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Kirby Air Riders - Review Thread

You don't play fighting games do you?
Cracking Up Lol GIF by reactionseditor

You play fighting games with a controller?

SmashMR I guess!


The Switch Pro 2 controller feels great in all seriousness. It is expensive which I cannot disagree with but so far its been even better than the Switch 1 PC which I thought was amazing as a first party device.
 
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What is great about Kirby is that it is just the right amount of bonkers for a racing game.

Mario Kart kind of gets it, but doesn't go full on weird.
 
how switch 2 pro controller is #2 amazes me, there is so many better and cheaper option on the market that i cant understand how ppl buys this overpriced piece of shit.

Kirb doing great numbers, ll take a look when i got my SW2
It's got horrible ergonomics and makes my hands cramp. Also, the haptics are no where near as punchy or as impressive as those in the Dualsense.
 
Asked my son if he wants the new SpongeBob game or this.

He picked this.

Fucking idiot. I expect it'll go like Mario kart. Played it twice then back to Roblox.
 
Asked my son if he wants the new SpongeBob game or this.

He picked this.

Fucking idiot. I expect it'll go like Mario kart. Played it twice then back to Roblox.
Or maybe...just maybe, he's a deep down Kirby fan and will actually like the simplicity yet wealth of content on offer, plus multiplayer with his old man.....or maybe back to Roblox. You never can tell with that generation.
 
Or maybe...just maybe, he's a deep down Kirby fan and will actually like the simplicity yet wealth of content on offer, plus multiplayer with his old man.....or maybe back to Roblox. You never can tell with that generation.
So far:
-Played 7 mins of Mario Galaxy never again
-Played DK Bananza half way
-2 times with Mario wonder never again
-Doesn't like smash doesn't even want to try it
-beat Mario odyssey to my surprise

Just some recent examples. If he's secretly a Kirby enthusiast then I've failed him as a father.
 
My own son bought this which sort of saved me money, I guess? Although now I'm considering getting it myself down the line because I'd like to own all the Sakurai games.

It's good! Not for everyone and at times a little too loose/chaotic especially when you're circling a single power-up in City Trial over and over, but it's got a ton of polish and weird goofy modes and the Shogo Sakai soundtrack is superb as expected. Top Ride is surprisingly fun too; it's neat to play a modern version of Off-Road like this.

You kind of have to be self-motivated to enjoy the 1P though. There's not much in the way of story so it's really about lots of racing and clearing the 750 challenges on the checklist. A lot of them give good unlockables which keeps it rewarding.

My boy really enjoys the game too but his cousins (my nephews) don't know what to make of it. I don't think this will be a runaway hit due to being kind of weird and divisive but it should find a bigger audience than the original did.
 
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So far:
-Played 7 mins of Mario Galaxy never again
-Played DK Bananza half way
-2 times with Mario wonder never again
-Doesn't like smash doesn't even want to try it
-beat Mario odyssey to my surprise

Just some recent examples. If he's secretly a Kirby enthusiast then I've failed him as a father.
That's rough. I don't have a kid but my Nephew was a HUGE Sonic and Kirby fan by age 6. Then he gravitated to Mario/DK afterwards (around 10 or so).
My experience is that most kids will eventually find one of the genres/characters that Nintendo and SEGA have at least by age 6 or so. Give it some more time and his tastes/interests will grow
 
Played the beta for like 10 minutes and didnt know wtf i was playing. Tbh i didnt even gave it a fair chance. Game came out and watched some streams, it looked like fun so i bought it. Coming tomorrow.
 
So far:
-Played 7 mins of Mario Galaxy never again
-Played DK Bananza half way
-2 times with Mario wonder never again
-Doesn't like smash doesn't even want to try it
-beat Mario odyssey to my surprise

Just some recent examples. If he's secretly a Kirby enthusiast then I've failed him as a father.
I have cousins who are like 8-9 years old and they play alot of Roblox and the other day they came over my apartment and in my mind my apartment is like candy land for a kid like I have more games and toys there than an actual gamestop and these little shits were playing on their iPads and no matter how much I tried I could not get them to get even remotely interested in something like Mario Kart or Pokemon, and I have guys my age (late 30s) coming over and playing Mario Party for hours. Thank god I am never having kids!
 
