Donkey Kong Country

Donkey Kong Country is a video game developed by Rare and Nintendo, featuring the popular arcade character, Donkey Kong. It was released for the SNES and Super Famicom in 1994. The game was released in Japan under the title Super Donkey Kong.

The game has a sort of self-referential humor in that all of the characters are perfectly aware that they are in a video game, not only in the way of telling characters to press a certain button to jump, but commenting on the graphics and the like, breaking the fourth wall. That the characters are aware that they are in a video game is a well-established fact that has been referenced throughout most Donkey Kong games following this one.

It was produced by Tim Stamper.

Story

In this game, Donkey Kong has to recover his stolen hoard of bananas from King K. Rool. Fortunately, he has the special help of his nephew, Diddy Kong. Cranky Kong also lends some advice along the way, and new friends Funky Kong and Candy Kong also help out. It was also the first time Donkey Kong's home environment, Donkey Kong Island, was established.

Development history

Graphics

The game was revolutionary in that it was the first game for a mainstream home video game console to use pre-rendered 3-D graphics. It was a technique that was also used in Rare's Killer Instinct. Many later 3-D video games would also use pre-rendered 3-D together with fully 3-D objects. Rare took significant financial risks in purchasing the expensive SGI equipment used to render the graphics. Both Nintendo and Rare refer to the technique for the creating the game's graphics as "ACM" (Advanced Computer Modeling)

Nintendo producer Shigeru Miyamoto once criticized Donkey Kong Country, stating that "Donkey Kong Country proves that players will put up with mediocre gameplay as long as the art is good."The Ultimate History of Video Games: From Pong to Pokemon--The Story Behind the Craze That Touched Our Lives and Changed the World by Steven L. Kent Miyamoto later apologized, saying he had been too harsh due to Nintendo's pressuring him at the time to make Yoshi's Island more like Donkey Kong Country."

Music

Donkey Kong Country also had a popular soundtrack which was released on CD under the title DK Jamz. Composers Robin Beanland, Eveline Fischer and Dave Wise collaborated on this ensemble of jungle music. The diverse composition consists of over 20 tracks.

The soundtrack was also the focus of a OC ReMix collaboration entitled Kong in Concert.

Reception

Donkey Kong Country was well-known for reviving the Super Nintendo and creating huge sales for what were called at the time "lush, amazing" graphics.

Sequels

Two sequels, Diddy's Kong Quest and Dixie Kong's Double Trouble!, were later made. All three games also had counterparts on the Game Boy in the form of the Donkey Kong Land series. The Donkey Kong Country name was also used for an online game called Donkey Kong Country Barrel Maze in 2003.

In 1999, a Nintendo 64 game was released called Donkey Kong 64 that was a direct sequel to the DKC franchise. This title featured a playable version of the original 1981 arcade classic Donkey Kong.

Ports

In 2000, a port of Donkey Kong Country for the Game Boy Color was released. In 2003, another port of the game was released for the Game Boy Advance. Both games had some new features including new minigames, hidden pictures, a new stage (GBC version) and Time Trial mode (GBA version). Both versions also had a number of minor changes.

Records

Speed Run Records

The current records for this game as of March 19, 2006:

Regular Speed Runs

100% (Listed as 101%): 0:50 by Derek 'SnapDragon' Kisman

Tool-Assisted Speed Runs

Pure Speed: 25:03 by Sami O.
100% (Listed as 101%): 47:25 by Tim Alakangas

Notes

References

http://www.classicgaming.com/vgtunes/index_files/dkc.htm

External links

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