If it wants to be 2.5D then it pulls it off poorly.
Paper Mario, yet again pulls of being 2.5D perfectly.
You can't have a 2.5D platformer if everything is 3D but the controls, I'm sorry but it makes it feel unnatural. If it can be run on an SNES besides the graphics and is instead being run on a better system then something is wrong with that to me. I think games should fully take advantage of what system they are on, obviously earlier in the system's life, the games don't take as full advantage as games made in late life do because the technology is new and it's hard to really determine the limits of a brand new system so many games slowly test out many different limits until mid-late lifespan and thats when games REALLY can take full advantage of the system they are on and make something spectacular! (Simple things can be spectacular too, it honestly depends on what you're trying to do with your game. Sometimes simple things make the best things, but it doesn't mean that they don't take full advantage of what they use to run said game)
But Kirby isn't an early to mid N64 game.
Crystal Shards game out March 24, 2000
The early 2000's was the end of the N64's lifespan. (Gamecube came out September 14, 2001)
To put this into perspective Paper Mario came out August 11, 2000.
Paper Mario and Crystal Shards are only 5 months apart in age.
I guess I could understand your excuse for it the beginning of 2.5D if it was early to mid N64 life, but it's not. It's late life. Paper Mario certainly wasn't made in 5 months. To be honest I highly doubt that they had much time to even learn from any mistakes that Kirby made before they released Paper Mario considering that Crystal Shards was still p.new for game by the time Paper Mario came out.
So yes, it might have been a first 2.5D game but it didn't pioneer much for it. If anything I'd say Paper Mario did most of the heavy legwork in what people should base their 2.5D platformers after.
Paper Mario, yet again pulls of being 2.5D perfectly.
You can't have a 2.5D platformer if everything is 3D but the controls, I'm sorry but it makes it feel unnatural. If it can be run on an SNES besides the graphics and is instead being run on a better system then something is wrong with that to me. I think games should fully take advantage of what system they are on, obviously earlier in the system's life, the games don't take as full advantage as games made in late life do because the technology is new and it's hard to really determine the limits of a brand new system so many games slowly test out many different limits until mid-late lifespan and thats when games REALLY can take full advantage of the system they are on and make something spectacular! (Simple things can be spectacular too, it honestly depends on what you're trying to do with your game. Sometimes simple things make the best things, but it doesn't mean that they don't take full advantage of what they use to run said game)
But Kirby isn't an early to mid N64 game.
Crystal Shards game out March 24, 2000
The early 2000's was the end of the N64's lifespan. (Gamecube came out September 14, 2001)
To put this into perspective Paper Mario came out August 11, 2000.
Paper Mario and Crystal Shards are only 5 months apart in age.
I guess I could understand your excuse for it the beginning of 2.5D if it was early to mid N64 life, but it's not. It's late life. Paper Mario certainly wasn't made in 5 months. To be honest I highly doubt that they had much time to even learn from any mistakes that Kirby made before they released Paper Mario considering that Crystal Shards was still p.new for game by the time Paper Mario came out.
So yes, it might have been a first 2.5D game but it didn't pioneer much for it. If anything I'd say Paper Mario did most of the heavy legwork in what people should base their 2.5D platformers after.