Kirby Super Star Retrospective
(Initially published on viewport)
March of 1996. It was a turbulent time for Nintendo. After a huge rift in partnership, Sony had released their PlayStation six months prior. With the advent of new hardware, 3D polygon games had taken the world by storm. To catch up, Nintendo was ramping up to release their new 64-bit console in June of that year. Major game developers were preparing as well; opting to build games for the bigger, better Nintendo 64 over the now aging Super Famicom.
It was already way past the golden age of 16-bit gaming, and the 3D era was knocking at the door:
Knowing this, a young game designer at HAL Laboratory, decided to release a Super Famicom game named Kirby Super Star. And as if it were some miracle, amidst all the turbulence, uncertainty and increasing pressure, he managed to create one of the best Super Famicom games ever made.¹ ²
Bounded Creativity
Kirby. Super Smash Bros.
What do these two video game series have in common? Other than being household names within the Nintendo-brand, they also happen to be the brainchild of game designer Masahiro Sakurai.
