Kirby Air Riders Halloween Event Cancelled Before Its Nov. 4 End Date Over Game-Freezing Bug

Nintendo has pulled the Kirby Air Riders Halloween event from its Switch 2 racer just two days after it launched, citing a bug that made the game freeze mid-race. The seasonal celebration was meant to run until November 4, but it will now end well before Halloween itself.

What Nintendo said about the cancellation

The announcement came from Nintendo’s Japanese support account on X on October 30. According to a machine translation of the post, the company had “identified an issue” in the ongoing “Trick or Treat!” event in which “the screen may temporarily freeze during gameplay.” Its conclusion was blunt: “we have decided to cancel this event.” The news was first spotted by Nintendo Life.

The event started on October 28 and was the first Halloween outing for the roughly 10-month-old game. It brought spooky and fall-themed decorations, plus ghost-hat cosmetics that players could earn through play. Players reported the problems almost immediately, with clips circulating online of the game stalling for several seconds at a time. For a racing game, that kind of hitch can ruin a run.

Will the event come back?

Nintendo has not written the event off entirely. The same post says the company plans to hold it again so that players can still obtain the associated rewards, and that more details will follow once they are finalized. There is no date, and no indication of whether “again” means before the end of the year or some time later. Calling an event both “cancelled” and “planned to return” leaves a lot of room for interpretation. Kotaku says it has asked Nintendo for clarification.

The sources also don’t say what is actually causing the freezes. Nintendo’s statement describes the symptom but not the technical cause, and it has not said how long a fix might take. The fact that it pulled the content outright rather than patching it over the weekend suggests the problem is not a quick one, though that is an inference rather than anything the company has confirmed.

A small stumble for a game still getting updates

Kirby Air Riders, directed by Masahiro Sakurai of Super Smash Bros. fame, was released in 2025 as a follow-up to the 2003 GameCube title. It is a light, colorful racer, and ongoing themed events are a sign Nintendo is still investing in it months after launch. Seasonal updates like this one are a way to keep players returning, which makes a botched rollout on the first spooky season an awkward moment.

For players, the practical upshot is simple. The Halloween content is gone for now, the ghost hats are out of reach until the event returns, and Nintendo has promised a second chance without saying when. Anyone hoping to wear them on actual Halloween will likely be disappointed, but the company’s pledge to let players earn the rewards later at least means nothing is being lost permanently. Further details on the Kirby Air Riders event are expected once Nintendo finalizes its plans.

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File photo: Nintendo Switch 2-Konsole IL 20250606.png by PantheraLeo1359531, CC BY 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons.