By The Kirby (tentative) listings for Gamecube and Wii in Nintendo’s financial reports weren’t vaporware. Right after Kirby 64: The Crystal Shards came out, the Kirby team started working on a Gamecube sequel, which was briefly revealed at E3.
Shigefumi Kawase, a producer at HAL Laboratory, tried making a Kirby game with four player co-op, a feature that would eventually become part of Returns to Dreamland. This game would have come out shortly after Kirby: Air Ride, which Nintendo released in 2003.
Another canned Kirby game let players freely move around in 3D space, but was canceled because the team didn’t feel it’s quality was up to par.
A third game had a pop-up book style with an animated Kirby. The team tried to enhance Kirby’s copy abilities for this title, but like the other two games it was abandoned. Each game was in a partial state of completion. Eleven years later, we finally have Kirby Return’s to Dreamland, a console Kirby game from HAL Laboratory.
