Kirby 64-The Crystal Shards: A Study in Geocentricity
The original model for a geocentric universe posited by Aristotle, and then later Ptolemy, explained that the sum locus of reality was centered around the planet Earth. From this philosophical position it was argued that the planets, the sun, celestial bodies, and the remaining components of creation revolved around the planet in rings that were arranged according to a hierarchy that was later co-opted by the Roman Catholic Church to explain the essential role of human beings in the universe specifically in relation to divine plans of an omnipotent and extremely powerful creator. Geocentricity provided early naturalists, the pre-modern name for scientists and observers of the natural world, the explanation for gravity as well as the movement of the stars and planets in the sky at night. All elements, natural forces, heavenly bodies, chemicals, and organisms were bound in and around the planet which served as the conduit for understanding man’s role within the universe. Geocentricity afforded a way to understand that, for the all supposed enormity of creation, the realm of human beings was the center of everything and thus the most important and beautiful space in creation. In short, Earth was the main show.
Or at least it was until Copernicus and Galileo ruined the whole thing with actual observations, heliocentric models of the universe, and the scientific method. But, it should be noted for the record, neither of those men ever played a Kirby videogame.
I also wanna give credit where credit is due, the persian/Iranian scientists Abu Rayhan Muhammad ibn Ahmad al-Biruni and Abu Sa'id Ahmed ibn Mohammed ibn Abd al-Jalil al-Sijzi were both highly critical of Aristotle’s model of the galaxy and would contribute numerous writings about Earth’s rotation around the sun.
However, as far as I can tell based on my research, neither of these dudes ever played Kirby 64: The Crystal Shards.
Released for the Nintendo 64 console in Japan on 24 March 2000, 26 June 2000 in North America, and 22 June 2001 in Europe, Kirby 64: The Crystal Shards was the first Kirby game I can remember playing. I never played Kirby’s Dreamland on the Gameboy(or at least not before writing this sentence), nor did I ever play any Kirby games on my parent's Super Nintendo Entertainment System. I had Super Smash Bros for N64, which had Kirby as a playable character, but he was just one character in the game. I want to clarify immediately my lack of experience with the character Kirby was not some sort of philosophical line in the sand, with Kirby standing opposed to me representing anything and everything I didn’t like. Far more accurate is just the fact that I really loved playing Legend of Zelda, Super Mario, and Pokemon games. Kirby looked fun and interesting, but Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past had a giant Eyeball that shot electricity beams and Pokemon had Snorlax. Kirby didn’t have either of those and so I would have to discover his games in a different fashion.
I encountered Kirby 64 the way I did most of the videogames I would wind up playing as a young man: I checked it out from my local Hastings. I took it home, played it, returned it (actually my parents returned it because I didn’t have a car), checked it out again, and then at some point convinced my parents that I needed a copy.
Sometimes I wish I had cooler stories for how I discovered videogames, but what can you do?
Kirby 64: The Crystal Shards was sweet, in the purest sense, and despite it’s adorable aesthetic it managed to capture my attention and push through my jaded pre-teen boy mentality of what was or wasn’t a game that was okay to play without being labeled a weenie by other boys my age. This is to say Kirby 64 owned dude. And loved playing it. When I downloaded the N64 emulator app on my Nintendo Switch and saw that it was playable I hopped back in for a level or two, and while age has weathered my appreciation of the game, I still find certain elements fascinating in terms of videogame design and gameplay.
For those readers who are still wondering what that long introduction about geocentric models of the universe was about, stay tuned because it’s going to come into play when I get to perspective. But first I wanna lay out the narrative.
I’ll provide some basic plot info and game mechanics, and then we’ll get back to geocentricity I promise.
The plot of the game begins on the planet Ripple Star, homeworld of the fairies, which is invaded by the antagonist and regularly appearing character Dark Matter. Dark Matter is, much as the name suggests, a large glob of black static with the trademark single eyeball because every videogame from Resident Evil to Legend of Zelda has to make eyeballs the defining aesthetic structure of every villain. One of the fairies, a young girl name Ribbon, manages to escape with the Sacred Crystal before the planet is consumed. However, Dark Matter chases her and manages to shatter the Sacred Crystal across the galaxy. The scene cuts to Kirby on the planet Pop Star who’s watching what he believes is a meteor shower when Ribbon crashes onto the planet next to him along with some crystal shards. A pantomime cutscene plays which shows Kirby offering to help her track down the remaining crystals and from there the game begins. Kirby and Ribbon will eventually be joined by the characters Waddle Dee, Adeleine, and King Dedede who will appear sporadically throughout the game to aid Kirby as he navigates the levels.
Kirby 64: The Crystal Shards is an action, platformer, and puzzle-solving videogame that is side-view with occasional top-down perspective. When considering this essay I kept thinking about how the game was structured visually and how much freedom (or lack thereof) the player has to move Kirby through space. This is important not just because it’s where that whole geocentricity bit becomes relevant, but because Kirby 64 was released originally on, well, the Nintendo 64.
