This was my very first experience with the Donkey Kong franchise. Well, technically it was my second, if you count the few moments I spent as a young kid watching my best friend show it to me on his SNES. For whatever reason, the 3D graphics always turned me off, and since I never had my own SNES, I never had any reason to worry about it. The franchise thus eluded me. It seemed much more shallow than the other things I was playing, and it wasn't until recently that I learned to appreciate how much I enjoy platformers.

Over a decade later, I finally buy my own SNES, and what is one of the iconic titles I felt like I needed to experience? Donkey Kong Country. It was time to see what the fuss was about.

I was not disappointed. The first few levels surprised me, and I was worried about weak gameplay or just that the game would be lame overall. Instead, Donkey Kong Country kept surprising me over and over again. I actually moved pretty quickly through the levels, with the physics actually creating quite a thrilling experience. The game was designed to reward those who could get into the jungle groove and bounce perfectly over enemies and roll at the right times to beat the level as quickly as possible. This made every level extremely fun.

Additionally, each level kept bringing in new mechanics that challenged the way I saw the game. The oft-bemoaned Mine Cart level was actually quite a revelation for me, being one of the highlights of the game. I was blown away by how fun and creative and downright challenging that level was. And then, half the game later, another mine cart level appears, but instead of jumping with the mine cart, the Kongs are jumping out of the cart! It all just felt so fresh and creative.

Do I have gripes? Sure! The save points causes me to get stuck on certain strings of levels for what felt like ages, stashing up lives so that I could get through one level just to get smashed by the next. That alone made the challenge more on the frustrating side, since dying meant that the impossible level I just beat would need to be beaten again. Most of the time, I would die tantalizingly close to the end of the stage, too. Frustrating.

Even still, the game was a pure joy, a real challenge when I haven't played a tough platformer in a long time. It was hard enough to be frustrating and anxiety inducing (those barrels and bees will give me nightmares for months to come) but not so hard that it was impossible, and not hard in a way that felt cheap. I felt stretched, and that's a good thing in a game. It needs to push you and help you grow in your skills.

In the end, I have no regrets about this game and am so glad I picked it up. I won't be 100%ing it, but I am sad that it is over. However, I now know what the Donkey Kong franchise is all about, and I look forward to playing other installments.

Gameplay, Story and Value:

Donkey Kong Country was the game that officially added "Rare" to my video game vernacular. In it, you control Donkey Kong and Diddy Kong as you run, jump, swim, swing and barrel your way through several platforming stages in order to reclaim Donkey's stolen stash of bananas!

Unlike previous Donkey Kong titles, Donkey Kong Country is a pure platformer. You'll traverse dense jungles, rocky cliffs, snowy peaks and industrialized wastelands all in the name of potassium. Mechanically the game is fairly straight forward. You can swap between the slower but stronger Donkey Kong or the faster and light Diddy Kong any time you're standing still, and taking damage will cause you to lose your active primate. Should you find yourself alone, every stage is littered with DK barrels which allow you to reclaim your fallen comrade. As far as controls go, everything is really fantastic once you become accustomed to the game's nuances. Everything is fast and accurate, but there's definitely a "feel" specific to this series that you'll need to pick up on. My only real complaint in this regard, if you can call it that, is that one of the game's most key abilities (the roll jump) is never explained to you, and knowing it exists is a game-changer.

Stage design in DKC is another highlight. There are very few games where I don't dread The Water Level™, and even fewer where I actually look forward to them. Donkey Kong Country manages to fall into the latter category. Not only do you get actually good water stages, but you'll be riding mine carts, navigating blackout stages, riding animals and doing all sorts of other things as you make your way through the game.

Each of the game's 6 worlds contains 5-6 stages, a save point, an airplane to take you to other world's you've unlocked, and tip station where you can potentially glean some of the game's many secrets. Finally, each world ends in a boss fight. The boss encounters are... okay... if not particularly exciting. The bosses themselves are just overiszed regular enemies that move in predictable patterns and take a few hits to defeat. You can revisit stages as often as you want which is great if you're looking to 100% the game. Beating the game is straightforward enough, but uncovering the many, many secret rooms and barrels can prove very challenging.

