2003's Kirby Air Ride was "ahead of its time," Nintendo exec says, and the Switch 2 sequel might finally let people appreciate "the genius of Masahiro Sakurai"

Kirby Air Ride got a tepid response from critics when it launched some 22 years ago, but the racing game nonetheless developed a cult following, and director Masahiro Sakurai is getting the chance to return for a Switch 2 sequel called Kirby Air Riders. One Nintendo exec believes the game was ahead of its time, and perhaps it's only now that the world is ready to understand Sakurai's "genius."

"It's great to see [Sakurai] come back to lead and direct a Kirby game again for the first time in a couple of decades," Bill Trinen, Nintendo of America's VP of product and player experience, tells IGN. "But I think more importantly, I've always felt that Kirby Air Ride on GameCube was a game that was ahead of its time and maybe not fully understood at the time that it came out."

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Kirby Air Ride launched on GameCube in 2003 to a middling 61 on Metacritic. The controls, where you automatically accelerate and simply guide steering and braking, were roundly criticized as being overly simplistic. Nevertheless, it sold well enough to get the "Player's Choice" bestseller tag, and it's clear that there are a lot of players with very fond memories of it.

"I'm just really excited because there's a core group of people that played that game on GameCube that love it to death," Trinen continued. "And number one, I'm just happy because for them, this is such a big announcement and it's so good to see their excitement. But at the same time, I think that with where we are in the game industry today, I think we've got a real opportunity to introduce a much bigger audience to Kirby Air Riders. And I think people will finally really begin to appreciate just what I think is the genius of Masahiro Sakurai and what he created with that game."

Since the launch of Air Ride all those years ago, Sakurai has directed numerous Smash Bros. games, and between those games and the dev's fantastic YouTube series on game creation, he's built quite a reputation among fans. It's easy to see those fans coming in with a much more open mind for Kirby Air Riders later this year, but I suppose we'll just have to wait and see how it turns out in the end.

Kirby Air Riders is just one of many upcoming Switch 2 games.