"A good game for GC's first rhythm action game"

Donkey Konga is Nintendo's first shot at a rhythm action game on the GameCube, and I think that it came through well for them. Donkey Konga is played using a set of bongos and using your hands to clap. You can jam to classic Nintendo tunes like The Legend of Zelda theme, TV show themes like the Pokemon theme, and songs old and new like We Will Rock You and All the Small Things.

The list of songs is relatively small, only about twenty-five songs, a few of them specially made for this game, but most of them just remakes or original songs. However, a small sound list should be expected since this is the first game in this series. Though the song list is short, there are still many good tunes. Each song's difficulty is represented by a number of bongos. However, this system of rating a songs difficulty doesn't seem to be very consistent in this game because some hard songs in the hardest mode have a lower rating than much easier songs in easier modes.

When you first start the game, there are three difficulty levels(Monkey, Chimp, and Gorilla), however, all songs must be unlocked for Gorilla mode. The unlock system for this game is one used before, which is why it is solid and fair. To unlock songs, you must first gain coins by passing songs, then you can choose which songs to buy with these coins. You can also unlock different sets of sounds for the bongos to make, which doesn't add much to the game since the normal sound is the only one not incredibly annoying. Also, three mini-games can be bought with these coins. They are moderately fun, but not particularly addictive to me. There are also quite a few other types of game play where you have to memorize the beats to a song.

One of the most entertaining features of this game is its four-player support. Playing this game with multiple people just increased the fun in this game that much. With just one set of bongos, the replay value on this game is already relatively high, but if you can get more than one person to play at a time, the replay value skyrockets. Groups can battle, play duets, or just compete against each other in any song available in regular mode. The replay value is also high because it seems very hard to get perfect scores on a song. The highest value for any single beat is a Great, which requires a very small margin of error to achieve. However, passing songs is not a great challenge. Even the hardest songs in the game I could pass after just a few hours of playing. None of the songs provide the extremely rapid and intense play that one would expect from the hardest songs.

Graphically the game wasn't stunning, but graphics aren't all that important in this game. Unlike other rhythm action games, this one has no special backgrounds for each song or icons for a song. Throughout the entire game the graphics are very lack luster and boring. What graphics are in this game definitely are not up to par with the GameCube's standards, but fortunately it doesn't really affect game play. The case art isn't all that impressive either. A boring orange background with plain white letters on the spine, and a crappy image of Donkey Kong on the front cover are the main attractions.

Final Words
Donkey Konga is a very different type of rhythm action game, but it is definitely worth trying out if you like rhythm action games or if you are looking for a good party game. It takes a little practice, but this game is very addictive.

Reviewer's Score: 7/10, Originally Posted: 01/05/06