Donkey Kong Country

"The first game in the best platformer series ever"

I have always been a big fan of platformers. From Super Mario Bros. to Super Mario 64, platforms were always high on my list. However, most of these platformers are only mediocre. Just average. I needed something to spark my interest into platformers again. Enter Donkey Kong Country. It has all the feel of Super Mario World, with much better graphics. It has the cool music. It has the perfect Play Control that is a standard in most platformers. Whether it be the awesome graphics, the wonderful music or the beautiful Play Control, this is one of the best platformers I have ever seen. And believe me, that's hard to get, with many superb platformers such as Super Mario World 1-2, Super Mario Bros. 1-3, and the (superior!) sequel to this game, Donkey Kong Country 2. This beats most of them.

GRAPHICS (10/10)
Definitely the most perfect quality of Donkey Kong Country. For 1994, this was beautiful. It was one of the first attempts in the video game world to use ACM (Advanced Computer Modeling), and heck yeah, it was a good move. With large, distinguishable, beautiful character sprites and supreme backgrounds, it was one of the best visual treats I have ever played. If I had to name a problem with the graphics in this game, it is that Donkey Kong looks a little more fuzzy than necessary, but that isn't really a problem, just something to nitpick. The rest of the sprites are wonderfully textured. They are much better than anything was to date.

SOUND (10/10)
Sound and Music is another delivering feature of Donkey Kong Country. The music is perfectly fitting to the levels. For example, in the jungle levels you have a more upbeat song that fits Donkey Kong wonderfully. In the caves you have a strange song that is an ''exploration'' type of song. In mines you have no real song, but rather some sound effects mixed together to make it feel damp and spooky. If these aren't perfect for the level they go to, I don't know what is. Likewise, the sound effects are perfect for what is happening. They are much less ''bleep'' and ''bloop'' than the games that came out before it, and more realistic. Bashing barrels sounds accurate. King K. Rool grunts like you would expect him to, as does all other kremlings. It truly is an experience.

PLAY CONTROL (20/20)
This, likewise to the above two, shows Donkey Kong Country's excellence. You will not have any problems with the superior Play Control. The A button or Select button allows you to switch characters. The B button lets you jump. The Y button lets you roll/cartwheel. The Y button also allows you to pick up barrels. The controls are slightly different with animal buddies, but are the same way most of the time. They take less than 5 minutes to perfect, although you may have a little trouble jumping as high or low as you want in the beginning. You shouldn't have any problems whatsoever after this.

STORY (18/20)
This is one of the many games in the world that don't need a good storyline to be good. However, I felt it important to mention the story because it remains in the later games, which brings changes to their reviews. The story in this game is to rescue your little buddy Diddy, who has been kidnapped by the Kremlings, as well to rescue your stolen bananas. Very... odd, to say the least. Though it's fairly original, it is... a little strange. But it works, so I can't take too many points off for it. Also, there is another point that keeps the points high: the cool characters.
Donkey Kong kicks butt. He's a big cool ape. Diddy Kong also kicks butt, because he's a small, fast version of Donkey Kong. Cranky Kong is the original Donkey Kong, and he is extremely funny when he talks about the good ol' days when games were games. Candy Kong is Donkey's love interest who saves your game, but she's sort of weird. Funky Kong is cool enough, if only because he's cool looking. In addition, the game has cool animal buddies. I cannot take very many points off in the game for story when it has these cool characters

GAME PLAY (30/30)
Perfect. Perfect. Absolutely PERFECT Game Play. You will love the game the entire way through. The levels are fun to play through, and you can backtrack to get secrets. It's simply wonderful. It is not something that can be explained in words, you need to play the game to get its true full excellence.

CHALLENGE (7/15)
OWWWWWW. This game, while perfect in nearly all other areas, had very, VERY little challenge to it. The latter two in the series improved on this area a ton. While it can be slightly difficult to get 101% in the game, simply going through the game is so easy it's not even funny. Another point: The bosses. Oh my GOD, I hate the bosses. They are easier than the game itself. I am sorry, but this is not a delivering quality about Donkey Kong Country.

REPLAY (15/15)
This game is extremely fun to play through many times over in order to get 101% many times over. Every time you will have fun playing the game, even if it is easy.

OVERALL (110/120) (91.6666...%) 9/10
This game is an excellent game that I wanted to give a perfect 10. However, numbers do not agree with me, and the challenge flaw brings it down to a 9. However, despite the easiness of the game, you really should give Donkey Kong Country a try. You will almost definitely love the game.

OTHER STUFF
If you enjoy Donkey Kong Country, you may also want to try Donkey Kong Country 2: Diddy's Kong Quest, which improves over the original in almost all ways; and Donkey Kong Country 3: Dixie Kong's Double Trouble, which is not as good as the first two but still has its delivering qualities.

Reviewer's Score: 9/10, Originally Posted: 04/07/01, Updated 04/07/01