The fourth and final Nintendo DS game of the Kirby series, Kirby Mass Attack (known in Japanese as Atsumete! Kirby, or "Gather! Kirby") is yet another Spin-Off title, this time featuring a Lemmings-esque style of gameplay rather than the classic Power Copying found in most Kirby games.
The game also features several sub-games, which have cameo appearances of characters from previous Kirby titles as well as characters from Kirby: Right Back at Ya!.
The central plot revolves around Necrodeus, the Big Bad of the game, who splits Kirby into 10 smaller Kirbys while the original Kirby is sleeping. Necrodeus manages to kill all the Kirbys save one that escaped alive. The lone Kirby then goes off on an adventure to save Dream Land and fight Necrodeus to reunite himself once more. In the meantime, Kirby is joined by the returning Squeaks, and Daroach, their leader, helps Kirby by giving him hints and general tips along the way.
The game was released in Japan on August 4th, 2011, North America on September 19th, 2011, Australia on October 27th, 2011, Europe on October 28th, 2011 and South Korea on December 1st, 2011.
Kirby Mass Attack provides examples of:
- 100% Completion: Collect all the medals, get gold stars on every stage, complete the Checklist, and clear all the sub-games.
- Abnormal Ammo: This game has a tank vehicle which shoots out live ammunition. Small-sized, pink ammunition...
- Air Borne Mook: Starmen appear in groups of three in Kirby Brawlball, and are worth a thousand points if Kirby can hit them. Tookey and Twizzy fly by at less regular intervals, but serve the same purpose.
- American Kirby Is Hardcore: For a change, there's angry eyes on both the North American AND Japanese boxes. That said, the North American boxart
has about half the Kirbys fighting various enemies. - Anti Poop-Socking: Some of the things Daroach may say when you stop by on his airship are reminders to take a break now and then.
- Apes in Space: Some gorilla-like Oohroos haul a next stage-opening switch onto a spaceship and take off with it. To retrieve the switch, the Kirbys must infiltrate the apes' terrestrial headquarters, find their super secret spaceship blueprints, and assemble their own functioning starship. The advanced technology is remarkable considering it is all researched, planned, and built by some mooks who die in one second-and-a-half of pounding.
- Ascend to a Higher Plane of Existence: Happens when a Kirby dies: he transforms into a white angel that slowly ascends upwards, but don't worry; the other Kirbys can bring the angel Kirby down and revert it to normal.
- Ash Face:
- Electricity does this to Kirby.
- Letting the timer run out after being set on fire results in one of these. A second later, the affected Kirby disintegrates.
- Back from the Dead:
- Kirby can save some of his clones from dying if he can grab them quickly enough.
- There's a Boss Rush at the end of the fourth level that has resurrected, stronger versions of Big Warwiggle, Great Gear, and King Eelongo.
- In Strato Patrol EOS, whenever you kill Mr. Bright (the sun), Mr. Shine (the moon) will revive him. Obviously, you must kill Mr. Shine first. But if you kill Mr. Bright four times, Mr. Shine will decide to merge with Mr. Bright's power and goes berserk.
- Badass Adorable: Kirby, especially now that he has ten Fun Size versions of himself to save the day. It's practically cuteness overload!
- Balloonacy: The Balloon Bobbleship, which appears in the fifth stage of Sandy Canyon, is some kind of gondola attached to ten balloons. The Kirbys use it to ascend into the air.
- Batman Can Breathe in Space: Zig-zagged. Kirby can breathe on a planet where the gravity is so low that he has to swim from place to place, but for this game only, can no longer breathe underwater. Lampshaded by Daroach at one point if you talk to him enough: "If there's no air in space, why is it that YOU can breathe?"
- Big Bad: Necrodeus is the game's main antagonist, commanding the Skull Gang to take over Popstar and splitting Kirby into weaker clones to prevent the hero from interfering.
- Big Eater: Kirby eats a lot of fruit to gain more Kirby clones.
- Blackout Basement: There are some of these stages and with two variations: One where the only light comes from candles and torches, and the other one where lightning flashes to illuminate everything.
- Bonus Stage: Touching a Warp Star, outside of Dedede's mouth, in Kirby Brawlball. It involves respawning Waddle Doos bouncing Kirby upwards.
- Boss Rush:
- The penultimate stage in Level 4 has harder versions of three minibosses, followed by a battle against a brand new miniboss, Buzzybat.
