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

Anybody wishes to see Candy Kong again?
Edi: Actually don't mind me folks lol. Haven't been keeping up with this thread for months now.
 
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Timber the Tiger is lowkey one of the most important characters in the Donkey Kong universe.

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In Diddy Kong Racing and Diddy Kong Racing DS, Timber's parents leave for a vacation to Kong Country and leave him temporarily in charge. The island is governed and owned by Timber's parents and it has a magical protector named Taj.
Click to expand...

The official story of Diddy Kong Racing - according to the game's instruction manual.

Diddy Kong sat on the porch of his tree house and curiously tore open the
letter. It wasn't often that a message arrived from so far away that it had to
be brought in by carrier pigeon! Eager to find out what it contained, he tugged
out the note impatiently and started to read.

"Dear Diddy," it began. "Help!!!"

Now this sounds promising, he thought. Things had been all too quiet since those
old family friends the Tigers had arrived to spend their summer.

And as it turned out, the message was from his old friend Timber, son of the
Kongs' guests, the Tigers.

The young Tiger had found himself in quite a bit of
trouble that, for once, wasn't even his fault. After Diddy Kong carefully read
the note through a couple more times, he sat back and gnawed on a finger, his
gaze fixed somewhere beyond the early morning jungle mist.
He'd been asked to help, so his intention to zip off as soon as possible could
not be in doubt. The question that preoccupied him now was whether or not he
should draft some extra help, just in case... after all, this Wizpig sounded
like a pretty mean foe.​




This raises so many questions.

1. Timber's parents are going on vacation to Kong Country?
2. The "Kongs" and the "Tigers" are old family friends?
3. Diddy Kong and Timber Tiger are old friends?
4. Why do Timber's parents own an entire island? Is Timber the son of rich billionaire parents?
5. Why does a genie live on Timber's island?
 
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Professor Chops said:
I love Professor Chops and I don't understand why some DK fans dislike him. He feels like a character Rare themselves would have created.

It's frustrating that Universal was seemingly restricted from using any pre-DKCR characters, though. I knew the Ellie appearance in the concept art was too good to be true. 😔
Click to expand...
For me, I don’t get how anyone can have a strong opinion to say they like or dislike him. He’s just a bland character that’s largely forgettable. I’ve never taken the time to think about him until now. Now I’m wondering what his relation to the Kong’s is. If none, why not just use the barrel as a checkpoint like in the Rare games?
 
It's really interesting to see Nintendo's ambivalent relationship with Donkey Kong Country and, more broadly, with the Rare era. On the one hand, they were quick to redo all the designs as soon as Rare was sold, as if to reaffirm the series' allegiance to Nintendo. On the other hand, the latest main games position themselves as direct heirs to Rare's games, with the Park expansion making direct reference to them, and the Mario movie not only mentioning Donkey Kong Country but also making a reference to Donkey Kong 64.

At the same time, Miyamoto takes time out in a recent Nintendo Direct to talk about a marginal change to DK's design, always giving that impression that Nintendo needs to say "hey, we own that IP!" from time to time. I'm also a little intrigued by some almost bitter-sounding comments Koizumi made about Country in an interview he gave as SM3DW's producer. A journalist asked him about the influence of Jungle Beat and he replied that he was grateful and surprised by the question, as if he somewhat believed that Westerners weren't interested in Jungle Beat...

I don't know, there seem to be conflicting feelings, even internally, about the Rare era. Nintendo keeps coming back to it, but regularly feels compelled to distance itself from it, while continuing to refer to it, but not completely, but still a little. It's just strange. Or maybe there are people internally who don't think the same way.
 
It’s impossible for them to not bring up the Rare era when that’s undoubtedly when the character was at his most popular. The DKC GBA games were the only thing keeping the brand afloat during the wilderness buyout years, considering how tepidly the other projects got received. Jungle Beat was never a sales darling.
 
boodream said:
I'm also a little intrigued by some almost bitter-sounding comments Koizumi made about Country in an interview he gave as SM3DW's producer. A journalist asked him about the influence of Jungle Beat and he replied that he was grateful and surprised by the question, as if he somewhat believed that Westerners weren't interested in Jungle Beat...

