Donkey Kong 64

"DK64 is good...but a classic? no..."

Well it came I saw I even liked at first glance, sure Donkey Kong 64 has superb graphics, no doubt, this is due to the use of Nintendo's expansion pak! The worlds are stunning, huge in size and most look visually flawless, maybe the worlds were a little to big for my liking, I‘m not quite sure. The game was pretty hyped up when first released, no doubt people expecting it to be just as ground breaking as the DKC series on the SNES, however it didn’t live up to its hype in my opinion just another platformer, following the same lines as Banjo Kazooie. DK64 I would call a good game but it doesn’t even verge on classic!

Story
Yep, King K. Rool is back and this time his bigger and badder then ever, armed with a new vessel he plans to destroy DK isles, the home of the Kongs. In an attempt to foil Donkey Kong’s attempt at saving the isles King K. Rool kidnaps DK’s friends, and guess who’s job it is to save them? Yep you guessed! DK must save his friends who have been locked away in various worlds, while at the same time collect everything besides the kitchen sink! Ok so the story isn’t great, but it isn’t as bad as some! 7/10

Gameplay
This is where the game seriously lacks, and this is the reason for my lower rating! Lets face facts a game is nothing if the gameplay is absolutely unbearable, well DK64’s gameplay isn’t “unbearable” but verges closely to it. I don’t know how many times I just wanted to pack it all in! The game is looooong and will take most around 30+ hours to beat without the help of a FAQ. Ok great you say? Well I hate to burst your bubble but the only reason this game is so looooong is because you have to keep back tracking through the same worlds, collecting item upon item upon more highly “unnecessary” items. Lets see you have to collect Golden Banana’s, Regular Banana’s, Fairies, Battle Crowns, Boss Keys, Banana Medals, Blueprints....the list goes on! All this collecting would make anyone irritable! Far too tedious for my liking!

The game hosts a number of mini-games you must play, you receive 1 golden banana per game, some are easy and quite enjoyable, while others are hard and frustrating. Another thing in order to beat the game you must collect both the Rareware Coin and the Nintendo coin, the Rareware coin is relatively easy to obtain, but the Nintendo coin...well lets just say my controller has seen better days, I’ll let you see this one for yourself.

Arghhh...Glitches, before I brought this game I had read that it had some glitches, more then most games, well I sure coped my fair share. One Glitch that really annoyed me, I was fighting the level 4 boss can’t remember its name its the one where you have use Tiny and leap from pedestal to pedestal, well neways I fell down and the lift bought me back up, well I then jumped off the lift and onto a pedestal to my surprise the boss had become stuck on a pedestal, he kept leaping out but only to land on the same pedestal! I had no choice but to exit the level, and I had almost destroyed him too!...bwah!

The controllers are fairly easy to get accustomed to, it might take a bit of getting used to at first but after a while of playing it will become second nature...;)...no complaints with control! Gameplay is where DK64 fails in my opinion. 5/10

Graphics
As stated the graphics are pretty fantastic, apart from in DK isles, here the graphics seem dull and uninspiring, who wants to save that piece of Garbage?...j/k...Apart from that minor disappointment all the worlds sport impressive graphics. I was particularly impressed with “Fungi Forest” the textures were especially good in this world. The Kongs themselves were also visually appealing...mmmm...yes...I’ll put that in another way, they looked really really good...there that's better...:D...The only character that lacked something was King K. Rool, personally I thought he looked better in the SNES versions! The expansion pak has been worked into this game well, and the results certainly show. In all I wasn’t let down by the graphics. 9/10

Sound
Probably not the most important factor when considering a purchase of a game, but never the less, the sounds in most instances fit what your doing at the time, and mood of the music is usually an accurate representation of your current surroundings. And example of this is in “Fungi Forest” the music seemed to fit perfectly...mmmm...anyone get the feeling I like “Fungi Forest?”...*heh* 9/10

Replayability
The multiplayer mode is enjoyable, and adds to the replay factor also by collecting the 20 fairies you get the option of refighting bosses, again adding to the replay value, but in time you will get bored with both the multiplayer mode and the bosses, its nothing to fabulous. Give me Goldeneye any day! 6/10

To buy or to rent?
I wouldn’t advise renting because there is no way you’ll finish it unless you play it night and day, if you can pick this game up second hand its a good buy, but play in moderation otherwise you’ll soon get bored with it and its tediousness.

Overall
It’ll pass an hour or two on a rainy day, I wouldn’t advise playing more then an hour or 2 of DK64 per day otherwise you will soon bored with it! I didn’t dislike DK64 I thought it was an enjoyable game at first but then the item collection got in the way, this is what stopped the game becoming truly great in my opinion. Rare really didn’t have to make this game as long as they did, it really didn’t need to be, maybe if some of the item collection was cut out I would of enjoyed it more! I guess I’ll never know, neways I won’t take up anymore of your time, hope you found this review helpful.

Reviewer's Score: 6/10, Originally Posted: 11/22/01, Updated 11/22/01