Nintendo revealed Kirby and the World Beyond as the closing announcement of its September 9, 2026 Direct, confirming an open-world Kirby game built by HAL Laboratory for Nintendo Switch 2. The game is set to launch in spring 2027, a window Nintendo has tied to the Kirby franchise's 35th anniversary.
It's only the second mainline 3D Kirby title, following 2022's Kirby and the Forgotten Land, but Nintendo has been explicit that World Beyond breaks from Forgotten Land's level-based stage structure in favor of a genuinely open world players can explore freely.
What the reveal trailer showed
The roughly two-minute trailer walked through traversal, exploration, and combat across a large, open outdoor environment resembling the grassy plains style of Forgotten Land, but scaled up considerably. Kirby is shown fighting King Dedede partway through the trailer, a battle that ends with Dedede crashing through the sky and tearing open a massive hole that reveals a far larger area beyond it — the "world beyond" of the title.
The trailer also leans into a Truman Show-style premise: the setting Kirby starts in appears to be enclosed inside a giant dome or outer wall, and part of the footage shows Kirby breaking through that boundary with a powered-up Sword ability to reach the wider world outside. Kirby is also shown meeting a mysterious girl and is accompanied by a new floating companion character, though Nintendo hasn't named either or detailed their role in the story.
Copy Ability changes
Several of Kirby's familiar Copy Abilities have been reworked around open-world traversal rather than the point-to-point platforming of past games:
- Cutter now lets Kirby ride a remote-controlled, boomerang-like cutter as a hoverboard, letting him glide across the map and ram into enemies with the spinning blade.
- Sword has been enlarged and empowered, letting Kirby cut down trees and cleave through environmental obstacles to open new paths, in addition to combat use.
- Nintendo also showed Kirby gaining temporary, situational power-ups to existing abilities in certain areas — visually similar to the series' existing Super Abilities — that let him interact with the environment in bigger, more destructive ways than the base ability allows.
Nintendo hasn't confirmed a full list of returning or new Copy Abilities, nor how many will get traversal-focused upgrades like Cutter and Sword.
What's still unconfirmed
Nintendo has not announced pricing, a specific release date within spring 2027, box art, special editions, or whether the game will support multiplayer — a feature recent Kirby entries, including Forgotten Land, have included in some form. The game's story beyond the trailer's setup, including who the mysterious girl is and what lies in the world beyond the dome, hasn't been detailed.
It's also unclear whether World Beyond will run on Switch 2 exclusively with no path to the original Switch, though nothing shown so far suggests a version for the older hardware is planned. Gamingonix will update this piece as HAL Laboratory and Nintendo share more ahead of the spring 2027 launch.
Emma covers gaming news and industry announcements for Gamingonix, reporting on releases, reveals and the stories moving fast.