While not the hardest game on the console, Donkey Kong Country boasts a very challenging difficulty. The good news is that, while it might not seem so when you're dying repeatedly, the difficulty is completely fair. Enemies are not randomized, and with enough practice and repetition you'll be able to clear the craziest platforming sections with ease and efficiency, or at least efficiency. This is the best kind of challenge as it becomes highly addicting and makes you want to push forward, even after multiple game overs.

Presentation, Music and Sound:

I remember this game blowing my mind when I first sat down with it as a kid. The graphics looks AMAZING! Unlike anything I'd ever seen on the console before. 20 years later, even though the mystery has faded, Donkey Kong Country still looks pretty incredible. You'd almost expect these kinds of graphics to age very poorly, and while upscaling certainly brings some jagged pixels to light the game still holds up very well. If you pay close enough attention, you'll see the environments are only really made up of a small handful of tileset. Donkey Kong Country hides this fact masterful by means of weather effects, lighting effects, parallax scrolling and color hues. Every world feels different but there's a consistency that runs from start to finish. If I had to come up with something bad to say about the game's visuals, it would be that there's not much in the way of enemy diversity. By the time you've gotten halfway through World 2 you'll have seen just about every enemy in the game.

The sound effects are excellent, both in the sampled laughs, screeches and grunts of the players and enemies, as well as in the ambient sounds that play through each level. The real gem here, though, is the music which ranks among some of the best in gaming. It's not my favorite soundtrack, in fact I think the sequel has better music, but there's no denying it's absolutely fantastic. I mean, I'm listening to it right now!

Afterthoughts:

It should surprise absolutely no one that I love this game. It's almost pointless, like saying "I love Super Mario World". Of course I love this game, because it's a fantastic game, and the fact that it's not my favorite game on the console should speak only to the games that trump it.

All in all, had a great time with this one, and I'm glad to see that I can still beat it!

Review:

Playthrough:

Preliminary: I thinnnnk I only had access to the Gameboy version of this, btu I deffffinitely remember this beginning. Great graphics, great tunes, silly, good setting that did a lot of world-building, lots of precedents for what I associate with the Rare aesthetic. Nice.

Yep instant memories frmo the game. Again, unsure whether was SNES or GB but Kongo Jungle world map is vividly remembered . Amazing music too

Wow yep and I remember this first level as well as I remember the first Super Mario level etc, the pseudo-3D graphics are great, tunes keep being great, I always liked playing as Diddy Kong and I believe I felt that I needed to collect all the letters, but that seems that was just to satisfy my collectible urge. I remember there was a level I could never get past/never really wanted to because I didn't love the gameplay, but the Feel, Look, Sound are all giving so far.

Nice the first level is a nice way of easing in, love the rhino riding segment, I got all the KONG letters, and I like the sunset/dimming as hyou end it. It's music tiem now but I am exccited to return to this after dinner!

Day 1

Well I didn't put it down lol. Diddy is a little too fast and slippery, but I do slightly prefer playing as him still. I loved getting the last G of the second level: something I lovvvve about the 3D game universe is edges/peripheries/liminal spaces etc, and this was an early example of jumping on the ending of the level to access a collectible. Love it. Loving this! I can see an influence on Crash Bandicoots too.

I love love love this hint area, the graphics and the music are amazing, and it's a nice touch to encourage you to go back to levels and discover more

It seems I've gotten all the collectibles so far? I suppose it's a way to introduce the idea of collectibles and secrets to the player.

OMG I FORGOT THIS IS THE GAME WITH AQUATIC AMBIENCE. And the Look of this area is amazing too . Especially the horizon/edge factor again, I didn't realize this would be the game, long before Crash and GTA etc, to establish that Feel for me

I seem to keep stumbling upon the secrets and collectibles and I am here for it. I am absolutely loving this so far, they even pulled off the water level well.

