Kirby

Kirby (, Kirby) is the eponymous protagonist of the series. A round, pink creature hailing from Planet, he is best known for his ability to enemies and copy their abilities, and uses these powers to defend his homeland from various threats ranging from his "arch-frenemy" King Dedede to outside evil forces such as Nightmare and. He was created by Masahiro Sakurai, who also created the  series. As a member of the "perfect-attendance crew", Kirby has been featured as a playable character throughout the entire Super Smash Bros. series.

Origin
Kirby is a resident of the yellow, star-shaped planet, and the planet's consistent hero. His round, pink form is only 20 cm (8 inches) in height, though his dimensions are obviously enlarged in the Super Smash Bros. series. Living in the peaceful kingdom of, he defends his home against foes such as his "arch-frenemy" King Dedede, and the malevolent, shadowy. Kirby is generally depicted with an innocent and easygoing personality, but he is also shown to be determined and heroic when the situation calls for it. While Kirby's species is left unclear, he is not the only one of his kind; multiple Kirby-like beings are known to exist, including Meta Knight, who bears a striking resemblance to him.

Kirby's demeanor is best described as childlike. He is often motivated solely by his instinctual needs to eat and sleep, and depending on his temperament, he may make brash decisions or allow others to take advantage of him. This extends to the point that he is occasionally compared to an infant, especially in the  anime. His voice, reflecting his nature, is comparable to a toddler learning to speak: mostly incoherent babbling with a very rare short sentence. However, Kirby does show some intelligence that an infant would not possess, particularly in his combat skills and adaptability to the situations he comes across. Kirby is also perceptive of emotions, being able to tell what others are feeling and respond appropriately.

Kirby's trademark attack is his ability to forcefully, allowing him to swallow his enemies whole or spit them back out as star-shaped projectiles. Introduced in Kirby's Adventure was the option to copy a swallowed enemy's ability to fight back (known as a Copy Ability). He has a multitude of Copy Abilities that allow him to perform a wide variety of techniques, such as wielding a sword, breathing fire, or creating beams of energy. He can also float by storing the air he inhales, making himself large and puffy.

Kirby began as an entirely different character that starred in Masahiro Sakurai's early Game Boy game in development, originally called "Twinkle Popo". 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 it as the final character. Originally called Popopo, the little protagonist was eventually named Kirby, and the game itself named Kirby's Dream Land. The name was chosen from a list of candidates provided by Nintendo of America, who wished to give the character more international appeal; Shigeru Miyamoto thought that the contrast between the cute character and the name's "harsh" sound was humorous. The name was also chosen to honor John Kirby, the attorney who defended Nintendo during a copyright infringement lawsuit filed by Universal Studios over the name of Donkey Kong.

Contrary to popular belief, Kirby was always intended to be pink, but the Game Boy's monochromatic palette led to initial confusion about his color scheme. North American marketing for Kirby's Dream Land depicted him as white, similar to the in-game graphics. Meanwhile, Miyamoto initially interpreted the character as yellow; as a result, the second player in later Kirby games is typically a yellow Kirby. His pink coloration wouldn't be seen in-game until Kirby's Adventure, the second game of the series, which also introduced the iconic Copy Abilities.

As a playable character
Kirby makes his first appearance as a starter character in Super Smash Bros.. Kirby is known for his great recovery, quick attacks which gives him a great combo game, his incredibly fast up tilt, and surprisingly long-range aerials, all of which place him high in the original game's Tier list, placing 2nd only behind Pikachu. Kirby's trademark move is Swallow, which allows him to him suck in enemies caught within the vortex and emulate their neutral special attack.

In-game description:
 * The 8-inch high Kirby hails from a distant, peaceful star. Like his simplistic appearance, he is an easily-understood character. True to his instincts, Kirby eats when he gets hungry and sleeps as soon as he grows tired. Nevertheless, Kirby remains a formidable opponent. In addition to his distinct flying and swallowing skills, he also has the ability to copy enemy attacks for ever-changing action.


 * Works:
 *  (GB)
 *  (GB)
 *  (SNES)

As a playable character
For Kirby's return in the GameCube Smash entry, he gets a redesign and has new attacks, including the as his new side special move. He is still a starter character and is still a floaty, lightweight character that can jump five times in midair. However, Kirby has been severely nerfed, losing most of his power, combo ability, and speed from Smash 64, while also being harmed by the game’s faster mechanics overall. As a result, Kirby now heavily struggles to compete against the vast majority, with most of his foes able to shrug off his approaches by overwhelming him with fast attacks and speed or by camping him. These nerfs have landed him in the F tier, rendering him 25th out of 26 characters.