- The fifth level in its entirety consists of battles against the previous 4 bosses, followed by the final boss.
- Stage 4 of Kirby Quest ends with fighting King Dedede, Sweet Stuff, Bonkers, Mr. Frosty, Meta Knight or Galaxia, then finally Dark Matter.
- In Kirby Brawlball, the player can input Right, Select, B at the same time in the title screen to enter Boss Rush mode, which lets Kirby fight the bosses repeatedly.
- Collecting every medal in the game will unlock the Survival Rush sub-game, in which the player fights all of the game's main bosses and mini-bosses in a row.
- Bottomless Pit Rescue Service: Kirby's friend Kine will save him once from the drop zone in Kirby Brawlball. Two friendly Grindarr offer less protection on the left and right drops.
- Butt-Monkey: Beanbons are frequently the target of many hazard demonstrations.
- But Thou Must!: Daroach asks you if you'll collect the medals for him. If you say no, he simply comments on your sense of humor and reiterates his "request".
- The Cameo:
- In addition to the below mentioned Canon Immigrants, some characters not normally appearing in this game appear in sub-games, such as typical Kirby enemies, the Dedede Robot (which first showed up in the E3 2005 trailer for the canceled GameCube game and got a revised version known as HR-D3 in Kirby's Return to Dream Land), Meta Knight, Nightmare, and none other than Dark Matter, in his first major appearance outside his trilogy of games (i.e. Dream Land 2, Dream Land 3, and Kirby 64: The Crystal Shards). Worthy of note, it also has cameos from characters that never appeared in a game, such as Escargoon from the Kirby anime.
- Dyna Blade makes an appearance as a special move in Kirby Quest, as does a colored-in Kirby Tankbot from Kirby's Epic Yarn.
- Another special move in Kirby Quest sees Kirby riding a Moto Shotzo fleeing from a giant robot dragon, which was a boss in Trax, an old Game Boy game by HAL Laboratory.
- Canon Immigrant: A few characters from the Kirby: Right Back at Ya! anime such as Escargoon and the N.M.E Sales Guy make cameos during the sub-games.
- Circling Birdies: Objects circle Kirby when stunned.
- Classic Cheat Code: Much like in Kirby's Pinball Land, pressing Right+B+Select on the title screen for the Kirby Brawlball sub-game will cause a black cat to walk across the bottom of the screen and give you access to a Boss Rush mode.
- Clown-Car Grave: As to be expected of some of the Big Boo's Haunt stages have seemingly endless, sometimes actually endless lines of undead rising out of the ground.
- Continuity Porn: The mini-games feature a lot of returns for old Kirby enemies, as well as canonizing a handful of anime-exclusive characters.
- Corridor Cubbyhole Run:
- One of the desert stages has a very dense wind periodically occurring and cover must be taken from it.
- King Eelongo's boss battle operates like this. The boss rushes at Kirby from the edges of the screen, but the hero hides in underwater crevices and strikes the enemy when he moves over him.
- Creative Closing Credits: One can speed up the credits reel. And go fishing during the credits.
- Cumulonemesis: This game introduce the Floof enemies, cute little clouds with a bewildered expression. While most of the Floofs are harmless, the Flickerfloofs actively try to zap the Kirbys with powerful lightning attacks.
- Darker and Edgier: With a Big Bad that's played straight as the first (and so far only) Eldritch Abomination in the games to ACTUALLY come close to killing Kirby, in contrast to the other antagonists (Eldritch Abominations included) that Kirby CONSTANTLY trounces despite their difficulty and styles of attack, along with a series of elements exclusive to this game that would result in the deaths of certain Kirbys if not avoided, and despite that, many Kirbys were eliminated by the Big Bad's mooks until only one was left every time they left one of the islands... This game can easily be considered the darkest out of all the Kirby games, completely sealed in Cerebus Syndrome compared to the other games.
- Degraded Boss: Whispy Woods is a rare but nonetheless simple target appearing multiple times in Field Frenzy, but come Kirby Brawlball he's a boss again, if a Warm-Up Boss.
- Determinator:
- After being weakened and witnessing his clones be exterminated by the Big Bad, the sole remaining Kirby still goes off to fight him once again.
- When a Kirby takes a hit, he turns blue. When he takes another hit, the Kirby dies and floats up to heaven... At least, he would, if it weren't for another alive Kirby being able to launch himself towards the dead Kirby's soul, drag him down, and bring him back to life.
- Divide and Conquer: Necrodeus utilizes a rather unique version of this in the intro: he splits up Kirby into ten clones, with each having only a small part of the complete Kirby's power. Without his special abilities, Kirby was helpless against Necrodeus, allowing the skull-faced fiend to destroy the Kirbys one by one. Necrodeus would have won then and there, if one Kirby hadn't escaped.
- The Dragon: Skullord. He's a greedy pig who Necrodeus granted some of his powers to. He rules over some of the Skullys.
- Duel Boss: One of the challenges requires the player to defeat King Dedede with only one Kirby. This is both harder and easier than it sounds. Since you have only one Kirby, you can't afford to be KO'd at all; get hit by just one bomb blast, and you have to start all over. This makes the first phase of the fight somewhat tense and the second phase (which is already hectic) textbook
Nintendo Hard. The third and final phase, however, is a cakewalk, as Dedede takes surprisingly little pummeling to KO, even from a single Kirby. - Early-Bird Cameo: The Kirbys encounter Big Birdee in the first stage, and then fight her in a later stage. Then she becomes an ally to the Kirbys in an even later stage.
- A more major case would be the Dedede Robot, who as mentioned above, would reappear as HR-D3 in Kirby's Return to Dream Land 2 months later.
- Eating the Enemy:
- Notoriously averted. Due to his power being cut down to a 10th, Kirby can't inhale his enemies, unlike in almost every other game in the franchise.
- Necrodeus will send his Skullions after your Kirby gang in the final boss fight to abduct them. If you don't free your Kirbys in time, Necrodeus will have the Skullions bring the Kirbys to him and eat them.
- Electric Jellyfish: Cube-shaped jellyfish produce electricity.
- Elite Mook: Skullions are rarer, more powerful Skullys.
- End-Game Results Screen: After the credits, you get to see the results you got, such as how many enemies you defeated and how many fruits and medals you collected.
- Endless Game: Kirby Curtain Call never ends, but you can never score higher than 99.
- Enemy Roll Call: The Japanese version has
an enemy credits sequence with a few Kirbys and a bunch of enemies watching it in a theatre, but it was Dummied Out in other versions for some reason. - Final Boss:
- Necrodeus is the final boss of the main campaign, and can only be fought once the player collects all Rainbow Medals.
- In the sub-games, various other Final Bosses from previous games show up to confront Kirby. Kirby Brawlball has Marx, Strato Patrol EOS has Nightmare, and Kirby Quest has Dark Matter.
- Flash of Pain: Most bosses, as pummeling does not automatically damage all of them.
- Flunky Boss: In Kirby Brawlball, Whispy Woods has a Cappy that tries to block Kirby as you launch him with the flippers, and two Little Woods that protect Whispy. Lololo and Lalala have a Blocky blocking Kirby's way. Heavy Lobster has a Wheelie blocking Kirby's way and can produce Mini Lobsters. Heavy Lobster's paint blobs will also move on their own. Marx has a smaller version of himself, from before he wished to NOVA, blocking Kirby's path, and can spit out Bronto Burts.
- Game Within a Game: This game started a trend of the series' sub-games becoming way more fleshed out than you'd expect. There's a pinball game calling back to Kirby's Pinball Land, a kind of Quick Time Event RPG and a shoot 'em up with several levels.
- Gelatinous Encasement: The primary attack of the Snoozroot is shooting a blob of poison that envelops Kirby upon hit.
- Giant Hands of Doom:
- In Necrodeus' first phase, he attacks Kirby by pummeling him with his hands and shooting electric spheres out of his fingers. Destroying both appendages leads to the boss' second phase.
- In the tower stage of Volcano Valley, gigantic stone hands manifest out of nowhere and try to pummel your Kirbys.
- The Goomba: Beanbons, the turnip-like enemies, are the weakest enemies in the game and generally offer no threat to Kirby.
- Gotta Catch Them All: All of the Rainbow Medals in each stage must be collected in order to access the final level.
- Ground Pound: Blocky uses these in Kirby Brawlball. The resulting shockwave doesn't affect Kirby at all, but if he lands on Kirby he might push him into the drop zone and out of the boss stage.
