Nendoroid Kirby review

I think everyone knows about Kirby by now; we know he loves to eat food, we know he's adorable, as he is known to go on these adventures to save the cutesy world of Dream Land from any ominous gods of powers beyond your wildest imagination. You should be aware of him by now if you've either played one of his games, mained him occasionally in Smash Bros, or saw the anime Kirby: Right Back At Ya (which had a pretty good English dub, don't let subtitle suckers tell you otherwise). That said, I technically had a bit of history with this Nendoroid, though it was my brother's, and it was a bootleg. As far as I remember, the paint quality seemed decent but the mouths were redder on some of the faceplates while the magnets are made differently. Now I have an official version after Amazon fucked up and canceled my preorder, so let's see if waiting a whole decade later for an official Kirby was worth it!

Here we have Kirby in-hand. Given his design, the only priorities are that the eyes and cheek paint apps are as straight in his face as they possibly can be, and that the magnets work so the stubs and feet can stay on his body. Thanks to said magnets, his articulation is extremely fluid at those four appendages, so he won't have any issues with however you want to pose him; just know that the mouth and the peg hole near his rear won't work (and yes, the latter looks vulgar). One issue is that without the display base, he ends up falling back, and I wish the feet were flatter so he can stand on his own. In fact, I have seen people talk about how their Kirbies tend to get either sticky or grimey after some time, either from being in storage or general exposure to certain room temperatures, so be careful if you clean him. Setting aside this being a technical time bomb, Kirby also has a cool feature for swapping parts: the faces can be twisted off and replaced with three of the other options he comes with: one includes him sucking whatever is in his range or him fully stuffed or puffed up as he flies.

Some of the other accessories he comes with include a stub meant to hold either his wand or his sword, and angry faces to accommodate either his Sword or Fire abilities. We also have hats appropriate for each ability. Further still, an additional stand is included for the fire effect part. The biggest issue with the hats is they don't stay on as well as the limbs due to the weight they have, and I have a feeling it will mostly apply to other hats. At the very least, all of the accessories are nicely painted, and they feel just as nice in-hand as Kirby himself 

As far as other versions of Kirby are concerned, we have the 30th anniversary version with a retro smile, a more modern face with starry eyes, an expression with his eyes comedically wide like an animanga character would, and one of him looking dizzy. The other is of the chef variety meant to tie-in with Kirby Cafe. His cheeks are more squiggly to fit the artstyle, and he also comes with a face of him with his mouth full (but not the whole body) as well as a chef hat, a fork, and cup, a sign for said cafe, a dessert piece, some icing on his face, and the icing tube. 

Planet Robobot also got some attention, with the mech suit either including its own Kirby or sold on its own. The helmet and the determined face complete the look of the cover art, and I want my hands on this asap. I wonder if it is made of die-cast....

As for power ups, we have Ice Kirby with his body in baby blue, and Beam Kirby, with a removable jester hat so he can be Keeby if you want. I love the headpiece on Ice Kirby for how much it looks like a Crystal Crown while he uses a similar set up for his ice wind. He comes with a spitting star piece as well as a parasol, headband, and sleeping faces for normal Kirby. Beam Kirby uses larger beam pieces but has no accessories meant for regular Kirby.

For anyone wondering about a size comparison, here he is with Pac-Man from the Figuarts line. The scale almost fits since I would imagine Kirby would still be small, but keep in mind that Smash Bros scale isn't in consideration. I love putting these two since they're both well-rounded food lovers, they both have limbless forms somehow, and they tend to go against threats bigger than them. Hell, Pac-Man World 3 predated the Robobot concept with the round dude riding a Toc-Man now used for good rather than identity theft in the first game. As for Nendoroid Kirby, he has some issues with longevity for the texture and some of the hats not staying on that great, but he's easily my favorite Nendoroid that I own and possibly of all time. With how samey the super deformed motif is for Nendoroids in general, especially with the whole "oh they have two extra faceplates where they are angry or cutesy", but being a wholly simple yet different design does this super tuff pink puff so many favors. I know I will feel like I am repeating myself if I ever review the Ranma duo, but I don't think that will be the case when I review Meta Knight. I hope Bandana Waddle-Dee and King Dedede get reissues, but apart from the already existing blue and yellow Kirbies, I want ones in red, green, purple, brown, light brown, white, grey; in fact, give me all the Kirbies!

Final ranking: ⭐⭐⭐⭐ out of ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