Kirby

Kirby
Universe	Kirby
Appears in	Super Smash Bros. Super Smash Bros. Melee Super Smash Bros. Brawl Super Smash Bros. 4 Super Smash Bros. Tourney Super Smash Bros. Tourney 2: The New Challengers
Availability	Starter
Bonus Costume	No Bonus Costume
English voice actor	Makiko Ōmoto
Japanese voice actor	Makiko Ōmoto
French voice actor	{{{frenchactor}}}
German voice actor	{{{germanactor}}}
Arabic voice actor	{{{arabicactor}}}
Mandarin Chinese voice actor	{{{chineseactor}}}

How Kirby joined the Tourney

Kirby began as an entirely different character design named Popopo that starred in Masahiro Sakurai's early NES game in development, originally called "Twinkle Popopo". During development he used a placeholder sprite resembling a ball with a happy face on it. Sakurai eventually came to prefer this more simplistic design and decided to use this character design instead of the original one. The little protagonist was eventually named Kirby and the game itself named Kirby's Dream Land.  A later design change gave Kirby one of his most alluring characteristics -- his color. Kirby was originally to be yellow, but Sakurai had imagined him as pink. His name has two possible inspirations: a vacuum cleaner company named Kirby Corporation, or the legal counsel of Nintendo, John Kirby, who saved Nintendo during a copyright infringement lawsuit filed by Universal Studios over the name of Donkey Kong.

Character Select Screen Animation

When highlighted

Waves at the camera.

After the announcer calls his name

Kirby stands on the front of his feet and waves saying "HIIIIIII!".

Special Attacks

Inhale (Neutral)

When the special move button is pressed, Kirby opens his mouth and begins to inhale, creating a vortex of wind. Kirby will not stop inhaling until the button is released. If a character comes near the vortex, they will automatically be sucked inside Kirby, who will bloat up with the person inside of him. He cannot move in Super Smash Bros., while in Melee and Brawl, he will move at extremely slow speeds and jump a short distance. Increased weight causes Kirby to fall faster as well. The goal of the attack is to swallow the victim (by pressing down or the special move button), which will make Kirby copy their powers, enabling him to perform that character's neutral special move (the character pops out after being swallowed and can still perform their neutral special attack). If Kirby traps the wrong character in his mouth, or simply doesn't want the character's move, Kirby can spit the character out by pressing the attack button and it has set knockback. Any player who is hit by the character that was spit by Kirby will take damage and decent vertical knockback. For a full list of copy abilities, see Copy ability.

Hammer (Side)

Kirby takes hold of a hammer and horizontally swings it forwards, dealing a strong blow to enemies at medium range.

Final Cutter (Up)

Kirby draws a silver blade, similar to a scimitar, jumps into the air a bit less than the height of Falco's full jump, (meaning that it's a decent vertical recovery), and falls quickly, releasing a blue "wave" projectile forward if he lands on a solid surface, traveling the distance of a Falco Phantasm.

Stone Kirby (Down)

Kirby transforms into a rock, becoming impervious to damage and knockback for a short time.

Super Inhale (Hyper Smash)

Same as the regular Inhale, but allows Kirby to inhale bigger opponents such as Azazel. After copying someone's ability, Kirby's Hyper Smash will be the same as the owner's Hyper Smash.

Cook Kirby (Final Smash)

Kirby puts on a chef's hat and clangs a spatula & frying pan, and nearly everything within a limited radius is drawn into the cauldron to stew. After a short while, the characters that are sucked in and various items, mostly food items, are launched upward, causing about 24% and relatively weak knockback that may not generally KO those under 100%; though this can be helped by using the move closer to the blast lines. Its true strength is in its decent range against multiple foes, and the helpful items it produces. After copying someone's ability, Kirby's Final Smash will be the same as the owner's Final Smash.

Victory Animations

All of Kirby's victory poses are variations of his victory dance from various Kirby series games.

1. Kirby spins, and holds his hand up.
2. Kirby does some flips, and holds his hand up.
3. Kirby skids to each side, and holds his hand up.

On-Screen Appearance

Kirby crash-lands a Warp Star to the ground then says "HIIIIIII!".

Trivia

• Kirby shares his Japanese voice actor with Ness, Super Megan, and Lyndis.
• In the sequel, Kirby isn't the only character who can copy other characters' moves. Irate Gamer is also capable of doing this. This doesn't remove Kirby from the roster of the sequel, though.
• Kirby's select pose resembles his famous taunt from every Smash game to date.
• All of Kirby's victory poses are silent victory poses, this is a similar trait that will also be used for Sheik, Zelda, Bruce Irvin (unless he has the correct matchups), Young Link, and fellow Kirby character King Dedede.
• As a series first, when Kirby gets a copy ability in the Super Smash Bros. Tourney series, the SFX from Kirby Super Star when Kirby gets a copy ability will be heard. Kirby will also do an animation where he looks at the camera and holds his left hand up.
• It has been confirmed that Kirby will be speaking in cutscenes, but there is no word on who will be voicing him.
• Kirby's Super Smash Bros. Tourney rival happens to be King. In Tourney 2, his second rival is also King.