I’m not a professional reviewer, but I am nothing if not an amateur opinion-haver. For the past few weeks I’ve been glued to Donkey Kong Banaza, but even after having beaten the game and experiencing most of everything it has to offer, I’m still having trouble articulating (or even synthesizing) how I feel about it.
As I alluded to in a previous post, I’ve always been a tremendous fan of the Donkey Kong game series. Most of my childhood was spent either playing the original Donkey Kong Country trilogy on the Super Nintendo, or playing Donkey Kong 64 on the Nintendo 64. The first Country game came out in 1994, the same year I was born. I started playing when I was around two or three. For my fifth Christmas Santa Clause brought me a DK64/Nintendo 64 in DK Jungle Green (complete with expansion pak). I grew up with those games, and played them for hours on end. Then, in my late teens and early twenties, I had the pleasure of enjoying the newer Donkey Kong Country titles produced by Retro Studios.
I have an entire shrine in my closet dedicated to Donkey Kong. My love for the DK Universe knows almost no bounds.
When I first heard that a new 3D Donkey Kong game would be coming out this summer, the first in over twenty-five years, I assumed I would be one of the first people in line for a Nintendo Switch 2. But as I began to watch more and more gameplay, I felt the excitement dwindle.
At first, before I actually got my hands on a copy, I had some concerns about the mechanics I was seeing in the trailers and early demo footage. I didn’t like that being destructive is the primary attribute of Donkey Kong in this game. He’s not Wreck-It-Ralph (even though the latter was clearly inspired by the former). I didn’t like the thought of him punching his way endlessly through the terrain, nor did I like the thought of collecting endless heaps of gold and hundreds upon hundreds of bananas. I know that’s rich coming from someone who adores the unabashed collectathon that is DK64, but at least in that game you have a huge array of different moves, special power-ups for each of the five Kong family members, and even things like weapons and instruments.
Once Bananza was released, the clear opinion that emerged from both reviewers and people in the DK fandom was that this game was a masterpiece. From various posts I started seeing easter eggs and cameos from the earlier entries in the series, which made me very excited. I watched a few people play through the introductory level, and suddenly the game starting appearing much more fun than I first expected.
When I first got my hands on a copy, I fell in love immediately. I played the demo at a random Walmart on Saturday night, and by Sunday afternoon I had picked up a Switch 2 and a copy of Bananza. For the rest of the day, and every evening in the weeks that followed, I was glued to Bananza.
It is not a perfect game, by any means. Cranky’s rants are repetitive. Diddy and Dixie’s role in the game is way too diminished. Donkey Kong is less serious and sillier (dare I say, dumber) than his normal portrayal in earlier titles. And I have mixed feelings about the “ending.”
And more than anything, my biggest criticism is that the vibe is slightly off. There was a darkness to the old DK games that is simply absent here. There was an edge, a spookiness, a gritty realism that isn’t present for Bananza. Bananza is vivid. It’s colorful. It’s bright. It’s joyful. Those attributes are all completely fine, but it’s still a departure, and it takes time to get used to the change in vibe.
I also don’t like how much this game feels like Mario Odyssey. I know many folks argue it’s not all that similar, but the entire time I’m playing it, I can’t help but constantly be reminded of Odyssey. You have three cartoonish villians in each, the progression works the same, the enemies are reminiscent, and overall, it’s just unmistakably obvious that the same team worked on both games.
All those criticisms aside, this game is a gem. It is such a pleasure to play. The destruction never did get old to me. The various ways you can move the character, the new mechanics that show up all throughout the game, the various transformations you get as part of your set of “Bananzas”, and the wildly creative environments all work together to keep the game feeling fresh.
Not to mention that the game never drags. There’s never a moment where you don’t know what you need to do, or are trying to get past a boring part to get to the good stuff. It’s all the good stuff. And before when I said it was joyful, I meant it: the joy is downright contagious. Paulene reacts to everything with a youthful excitement that rubs off even on middle-adged grumps like me. The pace is absolutely extraordinary. And it adapts to your playstyle. If you want to collect everything as you go, it does not stand in your way. And if you want to be in a hurry to progress through the game and beat it as quickly as you can, it doesn’t hinder you from doing that, either.
Ultimately, I found myself grinning ear to ear the entire time I was playing Donkey Kong Bananza. I am already looking forward to another playthrough (I doubt I’ll ever 100% it - that has never really been my style when it comes to video games). The truth is, if this game was released when I was eight years old, it would have been my favorite game of all time and I know I would not be shutting up about it. I’m older, harder to please, and generally more difficult to excite. I loved this game more than I ever thought I could, and for that, I am thankful. But a part of me wishes I could be a kid again, just for a moment, to know how playing this would feel. Little Nathan would have his mind blown.
All I know is that this game has all my favorite characters, it pays homage to my favorite classic Country levels, and it includes the DK rap. What more need be said?