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StarTopic Donkey Kong Community |ST| No Country For Old Kongs

the Fungi Forest rabbit race is even worse, I think you basically have to rely on him getting stuck on something to actually win the second one.
Just did the first Bunny race, which I thought was easy. Only took two tries. For a second, I thought that what all of you were talking about was a joke. That is until I realized there's a second race.💀 i didn't even read through the quoted part I highlighted even carefully.😭 I do know that you have to backtrack from another world to do the second race again, judging on the invisible Lanky barrel.
 
Do you ever stop to think how cool it's that we had modern renditions of the mechanical Crocodile Isle (complete with all the platforms you can hop in DK64) and the original DK Island shape?

1200px-SSBU_Crocodile_Isle.png



1200px-SSBU_DK_Island.png


Man, I really hope they restore the DK Island back of what used to before Returns; It's so... bland and uncharacteristic now; Not to dismiss any of work of Retro, it's the island itself is a shadow of what used to be.
 
It was surreal seeing the island head again; one of many surreal things about that day. As much as I like the Retro games, I do think it's unfortunate that they felt the need to redesign every aspect of the series from the ground up, because the result was almost always a downgrade. The island head is one of the most obvious casualties. I liked the new take on the forest, at least? It was more distinct from the jungle levels and less "this is just a Return of the Jedi screenshot".
 
I'm curious to see what the island will look like in the next game since it is a different team taking over. Honestly, a lot of my interest in Donkey Kong EPD is based on what old elements will be present along with what new elements created by EPD will pop-up. Will K. Rool come back? Will he have the DK 64 Crocodile Isle as his bases of operations? Will the DK Jungle Beat monkeys appear? What about Professor Chops? Etc, etc. I know that part of the reason why I've been going through a bunch of the RareWare DK games is to know the Crocodile King himself so that his reappearance will make an impact on me personally. That, and also the fact that I'm doing it for DK's 40th.
 
Apparently it's old news but Nitnedo will appear at Gamescom in August, which is after all of their games with release dates come out. I do think that bodes well for a "summer direct" and by proxy a DK announcement but I won't hold my breath. Though I must admit it would be very weird for them to pull up to Gamescom with no upcoming titles. If nothing else, I definitely see a partner showcase happening at the bare minimum like last year. Maybe we could even get our next mainline title announced via twitter post, lmao
 
Seeing the response to the K.Rool animation and how it's written and resonating like...
I do sometimes feel it's weird how I can see the same people beg for Mario to diversify especially in Paper yet want DK to stay the same with its characters, but at least until there are far more consistent games I think this kind of thing shows why, this character has so much potential
I'm a hypocrite for saying this while wanting Paper Mario to have partners again but I think if the new game doesn't have K.Rool it'd be a tradgedy
I mean both PM and DK have issues of time passing and moving further away from the beloved elements of the older games. New games kept coming out without the elements fans wanted (traditional RPG with partners, Rare characters). People have different expectations and hopes for both series, seems pretty clear to me.

Mascot platformer series like Crash and Sonic have a strong identity in part to their recurring cast and there’s no reason DK can’t do the same. Meanwhile with RPGs people expect new characters and locations.
 
That is actually something I've been feeling for awhile now: Modern Paper Mario and Modern Donkey Kong Country, despite both being produced by Tanabe, kinda go to complete opposite extremes of each other.

As in, Modern Paper Mario tends to rely far too much on pre-existing Mario iconography while keeping new characters to the bare minimum. Meanwhile, Modern DKC seems all too eager to completely move away from the pre-existing Rare stuff and making up its own new cast while keeping the returning veterans from DKC1-DK64 to a bare minimum.

Like, it's kinda odd hearing stories about how Miyamoto "suggested" for the Paper Mario Sticker Star dev team to only rely on established Mario characters, but then turn around and say (or at least come to a mutual agreement with Tanabe, to be fair) "do we really need King K. Rool back? Why not just make new characters?" when getting DKC Returns off the ground.

