It is hard not to get lost in the overall aesthetic ofKirby’s Dream Buffet. The game takes place in a world where all the Kirbys have been shrunken down, tasked with rolling around on top of cakes, donuts, and various other food items to eat up as many strawberries as they can.
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The stages are visually pleasing, but not all stages look the same. Some are courses meant for races, others are minigame stages, and the rest are battle arenas. Regardless of what purpose each stage serves, someKirby’s Dream Buffetlevels stand out more than others for a variety of reasons.
10Kirby Cake
While the minigame and battle royale stages do not have the depth of the racing courses, there are a couple of highlights among the group. One of the minigame stages that stands out is theKirby Cakelevel which, unsurprisingly, is shaped like the pink hero himself.
The stage is Kirby actively attempting to suck in something. The part of the cake that is his mouth is actively spinning, which is meant to cause misdirection when frantically participating inwhatever minigame the gamethrows at the players. While it may not be the most visually appealing, it is the most fun stage to play on in the second part of the Gourmet Royale.
9Whispy Stage Cake
The battle-royale courses have a little more depth to them than the mini-game ones as they tend to have added layers, or at least more room for players to move around on. While there are a lot of interesting stages in this category, the one that stands out the most isWhispy Stage Cake.
The level itself is pretty straight forward as it is played on a flat green surface. However, Whispy Woods,the classic bossfrom manyKirbygames, is actively part of the action. While Whispy won’t be actively attacking, players can attack the tree to get strawberries to fall down. This serves as a benefit in the venture to get strawberries and satisfying to beat up Whispy Woods again.
8Cake Rolls
The rest of the stages on this list are all racetracks because of the layer of detail that every single one has. One of the more basic races, though, is theCake Rollstrack. A lot of the path includes circular platforms that are cake rolls that players can collect strawberries or other fruit on.
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These cakes can be connected by wafer rolls that serve as narrow areas to navigate since Kirbys can easily be kicked off. There is also the occasional dash panel that is presented usually on a larger cake roll. Overall, rolling around on the cake rolls and their filling is great, but there isn’t the level of creativity that most of the other courses have.
7Shortcake
Like the Cake Rolls track,Shortcakeis apretty easy track to get through, but there is a little more depth while rolling around. Most of the tracks are wide enough where there isn’t much danger to fall off the sides or bump into other competitors. However, there are some cool pieces throughout each variation of the track.
Most variants start out with rolling up a multi-tier cake. There are also areas where players can bounce up a few slices of cake to reach a cannon that blasts Kirbys ahead of some competitors. There are even some sharp turns that involve getting through a gap, with a nice reward for jumping over it.
6Chocolate Fountain
Things start to get complex when talking about theChocolate Fountaincourse, which isone of the unlockable coursesthat players can get after reaching a specific rank. As the name implies, Kirbys will be rolling across the top of multiple chocolate fountains.
What makes the course fun is learning how to navigate the fruit and cookies floating on top of the chocolate since swimming in the liquid will cause the player to slow down. It makes for difficult traversal if players just wing it, so it is important to keep looking ahead at other platforms to get to.
5Baumkuchen
Cake is used a lot inKirby’s Dream Buffet, but the best use of it comes with theBaumkuchen. The course is one of the most colorful looking thanks to the pastry’s presence, but also because of the extra candy such as lollipops and gummies that are sprinkled throughout the course as well.
But beyond just the visuals, Baumkuchen provides unique layers tothe racing experience. After going down a few winding paths, there are a few hills that the players will need to clear. There also multiple pipes that the Kirbys roll through, including a full pipe that is spinning near the end. Add in a bunch of side paths that can net nice rewards, and it is a wonderful course to race on.
4Ice Cream
While most tracks go back and forth between having surfaces that are easy to race on and surfaces that simply slow Kirbys down,Ice Creamhas a unique surface that causes players to rethink how to control their character as there are many slippery surfaces along the way.
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The race starts out on these slippery popsicles and a few obstacles in the way. There a few buckets of ice cream that players will roll on the surface of, which will be similar to rolling on icing. Then, there is a large section that is all slippery popsicles that players will have to figure out how to navigate, including choosing whether to take risky paths for strawberry rewards.
3Doughnuts
Out of all the food items inKirby’s Dream Buffet, one of the most appetizing looking stages is theDoughnutscourse. Most of the stage is made of large donuts, which aredeceptively difficultgiven that there tend to be no barriers and not turning at the right time could lead players to falling off.
Besides the large donuts, there are also churro bridges that players who aren’t perfectly centered may have some difficulty traveling over. There are also paths that involve smaller donuts that may serve as obstacles or as pathways to dash panels. This can be brutal for the larger Kirbys as getting to a specific size will deny the player access to the small donut holes.
2Pancakes
Those who like breakfast should be big fans of thePancakescourse as it is a celebration of two of thebest sweet treatsto have in the early hours of a day: pancakes and waffles. The stage has one of the most unique traversal mechanics in the game: syrup walls.
These yellow, gooey paths is stationary as it appears along the pancake walls. Kirbys can just roll into it and slowly move upwards. In addition to this, there is a waffle area in the course with spinning pancakes that have parts cut out of them for players to roll through when the timing is right.
1Hamburgers
Everything inKirby’s Dream Buffetis presented as super sweet, so it may feel weird that there are stages in the game dedicated to the savory. However, theHamburgerracing stage in the game is very creative and delightful to play through.
Most variants of this stage start out by rolling across bacon or asparagus bridges, ending with players bouncing on the yolks of eggs to bounce up to higher platforms. There are also spinning vegetable platforms and sandwich slopes that have some tough strawberries to get. These tracks tend to have a tough bonus section to reach a cannon that can give players a huge advantage.
