Kirby and the Forgotten Land Switch 2 review: $20 upgrade will have fans tickled pink

Among the numerous pleasant surprises added to the Switch library over the years, Kirby and the Forgotten Land has to be up there among the most memorable.

Nobody could have predicted that Kirby would finally get to star in a full 3D adventure, least of all that it would end up being one of the most enjoyable Kirby titles ever (not to mention the best-selling).

The only real complaints people aimed at the game were that it was a tiny bit on the short side, and didn’t deliver the same slick and smooth performance expected by Nintendo’s usual standards.

This new Nintendo Switch 2 Edition aims to fix both of these issues in one fell swoop, delivering extra content and improved performance. It’ll cost you an extra $20 for the privilege, mind you, but it’s just about worth it.

First and foremost, much like the Switch 2 Editions of The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild and Tears of the Kingdom, Kirby and the Forgotten Land: Nintendo Switch 2 Edition + Star-Crossed World (a bit of a mouthful, appropriately) makes the game look and run the way it deserves to.

The game’s base resolution has been given a hefty upgrade, meaning whether you’re playing in docked or handheld mode the picture is much clearer and sharper.

If you haven’t played Forgotten Land since its original release you’d be forgiven for not noticing much of a difference, but I played it again for a while before receiving the Switch 2 upgrade and with the original fresh in my mind it’s an obvious improvement.

Far more noticeable is the boost from 30 frames per second to 60. Kirby and the Forgotten Land isn’t the fastest game in the world so the fact it originally ran at 30fps wasn’t a complete game-breaker, but there were a few fast-paced sections where an improved frame rate would have really helped.

By shifting everything up to 60fps, the game doesn’t just feel a lot slicker and more polished as a result, but those faster sections – like the Kirby Car time trials or the rollercoaster section – play a lot better with more responsive controls and a better chance to react quickly to oncoming items and obstacles.

As welcome as the performance boost is, the main event here – and the thing that makes Kirby and the Forgotten Land a $20 upgrade instead of a free one like Pokémon Scarlet & Violet – is the new Star-Crossed World expansion.

Playing the game with the update applied – you can use your existing save or start a new one – triggers a new cutscene in which a huge sparkly meteor crash-lands on the world. Crystals fly out from the meteor and are scattered across the land, so it’s up to Kirby to check them out and rescue the Starries trapped there.

Unlike the Switch re-release of Super Mario 3D World, which added its new Bowser’s Fury content as a completely separate mode, Star-Crossed World instead integrates itself into the existing game.

Each of the game’s six standard worlds now gets a couple of ‘Starry Stages’ added to the map. If you’ve already played and beaten the game you can load your existing save and start playing through those stages right away, otherwise each world’s Starry Stages appear when you beat that world’s final boss.

These 12 new stages could technically be described as ‘remixes’ of existing levels because many of them start off the same as their standard equivalents. In reality, however, most of them go off on so many tangents and so many new routes and features that they really do stand on their own.

They each have their own missions too, much like the standard stages do, meaning as well as clearing the stage and rescuing the hidden Starries – which essentially act like the trapped Waddle Dees in the normal levels – there are other hidden things to find and set-pieces to trigger before the stage can be considered 100% complete.

It may be lazy to say it, but there really isn’t a better way of describing these stages as “more of the same”. While there are a few new Mouthful Modes – the comedy power-ups that see Kirby enveloping himself over a giant item and using its properties – they don’t transform the game any more than the existing 14 already do, they’re just a few extra ideas on top of what’s already there.

To be clear, Kirby and the Forgotten Land is already a brilliant game, so an extra 12 stages (not to mention a few other little secrets that we won’t spoil) can only be welcomed. But anyone hoping that the addition of Star-Crossed World to the game’s title means it’s a similarly original, standalone mode like Bowser’s Fury was will be disappointed to find it’s little more than a level pack, albeit a fun one.

To be fair, Bowser’s Fury was a different situation because the 5.9 million players who already owned the Wii U version of Super Mario 3D World were being asked to fork over an extra $60 for the Switch re-release, meaning Nintendo had to justify this with a substantial helping of new content.

Given that Kirby and the Forgotten Land’s Switch 2 Edition is available as an upgrade this time, this means Nintendo only has to justify an extra $20 of content. In that respect, given how much better the game now looks on top of the extra few hours of gameplay included, it’s a fair deal.