Overall point: I think a better middleground can be found between these approaches. How much of this is due to personal developer choice or weird evil mandates from above, I don't know.
 
That is actually something I've been feeling for awhile now: Modern Paper Mario and Modern Donkey Kong Country, despite both being produced by Tanabe, kinda go to complete opposite extremes of each other.

As in, Modern Paper Mario tends to rely far too much on pre-existing Mario iconography while keeping new characters to the bare minimum. Meanwhile, Modern DKC seems all too eager to completely move away from the pre-existing Rare stuff and making up its own new cast while keeping the returning veterans from DKC1-DK64 to a bare minimum.

Like, it's kinda odd hearing stories about how Miyamoto "suggested" for the Paper Mario Sticker Star dev team to only rely on established Mario characters, but then turn around and say (or at least come to a mutual agreement with Tanabe, to be fair) "do we really need King K. Rool back? Why not just make new characters?" when getting DKC Returns off the ground.

Overall point: I think a better middleground can be found between these approaches. How much of this is due to personal developer choice or weird evil mandates from above, I don't know.
I noticed this as well but I think the difference is that Nintendo didn’t create the core DK cast but they did create the core Mario cast. So in both cases they want to focus on their own material while sidelining creations from other parties.
 
For what it's worth, outside of the weirdness with K. Rool and the Kremlings, I still think the other Rare characters like the Kong family members and animal buddies disappearing are really more just the result of Retro not finding any gameplay application for them in their platformers, which is fair enough. Like, we do know that Enguarde was seriously considered to be in Tropical Freeze so there clearly isn't some weird Nintendo mandate/blacklist going on there, he was just dropped because Retro ultimately just felt it'd be better to focus on the additional Kongs which to be honest, are basically just animal buddies in functionality anyway.

I think at the very least, people would be more accepting of most of the classic Rare DK character cast not appearing in Retro's DKC titles, if Nintendo were willing to give them more opportunities to appear elsewhere (besides the obvious Smash Bros., of course). Like if Retro can't really find a way to make characters like Lanky or Tiny or Wrinkly or etc. fun or interesting or fitting from a gameplay standpoint in the new platformers, I think the least Nintendo could do is still let them appear in Mario spinoffs or something, or even merchandise. But even since Returns "rebooted" the brand, it'd been kind of even a miracle even getting Diddy in these games anymore. The only real exception has been Mario Kart Tour, which also includes Dixie and Funky. But even those two have the claim of being in the most recent DK platformer.

Remember how Mario Super Sluggars had DK, Diddy, Dixie, Funky, Tiny, King K. Rool and Kritter? Those were the days.
 
I see Paper Mario and DKC as equivalent situations in that in both cases people are upset about the same thing: they no longer get to have fun characters. It's for sort of opposite reasons, but the end result is that people can't form attachments to both series the way they used to because the characters and to an extent the world itself are now disposable in a way they didn't used to be.

I remember how cool everyone thought Bashmaster was when we first saw footage of Punch Bowl, but that enthusiasm quickly died out, because basically everything there was to know about him was in that footage. He has no backstory, no dialogue, no blurb explaining who he is. He's a cool design with one inferred personality trait because that's literally all we got. Rare's DKC games were never lore-heavy affairs, but they put a little extra care into setting the stage for their world through supplemental materials, and included a bunch of character interactions in the games beyond what's strictly necessary. I'm shocked Retro even let the shopkeepers have dialogue, they're so allergic to text and story. The juiciest piece of flavor text related to Tropical Freeze is in a blurb on their website about Mario Kart 7. This was the same developer that gave context to every single piece of architecture and plant in Metroid Prime, but they overcorrected ridiculously hard when going to make Returns, and they talk about "does Donkey Kong need a story?" in interviews in an even more dismissive fashion than the old crocodiles bit.

