Kirby Air Riders main menu takes cues from the Super Smash Bros desk – and after being shown in the latest Nintendo Direct, its weirdly beautiful design may already be my favorite ever

Kirby Air Riders has shown off its main menu and it's already a contender for the greatest menu of all time despite the game not being out for another month.

One thing you can always count on when it comes to a Masahiro Sakurai directed game is that it will have a unique main menu. The legendary director's games have always paid attention to UI design, with his wife Michiko Sakurai being the UI design lead on all of his titles since the original Super Smash Bros. And despite being behind some of the best menus ever made, Sakurai's latest game may have outdone them all.

During the lengthy Kirby Air Riders Nintendo Direct, Sakurai unveiled the game's menus, with it featuring a little figure of Kirby as your cursor with a bunch of signs sitting on a desk representing the various sub-menus. The minimized menus take the form of a folder's bookmarks, and the Checklist challenges screen takes the form of a clipboard which can be summoned on most menus.

This also extends to other items you would find on a desk with the info screen being projected onto an acrylic board. However, my absolute favorite detail is that the Online modes are represented by a smartphone laying on the desk. While Sakurai didn't confirm if Michiko Sakurai was the UI lead this time around, it certainly is in line with her previous works.

This menu also has Amiibo functionality, where using the Kirby Amiibo will allow you to change the little Kirby toy cursor's pose. Meanwhile, using the other Amiibo will let you swap out the figure from Kirby to whoever you happen to be using (with Bandana Waddle Dee shown off).

2 Kirby Air Riders beta weekends will give you an early preview of 3 tracks and 3 modes in the Switch 2 racing game, including City Trial, in November