The Kirby Effect

[jman2050]

What is the Kirby Effect you ask? First, some background. It was oh, say a year ago when my little brother downloaded the rom for Kirby's Adventure for the NES (he loved Kirby in SSBM and decided to play one of his games). When I found out, I was a bit bewildered. You see, when Kirby first came out, I was neither impressed nor curious. The game had a very distinct kiddy look to it and when I read up on it, looking at the gameplay, I was revolted. It just did not seem interesting to me at all. I even remember playing through the first level or so, and not being interested in the game to play further.

So my brother goes, starts Nesticle and fires up the rom. It looked very stupid to me and so I left. However, curiosity at the game (having experience in video games teaches you to give every game a chance) caused me to try it for myself. From that day on, I was hooked. Me and my brother spent almost every day getting through the game, until the final battle on the warp star. The game was so simplistic, yet addictively fun with all the different powers you could get. It was amazingly fun. Since then I have played through Kirby Super Star, which I loved, and Kirby's Dream Course, which is deceptively enjoyable as well.

So what is the Kirby effect? The phenomenon in which a video game which you had previously thought was not good even after playing it for a bit ends up being one of your favorite games of all time. It can also refer to games that have this effect, such as the aforementioned Kirby series as well as another enjoyable but previously rejected game of mine, Ice Climbers.

So I ask: Have you ever experienced the Kirby effect, not neccesarily now but even in the past with older games?

[vegeta1215]

I've had the Kirby Effect on many music cds :) I'll buy a cd just for the single, and deem the rest of the album to be crap after only listening to the whole thing once or twice through all the way. Then after a while I start to like the other songs, which turn out to be better than the single!

In gaming, there are generally games I never bothered to play, usually old games, that I find myself picking up and giving a try, and I wind up liking them.

As for Kirby himself, I own the original Kirby's Dreamland for GB and Kirby's Pinball land. I think the only other Kirby games I've played are Kirby's Dreamcourse for SNES (which is really fun!)

[Dr. Mutagen]

I basically had the Kirby Effect with the Zelda Series. When the first couple of Zelda games came out, I guess I wasn't thoroughly impressed by them since I never actually played them. But ever since a friend got me hooked on A Link to the Past when I was in 4th grade, I decided to check out those two games and every Zelda game that has come out since. That's how I became the Zeldaholic I am now.

[vegeta1215]

Now that I think of it, Zelda II: The Adventure of Link is one of those games. I had it right when it came out, but I never got past the swamp dungeon cause I thought te game was too hard. But not long ago I picked it up and tried it again, and wound up beating it, and realizing that Zelda II is one of the best Zelda games ever made!

[Ultra22Lemming]

Hehe, Kirby is in all of us. I loved him since he came out!

Well I've had the reverse effect for a game. I thought Halo was an ok game until I played it. It was bad in my eyes.

[Dr. Mutagen]

Yeah. I saw Halo for XBox and I wasn't that impressed. Not nearly as good and fast-paced as 007: Nightfire.

[KJAZZ]

Yeah, this happened with Final Fantasy. o_O

I wanted LttP, but saw FF6 (3eng:P) at Block Buster a long time back, and rented it and yaddayaddayadda..;p

[SSJDragon420]

I had that effect with pretty much all rpgs, I thought they all looked boring as hell and would be completely gay, But than one day my friend (who now hates rpgs I dunno what happened) brought over FF7, So I started playing and I got hooked and now I've like alot of rpgs since.

And now that I've seen your avatar KJAZZ you reminded me that I also hated Mike Tysons Punch out for nintendo, But I played it a little while back and I was hooked and kept playing till I finally beat it.

[Tudorcat]

Well the Kirby effect hit me like lightning somewhat 2 years ago:

I was babysitting a friend of mines kids and they where playing Banjo Kazooie to the n64 and I first thought it looked and sounded very "silly" and stupid. But after the kids had gone to bed I just had to tryed it and I played all night, I didnt go to bed myself. And the next day I went to the local mall and bought the game myself and JOY when I realized that the sequal had came out a few days before = ) I hope they will make an apperance on the GC that litlle cool bird and the stupid bear ...

[Ian]

That's happened to me with some cd's and StarCraft. Evan (Ewild for those of you who joined in the past few months) came home with it one day, and I thought it wasn't very good. But after a few days of him playing it all the time, I decided to play it and bang, I've been hooked on it ever since.

[Dr. Mutagen]

Come to think of it, I had the Kirby Effect with Nine Inch Nails: The Downward Spiral. I thought the cd sucked when I first listened to it. Of course, this was before I was a complete techno freak. I decided to listen to it a few more times and suddenly I grew to like it.