"An average music game"

I played Donkey Konga at Circuit City when it first came out. It felt odd clapping in the middle of a store and to be honest the song list hadn't impressed me. Well, I got this as a gift because someone had found it on clearance for cheap and it came with the bongos. I popped it in and quickly played through the Easy mode and goofed off with the normal mode. Here's my review!

Graphic wise Donkey Konga is kind of bland. The back drops change but they are kind of bland. One has balloons that fly and to eb honest they distract from the actual game because they are round, like the keys and have the same colors. The characters on the screen are kind of generic in detail as well.

As a music game the sound is a very important thing. There is no voice acting. Music wise I am very mixed. Nintendo took a page from the Taiko Drum master book and provided popular music with classical and then threw in some theme songs. What could go wrong? Well, some of the songs are really bad covers. A lot of older music is here and then the obvious throw in to bring in a different kind of gamer (Blink 182...). My biggest problem with the music though are the classic Nintendo theme songs. Why are they really bad remixes? A few are decent but the Mario one doesn't really sound like the Mario theme. Oh and imagine playing the bongos to BINGO (you know, the song about the dog), or how about "Row, Row, Row your boat".... They can both be found in this title... Sound effect wise I found the normal ones to be really good. The problem comes in with the sounds you can buy. I only bought a few different ones but the Kirby one was terrible! Hell, the ones I did buy were terrible.

Donkey Konga comes with the bongo controller. It has a left and right bongo (attached together). In between them is a little mic that picks up a clap. Also, the control has a little start button. Now, I found the left and right bongos to be top notch and responsive. The problem comes in with the mic. I constantly found it picking up nothing yet doing the clapping motion which really messed me up at times. I found that it also didn't register some claps. Now, you can also tap the side of the drum and it picks up that sound but sometimes it double claps.... This and the music are the big reasons for the low-ish score. I also tried the game with the Cube controller and found that Type B setting worked best and made the game more enjoyable.

Game play is also key in a rhythm game. Now, the game has a number of modes. Single song mode which lets you pick from Easy or Normal. There is also a hard mode but you have to buy each and every song. This is my problem with game play though. You gain coins for good presses, about 300-400 per song. There are 33 songs so you do the math. On normal you get more coins. The thing is you need to buy all 3 mini games, all 33 hard mode songs AND all of the new sound effects. This means that you need to play the same songs over and over and over just to unlock everything. That isn't fair and there should have been new songs to buy instead of the hard versions, which should have been available from the start.

The game plays like any other rhythm game. Imagine a bar across your screen, going left to right. Running from the right to the left are circles. If it's yellow then it's a left bongo hit. If it's red it's a right bongo hit. Pink requires you hit both. A blue burst means you need to clap or tap the side of the Bongos. It's very simple and for the most part it actually is rhythm based. Sadly a few songs make little sense when rhythm is involved.

Replay value is fairly high in this title. Not only because you have to play the same songs over and over. There are also three mini games. The only one I really liked was the wak-a-mole one and even that wasn't all that great. The game supports up to four players and it rocks as a party game.

So, if you're looking for a party game then look no further. However there are much better music games out there. Taiko Drum Master did a much better job with this idea. The song selection is iffy at times and the bongo controller is a bit off with the clapping. Those little things really make me think this game isn't worth adding to your collection and it's a fine rental. Party people might as well run out and get it because it sure is a blast with friends. Single player is really weak though.

Story - N/A
Graphics - 6/10
Sound - 6/10
Control - 6/10
Game Play - 7/10
Replay Value - 9/10

Final Score - 6/10

Reviewer's Score: 6/10, Originally Posted: 05/21/06