I have cousins who are like 8-9 years old and they play alot of Roblox and the other day they came over my apartment and in my mind my apartment is like candy land for a kid like I have more games and toys there than an actual gamestop and these little shits were playing on their iPads and no matter how much I tried I could not get them to get even remotely interested in something like Mario Kart or Pokemon, and I have guys my age (late 30s) coming over and playing Mario Party for hours. Thank god I am never having kids!
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I have cousins who are like 8-9 years old and they play alot of Roblox and the other day they came over my apartment and in my mind my apartment is like candy land for a kid like I have more games and toys there than an actual gamestop and these little shits were playing on their iPads and no matter how much I tried I could not get them to get even remotely interested in something like Mario Kart or Pokemon, and I have guys my age (late 30s) coming over and playing Mario Party for hours. Thank god I am never having kids!
I'm grown as hell and I take my iPad everywhere and use it when whatever place I'm at bores me. I may be old but I have the attention span of an 8 year old.
 
Kids will latch onto whatever their parents let them. I've got a house full of classic games and no iPads and my kids all love Nintendo stuff. Over the last few years I played about half an hour a day for them a game of my choosing, like most of the Zeldas, Metroids, SNES all-timers like FF3 and Chrono Trigger and EarthBound, etc. They enjoyed all of it and best of all they don't talk like YouTubers.
 
I'm grown as hell and I take my iPad everywhere and use it when whatever place I'm at bores me. I may be old but I have the attention span of an 8 year old.
I have my iPad with me but I mostly use it to read Japanese manga, LIKE A FUCKING GROWN UP!
 
I have played this game for the last couple days. This is the best sequel I could have asked for. It plays so well and its becoming addicting to me just how the original was. I love switching machines and whipping through tracks trying to get the best times and participating in races. Top Ride is the best upgrade form the original with the use of all the machines available to use. Its crazy to use the Wing Star to fly around and fart on some of these stages. Also the options of diorama viewing give me the closest will get to a rc pro am isometric style racer. And City Trail while I think the original map is still my favorite has been a lot of fun and I can tell I am going to spend a lot of time in this game. Also can't wait to make some friends online and play with all my other air ride enthusiasts. I am still stunned that this game is sitting in my Switch 2 right now. Also if you want to goof around online and join up with me for some air ride, top ride, or city trail hit my friend code up 5537-5376-8009 and hit me up in gamechat when I'm on.
 
I did end up getting it despite not really understanding the demo, and I do actually like it. Here is my brief review:

+Game looks completely fantastic in motion. Super smooth and colorful, lots of great effects, great sense of speed. Other presentation elements are great too, music and cutscenes and audio.

+So much content to unlock, customization options, modes, online play, tracking... just a staggering amount of things to do. If Mario Kart World has this going on it would've been GOTY.

+City Trial and Road Trip are my favorite modes. City Trial I have a lot of fun riding around the map and participating in events, and really enjoy the mini game at the end. I think this will get the most longevity for me. Road Trip is fun too with all the little bite sized challenges, though individual runs of it are a little long.

+Top Ride I'll give a plus as well, I wish the courses lasted a bit longer but it's very fun controlled chaos.

-Air Ride mode is just not clicking for me for some reason to the point that I'm not even entirely sure it matters what you do. Like I understand it conceptually -- defeat enemies to gain speed, drift around corners, hit boosts, follow star trails, get copy abilities to attack, etc. but it just seems like it doesn't matter and the results are complete random. For example, in a CPU match I lost to my 6-year old son playing his second race who didn't understand these things at all (he got second place overall) -- and I was trying to win! Online I seem to be incapable of doing any better than 4th place, sometimes 3rd. I'm just not sure what I'm doing wrong or how to get better. I love the courses so would like to play this mode more but I'm not sure...