It's a bit sad that I still can't shake the feeling that the incredible three-dimensional settings Retro's artists built for Tropical Freeze are ultimately disposable backdrops that will never be seen again. Someone wanted to imply that Autumn Heights was the ancestral home of the Hootz with all the owl-themed architecture and their faces carved into the mountains, and perhaps they weren't always part of the Snowmads, but none of that is ever going to be explored or even acknowledged because to the people in charge that stuff doesn't matter. But this is the stuff a fandom is built on.
 
I don't know about Retro but Nintendo and Rare's difference is that, Nintendo is gameplay above all else, sometimes to a fault. Rare is... maybe not characters above all else, but much more world building focused, perhaps to a fault. Like there's a part of me that likes that in Banjo Tooie there's an oracle who opens the worlds for you... the other part of me is like, in the first game you can just walk up to a button on the ground to open a world, not have to find some specific guy. Same goes for getting 6 honeycombs vs going to Honey B to trade in honeycombs. Ideally in a remake I'd keep these but you do it the first time, then you can do it in a simpler way and their dialogue boxes pop up wherever you are (perhaps implying some omnipotence but Jiggywiggy is already an oracle idk). But like just generally I can see some weakness in both ideologies, but I don't know that it faltered much in the original DKC games.

I do expect some returns including ideally the Kremlings when DK "comes home" persay (assuming MonkEPD) but I don't know that the Rare type of world building is very likely
 
I don't know about Retro but Nintendo and Rare's difference is that, Nintendo is gameplay above all else, sometimes to a fault. Rare is... maybe not characters above all else, but much more world building focused, perhaps to a fault. Like there's a part of me that likes that in Banjo Tooie there's an oracle who opens the worlds for you... the other part of me is like, in the first game you can just walk up to a button on the ground to open a world, not have to find some specific guy. Same goes for getting 6 honeycombs vs going to Honey B to trade in honeycombs. Ideally in a remake I'd keep these but you do it the first time, then you can do it in a simpler way and their dialogue boxes pop up wherever you are (perhaps implying some omnipotence but Jiggywiggy is already an oracle idk). But like just generally I can see some weakness in both ideologies, but I don't know that it faltered much in the original DKC games.

I do expect some returns including ideally the Kremlings when DK "comes home" persay (assuming MonkEPD) but I don't know that the Rare type of world building is very likely
gameplay being above all else and shit doesn't really preclude nintendo or rare from trying to give the characters and setting of the game more depth. pretty much every single epd nintendo series except for mario only does this

i don't think i should be giving an example but like. splatoon was made to be an online multiplayer shooting game.
 
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I don't know about Retro but Nintendo and Rare's difference is that, Nintendo is gameplay above all else, sometimes to a fault. Rare is... maybe not characters above all else, but much more world building focused, perhaps to a fault. Like there's a part of me that likes that in Banjo Tooie there's an oracle who opens the worlds for you... the other part of me is like, in the first game you can just walk up to a button on the ground to open a world, not have to find some specific guy.
They actually made this one easier by attaching a character to it, you're always going back to the same place now instead of having to find the picture for each world. Tooie letting you easily warp back there makes it painless to do, though on the other hand, I think the minigame of actually assembling the picture is a pretty pointless addition.

If anything in Tooie suffers because of worldbuilding it's the way they expanded the size of everything without increasing Banjo's speed to compensate. Over the course of a playthrough you will spend entire minutes walking in and out of Mumbo's new two story house. Tooie is an ambitious game where a lot of its decisions have trade-offs like that, like Honey B is somewhat necessary to provide an interface because the empty honeycombs are more complicated and don't offer extra health at the same amount each time anymore. Which moves the debate to the merits of that change in the first place, but her existence wasn't arbitrary.

The only complete misstep I've encountered with this in a Rare game is the pause menus in Star Fox Adventures. I just want to check how many bafomdads I have, but General Pepper is yelling at me and I feel like I'm trying to use the toilet in prison. Just totally overdoing it by shoehorning in characters where they don't belong.

I've thought about the whole character versus utility thing before, and there are some examples of it having downsides, but it's a mostly unfounded fear and I'd take it any day over sterility.