Ok I'll shush and just enjoy the game but then the flight guy's song is amazing, the next level was great and fresh with being shot around (which I remember being a bit annoying as a kid but I solved it on first try now). Just yes. Yes. Yes. And omg there's a completion percentage too no wonder I was addicted to getting all the collectibles (which I have so far). And now I see why I must've gotten stuck at a point: save points are a bit too irregular. I know that was the norm for this era, but saving whenever you beat a level should've been the standard imo.

That first boss was quite easy lol, but on to the Monkey Mines. I like the ability to return to levels qwhewre you know there's an easy bunch of Bananas for lives, and I assume you can return to save points? So I forgive them for the irregularity (tho quite the trek to the first one)

Oh I don't think you need to collect the letters for percentage, let me look that up. But I've still found them all in each level and the golden statues too. Oh wow so a) it's 101% not 100% and b) boo, it's based on entering all secret rooms, not necessarily collectibles. Well for this playthrough I will probly just focus on trying to get all the letters for fun without stressing about it, and when I return to it (wihch is for sure since I am enjoying this so much), I will go for 101% some day a la the Crashes and Super Mario World. I know I stumbled upon to at least one true secret area in the water level. Not sure what constitutes a secret area tho. (Well, I went looking through the levels I've completed and they have the exclamation mark which should be 100% nice)

After reading about that tho it's hard to resist now actively searching for secrets etc. But I want to just enjoy the game and stumble upon them so I will try to resist.

Only complaint so far is I wish you could attack mid-air, but you have many ways to attack so I get it. Oh and that some of the scrolling gets clunky/chaotic/messy. But if that's the sacrifice I have to make for such a fast-paced and fun platformer, so be it.

These bosses have been kinda easy so far.

As always in platformers, I love that you can run. I love that you can cartwheel across gaps. I love that all these quirks are built into the level design, particularly for collectibles/100%ing not as required. And the music just continues to rock.

I was proud of another one of my carthwheel-then-jumps to get a Gold Ostrich and now I see what that leads to :-p Bonus area. Kinda silly but nice anyway. Lots of animals to ride and apparently be as well, which gives Adventure Island vibes. Omg! I regret getting that Ostrich... No more. It put me way back in the level... That definitely burned me out for

I feel like I'm really far in the game but supposedly only 19%. Nice. Tho I wonder how much of that is the collectible/secret factor.

I love this background too

Another great background, and I think this might be how far I got in the Gameboy game. Oh wait or am I thinking of Donkey Kong Land... (when it comes to the how-far-I-got debate).. then how did I recognize these SNES aspects? Maybe I rented it? (Yep, confirmed it was Donkey Kong Land that we owned for Gameboy... so we must've rented this game or I otehrwise watched/played it)

Gosh the beautiful backgrounds and music just don't relent (tho the Play is burning out a bit with the over use of the barrel shooting now and the icy area usually is irritating in all platformers, ... it's really just cuz I've played it nonstop due to the platforming hook and put off self-care/wellbeing things I really need to get to... right now! lo,l... after this level)

Day 2

The difficult is definitely increasing and no one likes slipper ice levels, and some of the design choices are getting mroe questionable (never a fan of overwhelming sight with things like the snowstorm as a method of increasing difficulty). And it's becoming way too reliant on the trial and error style of platforming gameplay (you went the wrong way in this tunnel you couldn't possibly have seen is the wrong way, you die and have to try again). So savestates have begun to be abused :-p

But even as the burnout becomes more and more real as I get to late game, as tends to happen with games, I am still constantly imrpessed by the backgrounds and music. And once I warmed back up, it's that constant intense fast-paced hook that I love that I can run (and now possibly load state when I die lol) but just go fast and have fun platforming.

Welp I got to the boss of the poison-y Corporate area. So I think there's only one area left. Hmmm to finish tonight or tomorrow.