Looking forward to the events and working on unlocking all the stuff, there's even a few characters I don't have yet. Hoping that Air Ride mode starts to click eventually.
 
Game is fun but holy shit the spinning on left stick wiggle is awful. Game literally has like 2 buttons, why i cant bind it to a button. Nintendo please...
 
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Game is fun but holy shit the spinning on left stick wiggle is awful. Game literally has like 2 buttons, why i cant bind it to a button. Nintendo please...

Yep, this is also very true. Spinning should be on "A" and inhaling enemies / attack with a on "X". Having the same button as slow down / drift to turn corners ALSO contextually be the one to inhale / attack (which both increase speed) doesn't make any sense either.
 
Yep, this is also very true. Spinning should be on "A" and inhaling enemies / attack with a on "X". Having the same button as slow down / drift to turn corners ALSO contextually be the one to inhale / attack (which both increase speed) doesn't make any sense either.
I have the switch 1 pro controller, the other day i played the game in handheld mode and goddamn the new hd rumble is so much better than the one on the old pro controller. I just hate the joycons, but the rumble is awesome. Noticed the same thing in mario kart and DK bananza
 
I have the switch 1 pro controller, the other day i played the game in handheld mode and goddamn the new hd rumble is so much better than the one on the old pro controller. I just hate the joycons, but the rumble is awesome. Noticed the same thing in mario kart and DK bananza
Joycon 2 rumble oes seems greater than Switch 2 pro controller rumble as well.
 
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Game is fun, but there are barely any players online... Nintendo and its retarded pricing policy. 1-2 min to find air ride matches and half of them are bots. City trial is the same, only finding like 3-4 players, rest are bots. Top ride has no players aswell
 
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My god this game is addicting. The gameplay is just so satisfying even tho it looks like a clusterfuck at first. Cant stop playing. Races are fun too, but city trial is just a dopamine bomb
 
3 modes are unfinished, 1 complete
What is this?
Both race modes feel completely at odds with the idea of progression, single courses on their own don't feel like a satisfying game, there needs to be a basic grand Prix option in these two modes so that they feel more satisfying, just unlocking things at the end of the course is t enough and feels very segmented. I'm not saying get rid of how it is now, just add the option of a Grand Prix, perhaps 3x3 new tracks 3 x 3 returning tracks once u locked and maybe even a large marathon mode, but none of my friends or family want to play just single courses on their own for more than a couple of minutes
As for city trial, it's very unsatisfying, 5 mins building power ups and vehicles to then have a raandom 30 second mini game leaving a very unsatisfying gameplay loop. It needs a 3rd round that uses the upgrades of round 1, adds something regards placement of round 2 to power up further and place on the starting grid then puts you to race as a final round with a cup type reward for 1st 2nd and 3rd.
Would work much better and be more satisfying, but 5 mins in city and then 30 second mini game is the whole reason that they needed 2xstupidly long Nintendo directs to try and sell the game
It has so much goin* for it, but 3/4 modes are lacking and unsatisfying even if the gameplay itself is very fun.
And don't get me started on the prices of those 5xamiibo £33 each - that's a lot of money for 1, and the cost of a 1st party Nintendo game when they rarely go on sale, that should not be the price of a stupid amiibo, and I have ,hundreds of amiibo, it these are ridiculous and I hope no one buys any of them and Nintendo are sent a message that no one wanted this crap, I just filled out my Nintendo survey on this game and filled nearly 2000 words on any section that asked for feedback
If I hadn't paid £36 for Kirby via Japan Eshop I would be pissed to buy this closer to retail price
 
Havent played for 2 days because of work, but im kinda missing it. Hours flew by playing this game. Kinda sad it wont get any post launch support
 
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