Having to visit Funky and Candy/Wrinkly in the first two DKC games to save/travel wasn't just an inconvenience, for example, it was a deliberate design decision that was trying to make a compromise between the tension of a lives system and the ability to replay levels. In every Mario game since World, extra lives are nearly pointless because you can grind them out at any time with complete ease by playing the early levels over and over (that is if there's even a consequence to running out beyond getting kicked back to the title screen).

DKC recognized this, and made it so that stretches of the game would lock you out of easy grinding. DKC2 took it further by not letting you spam saving and traveling for free, something it's often criticized for today. Both games also reset your lives and coins whenever you resume the game to keep you from stockpiling them, something they didn't have to do from a technological perspective (3 actually saves your coins).

They're imperfect systems, but I respect the attempt a lot as someone who finds Mario 3 very systemically beautiful and has a more contentious relationship with most of the things World introduced to the series and genre (secret exits are the worst part of Tropical Freeze). That future DKC entries/versions let you save and travel at any time is more convenient, sure, but there were game design trade-offs to that change too, it wasn't just about cutting out the character middlemen.

And they could have found a way to preserve and even enhance that at the same time if they really wanted, like if after you beat Mugly in Returns, Funky Kong showed up and was like "Woah dudes! You can use my super turbo barrel plane to travel across the island!" and then they had an animation of the plane circling instead of Squawks when you hovered over a world, with Funky making comments about the place or just having random dialogue, like when you hang around Gruntilda's Lair in Banjo-Kazooie. But this is a game where the worlds are named "Jungle" and "Cave", so of course it doesn't have that, mechanics have nothing to do with it. Bottom line is that character and "gameplay first" design are not enemies. Banjo-Kazooie and DKC2 are two of the most immaculately designed platformers ever made, but they're at least as acclaimed for aesthetics and personality as they are gameplay.
 
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As you can see, I finally was able to finish all of DK 64 with a 101 percent save file a couple of days ago! This also means that I have played through and completed all of the Rareware Donkey Kong games excluding DKR and the remakes. Depending on when DK EPD releases, either I will do the Retro Studios duology or the two Paon handheld games in addition to the Retro duology.
 


As you can see, I finally was able to finish all of DK 64 with a 101 percent save file a couple of days ago! This also means that I have played through and completed all of the Rareware Donkey Kong games excluding DKR and the remakes. Depending on when DK EPD releases, either I will do the Retro Studios duology or the two Paon handheld games in addition to the Retro duology.

Do not forget Jungle Beat!
 
Do not forget Jungle Beat!
I don't have plans to do Jungle Beat for multiple reasons. Firstly, I have to find a copy of the game along side the bongos. Secondly, I remembered playing the Wii version and finding it so difficult to play through due to the mechanics of the game. Lastly, the DK games that I intended to play in the marathon are the games that features the Kremlings and K. Rool and the Retro duology since the rumor is that future DK games will take elements from the Rareware and Retro titles. I feel like Jungle Beat is too far off from the other games for me to do it. Sorry if you expected me to do that game. Hopefully, you should understand why. Maybe I'll play it on my own time that's not related to the marathon.
 
I don't have plans to do Jungle Beat for multiple reasons. Firstly, I have to find a copy of the game along side the bongos. Secondly, I remembered playing the Wii version and finding it so difficult to play through due to the mechanics of the game. Lastly, the DK games that I intended to play in the marathon are the games that features the Kremlings and K. Rool and the Retro duology since the rumor is that future DK games will take elements from the Rareware and Retro titles. I feel like Jungle Beat is too far off from the other games for me to do it. Sorry if you expected me to do that game. Hopefully, you should understand why. Maybe I'll play it on my own time that's not related to the marathon.
Ah, don't worry! Jungle Beat is my favorite DK game so I'm always going to champion it, but it's a very weird game and definitely not for everyone. It's an outlier both among DK platform games, sandwiched between the Rare and the Retro era, and Nintendo games in general, with a design ethos reminescent of arcade SEGA games. And of course, the best version of the game even requires its own controller!

