Kirby Air Ride lets you race across a variety of vibrant tracks with a roster of beloved characters, each with their own unique flair. Getting the full band of riders unlocked feels essential, especially since some require tricky feats like not crashing or winning without power-ups. It’s a satisfying challenge that opens up the full experience and lets you jump into races with all your favorites.
Characters in Kirby Air Ride unlock through diverse game modes, and earning their alternate colors or costumes means meeting their unlock criteria more than once. This adds a neat replay incentive if you’re aiming for fully customized options beyond just the character itself.
Each rider’s unlock conditions are tied to a specific game mode, required location or track, and sometimes unique rules you have to follow. It pays to carefully prepare your approach for each unlock to avoid unnecessary frustration.
King of the series, Kirby has several unlock requirements across modes:
- Air Ride: Laps - Finish a race without crashing into any walls.
- Top Ride: Flower - Win a race without picking up any Copy Abilities.
- City Trial: Big Battle 2 - Defeat a rider while shrunken.
Unlocking Big Battle 2 in Stadium means first beating five riders in Big Battle 1. I found Kirby on the Battle Chariot really helpful here—his area-effect special hits multiple foes, and the chariot’s durability is a huge plus. Then, you’ll need to get one of the blue shrinking pills and take down a rider while small in the upgraded battle mode.
The other unlocks for Kirby mainly test your driving and racing finesse. For the wall-free lap, pick a forgiving track and a nimble machine like the Wheelie Scooter to keep mistakes low. To skip picking up Copy Abilities in Top Ride, simply turn off items in the rules before the race.
King Dedede also needs some targeted efforts:
- Air Ride - Win a race with course, rider, and machine all set to random.
- City Trial: Gourmet Race - Score 80 points in a single match.
- Road Trip - Complete a Treasure Hunt Challenge.
The random requirements make Dedede’s Air Ride challenge easy to just stumble into by picking all-random settings. For the Gourmet Race, speed and smooth turning are your allies, so choose a fast, agile combo. The Road Trip’s Treasure Hunt Challenge can be elusive due to fixed locations—knowing when one appears can save hours of searching.
Road Trip is a bit of a different story. You’ll have to come across a Treasure Hunt Challenge while progressing through the stages. The challenges are fixed, so if you happen to know when you’ll encounter one, this will be easier. If you don’t, good luck finding them!
Meta Knight proves more demanding to unlock:
- Air Ride: Nebula Belt (Laps) - Finish a lap with no more than two wall crashes.
- Top Ride: Nova - Complete a lap without attacking any other rider.
To race on Nebula Belt, you first need to unlock the Galactic Nova course by winning 15 Top Ride races. Then, completing a lap on Nebula Belt after defeating 5 enemies unlocks it. The Wall Crash limit demands focus and smooth handling—Wheelie Scooter helps tame tight turns. The Top Ride Nova lap unlock follows a similar pattern, requiring a clean non-aggressive lap; turning off items makes this less stressful.
Unlocking Meta Knight by playing Top Ride is a similar deal. You have to win 15 races in the mode to unlock the Nova course first. But after that, all you have to do is complete a lap without attacking another rider. This can be made easier by changing the rules so that no items will appear.
Waddle Dee is less complicated but grindy:
- Road Trip: Skyah - Defeat 30 riders during City Trial challenges.
In Skyah, you’ll need to aggressively take down opponents. Farming is an option if you have enough Road Miles saved to reset the challenge. Make sure you seize every combat opportunity while navigating these trial challenges.
Bandana Waddle Dee has a couple of straightforward tasks:
- City Trial: Field - Destroy two boxes within 30 seconds of the start.
- Road Trip: Top Ride - Complete three Top Ride challenges.
Boxes are easy targets at the start of a Field match—just smash whichever are closest. For the Road Trip challenge, look out for the Top Ride race or time trial events; a fast ride will make clearing these three faster and less frustrating.
Waddle Doo requires careful attention:
- Air Ride: Floria Fields (Laps) - Finish a lap without hitting enemies.
- Top Ride - Hit a rider with a Course Quaker.
You can tweak the enemy spawn settings to reduce the Copy Ability enemies on Floria Fields, making the no-crash lap more manageable. For Top Ride, crank up item spawn to "Many" and set Item Restrictions to "Safety"—it improves your chances that the Course Quaker will appear, so you can land the necessary hit.
Chef Kawasaki offers some unique unlock moments:
- Air Ride: Mount Amberfalls - Eat the onigiri near the teahouse past the first turn.
- Road Trip: Air Ride - Clear three Air Ride challenges.
The onigiri is located just after the waterfall on the right side of the road, so keep an eye out. Mount Amberfalls defaults to a single lap, but you can extend the race length in the rules to give yourself more time if needed. In Road Trip, winning three Air Ride challenges will unlock Chef Kawasaki—ensure you have the best machine to meet different challenge types.
To unlock Chef Kawasaki from Road Trip, you have to win three Air Ride challenges. These will be the red challenges. They can vary, requiring you to either defeat opponents, win a race, or be in first place when time’s up. Just make sure you have the appropriate machine for the task.
Knuckle Joe brings in some stealth and progression mechanics:
- City Trial: Field - Steal a machine from a rider currently using it.
- Road Trip - Boost all stats to at least 1.
To steal a machine, target one that's on its last legs—smoking and damaged—then lock on with the Y button and hit it to eject its rider. The timing can be tricky, so patience is key. For Road Trip, just collect one of each of the nine stat boosts scattered across challenges, shops, and rest areas. You can always check your stats in the pause menu.
As for unlocking Knuckle Joe from Road Trip, just pick up one of each of the nine different stat boosts. From challenges to rest areas to shops, there’s plenty of opportunities to complete this mission. You can always pause the game to check the power-ups you’ve accumulated of each stat.
Rick needs sharp racing skills and exploration:
- Top Ride: Mountain - Win the race with at least a 5-second lead over second place.
- Road Trip - Visit the shop three times.
Lowering CPU difficulty and enabling attack items makes maintaining a 5-second lead easier. Meanwhile, Road Trip unlock only requires you to enter shops, which are marked by shopping bags on your mini-map.
Gooey mixes risk and reward:
- Top Ride: Air - Win after being caught in the tornado three times.
- City Trial: Skydive 1 - Score 2,000 points in a match.
Top Ride's tornado challenge is tricky because the tornado is fixed in one spot and missing it means restarting. However, winning despite the disruption is doable, sometimes even advantageous. Skydive’s high scoring demands a machine like the Paper Star that moves slowly, letting you collect more rings and rack up points efficiently.
If you want to unlock Gooey by playing the Skydive contest, you have to get 2,000 points. You’ll need a machine that can fly slowly so you can go through as many rings as possible. Try using the Paper Star for this one, and aim for those rings with the high points.
Cappy blends speed and caution:
- Top Ride: Flower – Complete a lap within 0:30.00 with Warp Star.
- City Trial: Field – Clear without getting any power-down items.