Kirby: Canvas Curse
Encyclopedia
Kirby: Canvas Curse, known in Europe as Kirby: Power Paintbrush and in Japan as , is a 2005 platforming
video game developed by HAL Laboratory
and published by Nintendo
for the Nintendo DS
handheld video game console
. It was first released in Japan
on March 24, 2005, and was then later released in North America
on June 13, 2005, in Europe
on November 25, 2005, and in Australia
on April 6, 2006.
While Kirby: Canvas Curse is a platformer, it does not play like a traditional Kirby
video game, as it uses the stylus exclusively.
to help Kirby. The player and Kirby set off to find and destroy Drawcia to restore Dream Land to its normal state. Along the way, Drawcia creates replicas of Kirby's oldest foes to slow him down. These include Paint Roller, Kracko, Kracko Jr., and King Dedede.
Unlike most previous Kirby games, the player does not directly control Kirby with a directional pad
, face buttons, or shoulder buttons. Instead, the player only uses the stylus and touch screen to control Kirby. The player can draw rainbow lines, which Kirby will roll on, or poke Kirby, to make him do a little speed dash. These rainbow paths can form ramps or bridges for Kirby to cross, or walls to protect him from enemy projectiles. Drawing paths depletes the player's rainbow ink supplies, which recharges slowly while Kirby is in the air or on a path, but quickly when Kirby is on the ground. These paths eventually disappear, even faster if another path is painted. However, the player must either tap on Kirby to cause him to dash forward onto the path, or have the path created directly underneath him, causing him to automatically move forward on it.
The player can use the stylus to stun enemies by tapping on it. Afterwards, the player can either allow Kirby to roll into the enemy with his own momentum or by dashing to defeat the enemy. Defeating certain kinds of enemies by either dashing into them or touching them while stunned causes Kirby to gain one of several special abilities, which may be used at any time by tapping Kirby himself. This special ability replaces the dash. Once an ability is obtained, the only way Kirby can lose it is either by tapping a button in the bottom left corner or by being damaged. This is also the only way to get a different ability from the one Kirby already has.
Kirby: Canvas Curse spans eight worlds, with all but one having three levels. A variety of themes are used throughout the game. These themes range from a volcanic area to a frozen area. The objective of every level in the game is to reach a rainbow-colored doorway. As the player makes progress in the game, the environmental hazards become far more plentiful. In one level, the player must maneuver Kirby quickly enough to avoid getting defeated by an ever-rising body of lava. Occasionally, Kirby will come across a barrier, which prevents the paint lines from being created inside of them, forcing Kirby to do nothing but roll, dash, and use a power (if applicable). Portions of these levels can be played in Rainbow Run mode, where speed and amount of paint used are key factors in the player's success.
At the end of each world except for world seven, Kirby must face a boss. In worlds one through six, the first time he completes them, he must face one of each boss - Paint Roller, Kracko, or King Dedede (all of whom must be battled twice). With the exception of the final boss, all bosses are mini-game based. The boss of world eight is the main villain of Kirby: Canvas Curse, Drawcia Sorceress. Drawcia starts out in her standard form. Upon defeat, she will transform into a large ball of paint with five eyes and a mouth called Drawcia Soul.
Kirby: Canvas Curse features special collectibles called Medals, which can be used to unlock secret features in the game, such as characters, sound tests, and alternate paint colors. There are three ways for the player to find a Medal. The first way is to get one in one of the main levels. Each level has three Medals to be found, all of which can be seen on the map if Kirby is in the correct area and close enough. It is often required that the player do something particularly challenging to acquire one, and the difficulty of the challenge is respective to the difficulty of the level. Another way is through Rainbow Run mode. In it, Kirby must complete a portion of one of the main levels, with the objective being either getting through it as fast as possible, or getting through it while trying to use as little paint as possible. Reaching a certain peg awards Kirby with one or more Medals. The third way is by defeating the lesser bosses outside of the main game with an A Rank on the third level in each of the boss battles.
called it "genuinely excellent", saying that "it's a welcome reinvention of gaming's most overplayed genre
" and later concluded that Canvas Curse is "the DS's first great game". The stylus gameplay has also been noted, with IGN
hailing it as "incredibly innovative", GameSpy
saying it is "quite rewarding", and GameSpot
calling it "a satisfying part of the gameplay."
The game has drawn criticism from a few sources which claimed that although the game was innovative, it was not especially entertaining: Play Magazine
editor noted that "it's innovative... but for me, that's not enough."
Kirby: Canvas Curse was the third best-selling game in Japan during its week of release at 75,365 units sold. Famitsu
annual sales for the region show the game sold 276,418 copies by the end of 2005. According to NPD Group
, the game sold just under 80,000 copies in North America during the month of June 2005. The following month, it was the top-selling DS game in the region at 50,000 copies.