Yesss "Manic Mincers" as a level name lol I see you. I am supposed to switch up to relaxing with warm rag and wathcing a movie ugh why does platforming hook always do thist o me lol

Lol trying to move this clunky large rhino in this cave level.. (I had already stumbled upon the secret area unlocked by the rhino, I was trying to keep it through the whole level but uff those small platforms aren't meant for that messy sprite and collision mask)

The Misty Mine level was fun to bounce off the repeatedly spawning enemies that were in a row :-p weee that's my kind of platforming. Oh gosh now there's one of those lights-gimmicks levels. Hmmm Maybe I'll finish this up tomorrow.

Ugh yea the Platform Perils has some annoying antics with platforms that lead to death/trial and error, but it's really hard to put this down despite my better judgment grrr (and ehre I am... finished the level thanks to checkpoints lol... and mayben a save state after that). Oh I meant to mention the platforms and chaos is really displaying how glitchy some of the sprite and collision mask mechancis are. Piling on top of each other and whatnot. But hey, like I said earlier, if that's necessary for a fast-paced fun platformer, so be it.

Well yea I can';t stop now despite denying myself music time: I'm on the final boss! It's nice they give you a DK barrel to start to ensure you have both. And the music is awfully... cute/nice lol.

Al the bosses had the same basic concept and were, dare I say, too easy? At least compared to its contemporaries. Even this last boss was just repetitive and kinda bland. Too much waiting too. It's not like the cannonballs falling frm the top were some confusing overwhelming gimmick... Maybe that was a false final boss? But it's acting as the final boss so I am accepting it as is, and had a good time playing this.

Hmmm it says The End? OMG! I fell for it! Was typing here. I blame the fact I was antrsy to finish the game. Argh lol. And I hadn't used a singl esavestate because the boss was quite easy, here we go again lol. I was wondering why all the credits, er kredits, had a k in them lol.

And then how you gonna have this true final boss be super repetitive and easy too lol the whole gimmick was the surprise/false credits.. I had a screenshot of the false ending right before realizing the game had started back up :-p

Lol he calls me out for not quite getting everything/100% . Well sorry old man, but not this playthrough. Yesss the credits screen is great, great music, and the room and the old man etc remind me of Jak & Daxter (I assume it was influenced by this). The music is sooo good

Neat how Cranky challenges you to try for more completion and faster. Buds of an era of completionism that I grew up in.

Look: 9.5/10 Precedent-setting, quasi-3D is so beautiful, very pixelated but the backgrounds and precedent-setting boost this

Sound: 9.5/10 This very well may be a 10, it just needs to grow on me over time. I never once wanted to turn it down, well maybe for some of the sound effects/enemy sounds, but the music... wow

Play: 9/10 Some flaws for sure, but excellent addicting platforming. Fun fast-paced. I was gonna give this 8.5 but the addiction alone warrants the 9. I thought you play as the girl with the blond hair who flips the barrels? I guess I played more Donkey Kongs as a kid than I realized..

Feel: 9/10

Attachment: 8.5/10 It really does a good job encouraging replayability. If I had had the drive to attempt 100% this time, this would've been higher. And if the replayability was more about collecting more than entering rooms. I know in the end it's basically the same but I dunno how to explain it, it's just how my completionism mind works.

Overall: 9.1/10

Completion: Main Story

Playtime: ~3h 30m

Game #8/200 Donkey Kong Country is a barrel-based banger/challenging SNES platformer with excellent sound design, fun gameplay, and nostalgia-laced visuals. In a way, it precedes the Super Meat Boy style of precision platformer by containing some rather difficult levels that are easily accessible for retry. The game’s fun is derived from both memorization of hazards but also maintaining focus for a prolonged period to respond them. Lives are super plentiful and there are save points. It came out around that era where games began allowing permanent progress immediately after a level. It (thankfully) eschews a continues-based formula as seen in games like Sonic the Hedgehog. You do still have to run back to a save point after beating a level but it’s no big deal. Many of the levels require precise hazard avoidance and/or fast reflexes. You alternate between DK and Diddy in a cool way that basically guarantees that you’ll split your playtime between them. One hit = a switch to the other character. The next hit = a death. There are lots of opportunities to find a barrel containing your partner after you get hit and they’re satisfying to pick up. As mentioned, you have to be careful in levels but also react quickly and memorize upcoming hazards upon dying. On the other hand, levels are short. It’s not a truly insurmountable game in the sense that you’ll get very stuck often, but it’s frustrating at times. Bosses are a joke however — usually you can just jump on them and avoid a single simple pattern.

