I could see just having such a homage be a surprise. However, when it comes down to actually including someone elses character in a game, that's some heavy stuff. Good on you seekin' out an answer first. Cookies for you.

Speaking of Squeaky Bogg/Gobbo in games (unless you meant Uncle Gobbo, which would be kinda weird), he's already sitting on a dusty shelf at that very site, soon to be re-vamped and re-dusted, in Dream Land Dash/Squeaky Bogg Jammer, not to mention saving some unspecified day in the near or distant future. Despite that, I get a little on-edge and finicky about him appearing in other people's works.

For one thing, since I'm under the assumption this is a Kirby fan game, I'd rather see someone like Broom Hatter, Blopper, or Bounder in a game before Bogg. B's are were it's at, it seems. The other and probably more to my concern factor would be the quality of the game. I'm not saying the quality has to be masterwork in gold but at least clay or plaster. No one wants a tribute sculpted out of mud and garbage. Basically, I'd have to see some fundamentals in the game before condoning such permissions.