If you're an old-school Kirby fan, odds are a quick spin through Kirby Wii (not its finalized title) will tickle your inner Game Boy-shaped heart. Nobody's re-invented the wheel here -- Kirby floats, inhales, and spits. Devouring the right baddies add new super powers to your arsenal. You even savagely beat a tree who inexplicably decides to oppose you.

Naturally, it lands with some Wii-related detailing. Shake the Wiimote while inhaling, and you can suck up much bigger objects (or more smaller ones), spitting out huge projectiles. And of course, it's crossed over into the four-player, local-co-op genre Nintendo's fallen in love with in recent years. Kirby's aided in his mayhem by King Dedede, Waddle Dee, and Meta Knight on a drop-in, drop-out basis.

Suck it, you Earth First! hippies!

I'd call the graphics "new-school Nintendo a la Wii" -- far from the best but quite serviceable. The levels carry a few interesting challenges, like racing through a spiky gauntlet to ring pest-repelling bells. In fact, after several run-throughs with the game, I only found two real problems. First, if you snag a super-power-up, the game suddenly becomes ridiculously easy.

Second, the fun factor takes a severe dip if you're not playing as Kirby.

I'll explain. The power-ups come in two flavors. Normal transformations dress Kirby up in knight's clothing, give him a bright red Stetson and whip, or turn him into faux-Link, to name a few examples. But swallowing any enemy with a rainbow glow gives Kirby mega-powers, like a fire dragon that obliterates every enemy on screen or a giant Master Sword that literally slashes everything in one devastating arc.

These help immeasurably. In an Egyptian-ish cavern, my mega-sword (alternatively appearing as a scimitar or a hatchet) hacked through giant ropes in one pass, closing down spike traps. It's also ridiculously easy to bull your way straight through the stage by spamming the super-attack button. Mega-powers have a timed duration, but unless you just stand around admiring your awesomeness, it won't run out before you reach the next door. I count it as lucky that they don't carry over to the next stage, so a bit of challenge can return to the game.

Ima gonna knock you THE F*** OUT!

Only Kirby can access these abilities, and therein lies the game's other drawback. Player one must play as Kirby. If you want to roll solo through the campaign as Meta Knight or King Dedede, forget it. Not possible.

It gets worse. Kirby's the central focus -- the only focus, really -- so only Kirby can pick up certain objects or exit the stage. In fact, on occasion I zoomed ahead of Player 1 only to have the game automatically whisk me back behind him. Kirby also has the only power slam should players decide to start griefing each other: He can eat anyone else.

Oh, and the game only ends if Kirby dies...his worthless minions can croak over and over without consequence. The drop-in, drop-out option tends to relegate any additional players to the role of expendable, armed escorts. While taking a turn as Meta Knight, I found myself going kamikaze to chip a boss's health down and almost instantly respawning when I died. Worked, too. It kept Kirby alive and made the boss dead, but it felt cheap.

So if Kirby occasionally feels over-powered -- and over-burdened with a number of Kirby-only puzzles and tasks -- the other characters feel under-powered and routinely undermined.

Gaming's poster boy for bulimia.

All told, Kirby Wii works best when playing alone. I enjoyed my first pass -- solo, without any foreknowledge of who else I could play aside from Kirby. The further I moved away from that experience, the more flaws appeared.

Really, it's the four-player co-op and its total focus on Kirby that messes things up. Nintendo should chop one or the other before this game hits shelves. As-is, instead of another party game, what you get here is a party game where everybody lets the birthday boy have his way all the time. If it's your name on the cake, you're golden. Otherwise, you might find your eyes straying to the door, waiting for the right moment to make your excuses and say your goodbyes.