5 Games in 2005 #5: Kirby: Canvas Curse

Monday, February 6, 2006 » gaming list thought

When the Nintendo DS came out a little over a year ago, I, along with many other naysayers, profiled it as a doomed gimmick system. Adding a second display on a portable seemed like a completely arbitrary decision, and I expected the touch screen to be a novelty at best. That turned out to be a pretty accurate prediction based on most of the games out at launch and during the system's first six months or so.

Then this Kirby game came along, and I started to get an idea of what Nintendo was thinking when it came up with the DS. Canvas Curse doesn't boast immersive 3D graphics or a storyline full of twists. It's straightforward and unpretentious1. It's a game. The way you interact with and guide Kirby through each stage with the stylus is intuitive and simple, yet it allows enough control to the point where I kept remembering in amazement that the game never uses a single one of the DS's buttons (unless you want to pause). It's a welcome change of pace from having to memorize a new controller mapping for each new console game. At times, it's even relaxing.

Kirby: Canvas Curse is often compared to Yoshi Touch & Go, an earlier DS game with a similar gameplay mechanic. However, whereas Touch & Go evidently contained two whole stages, Canvas Curse offers a lengthy main game where each stage features its own unique obstacles and gameplay twists. On top of that, there are bonus characters and unlockables to provide a ton of replay incentive, time- and line-attack modes, and three (or four) minigames that are all actually pretty fun. And did I mention that all you use is the stylus?

Many reviewers credit Advance Wars: Dual Strike or Nintendogs as being the first must-own DS game, but I'm going to say that Kirby: Canvas Curse was the first to show how a game on a nontraditional, maybe even avant-garde2, platform can still be plenty addictive.

1 At least until I call it "avant-garde" later on.
2 There we go.