Kirby

Verified Timeline

Lore & Background

Kirby hails from Planet Popstar, a yellow star, and spends most of his time in a territory called Dream Land. He has a pink, spherical body with small stubby arms and large red feet. His body composition has not been revealed, but HAL Laboratory executive director Shinya Kumazaki stated that his animation is based on 'a human running energetically, with the thighs, knees, and ankles invisible, but nevertheless accounted for'. His body is soft and flexible, allowing him to stretch or flatten and adopt different shapes, open his mouth very wide to inhale foes, or inflate himself with air and fly. Despite this malleability, certain parts of Kirby do not stretch in order to maintain his cuteness, such as the distance between his two eyes and between his eyes and mouth. Kirby is characterised by his childlike innocence and his insatiable appetite. When he swallows enemies, Kirby does not digest them in his stomach. Instead, they disappear and reappear somewhere in the game world. Kirby's official height is 20 cm (about 8 in). Kirby's gender is listed as 'unknown' in the Kirby series encyclopedia Hoshi no Kābī Pupupu Taizen. Sakurai wrote Kirby's profile, which also lists the character's gender as 'unknown' and once jokingly questioned whether Kirby could actually be female. Likewise, Makiko Ohmoto stated that Kirby's gender is unknown and explained that she performs the character just as 'Kirby' without caring about the character's gender. The English manual for Kirby's Dream Land refers to Kirby as a 'little boy', whereas the Japanese version uses wakamono (若者), which translates to a gender-neutral 'youngster' or 'young person', though is more frequently used for males. When asked what sort of being Kirby is, Kumazaki said that he is an 'always-shifting and mysterious individual'. HAL Laboratory producer Tadashi Kamitake said that Kirby has a unique personality, but is also like a blank sheet of paper, as he can transform into anything that he sucks up. He explained that because he embodies these two opposite extremes, he can be an indestructible superhero while also being a friend.

In Their Own Story

Kirby was created by Masahiro Sakurai as the player character of the 1992 video game Kirby's Dream Land. Sakurai conceived the idea around May 1990 at the age of 19 while he was working at HAL Laboratory. The character's design was intended to serve as a placeholder graphic for the game's original protagonist in early development and thus was given a simplistic ball-like appearance. Sakurai switched to the placeholder design after deciding that it served the character better. The character was known as Popopo (ポポポ) during development, as the first game was planned to be titled Harukaze Popopo (lit. 'Spring Breeze Popopo', or 'Popopo of the Spring Breeze'). The game was later renamed to Twinkle Popo; however, after Nintendo became involved in its release, Nintendo and HAL chose to change the name of the game and its protagonist so that it would appeal to Western audiences. The name 'Kirby' was chosen from a list of potential names provided by Nintendo of America. Shigeru Miyamoto stated that 'Kirby' was chosen partly in honor of American lawyer John Kirby, who defended Nintendo in the Universal City Studios, Inc. v. Nintendo Co., Ltd. case, and partly because the harsh-sounding name contrasted amusingly with the character's cute appearance. Reflecting on Kirby's design, Sakurai said that he wanted to create 'a cute main character who everyone will love'. Satoru Iwata added that Kirby was given a simple, circular design so that anyone would be able to draw him. The BBC quoted Negative World: 'Kirby has a great design. He's expressive, iconic, instantly-recognisable, and easy for kids to draw.' Kirby appears white in Kirby's Dream Land due to the grayscale palette of the Game Boy system. Sakurai always intended the character to be pink, though this was unknown to the development team at first; in particular, Miyamoto thought that Kirby would have been yellow based upon similar characters, but thought that pink was a more distinctive choice. Kirby appears white in the game's North American promotional materials and artwork to reflect the character's in-game appearance. Miyamoto's color choice was repurposed in some games for secondary players.

Reader's Guide

Kirby's signature ability involves inhaling enemies and objects, then either swallowing them or spitting them out with incredible force. He also has the ability to fly. Kirby's Adventure introduced the Copy Ability, allowing Kirby to mimic the abilities of his foes by swallowing them, giving him a variety of powers, such as breathing fire. Instead of finding and using power-ups, Kirby uses his enemies as power-ups. Kirby Super Star expanded on the concept of the Copy Ability by introducing multi-functional techniques for each ability. In Kirby Super Star, Kirby can sacrifice his current Copy Ability to create a 'Helper', which can be controlled by the game or a second player. Kirby Star Allies (2018) has a similar mechanic where he can create small pink hearts that can be thrown at enemies to turn them into an ally. Since Kirby's Adventure, the Kirby games have introduced a large variety of Copy Abilities, which grant him numerous powers and costumes, including Sword. For a period of time beginning with 2002's Kirby: Nightmare in Dream Land, Kirby consistently appeared in North American promotional material with a more serious expression than in Japan, where his expression was cheerful. Kumazaki said that the more battle-ready appearance was intended to appeal to a wider audience in North America, based on feedback and market research from Nintendo of America. Discussing Kirby's portrayal in Nightmare in Dream Land, Sakurai said that Kirby's voice acting had been purposefully restricted because clear speech would have seemed unnatural for a pixelated sprite character, and could typecast him as a particular type of character. Kirby's spherical shape presented certain challenges when transitioning him to a 3D character. Tatsuya Kamiyama at HAL Laboratory explained that it was difficult to determine which direction he was facing when viewed from behind, which meant that facing enemies correctly in order to inhale and spit them out could create frustration. This was particularly problematic for ranged attacks, so for Kirby and the Forgotten Land a subtle, automatic homing system was developed to help the player target nearby enemies. Kumazaki said that the Mouthful Mode concept began by asking what Kirby is and exploring his shape-shifting nature, as the team wanted him to have inhuman abilities. He also said that although Kirby's Mouthful Mode appears to give him the ability to hold anything in his mouth, there are rules governing what he can swallow. During development, the team focused on defining the different shapes he could make and what he could do with the shapes, rather than giving him new powers. He also explained that the core concept of each game in the series is to make Kirby the hero, although the character has no aspirations or sense of morality due to being a pure, blank slate character.

Did You Know?

• Kirby's official height is 20 cm (about 8 in).
• The name 'Kirby' was chosen partly in honor of American lawyer John Kirby, who defended Nintendo in the Universal City Studios, Inc. v. Nintendo Co., Ltd. case.
• Kirby's gender is listed as 'unknown' in the Kirby series encyclopedia Hoshi no Kābī Pupupu Taizen.
• Kirby appears white in Kirby's Dream Land due to the grayscale palette of the Game Boy system, but Sakurai always intended the character to be pink.
• For Kirby and the Forgotten Land, a subtle automatic homing system was developed to help players target nearby enemies due to challenges with Kirby's spherical shape in 3D.