I don't know, there seem to be conflicting feelings, even internally, about the Rare era. Nintendo keeps coming back to it, but regularly feels compelled to distance itself from it, while continuing to refer to it, but not completely, but still a little. It's just strange. Or maybe there are people internally who don't think the same way.
Click to expand...
Thank you for linking this article, I can't read French but the translation seemed pretty on point and I found it a really enlightening read. I think with the translation I might have missed the nuance of any bitter-sounding comment about Country, can you please share or explain which part that is? Thanks!
 
Yes, sorry I should have done that from the beginning:

One of the first games created by EAD Tokyo, Donkey Kong Jungle Beat, was both innovative and simple to handle, while offering a fair amount of challenge. In contrast, Super Mario 3D World multiplies movements and transformations to offer variety. Have you ever thought of applying the Jungle Beat formula to a Mario game?


(surprised) Have you played Donkey Jungle Jungle Beat? On GameCube or Wii?


On GameCube, with bongos. It's one of my favorite platform games.

Koizumi: Aaaah... (he bows) Thank you very much (laughs).
Click to expand...
It gives the impression that he thinks people don't like Jungle Beat. As Regulus Tera said, it probably has something to do with low sales.
 
Jungle Beat is a decent game, but will always be the odd sibling of the series; It just won't be that hated because Donkey Konga exists.

I don't blame Koizumi for getting that apparent impression. I'd welcome an element or two from JB on newer DK games, but yeah... It's not too fondly remembered in the DK fandom.
 
boodream said:
Yes, sorry I should have done that from the beginning:


It gives the impression that he thinks people don't like Jungle Beat. As Regulus Tera said, it probably has something to do with low sales.
Click to expand...
No worries and thanks! Which was the part about him having any issue with Country?
 
He doesn't mention Country directly, but I think his reaction in the interview is clearly linked to the fact that Returns sold 9.5 million copies, 10 times more than Jungle Beat on GameCube, and 20 times more than Jungle Beat on Wii.

This was his first project as lead director, so it must have marked him to see the difference.

I'd like to point out that I love Donkey Kong Country AND Koizumi immensely, so my aim here was not to polemicize at all, but really to try to understand the sometimes seemingly contradictory internal impulses regarding DK.
 
boodream said:
It's really interesting to see Nintendo's ambivalent relationship with Donkey Kong Country and, more broadly, with the Rare era. On the one hand, they were quick to redo all the designs as soon as Rare was sold, as if to reaffirm the series' allegiance to Nintendo. On the other hand, the latest main games position themselves as direct heirs to Rare's games, with the Park expansion making direct reference to them, and the Mario movie not only mentioning Donkey Kong Country but also making a reference to Donkey Kong 64.

At the same time, Miyamoto takes time out in a recent Nintendo Direct to talk about a marginal change to DK's design, always giving that impression that Nintendo needs to say "hey, we own that IP!" from time to time. I'm also a little intrigued by some almost bitter-sounding comments Koizumi made about Country in an interview he gave as SM3DW's producer. A journalist asked him about the influence of Jungle Beat and he replied that he was grateful and surprised by the question, as if he somewhat believed that Westerners weren't interested in Jungle Beat...

I don't know, there seem to be conflicting feelings, even internally, about the Rare era. Nintendo keeps coming back to it, but regularly feels compelled to distance itself from it, while continuing to refer to it, but not completely, but still a little. It's just strange. Or maybe there are people internally who don't think the same way.
Click to expand...
I don't think Nintendo had any issue with Rare's games -- they could have told Rare to change their games at any minute (they didn't allow Diddy's design for Jr. and they hated the original realistic gun in DK64, for example), they chose not to.

However internal Nintendo teams are very protective of their own creations and have a very strong design philosophy. They have a very "auter"-ish approach, but most of the time the auter is the whole team (EAD, R&D1, EPD) instead of a single person. They probably feel inadequate to handle characters created by others, and -- while respecting the characters, worlds, and gameplay devised by others -- know that they would do it differently.