Platform game
A platform game is a video game characterized by requiring the player to jump to and from suspended platforms or over obstacles . It must be possible to control these jumps and to fall from platforms or miss jumps...
video game developed by HAL Laboratory
HAL Laboratory
is a Japanese video game developer that was founded on February 21, 1980. It is headquartered in Chiyoda, Tokyo. Its name comes from the HAL 9000 computer in the film 2001: A Space Odyssey. The company is most famous for its character Kirby, the protagonist of the eponymous game series, as well as...
and published by Nintendo
Nintendo
is a multinational corporation located in Kyoto, Japan. Founded on September 23, 1889 by Fusajiro Yamauchi, it produced handmade hanafuda cards. By 1963, the company had tried several small niche businesses, such as a cab company and a love hotel....
for the Nintendo DS
Nintendo DS
The is a portable game console produced by Nintendo, first released on November 21, 2004. A distinctive feature of the system is the presence of two separate LCD screens, the lower of which is a touchscreen, encompassed within a clamshell design, similar to the Game Boy Advance SP...
handheld video game console
Video game console
A video game console is an interactive entertainment computer or customized computer system that produces a video display signal which can be used with a display device to display a video game...
. It was first released in Japan
Japan
Japan is an island nation in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean, it lies to the east of the Sea of Japan, China, North Korea, South Korea and Russia, stretching from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea and Taiwan in the south...
on March 24, 2005, and was then later released in North America
North America
North America is a continent wholly within the Northern Hemisphere and almost wholly within the Western Hemisphere. It is also considered a northern subcontinent of the Americas...
on June 13, 2005, in Europe
Europe
Europe is, by convention, one of the world's seven continents. Comprising the westernmost peninsula of Eurasia, Europe is generally 'divided' from Asia to its east by the watershed divides of the Ural and Caucasus Mountains, the Ural River, the Caspian and Black Seas, and the waterways connecting...
on November 25, 2005, and in Australia
Australia
Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...
on April 6, 2006.
While Kirby: Canvas Curse is a platformer, it does not play like a traditional Kirby
Kirby (series)
The series is a fantasy video game series developed by HAL Laboratory and Nintendo, and produced by Nintendo. The gameplay of a majority of the games in the series consists mainly of action, platform and puzzle-solving elements...
video game, as it uses the stylus exclusively.
Story
One day, a strange portal appears in the sky, and out of it comes a witch named Drawcia. Drawcia casts a spell over Dream Land, turning it into a world of paint. Upon fleeing back into the portal she came through, Kirby gives chase, eventually finding himself in Drawcia's also paint-themed world. The witch curses Kirby, turning him into a limbless ball. After Drawcia escapes, the Magical Paintbrush (Power Paintbrush in the European version) turns to the playerPlayer (game)
A player of a game is a participant therein. The term 'player' is used with this same meaning both in game theory and in ordinary recreational games....
to help Kirby. The player and Kirby set off to find and destroy Drawcia to restore Dream Land to its normal state. Along the way, Drawcia creates replicas of Kirby's oldest foes to slow him down. These include Paint Roller, Kracko, Kracko Jr., and King Dedede.
Gameplay
D-pad
A D-pad is a flat, usually thumb-operated directional control with one button on each point, found on nearly all modern video game console gamepads, game controllers, on the remote control units of some television and DVD players, and smart phones...
, face buttons, or shoulder buttons. Instead, the player only uses the stylus and touch screen to control Kirby. The player can draw rainbow lines, which Kirby will roll on, or poke Kirby, to make him do a little speed dash. These rainbow paths can form ramps or bridges for Kirby to cross, or walls to protect him from enemy projectiles. Drawing paths depletes the player's rainbow ink supplies, which recharges slowly while Kirby is in the air or on a path, but quickly when Kirby is on the ground. These paths eventually disappear, even faster if another path is painted. However, the player must either tap on Kirby to cause him to dash forward onto the path, or have the path created directly underneath him, causing him to automatically move forward on it.
The player can use the stylus to stun enemies by tapping on it. Afterwards, the player can either allow Kirby to roll into the enemy with his own momentum or by dashing to defeat the enemy. Defeating certain kinds of enemies by either dashing into them or touching them while stunned causes Kirby to gain one of several special abilities, which may be used at any time by tapping Kirby himself. This special ability replaces the dash. Once an ability is obtained, the only way Kirby can lose it is either by tapping a button in the bottom left corner or by being damaged. This is also the only way to get a different ability from the one Kirby already has.
