Milky Way Wishes

"In order to stop the serious fighting between the sun and the moon, you will need to visit many planets and summon a comet. This game has slightly different rules concerning Copy Abilities, so pay close attention."

- Game Modes

Milky Way Wishes is the sixth main game of Kirby Super Star and its remake. The game uses Copy Essence Deluxe: statues similar to ones inside Museums and Copy Essences that Kirby must touch before he can acquire its ability. Inhaling enemies, regardless of whether they give Kirby a Copy Ability, results in a "no good"; the exception to this is that Kirby can still obtain the limited-use abilities Crash, Mike, Sleep, Cook and Paint as normal. To acquire regular Copy Abilities, Kirby must find the necessary Copy Essence Deluxe for it. Beating Milky Way Wishes unlocks The Arena, containing all of the bosses that Kirby has fought before.

Milky Way Wishes is the first and only game to feature Copy Essence Deluxe in place of the usual means of Copy Ability acquisition. While this did fix the classic problem of not having the right ability at the right time, it did mean that the player initially had to travel powerless unless they, by prior knowledge or otherwise, visited the planet ???, and acquired the Copy Essence. With this item, they could replicate the traditional method of gaining Copy Abilities.

The premises for finding the Deluxe Essences are similar to finding Treasure Chests in The Great Cave Offensive, although there are a lot less items to find. There is a counter at the bottom-right of the Nintendo DS touch screen indicating how many Essences Kirby had not collected yet, which helps in locating the remaining ones. To fully complete Milky Way Wishes and contribute to a 100% completion ranking overall, the player must find all 19 Deluxe Essences.

In this game, all of the enemies and mid-bosses are given an alternate color palette. In Kirby Super Star Ultra, bosses also have an alternate color palette, except for Computer Virus, which is most likely due to fact that it has changed its set of bosses. The alternate palettes are later used in Helper to Hero.

Milky Way Wishes is the only Kirby Super Star game to be set largely in outer space. This would be done again, although on a smaller scale, in Kirby 64: The Crystal Shards, but since then, Kirby's adventures have taken place largely on Popstar. It is one of the only games in the Kirby series, along with Kirby Star Allies, to use a free cursor that allows Kirby to be moved on the map anywhere the player chooses to move him.

Story
Kirby is seen standing in front of the Fountain of Dreams. The Star Rod glows and shoots a bright light up in the sky that soon spreads. The light soon opens and reveals the Sun and Moon fighting each other and pushing each other out of the sky, changing it constantly. The camera scrolls down to reveal Kirby standing alongside, Bronto Burt, Waddle Dee, and Poppy Bros. Jr., who were all watching the two trying to take each other down from far below. A jester named Marx appears bouncing on a multicolored beach ball. He asks Kirby to ask the giant comet Nova for help in order to stop the fight, but to do so, Kirby has to gather the star power from the different planets near Pop Star. Kirby, back at the Fountain of Dreams, jumps on a Warp Star that the Fountain made for him, and soars into outer space with Marx wishing him good luck.

After gathering the power stars from the seven planets, Kirby summons Nova and makes his wish. Before he can do this however, Marx knocks Kirby off screen and makes his own selfish wish: world domination on Planet Popstar. When this happens, he transforms into a fearsome monster resembling a bat. He reveals that he tricked the Sun and Moon into fighting each other, and that he managed to get Kirby into doing his dirty work for him, and this was all part of his master plan to conquer Popstar. Nova is obliged to grant Marx's wish, unfortunately forcing Kirby to destroy him. Nova begins looming towards Popstar, leaving Kirby alone in space. Fortunately, the power Kirby had gathered comes together and creates a Starship for him to chase after Nova with.

Nova is suddenly stopped by the Sun and Moon, giving Kirby the chance to enter him. Upon Kirby destroying his core, Nova is wounded, infuriating Marx, who then attempts to attack Kirby himself. Kirby then lands on what appears to be the moon from his battle with Nightmare, and fights Marx. Kirby wins in the battle, sending Marx flying away and into Nova, seemingly destroying them both in the process during a massive explosion engulfed in a bright white light. Kirby flies back to Popstar via a Warp Star, and the Sun and Moon are seen circling around each other, ending their feud.

Trivia

 * In the original game's story line, the moon is seen spinning clockwise, even when on its own. In the remake, however, the moon can spin both clockwise and counterclockwise.
 * The only time the moon is not spinning is on the game map. The sun also has different sized spikes going around it in the map as well.
 * Except for the Fountain of Dreams scenes in the original introduction, everything appears as sepia tone, a shade used to imply old age.
 * Nova is seen to move its parts around in the remake. This is proved by his swinging pendulum, turning globe, moving gears and the ability to move his eyes down to look at Kirby.
 * In the remake, the game map and the cutscenes in outer space have a dark blue color. In the original game, outer space appears to be black.
 * Milky Way Wishes is one of two sub-games in Kirby Super Star and its remake to have a map that shows the different levels, the other sub-game is Dyna Blade.
 * A remix of the opening cutscene music is heard as a part of the soundtrack for Kirby and the Rainbow Curse.
 * A few of the planets had minor name changes between games. Aquarius was originally Aqualiss, Cavius was Cavios, and Mekkai was spelled Mecheye. They retain these names in the Japanese version of Kirby Super Star Ultra.
 * Right before the music starts playing and the introduction scene starts in Kirby Super Star, a star rolls by skywriting Kirby's name. This scene was omitted in Kirby Super Star Ultra, instead appearing in the "Original Kirby Movies" cutscene for Milky Way Wishes.
 * The music that plays at the beginning of "Kirby's Triumphant Return" (which plays after Marx collides with Nova) is featured in various songs, such as when fighting Magolor's last phase/Magolor Soul, fighting Star Dream/Star Dream Soul OS, and against Dededestroyer Z, although this melodic idea is first heard in Revenge of Meta Knight.
 * In Star Fox Zero — The Battle Begins, Slippy Toad reads a Nintendo Magazine. The names Floria, Aqualiss, Mecheye, and Halfmoon appear on the magazine's cover, a reference to Milky Way Wishes's planets of the same name.
 * If the player looks at the Fountain of Dreams before it shoots off the light into the sky in the original introduction, one can see that there is no flowing animation of the water emerging from the Fountain as well as the four mini-geysers behind it. However, when the Fountain makes the Warp Star for Kirby towards the end of the scene, the water appears to be flowing forward. This was fixed in the original Kirby movies cutscene in Kirby Super Star Ultra.
 * When a file is selected in Kirby Star Allies, it is possible to see a scene between Marx, Parasol Waddle Dee, Poppy Bros. Jr. and Kirby. Marx enters from the left on his ball after the other three enter the screen. After a short moment, Kirby and Marx appear to interact with each other, and Kirby then runs off to the right side of the screen. This appears to be a reference to the intro cutscene of Milky Way Wishes.
 * Furthermore, after Marx, Waddle Dee, and Poppy Bros. Jr. leave the screen, Marx re-enters the scene, but he is using his wings, a reference to the events in Milky Way Wishes.