The Super Meat Boy connection for me comes from how levels are conquered. Remember the moments in a level where X hazard is coming, or where X action is required. The characters’ fragility is also notable. You may wince sometimes as you’re scrolling along and smash into a bee or fall down an unexpected hole or shoot out of a barrel in the wrong direction mistakenly.

There are abundant secrets and it can be fun finding a cache of bananas or even the letters of “KONG” and scoring an extra life. Levels are spiced up with some powerful allies hidden in boxes in some stages. The game has a fast pace and enough variety to be quite addicting. Especially as the high difficulty demands skillful play. I’ll remember my time playing Donkey Kong Country as satisfying. Each level packs a punch and has its own personality. Highly recommend.

I'm gonna start with a personal one. Donkey Kong Country was the first video game I ever played. Period.

I had the luxury of an unemployed uncle who spent his days playing soccer with his friends, living off his parents, and burning his eyes every weekend on videogames. I tend to remember many digital places and symbols from my childhood — the terrifying continue screen from Mortal Kombat 4. The alien atmosphere of Jet Force Gemini. Nemesis coming after Jill. I vividly remember being stuck in Gorilla Glacier’s levels, frustrated but impossibly hooked, and will never forget how fearful I was of the Rockkrocs in Stop & Go Station. Every time I boot up Donkey Kong Country, I’m flooded with that same sense of discovery.

It’s comforting to see these iterations of real-world places prerendered — color-coded with beautiful sunsets, glimmering blue crystals, and warm lights in the distance. But it’s also unsettling, as if these places lack a physical ending. Kong’s tropical island floating in the limitless ocean, the mines forming a visible cacophony of wooden beams, the deep sea repeating itself oppressively. It’s visually stunning, but… also inexplicably stuck, even by the standards of its time — a hard quality to pin down in words without resorting to saying "liminal". The whole ecological warfare thing (Kremrock Industries literally poisoning nature, like that one greenish lake) adds to the visual drama.

The best struggle lies in its gameplay being a 2D platformer — a mechanical realm with simple tools, jumping and running. You’re asked to play more aggressively as the levels go on — faster, sharper, more attuned to the aerodynamic combo between Donkey and Diddy. It rewards memory, but not just visual memory; it wants you to become one with the controller, developing muscle and surpassing a skill ceiling that suddenly becomes like... being on a meditative zen state of doing everything perfectly. Mastering jump cancels, rolling constantly, finding new leaps, using Donkey like a feather — these are the values that Donkey Kong Country excels at. DKC2, for how much I like it, does not hit the same peaks in gameplay, it goes its own way.

Now, even though it contains stellar levels, I'm safe to say the bosses are unexplicably simple and the final world is rather exhausting. Its gimmicks push the franchise’s skill ceiling to the limit while also being rather uninteresting by reusing sooo many assets. It’s a strangely disconnected place within DKC world too! What's the point of that cave?

The Christmas thing is true though... It’s a ritual I started years ago, long before I knew of Vinny from Vinesauce doing something similar. It’s such a comforting act. I played DKC with my mom, alongside my dad with cousins, showing it to classmates and longsome friends.

These days, with eggnog in hand (we make Colemonos in Chile!), companions I’ve made along the way, and a room filled with the smell of fruit bread and plastic of tree decorations — whether on the original hardware, emulated on PC, or through the Nintendo Switch — it doesn’t matter. Whenever the time comes to give love and affection (which should be every day, though that day we’re better dressed), I give something dear to those who matter most. And I give a share of it to Donkey Kong Country.

It’s like… an old friend. Time isn’t an issue between us. Every time it visits, we have the exact same conversation. And I love that repetition. I wouldn’t want it any other way.

