Kirby Star Allies Assignment: Elements
This post contains spoilers for Kirby Star Allies.
When my professor spoke of what he wanted in this blog post, he talked at length about Red Dead Redemption; about how it creates an immersive experience of the Wild West that bridges the gap between fiction and reality.
Kirby is nothing like Red Dead Redemption.
There are very few Kirby games that could be described as immersive. Forgotten Land comes the closest, due to having a world modeled after Earth, and how minimalist the UI is. Kirby Canvas Curse also comes to mind; it's not immersive for any sense of realism, rather, the game feels like an experimental piece of modern art. But other than these two examples, the series never tries to be immersive; they're fun platformers for all ages.
Although, nearly every Kirby game has a tonal shift at the end, when Kirby comes face to face with a terrifying entity. These are probably the most immersive that most Kirby games will get, but even then the colorful UI and cartoony sound effects don't disappear. Rather, the purpose of these fights is to show how optimism will always triumph over negativity.
Star Allies, being a celebration of the series' 25th anniversary, tells this message more strongly than ever by having a final boss who is the embodiment of nihilism and complete opposite of Kirby. The final boss' connection to Kirby is communicated wordlessly through music, blending this element together with narrative.
By completing the main story, the Guest Star speedrun mode, the post-launch Heroes in Another Dimension epilogue story, and defeating the boss rush mode a minimum of 3 times, the player unlocks the highest difficulty level of boss rush, at the end of which is the true final boss: Void. The music that plays during this fight is the final movement of "Suite: The Star-Conquering Traveler", titled "Sparkling Star". The title is a reference to the Sparkling Stars that Kirby collects in his debut game "Kirby's Dream Land".
"Sparkling Star" opens with a minor-key waltz-rhythm rock arrangement of Green Greens, a classic song often used to represent Kirby as a character, mixed together with the Song of Supplication, the theme of the destructive Jambandra cult. This is the same as the song used during the fight against Void Termina in Story Mode, but at the point where that song would loop, "Sparkling Star" changes. The tempo slows down to half speed. The electric guitar that played the melody in the first part is now replaced by a piano, with a choir accompanying.
In the second loop of this piano section, 4 minutes and 27 seconds into the song, the square waves of the Game Boy join the orchestra; the same instruments used in Kirby's Dream Land, which released on April 27th 1992. In the third loop of this somber section, the square waves take over the melody, and make the song sound even more like the first Green Greens, but still in a minor key like the rest of Sparkling Star.
This song tells a story to long-time Kirby fans. The details of this story are not clear, due to the fact that it is told without words. Fans debate over whether Void is a past incarnation of Kirby, or another member of Kirby's species. Despite its lack of words, the story told by this song is emotionally gripping and a wonderful conclusion to the series.
Other immersive/interesting moments in Star Allies include: 