Take Jungle Beat, for instance. It would have been very, very easy to turn it into a Country-like game -- replace some of the lil' monkeys with Diddy & Dixie, some of the animals with Rambi & co., maybe throw in K. Roll as the final boss, and you're done (a competent ROM hacker could do that in less than a week, I suppose?). The first level of JB even shares the icon music of the first level from DKC, and on the surface, the two games are very similar. They took what they liked from DKC and gave their spin on it. Koizumi himself said that they wanted the new game to have EAD Tokyo personality, and that's harder to do if you are recycling characters.

The Retro games have a less radical approach, but still -- Nintendo probably gave direction on what they believed worked particularly well, and Retro built on it. As already discussed pages ago, they say what you want about their enemies, but they follow the "form-follows-function" mentality to the point, whereas sometimes Rare got lost. I'm sure Nintendo was involved there.

But everything left behind? It doesn't mean that Nintendo "hates" K. Rool, Candy, or Enguarde, just that they don't (currently?) fit their vision for the series, or that they don't feel comfortable using them for whatever reason.

If you want to make a comparison...

xuqqjh0.png


Goof Troop was a 90s TV series developed by the TV division of Disney. The series gave Goofy a son (Max) and moved him away from the "classic" universe -- the character was redesigned, and his old pals Mickey and Donald were never mentioned. Pete was his neighbor, and he also had a wife, a daughter, and a son.

At some point, Disney decided to make a movie out of Goof Troop, and their "main" division got involved (WDFA, now WDAS). WDAS was the "proper" creator of Goofy. They were (are) Disney's EAD -- the team who created Goofy in the first place for those old animated shorts. Under their vision, "Goof Troop - The Movie" became "A Goofy Movie". The main character was re-designed, Mickey & Donald had some cameos, and other elements were dropped (most of Pete's family). Just like EAD, WDAS is a team with a very strong identity and values. They respected the work of the TV division, but at the same time, they wanted to make their project and distance themselves from some elements.
 
Worth noting for the sake of this conversation that it was for a long time believed that Koizumi was completely dismissive of Rare's characters due to an infamous 2005 quote about Jungle Beat: "All the characters outside of Donkey Kong and the banana are completely original. We don't really feel the past look of Donkey Kong was fresh enough for today. We really gave our new development team the chance to really create something unique and stylish." This quote was part of an unholy trinity along with the probably made up Miyamoto one about Donkey Kong Country and the various Returns-era interview responses about the Kremlings.

It was discovered back in 2019 that this one was also pretty much just some guy making shit up. Some folks looked into it in light of a Mario Wiki comment about how, wow, Mario Odyssey sure was a turnaround in that department, and the actual quote turned out to have had no such judgement on the "freshness" of Diddy and co.




Malicious or grossly incompetent random IGN contributor "Anthony JC" singlehandedly contributed to a lot of the heat Jungle Beat got from English fans for over ten years with that translation which turned "this isn't like past Donkey Kong games" into "past Donkey Kong games are old and uncool".
 
Stilt Village said:
Malicious or grossly incompetent random IGN contributor "Anthony JC" singlehandedly contributed to a lot of the heat Jungle Beat got from English fans for over ten years with that translation which turned "this isn't like past Donkey Kong games" into "past Donkey Kong games are old and uncool".
Click to expand...
I believe the source of the disinformation was N-Sidr. Other "translations" were outright made up.
 
Emotions over the departure of Rare were very high at the time. It's easy to see how it boiled over into this sense of betrayal that got translated into this kind of misinformation.

Lots of butthurt at the time.
 
Gingerbread Man said:
If you want to make a comparison...

xuqqjh0.png


Goof Troop was a 90s TV series developed by the TV division of Disney. The series gave Goofy a son (Max) and moved him away from the "classic" universe -- the character was redesigned, and his old pals Mickey and Donald were never mentioned. Pete was his neighbor, and he also had a wife, a daughter, and a son.

At some point, Disney decided to make a movie out of Goof Troop, and their "main" division got involved (WDFA, now WDAS). WDAS was the "proper" creator of Goofy. They were (are) Disney's EAD -- the team who created Goofy in the first place for those old animated shorts. Under their vision, "Goof Troop - The Movie" became "A Goofy Movie". The main character was re-designed, Mickey & Donald had some cameos, and other elements were dropped (most of Pete's family). Just like EAD, WDAS is a team with a very strong identity and values. They respected the work of the TV division, but at the same time, they wanted to make their project and distance themselves from some elements.
Click to expand...
A Goofy Movie is a film that I like a lot and that had a great impact on my pre-teen years, so I really appreciate the use of this example!
 
