C3 Special | 30 Years of Nintendo's Donkey Kong Page 1

People may see Donkey Kong as the hero in today's world, with him taking centre stage in not only the Donkey Kong Country series, but also games such as Donkey Kong: Jungle Climber and even in the guest starring roles of high speed racer in Mario Kart and powerful hitter in Mario Tennis. However, 30 years ago Donkey Kong was brought to life as a villain who kidnapped fair maidens and caused all manner of chaos. With this year being the ape's landmark anniversary, the staff at Cubed3 take a look at some of the fondest memories from the past.

Adam Riley, Senior Editor

Donkey Kong has one year on me, with my 30th not coming until 2012, but there are many similarities between myself and the ape, such as the fact that we are both big and hairy. In all honesty, and on a more serious note, when I was a young lad I never tried the original arcade Donkey Kong games where players controlled Jumpman, or later Mario, as he attempted to dodge incoming barrels, climb ladders, avoid treacherous falls and scale the highest heights in order to rescue the damsel in distress. In all actuality, I even dodged the very first Donkey Kong Country, despite the furore surroundings its release in the early 1990s due to developer Rareware's special graphical technique (ACM; Advanced Computer Modelling) that helped the ageing Super Nintendo compete with the newcomer from Sony, the PlayStation, for a while longer.

It was games such as Donkey Kong '94 (played through a Super Game Boy!) and both Donkey Kong Country 2: Diddy's Kong Quest and Donkey Kong Country 3: Dixie's Double Trouble that caught the real attention, and these superb experiences definitely placed Donkey Kong firmly on my radar forevermore. With the ultimate demise of the Donkey Kong platform series post sale of UK outfit Rare to Microsoft, the key Nintendo character was left in somewhat of a limbo state for many years, with great-but-unusual titles such as DK: King of Swing and Donkey Konga coming to fruition.

Thankfully it appears that Donkey Kong rode the turbulent waves for a few years without picking up many scars, with all being right with the world again and Donkey Kong being put on firm ground once more. With the massive success of Donkey Kong Country Returns ensuring that series is set to continue for some time to come, and the continued strong sales of Mario Vs. Donkey Kong, with its mix of classic arcade gameplay mixed with Lemmings-esque puzzle fun, helping keep the old school dream alive, Donkey Kong has a long and healthy future ahead of him.

Rudy Lavaux, Reviewer

Though it is a well-known fact to Nintendo's most devoted fans, in the early 1980s, the Big N was a force to be reckoned with in the arcades. Donkey Kong was the prime example of this. What we tend to forget, however, is that those Nintendo games from the arcades also appeared on home machines of the time, which were not manufactured by Nintendo itself. We are talking about microcomputers and video game consoles pre-dating the NES. By the time I was old enough to reach the joystick and buttons of arcade machines, which were still to be found in the pubs in my area, Donkey Kong had unfortunately already come and gone, leaving a strong mark in even my parents' memory who still fondly remember trying to beat the high score.

My personal first taste of the game was the 1983 Commodore 64 port by Atarisoft. Although I had no idea at the time, this proved to be a pretty faithful port, visually, aurally and in terms of content. Unlike most ports at the time, it featured all four levels of the arcade version, albeit shuffled in a weird way. The gameplay however was not as faithfully reproduced, despite the microcomputer using a joystick and buttons setup comparable to what was available in the arcades. The controls were not very responsive and that made the game harder than its arcade equivalent. Despite all these flaws, though, this first try at this landmark in gaming history still holds a dear place in my gaming memories. For the record, I already knew who Mario was at the time, the NES being already released and Mario already being very popular. To me however, Jumpman was a totally different character belonging to another frustratingly hard game that surely contributed to rush my premature baldness.

Another experience, which I do not hold as dearly though, comes in the form of the Atari 2600 port that my uncle owned. Nowhere near as good, but its sound effects truly stick in my mind. Although these memories are the earliest I have of playing the series, I would not really become a fan until I played Donkey Kong '94 on Game Boy, recently revived on the 3DS Virtual Console, and obviously Donkey Kong Country for the Super Nintendo. That game blew my mind completely, like most of the Cubed3 staff here. Although I am not too fond of the numerous spin-offs that Donkey Kong found himself starring in during recent years, I can only hope that we will get to play more DK platformers in the future. Why not a return to the 3D format of Donkey Kong 64, Nintendo?

Mike Mason, Reviews/Features Editor

As a child, my sole experience with Nintendo's first major player was with the Commodore 64 conversion of the addictive arcade original; a game that I was terrible at but could not get enough of, when I was not clamming my little hands up playing Taito's arcade classics. As a Mega Drive owner, I never really played the Donkey Kong Country games back then, nor did I dip into Donkey Kong 64, and so I missed out on those much beloved titles until later years.

It was not until the GameCube that I appreciated the ape's antics fully. To a music game lover like I, Donkey Konga proved to be an excellent distraction, and to this day it still gets pulled out for a clap and smash every so often in the company of friends. The proper use of those DK Bongos, though, came with Donkey Kong: Jungle Beat’s release. Who would have thought that a platformer could be played so well with hand slaps on plastic bongos? The resulting game is not only one of the very best GameCube games, but also one of my favourite games ever. A near-perfect mixture of speed and clever level design, taking players tumbling both across ground and through air, it answered a question that nobody had ever thought to ask: what if Sonic the Hedgehog had the clambering abilities and brute strength of a gorilla?