If you are even going to replay it, try to approach Jungle Beat as a score attack game, where chaining moves for very long combo is more important than simply completing the level. This is where the game really shines, with levels such as Monkey Fest designed around this play style.
 
On the topic of Rare’s ability to add some flavor to their games, I remember when K. Rool got added to Smash, someone said “this is a victory for everyone who was obsessed with the promo art in the DKC manuals.” I felt that lol

BookReaderImages.php
 
Don't forget the everyone's favorite (and not controversial at all)
Baby+DK+e+sua+banana-taco.png


Frankly, Baby DK was always baby Cranky to me; quite simple :coffee:

He’s seemingly coming to Tour eventually, so we’ll get to see all of the fun responses when he shows up before Cranky or K. Rool.
 
He’s seemingly coming to Tour eventually, so we’ll get to see all of the fun responses when he shows up before Cranky or K. Rool.
Well, they would have included Cranky on the game in that sense though! :whistle:

in a little tangent.. is funny how the full set of "Star Children" from YIDS took a while to resurge on modern Nintendo games; Baby Mario, Luigi and Peach always had their guarantee presence on many Mario spinoffs.. Baby Bowser, even though they cheap out by just removing some of Jr.'s more characteristic details from his model, is still around on Yoshi games; but Baby Wario and Baby DK vanished for a while, huh?

Dr. Mario World brought Baby Wario back out the blue, after 14 years.. and now, Baby DK is set to return too!
 
On the topic of Rare’s ability to add some flavor to their games, I remember when K. Rool got added to Smash, someone said “this is a victory for everyone who was obsessed with the promo art in the DKC manuals.” I felt that lol

BookReaderImages.php
These manuals are really good, I managed to get all of them. You can tell Dkc3 was made by different people because the manual doesn't really have any of the personality and they didn't put golden boy Diddy in the game lol
 
Ah, don't worry! Jungle Beat is my favorite DK game so I'm always going to champion it, but it's a very weird game and definitely not for everyone. It's an outlier both among DK platform games, sandwiched between the Rare and the Retro era, and Nintendo games in general, with a design ethos reminescent of arcade SEGA games. And of course, the best version of the game even requires its own controller!

If you are even going to replay it, try to approach Jungle Beat as a score attack game, where chaining moves for very long combo is more important than simply completing the level. This is where the game really shines, with levels such as Monkey Fest designed around this play style.
I love jungle beat. Playing a 2d side scroller with drums is such a strange concept, until you actually play it and it feels entirely 2nd nature.
 
Just gonna say about Rare stuff I said I was kind of trying to find an alt. perspective, and partly compartmentalized Tooie criticism. I actually love that game (favorite 3d platformer ever (and just platformer in general but (plus it skirts the line of strictly platformer where as 3d implies collectathon such which fits much more neatly)) but it's probably the game I love that most exemplifies subjectivity and the importance of knowing and acknowledging the flaws of what you love, but perhaps Jiggywiggy and Honey B. aren't the best examples of said flaws. But well I think it was relevant in convo, this is not a Rare thread, just DK, so I'll leave it at that.
 
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I don't have plans to do Jungle Beat for multiple reasons. Firstly, I have to find a copy of the game along side the bongos. Secondly, I remembered playing the Wii version and finding it so difficult to play through due to the mechanics of the game. Lastly, the DK games that I intended to play in the marathon are the games that features the Kremlings and K. Rool and the Retro duology since the rumor is that future DK games will take elements from the Rareware and Retro titles. I feel like Jungle Beat is too far off from the other games for me to do it. Sorry if you expected me to do that game. Hopefully, you should understand why. Maybe I'll play it on my own time that's not related to the marathon.
Well I doubt it'd be major, I do think Jungle Beat getting some reference is quite likely, not only to bridge the gaps but also since if rumor is to be believed its by EPD who made Jungle Beat in general, and the 2d action listing is the same specific EPD dev team that made Jungle Beat (I think either way just being inhouse would make some JB more likely, but I don't think some grand loyalty to it, it will be Rare and Retro above all else, and some arcade above that likely, wouldn't be surprised to be a level or even world with city themings to throw in easy arcade references)
 
