Kirby General Discussion Thread (fun edition)

[Moon_Crasher]

Added to it, those are stated to be "located near Popstar" (Page 26). I have it in my to-do list to rework all related calcs.

That said, being closer to Popstar is not the same as being smaller in size. Have you seen the the Planet Popstar blog and all the info over its size?

What I mean is, the planets aren't aligned perfectly in that Meta Knightmare Ultra cutscene, so due to depth perception some planets may be closer or farther to the screen (such as how Nova is layered over the planets when it goes to towards Popstar in the in-game map) making it questionable if it is reliable to use as an exact method to get Popstar's size. (though, Popstar is clearly still bigger than all of them since they're not that spread out in the MKU cutscene)

But then again, after beating each boss in Milky Way Wishes a connection/chain of sorts will lead to the next planet, implying that they are somewhat in the same plane. So, it's possible that the planets are aligned during the events of Milky Way Wishes but not during the final stages of Meta Knightmare Ultra for whatever reason, it could be due to time the of day and planets shifting place over the course of time due to natural orbit or it could just be standard Kirby weirdness.

 

[Eficiente]

That same Jpn. guide comments over that connection energy thing between planets. It is 100% canon, created by the star power of each planet.

If it's too many issues we can use the Star Allies 3D map as well. I need to see all the numbers and arguments against and in favor on paper.

 

[Moon_Crasher]

That same Jpn. guide comments over that connection energy thing between planets. It is 100% canon, created by the star power of each planet.

If it's too many issues we can use the Star Allies 3D map as well. I need to see all the numbers and arguments against and in favor on paper.

What about planet curvature scaling? That would still affect the size, wouldn't it?

 

[Moon_Crasher]

What about planet curvature scaling? That would still affect the size, wouldn't it?

Actually, if we assumed Nova was the size of a planet (Earth sized), would planet curvature scaling still be necessary? Since Nova is essentially a cylinder and not a sphere, I'd imagine it function differently under these rules.

(Nova's sprite is 14 pixels in the Milky Way Wishes map btw).

 

[Eficiente]

What about planet curvature scaling? That would still affect the size, wouldn't it?

I'm sure that sounds right but I'm not well-informed to give a meaningful opinion, and I'm too busy to check the ins and outs of that. I'm sure it will be simple once I get to it.

Actually, if we assumed Nova was the size of a planet (Earth sized), would planet curvature scaling still be necessary? Since Nova is essentially a cylinder and not a sphere, I'd imagine it function differently under these rules.

(Nova's sprite is 14 pixels in the Milky Way Wishes map btw).

Nova's size is such a f*cking mess. In Air Riders, we have this shot of a super tiny Nova next to a massive Popstar, and that's not all of Popstar, it's a small part, we don't even see a "star tip" form properly, that's how close we are. And Popstar was in the background, smaller from the view, and Nova was closer to us, bigger to our view. Then we have this shot of Nova in its race track, attacking a planet in the background while Nova further away than the planet (See the race track itself), so Nova is comparable to that planet. Nova is shown to be building-sized in the race track itself, as we enter it, but the planet has a proven population inside, meaning that Nova has to be planet-sized (Or those portals used to reach Nova made Kirby & co. small country-sized, which is stupid...and a little consistent with other portals in the series).

I can ignore a building-sized Nova, I can see that as very much not intented. But what gives? Is Nova planet-sized and Popstar is much, much bigger than a regular planet? Modern sources about Popstar agree. Or is Nova the size of a very small planet? That could very much be the case for the planet it attacked, making Nova comparable, making Nova's size unknown next to Popstar bc we know it is smaller and that first image I showed could have been replicated with any small object, given the angle.

So f*ck Nova in terms of using its size to get Popstar's. Let's use the planets, which must be planet-sized bc MMW and Star Allies show them all as comparable to Popstar, Rainbow Curse shows island-like "worlds" as comparable to Popstar, the HWC hypes out the amount of resources in Popstar after years of resource-stealing planets across galaxies, Popstar is big enough to crash with the New World to destroy both planets, etc. Meanwhile Nova has a plot-relevant sprite game map with a sprite animation going on only in its favor.

 

[Moon_Crasher]

I'm sure that sounds right but I'm not well-informed to give a meaningful opinion, and I'm too busy to check the ins and outs of that. I'm sure it will be simple once I get to it.

Nova's size is such a f*cking mess. In Air Riders, we have this shot of a super tiny Nova next to a massive Popstar, and that's not all of Popstar, it's a small part, we don't even see a "star tip" form properly, that's how close we are. And Popstar was in the background, smaller from the view, and Nova was closer to us, bigger to our view. Then we have this shot of Nova in its race track, attacking a planet in the background while Nova further away than the planet (See the race track itself), so Nova is comparable to that planet. Nova is shown to be building-sized in the race track itself, as we enter it, but the planet has a proven population inside, meaning that Nova has to be planet-sized (Or those portals used to reach Nova made Kirby & co. small country-sized, which is stupid...and a little consistent with other portals in the series).

I can ignore a building-sized Nova, I can see that as very much not intented. But what gives? Is Nova planet-sized and Popstar is much, much bigger than a regular planet? Modern sources about Popstar agree. Or is Nova the size of a very small planet? That could very much be the case for the planet it attacked, making Nova comparable, making Nova's size unknown next to Popstar bc we know it is smaller and that first image I showed could have been replicated with any small object, given the angle.

