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When the Nintendo Switch 2 Direct aired last week, Kirby Air Riders surpassed my wildest and most unlikely wish going into the showcase. Since I eagerly awaited the official reveal of the rumored Mario Kart 9 (that would turn out to be Mario Kart World), I secretly hoped that Kirby would be revealed as a new racer. As unlikely wishes go, it's right up there, and I knew going into the livestream, it would never happen.
But with the likes of Legend of Zelda's Link, Animal Crossing: New Horizons' Isabelle, and the Inkling from Splatoon making an appearance in Mario Kart 8 Deluxe, I've daydreamed about hitting the track as my favorite pink puffball for a number of years. It was a true wild bingo card situation on my part, and of course, it didn't come true, with the reveal instead putting the likes of Moo Moo Meadows cow and Fish Bone behind the wheel.
Dream Land Driftin'
There were a lot of exciting announcements during the Switch 2 reveal, from the likes of Donkey Kong Bananza to FromSoftware's new IP, The Duskbloods. But nothing caught me off guard quite like Kirby Air Riders, and I'm still digesting the news several days later. While the original 2003 game might not be considered among the very best GameCube games in wider circles, it's always been a firm favorite of mine.
I have so many fond memories gliding through the tracks, and as a Kirby fan from a young age (Kirby's Dream Land on the GameBoy was one of the very first games I can recall playing), Air Ride on the GameCube married my love for the pink puffball, with my penchant for racing games – or car games as my kid self called them.
Mario Kart on the SNES and N64 had become mainstay fixtures in my childhood, with Mario Kart Double Dash keeping me firmly in the racing scene on GameCube in late 2003. So when Air Ride rolled around a few months later in the UK, my dad treated me and my sister to a copy, and I quickly took to its Kirby-flavored racing and fast-paced tracks.
The vehicles Kirby rides aren't your average four wheel drives, for starters. The pink blob from Planet Popstar instead hops onto a variety of different Air Ride Machines that all have their own distinctive styles. From his signature yellow Warp Star to several motorcycle-like options that take the shape of a single wheel, I can't tell you how excited I was to see some classic options in the new Air Riders trailer – including the truck-like Wagon Star and the Wheelie Bike.
The Air Ride Machines instantly set Kirby's racing adventure apart from the likes of Mario Kart and the other more traditional car-shaped racing games I'd played up until that point (like Midtown Madness 3). I loved the way they really made me feel like I was gliding through the air, just as Kirby had always done at the end of levels in his classic platforming adventures.
In Sakurai's video series where he explores the making of Kirby Air Ride, he even talks about the initial desire he had to create something that played on the fun feeling of drifting in racing games, and the team wanted to ensure that the all the Machines "feel totally different", which I think they did achieve. Even now, I can remember how I would physically lean into every turn or tight bend of a course, with Kirby smacking into the sides of the track when I failed to drift in good time. But every race felt fast-paced and, thanks to Kirby's signature copy abilities that he can inhale and use against competing racers, excitement was around every corner.
Down for the ride(rs)
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With a few different modes, from the main 3D races with a variety of tracks, to races with an old school top-down view, I have a lot of fond memories messing around in the free roaming City Trail mode. Kind of like an open arena you can zip through, you're free to explore for a short spell before you set off to find different vehicles, powerups, and items to try and best the other CPU Kirbys driving around. Sometimes, though, I'd ignore the competition altogether and simply enjoy speeding across the city streets.
Nintendo of America's VP of product and player experience Bill Trinen recently said that Kirby Air Ride was "ahead of its time", and I think the different modes and vehicles speak to that. In a sea of racing games, it felt distinctly its own — thanks to the copy abilities and Air Ride Machines — and it all works perfectly for Kirby as a character. It no doubt speaks to the fact that Sakurai was "directly involved in almost every aspect of the game", as he explained in his video series. No one knows a character quite like their creator, after all.
To know that Sakurai is returning to bring us Kirby Air Riders, alongside the Smash Bros Ultimate team at Bandai Namco, makes the follow-up not only an exciting prospect, but a meaningful one. Kirby Air Ride was actually the last Kirby game Sakurai directed before he parted ways with HAL Laboratory and went independent. He did go on to supervise Kirby and the Amazing Mirror and Kirby Nightmare in Dream Land, and the pink puffball was never too far away, since he became a mainstay fighter in Super Smash Bros (I'm naturally a Kirby main in Smash, too).
But it's great to see Sakurai back in the director chair over two decades later for an Air Ride sequel on Nintendo's next-gen console. It's something I could could never have predicted, but I'm so glad it's happening – not only for longtime fans like me, but for newcomers who will get to experience Kirby's own special blend of racing magic.
So maybe Kirby won't be joining Mario Kart (I was only kidding myself there), but Kirby Air Riders is the stuff my dreams are made of. I can't wait to see what it will draw from the original, and how it will bring Kirby Air Ride into a very new generation 22 years on. One thing's for sure: I'm so ready to hop back on the Warp Star in 2025.
Get a recap of everything set to come to the new-gen console with our roundup of upcoming Switch 2 games.