Kirby: Canvas Curse spans eight worlds, with all but one having three levels. A variety of themes are used throughout the game. These themes range from a volcanic area to a frozen area. The objective of every level in the game is to reach a rainbow-colored doorway. As the player makes progress in the game, the environmental hazards become far more plentiful. In one level, the player must maneuver Kirby quickly enough to avoid getting defeated by an ever-rising body of lava. Occasionally, Kirby will come across a barrier, which prevents the paint lines from being created inside of them, forcing Kirby to do nothing but roll, dash, and use a power (if applicable). Portions of these levels can be played in Rainbow Run mode, where speed and amount of paint used are key factors in the player's success.
At the end of each world except for world seven, Kirby must face a boss. In worlds one through six, the first time he completes them, he must face one of each boss - Paint Roller, Kracko, or King Dedede (all of whom must be battled twice). With the exception of the final boss, all bosses are mini-game based. The boss of world eight is the main villain of Kirby: Canvas Curse, Drawcia Sorceress. Drawcia starts out in her standard form. Upon defeat, she will transform into a large ball of paint with five eyes and a mouth called Drawcia Soul.
Kirby: Canvas Curse features special collectibles called Medals, which can be used to unlock secret features in the game, such as characters, sound tests, and alternate paint colors. There are three ways for the player to find a Medal. The first way is to get one in one of the main levels. Each level has three Medals to be found, all of which can be seen on the map if Kirby is in the correct area and close enough. It is often required that the player do something particularly challenging to acquire one, and the difficulty of the challenge is respective to the difficulty of the level. Another way is through Rainbow Run mode. In it, Kirby must complete a portion of one of the main levels, with the objective being either getting through it as fast as possible, or getting through it while trying to use as little paint as possible. Reaching a certain peg awards Kirby with one or more Medals. The third way is by defeating the lesser bosses outside of the main game with an A Rank on the third level in each of the boss battles.
Reception
Kirby: Canvas Curse has received positive critical acclaim since its release, with many reviews calling it the best Kirby game to date. 1UP1UP.com
1UP.com is a video game website owned by IGN Entertainment, a division of News Corporation. Previously, the site was owned by Ziff Davis before being sold to UGO Entertainment in 2009....
called it "genuinely excellent", saying that "it's a welcome reinvention of gaming's most overplayed genre
Platform game
A platform game is a video game characterized by requiring the player to jump to and from suspended platforms or over obstacles . It must be possible to control these jumps and to fall from platforms or miss jumps...
" and later concluded that Canvas Curse is "the DS's first great game". The stylus gameplay has also been noted, with IGN
IGN
IGN is an entertainment website that focuses on video games, films, music and other media. IGN's main website comprises several specialty sites or "channels", each occupying a subdomain and covering a specific area of entertainment...
hailing it as "incredibly innovative", GameSpy
GameSpy
GameSpy Industries, Inc., known simply as GameSpy, is a division of IGN Entertainment, which operates a network of game websites and provides online video game-related services and software. GameSpy dates back to the 1996 release of an internet Quake server search program named QSpy. The current...
saying it is "quite rewarding", and GameSpot
GameSpot
GameSpot is a video gaming website that provides news, reviews, previews, downloads, and other information. The site was launched in May 1, 1996 by Pete Deemer, Vince Broady and Jon Epstein. It was purchased by ZDNet, a brand which was later purchased by CNET Networks. CBS Interactive, which...
calling it "a satisfying part of the gameplay."
The game has drawn criticism from a few sources which claimed that although the game was innovative, it was not especially entertaining: Play Magazine
Play (US magazine)
Play was a U.S.-based magazine focused on video games, anime, manga, film, DVD, television, comics, music and media. Published by Fusion Publishing, Inc. since 2001, Play magazine also had a separate Internet presence on its website, Play Online...
editor noted that "it's innovative... but for me, that's not enough."
Kirby: Canvas Curse was the third best-selling game in Japan during its week of release at 75,365 units sold. Famitsu
Famitsu
is a line of Japanese video game magazines published by Enterbrain, Inc. and Tokuma. Currently, there are five Famitsū magazines: Shūkan Famitsū, Famitsū PS3 + PSP, Famitsū Xbox 360, Famitsū Wii+DS, and Famitsū Wave DVD...
annual sales for the region show the game sold 276,418 copies by the end of 2005. According to NPD Group
NPD Group
The NPD Group, Inc. is a leading North American market research company. The NPD Group consistently ranks among the top 25 market research companies in the independent Honomichl Top 50 report, which the media and the research industry acknowledge as a credible source of information on the market...
, the game sold just under 80,000 copies in North America during the month of June 2005. The following month, it was the top-selling DS game in the region at 50,000 copies.