- Heel–Face Turn:
- Daroach and the Squeaks are aiding Kirby. Not all that surprising, as they were remorseful at the end of Squeak Squad. They're thieves, not villains, especially when compared to the Skull Gang.
- Big Birdee becomes an ally to the Kirbys after they bring her babies back to her.
- Helpful Mook:
- The sentient tiny raincloud. Although it occasionally strikes with lightning, its rain can make fruit-bearing and enemy-crushing plants grow out of the ground.
- Certain aquatic enemies attack from beneath Directionally Solid Platforms, breaking steel blocks and pushing medals up from below inaccessible areas.
- The Hero Dies: If you get a Game Over, Kirby will actually die, instead of simply falling asleep or being knocked out cold.
- Homing Projectile: Whispy Woods' air shots home in during Kirby Brawlball.
- Human Snowball: Kirby is a victim at one point. The more Kirbys, the bigger the snowball. There's a medal that can be gotten with five Kirbys or less in the snowball and one with more.
- Interface Screw: Heavy Lobster's paint blobs will obscure the screen if Kirby collides with them in Kirby Brawlball.
- Invincible Minor Minion:
- Mummbons, who join the series wide Gordos as living unbreakable obstacles.
- Blocky usually isn't a "minor" minion, being a mid boss, but Lololo and Lalala are end level bosses consistently and during their boss stage in Kirby Brawlball they can be damaged but Blocky cannot be hurt or even hindered.
- Knight of Cerebus: Necrodeus is so far the only Eldritch Abomination to actually come close to killing off Kirby. In the words of the story, it was thanks to him that "Popstar was about to lose its greatest defender and be plunged into darkness forever."
- Law of 100: With fruits. Fill the meter to get either another Kirby or a load of bonus points.
- Lightning Bruiser: Heavy Lobster is the second toughest boss of Kirby Brawlball after Marx, is the fastest, much more so than Lololo and Lalala, and will dodge every time Kirby is sent at him head on unless Heavy Lobster is already in motion.
- Limit Break: As shown in this video, if you get a perfect score on Stage 4 of the Kirby Quest subgame, you get challenged by Galaxia instead of Meta Knight. If you beat it, you can use the sword to defeat Dark Matter in one hit.
- Macross Missile Massacre: Heavy Lobster can fill the screen with firebombs and missiles in Kirby Brawlball
- Man-Eating Plant: There are hostile plants from Green Grounds, but it's not until Volcano Valley that any try eating your Kirbys.
- Metal Slime:
- There are golden enemies that are quick to flee. Killing these will result in filling out part of the checklist.
- The Kirby Quest sub-game has more typical examples (being that its combat plays like a turn-based RPG), in that some enemies holding Maxim Tomatoes will give more experience than usual and the tomato will revive fallen allies for free. If an attack misses, however, they flee.
- Mission Control: Daroach acts as this, giving the Kirbys advice and updating them on the situation at hand.
- Mook Bouncer: If Kirby successfully hits Bio Spark in Kirby Brawlball, Tac will appear and attempt to move Kirby to a different part of the pinball table.
- Mook Maker: Twister can create Bouncies in Kirby Brawlball, something twisters have never been able to do before or since.
- Names to Run Away from Really Fast: Necrodeus literally means "Death God".
- No Fair Cheating: Taking a shortcut to the goal will result in getting no star for the stage.
- Nonindicative Name: There is no dashing done in Dash Course. It is a game of hopscotch. With speed instead of precision, but hopping all the same.
- Oddball in the Series: Kirby games are primarily platformers where the hero can use his enemies' own attacks against them. Mass Attack is instead akin to Pikmin, in that you guide a group of tiny Kirbies who are harmless on their own but pack a punch when united. The game's tone is one of, if not the the most oppressive in the franchise, as everyone is actually out to kill the poor pink blobs. All this plus the new graphics and the surprisingly robust sub-games were certainly in response to the criticisms Kirby: Squeak Squad faced for being too much like the Game Boy Advance installments.
- O.O.C. Is Serious Business: Once you leave the first level, you get a cutscene where Kirby is... flipping upset and scowling as his other 9 selves are ripped off the Warp Star by Necrodeus' minions and presumably Killed Offscreen.
- Oxygenated Underwater Bubbles: With the newly-added Oxygen Meter, these are added to the underwater stages to compensate. They can often be found inside clams or dropped by defeated enemies.
