Kirby

"'As Kirby flew home, he looked out across the cosmos. The stars were so beautiful. Darkness had its place just as much as light, he thought. For the stars sparkled twice as bright in the dark depths of space! As Kirby soared onward, he saw Popstar in all its glory! Popstar had never looked so wonderful. It shone like a brilliant beacon of hope.' - Kirby Mass Attack ending."

Kirby (カービィ, Kābī in Japan) is the main character and namesake of the Kirby series. He is a small pink creature who resides on and protects all of Planet Popstar, though his true origin is unknown. Despite his simplistic appearance, Kirby is easily recognizable by his ball-like stature, his large glossy eyes, and his cheerful demeanor. He is often seen riding a Warp Star, but can otherwise fly by taking in air and puffing up like a balloon. While Kirby has many ways to combat his foes, the most well-known by far is his ability to open his mouth wide to suck up his opponents and then swallow them whole. Doing this allows Kirby to copy the attributes of whatever he just ate, expanding his powers in ways that are difficult to predict. Using these abilities is often crucial for Kirby to overcome the greater challenges he faces on his adventures. Kirby is classified as a "silent protagonist"; that is, he does not speak audibly or in text to the player in most instances. In some supplementary material, he has shown the ability to speak, but this is uncommon and not generally considered canon. Despite this, he is very vocal, using lots of grunts, shouts, and monosyllables — most famously, his cheery elongated "Hi!"

Since 1992, Kirby has starred in over 30 video games (twelve of which can be considered part of the core series, not counting remakes), has appeared to some capacity in several other Nintendo games and products, has had an anime series, several manga series, a novel series, and has a great deal of merchandise in the form of figurines, plush dolls, clothing, and the like. Kirby and his series were created by Masahiro Sakurai under HAL Laboratory, with the latter of which retaining the rights to the Kirby series and characters despite Sakurai's departure from the HAL team in the mid-2000s. To this day, Kirby remains one of Nintendo's most famous and familiar mascots, with his games garnering millions of sales worldwide, and thanks in part to his perfect attendance as a fighter in the Super Smash Bros. franchise.

Kirby has been consistently voiced by Makiko Ohmoto since 1999, when he appeared in the first Super Smash Bros. game on the Nintendo 64. Ohmoto also voiced his anime counterpart in all versions of the series, with the exception of some lines that were dubbed over by Amy Birnbaum for the English version. Prior to Ohmoto's debut, the role was passed between various actors and actresses for one-off appearances.

Why He Rocks

 * 1) To start off, Kirby's design, whilst somewhat simplistic, is well-made and it does a great job at making him look adorable. While his face is very simple, it can be very expressive at times when it needs to be.
 * 2) While King Dedede and Meta Knight have obviously changed and grown as characters through the series' history, Kirby hasn't really changed at all outside of his design, and that's not a bad thing. Kirby is meant to be a pure character, who remains unchanged and uncorrupted no matter what hardships come his way. It is actually thanks to his positive influence that Dedede and Meta Knight were able to grow into better people in the first place, and they aren't the only ones. Kirby has made countless enemies into friends, and it doesn't seem like he's going to stop anytime soon.
 * 3) Kirby has many abilities. He can inhale and spit out enemies with great force, or swallow them to copy their abilities. In some games, Kirby can even combine two different copy abilities to create a new ability. But that's not all! Kirby also has Super Abilities from Return to Dream Land, the Hypernova inhale from Triple Deluxe, the Robobot Armor from Planet Robobot, Friend Hearts from Star Allies, and Mouthful Mode from Forgotten Land. Almost every finale in Kirby's games makes use of these abilities in some epic and climactic way that shows just how powerful the pink puffball really is.
 * 4) He is one of Nintendo's classic icons next to the likes of Super Mario, Pikachu and Link. Kirby has been featured in his own anime series, many manga publications in several countries, several merchandise lines (although many of them are only released in Japan), and even his own line of cafés with absolutely adorable food themed after himself and his friends (also exclusive to Japan only, unfortunately).
 * 5) His amazing games that anyone can pick up and play, with absolutely beautiful and colorful graphics, gameplay, characterization, and music. Even his side games have nice graphics and have unique concepts, such as splitting into 10 Kirbys, or becoming a ball that is controlled by a stylus and your touchscreen.
 * 6) The lore of his series is surprisingly well-crafted and intricate. This is thanks to the Kirby's current series' director, Shinya Kumazaki.
 * 7) Makiko Ohmoto's performance is absolutely fantastic, and she still remains as the voice actor for him, even to this day.

The Only Bad Quality

 * 1) Kirby has been out-of-character at least twice in his games:
 * 2) * He was very badly portrayed in Kirby's Avalanche/Kirby's Ghost Trap, becoming a rude and unlikable jerk, and in the first game where Kirby is portrayed in a negative light. Although, that game is non-canon since it was a reskin of Puyo Puyo.
 * 3) * His portrayal in Kirby Squeak Squad is bad too, where he was totally clueless about the threat and only cared about his strawberry shortcake. Thankfully, it was only temporary and he reverted back to his normal personality in the later games.

Trivia

 * Kirby was first called Popopo, his original name, and his model was created as a blob placeholder sprite during the development of what would be the first Kirby game,

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