These manuals are really good, I managed to get all of them. You can tell Dkc3 was made by different people because the manual doesn't really have any of the personality and they didn't put golden boy Diddy in the game lol
I mean after the DKC1 and 2 teams of Rare kidnapped the main protag, kidnapping him again + the new hero feels like a natural step up honestly, easy way to raise stakes. I'm not saying they'd for sure of done that cause it'd turn into some weird power creeping of Kong designs (Diddy was loved so protag easy, Dixie p loved, but like a Kiddy Kong game would already get some potshots in retrospect now) but it doesn't feel like Diddy being captured would never be considered previously.

Honestly the capturing thing is a great example of differences too, Nintendo would never do anything like that (yes Peach but she exists as the goal, turning a protag into the goal is different (and I'm hoping we're seeing a shift in that anyway))
 
I mean after the DKC1 and 2 teams of Rare kidnapped the main protag, kidnapping him again + the new hero feels like a natural step up honestly, easy way to raise stakes. I'm not saying they'd for sure of done that cause it'd turn into some weird power creeping of Kong designs (Diddy was loved so protag easy, Dixie p loved, but like a Kiddy Kong game would already get some potshots in retrospect now) but it doesn't feel like Diddy being captured would never be considered previously.

Honestly the capturing thing is a great example of differences too, Nintendo would never do anything like that (yes Peach but she exists as the goal, turning a protag into the goal is different (and I'm hoping we're seeing a shift in that anyway))
I disagree. The manuals for DKC1 and DKC2 are hitting you over the head with how cranky and donkey kong are stupid and lame and how the coolest character is Rate OC Diddy. It's like poochie, having him absent is odd enough but then you see Cranky isn't even in the DKC3 book and it makes sense.
 
On the topic of Rare’s ability to add some flavor to their games, I remember when K. Rool got added to Smash, someone said “this is a victory for everyone who was obsessed with the promo art in the DKC manuals.” I felt that lol

BookReaderImages.php
He just like me fr
 
Here's a fun gif I found while I was browsing for Baby DK pictures to post here;

donkey-kong-nintendo.gif


Really, Super Sluggers was the last true celebration of all things DK before Smash Ultimate and the Mario Movie (and even then.. I guess you could argue it wasn't quite comparable); Bless Bandai NAMCO's heart, man..
 
I finally watched the Mario movie recently, and unfortunate to say, I didn't like it. Some quick thoughts:

The film is plagued with pacing issues, Mario is portrayed as a Gary Stu, and the license music playing over what is our introduction of the Kong kingdom is just BS. I mean, I like A-ha, but give me a break.

The voices were fine, I guess. The characters themselves acted mostly how I envisioned they would, with the exception of Cranky. While Cranky's voice didn't bother me like it did for others (thought Armisen's Larry David impression is humorous), my main issue with Cranky was the writing. For a character named Cranky, he just wasn't really cranky.

My final beef with the film is how much of a pushover DK was in the entire film.
You meaning to tell me mini Mario is okay after being flicked by a large gorilla, but DK gets knocked out after Mario conveniently got godlike powers from the catsuit? Then Mario saves him from drowning later on the movie after the Kong army gets kongnapped, showcasing just how useless the Kongs were in the plans to take down Bowser. Lastly, he gets pummeled by Bowser, and Mario once again saves the day. The movie went by really quick so I'm not sure if DK did anything heroic in this entire movie.

Beyond the gorgeous visuals and the Kong cameos, not only did this movie made me actively dislike Mario as a character, but it feels like it undermines what makes DK awesome.