- Oxygen Meter: This is the only Kirby game to date to have one; underwater breathing being another one of the abilities Kirby loses when he gets split by Necrodeus. The meter starts out with three sections, becomes bigger with each Kirby you have, and can be replenished by gulping down large bubbles.
- Painful Pointy Pufferfish: The Stickles, spiky fishes that dwell in Stage 7 of Dedede Resort. In the water, they are covered in vicious spikes that damage the Kirbys on contact, but as soon as they are on dry land, the spikes retract, leaving them open for attacks.
- Product Placement: One of Daroach's general tips in the Japanese, North American and Korean versions promotes the Nintendo 3DS.
- Public Domain Soundtrack: Several stages in Sand Canyon borrow riffs from, fittingly, "The Streets of Cairo".
- Punctuated! For! Emphasis!: If you continue to pester Daroach about medals when he has no clues to give, he will eventually say, "I think I haven't gotten my point across. Let me try it more slowly... I'm. Still. Looking. For. Clues. About. Medals."
- Quicksand Sucks: Mainly in the second level and sparingly elsewhere.
- Recurring Riff:
- The world map themes of all levels are similar.
- The title screen theme pops up in several places across the soundtrack.
- Roar Before Beating: Freezy Rex, the ice dragon, starts the fight with a roar.
- Sand Worm: There are a few varieties, but a segmented version with a single eye and curved jaws may stand out.
- Scoring Points: Individual scoring for each level, and every subgame.
- Sequential Boss:
- King Dedede and Necrodeus have multiple stages.
- Also the Meta-Knights, Nightmare, and, if you do it a certain way, Mr. Shine & Mr. Bright in Strato Patrol EOS and Dark Matter in Kirby Quest without Galaxia.
- Shifting Sand Land: The second level has a few stages taking place in the desert environment.
- Shoot the Medic First: The Mr. Shine & Mr. Bright fight in Strato Patrol EOS. Mr. Shine, the moon, will keep reviving Mr. Bright. He stops doing it the fourth time, at which point Mr. Shine will become a sun-moon hybrid.
- Sizable Snowflakes: Big snowflakes approximatively half the size of a little Kirby fall in the wintry stages.
- Snowy Sleigh Bells: Snowy Zone has a beat made up of sleigh bell rings that have been cut in half to add to the song's pace.
- Spikes of Doom: Marx creates thorny vines, with roses, to block Kirby's path in Kirby Brawlball.
- Stealth Pun: The star that serves as the cursor is described as Kirby's own "heroic heart", which narrowly avoided being crushed by Necrodeus. Since the Kirbys all constantly move toward it, that means they're following their heart.
- Superboss: In chapter 4 of Kirby Quest, if Kirby never misses an attack, Galaxia shows up to fight before the player can engage the last boss. Winning lets Kirby wield the weapon in the final battle, and it can take down Dark Matter in a single hit.
- Suspiciously Cracked Wall: The player can find mysterious cracked walls in each stage. Breaking these reveals doors that instantly transport the Kirbys to the goal, but can only be entered if the player has cleared that stage at least once.
- Time Trial: Dash Course is a time trial version of 100 Yard Hop from Kirby 64: The Crystal Shards. Granted, Dash Course has different controls, much less time and no hazards.
- Title Drop: Daroach has one in one of his hints, saying that you should "mass attack" larger enemies to defeat them.
- Token Heroic Orc: All Grindarr want to kill the Kirbys, except for the two that protect Kirby from the left and right entrances to the drop zone in Kirby Brawlball.
- True Final Boss: Necrodeus can be fought by beating Skullord after collecting all of the Rainbow Medals.
- Vacuum Mouth: King Dedede sucks in Warp Stars in Kirby Brawlball. He doesn't eat them though. Entering his mouth where the Warp Star is sends Kirby to a Boss Stage.
- Wake-Up Call Boss: Kracko in Strato Patrol EOS charges around the screen erratically, killing a lot of Kirbys.
- Weakened by the Light: One of the shadowy monsters turns into a scared skull when exposed to the light.
- When Trees Attack: This game introduces Little Woods, stationary but hostile versions of Whispy Woods that are smaller than the original plant, which is also in the game.
- Wingding Eyes: The boxart for the game shows Kirby with blue star-shaped highlights in his eyes.
- Yellow Lightning, Blue Lightning: Lightning and electricity in this game is yellow.