“What will he find out there, doctor?” “His destiny.” -Zira to Dr. Zaius, Planet of the Apes

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By time the ’90s came around, the iconic ape known as Donkey Kong had begun to show his age. A handful of games released in the early ’80s, beginning with the big breakthrough title Donkey Kong in 1981, made DK a popular, coin-eating, barrel-chucking baddie in the neon-lit arcades but the times were slowing changing. Video games were moving irresistibly away from the arcades to home consoles and nearly 10 years between new Donkey Kong releases all but ensured that DK risked becoming nothing more than a relic. Nintendo needed a “rare” solution to this problem to resurrect the grimacing gorilla. That solution came from overseas in the West.

Tim and Chris Stamper were hard at work developing 3D sprites when the Big N’s eye fell on their Leicestershire company, Rare. Nintendo was so enamored with what they saw that they moved to acquire 49% of the company and Rare became a second-party developer. Donkey Kong would see the light of day again with a fresh, slick appearance through this partnership between Nintendo and Rare, and thus the former antagonist was given the chance to play the hero. Donkey Kong Country was born.

The glowering gorilla’s days of harassing Pauline and battling Jumpman were over. Shigeru Miyamoto’s creation was given a somewhat subtle facelift, yet the changes in his appearance were distinct enough to last decades to come. The now iconic red necktie stuck with the character, a carry-over from the quasi-remake of the original Donkey Kong released on the Game Boy just a few months earlier, but DK’s overall stature was diminished from monstrous and intimidating to lean and athletic. A smaller cranium made him appear less menacing, an expressive mouth that did more than gnash its teeth made him more accessible, a curled tuft of hair at the top of his head lent him a sense of style. The character leaped from 2D to new life in pre-rendered 3D.

“There was some wrangling over the look of Donkey Kong; we wanted to modernise the look and give him a different personality.” -Brendan Gunn, Rare developer

The redesign of this new hero needed a sidekick and this came in the form of Diddy Kong, who was not a gorilla but a chimpanzee with a red ball cap and tank top. The prototypical Diddy (initially “Dinky Kong”) was meant to be an update of Donkey Kong Jr.’s character but the change proved too much for Nintendo, who, in typical Nintendo fashion, demanded either DK Jr.’s appearance be made more consistent with his past or the character instead be made an entirely new one. Rare opted for the latter.

Perhaps the most immediately obvious change in the DK franchise was the implementation of Rare’s pre-rendered 3D. Donkey Kong Country was one of the early home console games to use pre-rendered 3D graphics, preceded by Killer Instinct, which was also produced by Rare, and succeeded later by Super Mario RPG: Legend of the Seven Stars, as well as many others. On the Super Nintendo, Rare’s pre-rendered graphics gave Donkey Kong Country a distinct and attractive appearance. At the time, I remember being wowed by their fluidity and detail, the almost plastic perfection of every palm frond, character gesture, and banana.

I am sure a lot of my impression was informed by promotional material but it was easy enough to project that onto the game itself.

Donkey Kong Country, as the name suggests, is set in the sprawling dominion of DK: an island frighteningly, coincidentally shaped like his head. Was this bizarre tropical cloister a habitat formed by the arbitrary hand of Nature, or did the raw power of the apes themselves shape their world in their furrowed image? Certainly this was not the Earth which God intended.

Joking aside and on a much more serious note, DK’s banana hoard (at the scale of an Arabian Nights cave of wonders) has been ransacked. The emptiness of the cave where once his sweet but pilfered potassium-ey treasures lay put a mirror against the howling vacuity of his gorilla longing, and so DK and Diddy embark on a quest fueled by the awesome rage of revenge.

Only one villain was depraved enough to rob the apes of their dearest desires. Only one foe could be cold-blooded enough to steal away DK’s very sustenance and soul. King K. Rool (whose name is suggestive of the word “cruel”, in case you didn’t pick up on that) is the tyrannical burglar responsible. DK and Diddy must wade through the Kremling armies, liberating scattered bananas along the way, before they face down the final reptilian robber himself.

Click here for the full review... https://thewellredmage.com/2018/03/10/donkey-kong-country/