But hey, if it gets people excited for DK and friends, which it seems it has, then that's a plus. I'm just probably not going to stick around for the sequel and even the DK movie if this is the quality going forward.
 
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Wild how this Kongversation happened just when I mentioned Baby DK here



I do concur that our modern/current/Rare/Super DK could be interpreted as a grown up DK Jr., while Cranky (DK Senior, the original Arcade character, no buts or ifs) is his grandfather and was the one raised him; Missed link be damned...

However, Baby DK is still Cranky as a baby to me, for simply fact that he was supposedly being delivered by the stork as the same time as Mario; And DK Jr. was always clearly so much younger than Mario in all the then current appearences like in DK'94; -- so I buy on the theory that Kongs just ages much faster (or I dunno, Mario characters age slower in the Mushroom Kingdom);

I don't know Mario Tennis 64 was a point of contentious; Modern DK and Jr. can coexist in the same roster no problem; They don't even need to give a time travel reasoning.. (I know that for DK Vine that's not how it works,.. but c'mon..)
 
Totk is the most fun I'm having with a Nintendo game since Metroid Dread came out. Since EPDs DK (reportedly) started development in 2018, that's roughly the same dev time as Zelda if not a bit longer, so I think we'll definitely be in for a treat when the time comes
 
i think the easiest way to work out the logistics of baby dk is by doing so within the context of the mario movie

baby dk would just be donkey kong as a baby and the events of yoshi's island ds didn't happen (they're not consequential to any mario game at all, anyway, neither are the events of literally any other mario game)
 
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I would say the donkey Kong from the arcade is Donkey Kong, and Cranky is one of his friends. Junior is out there somewhere, waiting for his chance to return.
the movie shows they're perfectly fine with completely ignore anything any donkey kong country game has said about cranky being the arcade donkey kong (with there being no arcade donkey kong at all, or modern dk taking his place)

considering how it's obvious mario doesn't have a canon you should ignore any pretense of donkey kong having one as well (or at least a canon where mario exists as a character)

me, I headcanon dk jr being dk's dad...
 
Nah, the movie is its own isolated thing; It took way too much creative liberties to condense everything that was done in both Mario games and DK games in 90 mins; They abridged a lot of stuff, including the relation between Mario and Cranky (basically, the Arcade events never happened; and there was I, thinking Pauline would be a major character in the first act of the movie...);

Not only that, the whole "Jungle Kingdom" thing doesn't really work in the context of the games; DK Island is way more estabilished thing. And on that note, sorry DK Vine, despite that, I like to think they are just far away from the Mushroom Kingdom, but still same universe.
 
(basically, the Arcade events never happened; and there was I, thinking Pauline would be a major character in the first act of the movie...);
well the arcade events are rarely relevant to any mario game at all. the only notable mention is odyssey which they specifically chose to contradict for the movie with the inclusion of brooklyn and two worlds over new donk city and everything being on the same world. it's not the point of the franchise to have a single established recurring setting and continuous plotline, unlike a series like splatoon, as every game is self contained, so arcade dk not happening is something they can roll with perfectly fine for a mario or donkey kong game if so they wish.

you can't really say anything the movie does doesn't matter, cuz you can apply the same logic with any mario game, lol...

Not only that, the whole "Jungle Kingdom" thing doesn't really work in the context of the games; DK Island is way more estabilished thing. And on that note, sorry DK Vine, despite that, I like to think they are just far away from the Mushroom Kingdom, but still same universe.
you should remember that the theme park doesn't even take place in dk island at all, it's not really an important concept in the donkey kong franchise that the monkeys live on an island, as long as they live in a jungle anything goes
 
the movie shows they're perfectly fine with completely ignore anything any donkey kong country game has said about cranky being the arcade donkey kong (with there being no arcade donkey kong at all, or modern dk taking his place)

considering how it's obvious mario doesn't have a canon you should ignore any pretense of donkey kong having one as well (or at least a canon where mario exists as a character)

me, I headcanon dk jr being dk's dad...
Yup. That's why I say Donkey Kong is always just Donkey Kong. Mario isn't sometimes Luigi.
 
