I can’t tell you what I ate for lunch two days ago, but I can tell you about the night I unlocked Mewtwo in Super Smash Bros. Melee.
I was at a sleepover at my friend’s house and I had brought the GameCube I’d gotten for Christmas just a few weeks prior. I’d already poured what felt like countless hours into Melee by then, but I had yet to reach the bottom. I didn’t have every character or stage unlocked yet, and I didn’t even know how to get them. My buddy was more internet savvy than me, so he found a list of unlock requirements. We discovered that we’d only get Mewtwo by playing Versus mode for 20 hours. We went to work, figuring out if we could speed up that process by plugging more controllers in and leaving the console idling overnight. We crashed for a few hours, woke up, and quit the infinitely rolling match we’d set up. A new challenger approached, and we were over the moon.
I have plenty of childhood memories that revolve around unlockables. It was all the rage in the 2000s, to the point where it felt like a mistake when a game didn’t come with a list of secrets to chase. Figuring out how to unlock characters, karts, or stages was every bit as fun as actually playing the game. Maybe that explains why I’m so obsessed with Kirby Air Riders right now, a game that truly understands the thrill of unlockables.
The Nintendo Switch 2’s new exclusive is the latest project from Masahiro Sakurai, the mad scientist behind Super Smash Bros. It’s an action-racing hybrid where players can split their time between traditional races, a story mode, a slot car-like minigame, and a signature City Trial mode that has players collecting stat boosts on a wide-open city map. Those are all fun in their own way, but none of them are the main attraction for me. Instead, it’s the game’s 750 unlockables that have me playing nonstop.
Yes, you read that right. 750.
Like its predecessor, 2003’s Kirby Air Ride, the sequel gives players a set of grids made up of 150 boxes each. Every box has an unlockable tied to it, which can be earned by doing a specific challenge. Drive on every course in Air Ride mode, don’t drive into a wall during a Top Ride race, finish a Drag Race in City Trial in a certain amount of time, et cetera. Due to the sheer mass of challenges, you’re bound to unlock half a dozen of them the first time you fire up a mode. A new machine, a racer, some decals for your machines. It doesn’t matter if you win a race or lose; Air Riders immediately makes it clear that you will be rewarded for simply playing.
That design philosophy got its hooks in me right away. I got a little hit of serotonin every time a race would finish and I’d be greeted by the checklist screen, as boxes sprung open like popcorn kernels. I’d unlock a new racer and immediately want to try them out, only to unlock a track by doing so, pulling me back in again. When I realized that just about anything I could do in a mode was likely tied to a challenge, I began experimenting as much as possible while playing even if it meant throwing a race on purpose.
That’s what’s so remarkable about Air Riders. It’s not just that it’s filled with shiny unlockables; it’s that getting them requires you to learn the game inside and out. Every challenge is a small tutorial or a test of mastery. They ask you to test every character and every kart. They teach you about secret routes on courses or encourage you to build your stats a certain way in City Trial. They show you how to achieve better times in Top Ride. Air Riders doesn’t just want you to pick your favorite character and get comfortable with a playstyle. It actively wants to show you every single thing you can do in it. After all, why build this mass of content if players are just going to ignore it all?
It’s no surprise that Kirby Air Riders and Super Smash Bros. Melee share a director. Melee has the same carnival game draw, giving you a good incentive to clear every Event Mode battle, try Adventure Mode with each character, and even goof around in Home-Run Contest. There’s always a prize to be won for your efforts. It’s one of the few games that I feel like I’ve truly mastered because of that approach. It’s not just that I collected every trophy in it or unlocked every stage; I learned it inside and out to accomplish that. To unlock Mr. Game & Watch in Melee is to learn how to play every single character well enough to clear each mode with them. That’s what makes Sakurai’s best games so joyful; they teach and reward in the same breath.
I can already tell that Kirby Air Riders is going to become my most-played Switch 2 game from the system’s 2025 game lineup. I’m still unlocking new things every time I play, getting a jolt of satisfaction each time a box pops. And, more importantly, I’m picking up new skills every time that happens. The grand prize waiting for me once I finish every single challenge? The knowledge that I’ll have what it takes to wipe the floor with anyone I meet in City Trial.
