Donkey Kong County Returns dissapointment

Marzy said:

I know, I know. I read exactly what you said. And what you said was fine, it was some of the other people. I don't want to name names, or start fights or anything, but I just think that some people need to appreciate new things for what they are. Otherwise we'll get Transformers 14 if you know what I mean.

It's like when people hated every new Halo game that came out. On their own, they're amazing games. There's no question. But people would have rather had say Halo 2.5 than Halo 3, which doesn't make sense to me. Now, here's an example on the other side though. I haven't played Dragon Ages 1 or 2, but from watching gameplay footage and reading reviews/comments, they completely changed the game for a worser product. Something like this makes sense. Idk, I guess I'm just rambling haha.

( Edited 23.05.2011 18:15 by bornforthis43 )

Chill guys!

I do agree that the series will evolve and change - but at the same time, it also needs to keep that special something that makes it unique.

DKCR just seemed bland and a little bit generic.

I must say DKCR to me felt like Sonic 4 did to the series - it tried to recapture the love but felt a touch boring. That said, at least DKCR was a working game compared to SEGA's pretty poor take.

Just wasn't too happy with the controls, imo not as responsive as the regular SNES pad. Classic should have been implemented as standard. Just felt a bit of a step back imo.

I agree on most of these points. I really do feel that the game was almost too difficult.

I do wish it would have kept the dark/atmospheric parts; however, I think Retro Studios did a great job. I even think they would have a done a better job than Miyamoto

I feel like if he made it, it would have been even more cartoony.

I'm rooting for DKCR2 though

GreythaGreat said:

I'm rooting for DKCR2 though

I hope nobody blasts me for making a comment (if it'll even let me since this thread's a little old..) but I don't know where else to say this without running into the incompetent bias I see everywhere else (espcially GameFAQs).

Like many of you, I played the DKC series since it started and really loved them, especially the first. They were atmospheric, had personality, and a lot of stuff that's already been said by other people in the thread. However, since a couple of people said something about looking at this the wrong way, I thought there WAS something I could talk about.

I have nothing wrong with games changing and evolving over time. Mario 64 was a great game, just as SMB1-3, and SMW was before that. Or how Final Fantasy 1-6 continued to chance and still feel great, even some of the later PS1 entries. But that's not what bothers me about DKCR.

I think what hit me hardest was.. well, the issue of originality. Hear me out, though, cause this falls on both sides of that coin. On one hand we have a lot of remixed or reused music from previous games. This alone seems wrong on so many levels. When Retro made Metroid Prime, they reused or remixed a small number of tracks that would resonate with people by having them in the appropriate place, such as Magmoor Caverns using the Norfair 2 theme. But I've recognized almost every track I've heard in this game and I shouldn't be doing that at all! This is a new game, where's the fresh music?

Then we have the other side of the coin, where they tried to be too original. What's with the pig as a midway point, like someone else said somewhere, that just didn't make sense. Where the hell did these Tiki guys come from and where's King K Rool? The Tiki guys might be supposedly original, but the more I play the game the more I feel like they're from something else. Perhaps it was an unused idea Retro'd had.. or maybe it could be like I keep thinking, and that they were somewhat inspired by Crash Bandicoot, which had Tiki stuff all over the place. It certainly didn't feel like Donkey Kong, though.

Then we have them wanting to recreate the fun of the minecart levels.. and they totally botch it by having them both ridiculously frustrating (especially if trying to collect KONG letters) and needlessly difficult by having any collison result in death; despite having 4 hearts. In the old games, you would lose DK or Diddy and could take another hit. That would have been a blessing or a miracle in this game.

And again going back to the other side, we have the barral riding levels.. which I admit were kinda cool at first, then they become downright agrivating with how hard it could be to control them (which is funny since you only use a single button). I lost count of how many lives I'd lose on those levels because I swore I pulled up in time but didn't, or something came outta nowhere from the background and I couldn't tell it was gonna hit me.

Honestly, the difficulty itself is a real problem for me. I'm not gonna lie, I ended up cheating about half of the levels in this game (unless you count remapping the motion controls to the B button, then I was always cheating). For me, it felt like Super Kong was an excuse to make the game more difficult than it needed to be. There's nostalgic old school gameplay, then there's exaggeration.. which I also feel is the case of Megaman 9 and 10, but that's beside the point. Basically, I think that some of the levels were far harder than they needed to be. No checkpoints in Temple levels, a lot of the puzzle pieces didn't even have any clues as to what to look for (or required leaps of blind faith), and indecisive damage ratios... why does one boulder do 1 heart, but another kills you instantly within the same level?

Did I enjoy playing the game? Sure, for the most part, but about .. I dunno.. 1/3 of the game was totally unenjoyable for me. Bogged down by unnecessary decisions or changes, the lack of fitting music and atmosphere, and the feeling that a lot of stuff was simply recycled from the older games.

I'm just really glad I rented this and didn't spend 50 bucks on it. I'd have been almost as disappointed as I was with Other M... maybe more-so.