Posted the rest over in the Mario Movie thread, but this part is worth posting here too: we're getting our first leaks of the home media bonus features (in 3DS camera quality), and it looks like Squawks was cut from the movie.

FxFyAkMWAAAFftm.jpg


I believe this is also the first time we've seen Cranky or Squawks in Shigehisa Nakaue's 2D Mario art-style too. Makes sense, given they're part of the Lego sets and supposedly present in the theme park too, that they would be a locked-in feature of EPD's take on Donkey Kong. There's a few other internal EPD pieces featuring DK in there too:

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Excited to get these in better quality, alongside any other pieces that may be in the full video.

EDIT: Few more pieces featuring the Kongs!

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It's nice to see Donkey Kong have such a prominent role in the movie even though he didn't need to. From a narrative standpoint, the movie probably would have been better if they ignored DK completely and spent more time developing the other characters, but Miyamoto really wanted him to be in it. We've known for years that Nintendo has big plans for DK, but if feels like we're finally on the cusp of something transformative. The wait has been agonizing.
 
We've gotten all of the above artwork in much cleaner quality since, but also even more pieces, including more DK!

 
you should remember that the theme park doesn't even take place in dk island at all, it's not really an important concept in the donkey kong franchise that the monkeys live on an island, as long as they live in a jungle anything goes
We actually don't know that; In fact, all the evidence showing the park being so heavily modeled after DKC Returns, implies more that is indeed DK Island and not the diversion they made with the Jungle Kingdom; The only true similarities would be the gold monkey head that is already a thing in Returns;

well the arcade events are rarely relevant to any mario game at all. the only notable mention is odyssey which they specifically chose to contradict for the movie with the inclusion of brooklyn and two worlds over new donk city and everything being on the same world. it's not the point of the franchise to have a single established recurring setting and continuous plotline, unlike a series like splatoon, as every game is self contained, so arcade dk not happening is something they can roll with perfectly fine for a mario or donkey kong game if so they wish.

you can't really say anything the movie does doesn't matter, cuz you can apply the same logic with any mario game, lol...
Man, that's no fun!

You have to piece everything together and make it cohesive even if the games don't state so! It's a good thing there's always margin for that!

New Donk City is a big contagious point, I agree; but outside of Miyamoto reafirmming recently that the Arcade era games featuring Mario were all in New York on real world, we can make our theories that Pauline made the transition to the Mushroom World at some point and got these folks (New Donkers) a familiar place to live ;P

And, of course, I'm not taking any retcons (that's the path cowards take!) and still work around the fact that DK Island is probably far away from the Mushroom Kingdom (or other dimension entirely, as seen in Kingdom Battle) only accessible through Warp Pipes.
 
Well, since we did get the Twitter drop for Everybody 1-2 Switch, how much are you betting that we get a Twitter drop for DK this month or will it be in a theoretical Direct, if it is even ready to be showcased?
 
The next mainline DK getting announced via twitter drop would be peak comedy, but I don't think that will ever happen. It's pretty noteworthy that we got yet another game that was long rumored to be near complete for a long time (other examples from this year being Metroid Prime: Remastered, Fire Emblem: Engage, etc), and were realistically approaching the point where DK could also be one of those games that's in the polishing phase right now just waiting to get announced be it as a Switch game or a next system game. From here I think our most realistic scenarios are:
-Everybody 1 2 Switch was a game they didn't want to tarnish an upcoming summer Direct, where they instead focus on their upcoming holiday lineup which could include DK
-The rumors were true and this is really it for the year besides more twitter drops. All we can do is pray for a September direct with DK releasing next spring.
Right now I think the first option is more likely. Mario Kart 8s next dlc wave got teased to be coming soon and as far as I remember that's something they've usually put inside Directs, so that could be a hint towards a decent sized summer direct happening. It's anyone's guess right now though
 


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