Diddy Kong Racing DS

"Don't let Rare touch another DS game, Nintendo!"

Alright, I played the original Diddy Kong Racing on the 64... and I absolutely loved it up to these days. I was excited to hear that there was a DS version that was a port of the original, so I was at GameStop faster than the eye could see. Since this is a port, I held it to the standards that the original had set... and this one didn't even attempt to jump the bar.

Graphics-Now, DKR was one of the first games for the 64, so it wasn't going to win any beauty contests. However, they actually made them worse for the DS! You would think a whole decade would've given them time to touch up the graphics at least a little. Water looks like it's painted on, and everything is flat sided. It feels like I'm on a cardboard island instead of a tropical island.

Sound-FREAKIN' TERRIBLE. The music has kept its tunes with only slight changes, and that's good. However, THERE'S ONLY ONE VOICE ACTOR IN THE ENTIRE GAME. I'm not kidding. They make the same sounds when you shoot them, pass them, or what have you, and only the pitch was changed. And Taj, the blue elephant? Instead of sounding like an Arabian genie, he now sounds like that creepy old guy from Family Guy. If you really wanna play this game, keep the sound off if you know what's good for you.

Gameplay-Now, this is where I rake a game over the coals. If it plays like crap, the game is crap. For the most part, the car and plane are controlled just like on the 64, so there's no problem there. The hovercraft though... it slides worse than anything I've ever seen! You can upgrade your carts as you play, and the hovercraft demands cornering, or you'll just go sliding into oblivion. You can also paint your carts, which I was happy for, but it turns out that colors are set to certain parts of the cart, so they look ugly and mottled if you move the color bars. The silver coin challenge is now a bonus feature (thank god!) but another feature was added that really steamed my broccoli. Bosses can now be raced a third time, and you control your driver like you're playing Kirby Canvas Curse. It's absolutely horrible! You have to spin your tire on the lower left side of the screen, taking away time you need to be steering around obstacles or cliffs, and other such bull crap, all for only 100 coins to upgrade your cart, and coins are hard to come by unless you play a track a million times. They also took out the bonus levels, like Fire Mountain and stuff and replaced them with a race with TT. Those levels were FUN! Why, Rare?! This game is great if you're going to play Multiplayer a lot, but prepare yourself for a major headache if you're gonna play Adventure.

Overall-Well, first impressions are most important, and this game gave off a HORRIBLE first impression. Sound is bad, certain points of gameplay are bad, and graphics are bad. If you get past all the hurdles, the game is pretty much like the original minus a couple flaws, but unfortunately, those flaws are pretty major. Go play Mario Kart instead. Rare, you better step it up if you're gonna make more DS games.

Reviewer's Score: 3/10, Originally Posted: 02/08/07