Review: Donkey Kong Country

A couple of days ago I ordered Donkey Kong Country 2. It's made me reflect on the original.

The year was 1994, many gamers were questioning when the 16-bit era would end. The Saturn was on it's way, and the 32x and Playstation had already arrived. It seemed that the Super Nintendo was on it's way out. However, some, including Sega's own Tom Kalinske, thought that, while it would no longer be the primary market, 16 bit games still could be sold at a reasonable price. Nintendo followed this policy where Sega did not. Nintendo did many things, such as release the super nintendo 2.0, the fx chip, etc... However no release exemplifies this strategy more than Donkey Kong Country. Rare, arguably the best British developer of all time or at least the 80's through the 90's, used pre-rendered graphics to try to compete with the newer 32 bit systems. This amazed gamers at the time as seen in the "Donkey Kong Country: Exposed" promo. This was the first Donkey Kong game not produced by Shigeru Miyamoto and he seemed to have a grudge at the time. He has been quoted as saying "Donkey Kong Country proves that players will put up with mediocre gameplay as long as the art is good." Miyamoto was in the process of making Yoshi's Island (SMBW2) and was under a lot of pressure to make that game look as "realistic" as DKC. It's interesting to see that even in the early 90's, game designers were still forced to adapt to some consumers ideal of realism versus creating their own ascetics. This divide seems to still lie along the lines of western versus Japanese developers.

Anyways, Miyamoto must have been playing the japanese version, which was modified to be easier (I really want to get a copy to see how much easier), because the game play is solid. It is very similar to mario, except jumping on enemies will launch you upward. This mechanic combined with barrels that launch you across the screen, provided interesting platforming opportunities for your pleasure! This game is damn tough and requires precision. But Donkey Kong Country is fair, and you'll be returning for more punishment again and again.

5 stars out of 5