Trophies
Kirby is the most extensively represented character in Melee trophies. In addition to having his set of three trophies earned through single player modes, there are five trophies named "Kirby Hat" that provide information about the powers he gains with his in-game inhale ability.

There are also trophies depicting Kirby in various guises he has taken in Kirby games:

As a playable character
Kirby returns for his third appearance in the Wii version of the Smash series. He was revealed in all trailers for Brawl before its release (also being the only character who didn't undergo drastic changes in graphics, as shown by the trailers), and was confirmed on the official website on June 7, 2007. He rounds out the roster again as a starter character and he is no longer the sole playable character of his series, as he is joined by both and. Kirby has been drastically improved since Melee, having increased reach, speed, power, combo ability, and aerial mobility. These boons have allowed him to be ranked 20th on the current tier list in D tier as a mid tier.

Kirby, like all characters, received a Final Smash in this game. Called Cook Kirby, the move allows Kirby to cook opponents and items, and then send opponents flying and release new items.

Trophies
Many of Kirby's forms are made into trophies in Brawl.

As a playable character
Kirby returns as a playable character in Super Smash Bros. 4. Kirby's Hammer attack has been replaced with a similar move called Hammer Flip, and his Final Smash was changed to Ultra Sword. Kirby does not have a new dash attack, unlike the last two games in the series.

At SSB4's initial release, Kirby had been nerfed since Brawl, with his overall range being reduced. However, Kirby benefits from general gameplay changes of SSB4, such as the changes to hitstun canceling, which allow him to perform combos more effectively. Kirby was also noticeably buffed courtesy of game updates to both versions of SSB4, improving his approach and KO power. However, such updates have not significantly patched up his key flaws, which has resulted in his representation in tournaments being scarce and his tier position being worse than it was in Brawl. He is ranked 50th on the tier list, placing him in the F tier.

As a playable character
Along with the rest of the veterans, Kirby reappears in Super Smash Bros. Ultimate as a playable fighter. He appears in the World of Light mode as the sole survivor of Galeem's initial attack. He can now inhale certain projectiles that could heal or damage him, and his dash attack is now the flame variant used in Melee.

Trivia

 * Throughout the series, all of Kirby's victory poses have been variations of the, a victory dance he performs upon completing a level or defeating a boss in his home series.
 * Additionally, he always finishes the dance at the end of the song within his home series; this carries over into the Super Smash Bros. series, as he always finishes at the end of his victory theme (itself is a remix of the level clear theme from his home series).
 * In Smash 64, Kirby only has two victory poses, as opposed to the usual three. This makes Smash 64 Kirby the only character in the series to have less than three victory poses.
 * At 20 cm (8 inches) tall, Kirby is the second shortest playable character in the Super Smash Bros. series, larger only than Captain Olimar as of Brawl with Olimar at ~1.9 cm (~0.75 inches).
 * Kirby's height was first given in Smash 64, but then canonized in Kirby 64: The Crystal Shards, and since then has been consistently given as Kirby's height in later profiles (though the actual scale of objects in the Kirby universe tends to vary).
 * Kirby uses a different dash attack in each of the first three Super Smash Bros. games. In Super Smash Bros., he performs a sliding tackle. In Melee and Ultimate, he performs the ability's attack. In Brawl and SSB4, he performs the  ability's Break Spin from Kirby Super Star.
 * Although he is able to do so in his home series, Kirby was unable to inhale projectiles in any Super Smash Bros. installment prior to Ultimate. However, he can do so if he copies King Dedede's.
 * Kirby is the only fighter to never be unlockable in any way or context in the entire Super Smash Bros. series, due to being a starter character in every game and being the only fighter playable from the start of World of Light.
 * Uniquely, while Kirby is voiced by the same actress in all regions, he has distinct regional voice clips for many of his Copy Ability moves, particularly ones that have different names between Japanese and English (for example, Palutena's "Autoreticle!" as opposed to ""). This even occurs with moves like Robin's, which shares the names of most of its variants between Japanese and English; for the English clips, Kirby calls out their names in a American accent. However, Kirby saying Jigglypuff's Japanese name when charging Rollout ("Purin...") is kept the same in all regions.