So f*ck Nova in terms of using its size to get Popstar's. Let's use the planets, which must be planet-sized bc MMW and Star Allies show them all as comparable to Popstar, Rainbow Curse shows island-like "worlds" as comparable to Popstar, the HWC hypes out the amount of resources in Popstar after years of resource-stealing planets across galaxies, Popstar is big enough to crash with the New World to destroy both planets, etc. Meanwhile Nova has a plot-relevant sprite game map with a sprite animation going on only in its favor.

Is Stardream and the Acess Ark still valid?

(I did find a bunch of high-quality promotional art that could be used to get the size difference since in game screenshots can vary)

If Nova isn't valid, Hotbeat which is also 14 pixels (as mentioned earlier), should still be.

(12742/14)*64 = 58,249.1428571 km (this is without using planet curvature scaling since I'm still unsure if it's necessary).

Here's the page for planet curvature scaling btw. So you can look into it when you have the time.

Not fully sure why we're not using Super Star Ultra for Popstar's size, but the planet is slightly tilted in that game unlike the original where it's flat, so it'd be preferable imo.

 

[Eficiente]

Is Stardream and the Acess Ark still valid?

(I did find a bunch of high-quality promotional art that could be used to get the size difference since in game screenshots can vary)

Took me a while to figure this out, but my idea of using the Access Ark was before the Air Riders stuff came up last year. With Nova's size put into question, so should Start Dream.

Granted, Star Dream has a better reason to be planet-sized than Nova, being said to be a "new hoshi [Star, planet, celestial body]" in a pause description, with 2 different sources calling Star Dream the greatest machine in space, which should put it above Nova, in a way that Star Dream could be bigger; we don't know, maybe they are the same size, maybe the HWC built them bigger for more power and capacity. But this is not good enough.

Let's focus on the planets shown in the 3d map from Star Allies, and the planets shown in the 2d maps from MMW, and then we can throw in the Nova and Star Dream stuff as supporting evidence.

Also, promotional art may very well be disproportionate. The game shows many shots of Star Dream next to Popstar in gameplay and cutscenes, all consistent save from the gameplay when Kirby is close to it (understandably so).

If Nova isn't valid, Hotbeat which is also 14 pixels (as mentioned earlier), should still be.

(12742/14)*64 = 58,249.1428571 km (this is without using planet curvature scaling since I'm still unsure if it's necessary).

Hotbeat was the smallest, wasn't it? Bc of its flames around. It's more of a fantasy planet that's kind of like a star, but it's not actually a star inside due to having land. Seems like using that planet would artificially lift the numbers. An Earth-like planet with land and water seen from space is far more likely to be Earth-sized, meanwhile why would we assume a fantasy planet is 100% Earth-sized if this makes it so the bigger "Earth-like planets" around (at least 2) are a tad bigger? Clearly Hotbeat is the outlier, the more fantasy-like planet could be of any size, even a tad smaller than Earth. Or maybe it isn't, and they just wanted to make all sprites the same size, and its flames took on too much space.

Here's the page for planet curvature scaling btw. So you can look into it when you have the time.

Ok then. Thank you.

Not fully sure why we're not using Super Star Ultra for Popstar's size, but the planet is slightly tilted in that game unlike the original where it's flat, so it'd be preferable imo.

That's correct.

 

[Moon_Crasher]

Hotbeat was the smallest, wasn't it? Bc of its flames around. It's more of a fantasy planet that's kind of like a star, but it's not actually a star inside due to having land. Seems like using that planet would artificially lift the numbers. An Earth-like planet with land and water seen from space is far more likely to be Earth-sized, meanwhile why would we assume a fantasy planet is 100% Earth-sized if this makes it so the bigger "Earth-like planets" around (at least 2) are a tad bigger? Clearly Hotbeat is the outlier, the more fantasy-like planet could be of any size, even a tad smaller than Earth. Or maybe it isn't, and they just wanted to make all sprites the same size, and its flames took on too much space.

Well, my issue with Aquarius is that it seems to just be a giant fishbowl made of glass when shown in higher detail, compared to Hotbeat which at least has a rocklike surface when shown in higher detail, which makes it feel closer to a real planet than Aquarius, despite it being on fire.

Aquarius also seems to be somewhat hollow too.

They're both called planets, are both spherical, can hold life on them, and have normal gravity, so either one being used for the size of a regular planet is ultimately fine by me.

Any other planet likely wouldn't be usable due to not being fully spherical (Floria, Cavius, and Mekkai) or being obscured by clouds (Skyhigh and Halfmoon).

 

[Moon_Crasher]

Also, promotional art may very well be disproportionate. The game shows many shots of Star Dream next to Popstar in gameplay and cutscenes, all consistent save from the gameplay when Kirby is close to it (understandably so).

I wouldn't necessarily say that, using the measurements we have of the two we get a noticeable difference.

Measurement 1: (12,742/169)*834 = 62,880.6390533 km

Measurement 2: (12,742/55)*310 = 71,818.5454545 km

That's a near 10,000 km difference between the two measurements.

I think the sprite-based games are probably the best for getting Popstar's size since screen resolution between computers and videos can easily skew results by a bit, being able to just use the actual sprites and the screen resolution of the SNES (256 by 224) for the planet curvature scaling makes getting a solid value much easier.

 

[Moon_Crasher]

Isn't the Star Allies map a bit inconsistent? (and no, I'm not talking about Kirby being nearly the same height as Castle DDD, that's just standard overworld logic)

Example 1 and Example 2.

Also, measuring Popstar with that method seems like a bit of a nightmare, as I explained earlier, I believe using the exact sizes of the sprites is the easiest method that wouldn't change between the screen resolution of another PC.