The Nintendo 64 was advertised to consumers almost entirely on the fact that it could render games in 3D. The flagship title for the console was Super Mario 64, with games like Legend of Zelda Ocarina of Time and Star Fox 64 following not long thereafter and demonstrating the strength of this system. Hardware aside, what’s important was that games that were being released were no longer two-dimensional sprites running along a pre-rendered background. Now characters were moving along the Z-axis, players were discovering the novelty of 3D space, and developers were seeing potential for creating new worlds and mechanics for videogames.
Kirby 64…does not give players that freedom.
Kirby 64 is, well, a Kirby game.
And Kirby games were, up to that point, pretty flat.
I interrupt to confess that there’s an ambition on my part to try and write essays about as many Kirby videogames as currently exist, but I’m hesitant to explain anything else since goals, like conviction, can quickly become something you talk about (or write about) rather than actually doing them. I have however been working through the early Kirby games in hopes about writing something about them individually, and also to support this essay. And in fact playing those games gave me a great insight to Kirby 64 because it follows the aesthetic and mechanical path of how this game came to be.
Kirby games were, since the first Kirby’s Dream Land released for Gameboy in 1992, about moving Kirby in one direction through the world. He was in effect yet another platformer hero, and in his first game he didn’t even get special abilities from swallowing enemies. The point was to move him from point A to point B utilizing his jumps and floating abilities. The Kirby series would continue, steadily developing it’s adorable aesthetic while keeping gameplay to just moving Kirby through the flat space. The only real exceptions were the puzzle and pinball games that were released.
But those are for another day and other essays.
Controlling Kirby in Kirby 64 follows the same pattern. Each level is a series of platforms that Kirby must navigate while also solving puzzles, defeating mini-bosses, avoiding environmental damage, collecting crystals and of course inhaling multiple enemy npcs in order to assume their power. This last action is the one most players probably would be able to remember best even if they’ve never played a Kirby game. Kirby 64 was also unique because it allowed players the chance to combine enemy abilities.
For example if the player consumes an enemy npc represented by the green moon and then an electric symbol Kirby will wield a dual sided, Darth Maul inspired, electric lightsaber. Likewise if they consume a green moon and fire icon Kirby will again draw a sword, but this one will be three times the length of his body and will be on fire. And of course, probably the skill I used the most, was combining green moons and bombs which gave Kirby the ability to throw ninja stars that would paralyze an enemy and then explode.
The copy ability is the staple of the Kirby universe, but what was most memorable was the geocentricity since Kirby 64 wasn’t a flat game; it was a deceptively flat game.
Looking at previous entries in the series, Kirby was always presented on a stationary level. The world would shift left and right, up and down whenever the player moved Kirby through whatever world he existed in, but the camera remained relatively fixed, and the perspective never shifted.
In Kirby 64 the designers shifted the perspective relatively depending on where Kirby was standing along the level’s platform.
Put another way, the weight of the world continually sinks around Kirby visually.
In the span of just a few steps Kirby will begin walking from left to right, but after a certain number of steps the path will begin to shift diagonally and Kiby’s sprite will change shape depending on whether the path is moving towards or away from the player. This effect is not dramatic, actually it’s rather fluid. While controlling Kirby does not inspire joy the way controlling Pac-Man or Wario does, the camera shifting its perspective in and around Kirby does create an undeniable energy.
And thus, the geocentricity meme comes full circle.
Literally every element of the world of Kirby 64 is drawn to Kirby in some form or capacity. Even enemy NPCS that are situated behind Kiby creating the illusion of 3D space only furthers the magnetic pull of the pink sprite that moves and acquires objects and abilities while he collects crystal after crystal. It doesn’t matter what the actual content of the game is however because the intellectual impression of playing Kirby 64 is that the world is moving around Kirby rather than the actual reality that Kirby is moving through the world.
Kirby’s platforming is still, geometrically speaking, a line segment that begins and ends by moving across horizontal and vertical lines. It may seem at first that Hal Laboratory, the designer responsible for Kirby as well as numerous other titles eventually released by Nintendo, didn’t explore the Z axis, or at least didn’t incorporate it into their design. But, again, the geocentricity of Kirby reveals that the Z-axis actually exists, namely behind a screen in the eyes of the viewer. As I move Kirby across the line, my perspective is shifting and that play with reality creates a memorable impression of the world.
After a certain point the implication seems obvious.
Kirby isn’t actually moving, I’m moving around Kirby.
The world is moving around Kirby.
The universe is moving around Kirby.
Geocentricity, as a working model of astronomy, was rather flat. But that only furthers it use as a way of explaining the visual language of the only Kirby game that ever graced the Nintendo 64. And decades after playing it I still recognise that it was this non-flat, flatness that was so appealing to me as a player.
Kirby 64 created a motion of energy around the protagonist that no other game ever managed to recreate and capture. While not the highest reviewed entry in the series, Kirby 64 still offers an excellent opportunity for videogame players, critics, hobbyist, designers, and artists to consider how space is created in games and how the presentation of space can create perceptions in the players mind and make the world present energies that linger in a person’s memory.
The weight of creation was centered in a pink ball that moved along a line segment.
The world, the universe, all of being and existence moved around that little pink spot.
Or at least it will until Copernicus and Galileo ruin it again. Nerds.
Joshua “Jammer” Smith
11.11.2024
Like what you’re reading? Buy me a coffee & support my Patreon. Please and thank you.