Regulus Tera said:
It’s impossible for them to not bring up the Rare era when that’s undoubtedly when the character was at his most popular. The DKC GBA games were the only thing keeping the brand afloat during the wilderness buyout years, considering how tepidly the other projects got received. Jungle Beat was never a sales darling.
Click to expand...
This is an often repeated notion, but:
-- Donkey Kong Country (GBA) - 1.82
-- Mario vs. Donkey Kong (GBA) - 1.37
-- Donkey Konga (GC) - 1.18

Less than 1 million: Donkey Kong Country 2 (GBA), Donkey Kong Country 3 (GBA), Donkey Konga 2 (GC), Donkey Konga 3 (GC), Donkey Kong: Jungle Beat (GC), DK: King of Swing (GBA).

Sure, the remake of the first DKC sold more than the other games, but the first vs. DK and Konga were still million sellers. Considering it required a peripheric and the small install base of the GC, I think Konga did very well. We don't have numbers for the sequels or Jungle Beat (nor the other GBA remakes, mind you), unfortunately, but even then, remember that they were released during the twilight years of the GameCube. Moreover, the Jungle Beat team was then given Mario Galaxy, so at least internally the game was seen as a good one.

So while I agree that overall the GBA remakes did better than other projects, it's not that the other projects were major failures.
 
Gingerbread Man said:
If you want to make a comparison...

xuqqjh0.png


Goof Troop was a 90s TV series developed by the TV division of Disney. The series gave Goofy a son (Max) and moved him away from the "classic" universe -- the character was redesigned, and his old pals Mickey and Donald were never mentioned. Pete was his neighbor, and he also had a wife, a daughter, and a son.

At some point, Disney decided to make a movie out of Goof Troop, and their "main" division got involved (WDFA, now WDAS). WDAS was the "proper" creator of Goofy. They were (are) Disney's EAD -- the team who created Goofy in the first place for those old animated shorts. Under their vision, "Goof Troop - The Movie" became "A Goofy Movie". The main character was re-designed, Mickey & Donald had some cameos, and other elements were dropped (most of Pete's family). Just like EAD, WDAS is a team with a very strong identity and values. They respected the work of the TV division, but at the same time, they wanted to make their project and distance themselves from some elements.
Click to expand...
So you're telling me that Max is Disney's Diddy Kong?

You know, he is even a repurposed concept of a Goofy's son that used to appear sometimes in old shorts (I think he was even called simply "Junior" lol)

And in the modern age, Max would even appear in general Mickey Mouse stuff, like House of Mouse and that one CG Christmas special... Much like Diddy was embraced by so many Mario spinoffs lol
 
CyberWolfBia said:
So you're telling me that Max is Disney's Diddy Kong?

You know, he is even a repurposed concept of a Goofy's son that used to appear sometimes in old shorts (I think he was even called simply "Junior" lol)

And in the modern age, Max would even appear in general Mickey Mouse stuff, like House of Mouse and that one CG Christmas special... Much like Diddy was embraced by so many Mario spinoffs lol
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Yeah, that's the analogy! Max / Diddy has been fully adopted by WDAS / EAD, and other Disney / Nintendo departaments.
 
HotelDrink said:
Now I’m wondering what his relation to the Kong’s is. If none, why not just use the barrel as a checkpoint like in the Rare games?
Click to expand...

That's precisely why I dislike him. He's not unlikeable, he's just randomly there.
 
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I really appreciate you all for the discussion, open-mindedness and thoughtfulness around the differing interpretations of DK and ensuing ups and downs in the fandom with the benefit of hindsight. It's threads like this that make Famiboards a very comfortable place to be a Nintendo fan with diverse tastes and perspectives.
 
Paon deserved better; they needed to have at least one chance to give a swing (heh...) at a big budget mainline game on console... Barrel Blast is great for the fanservice and all, but they putting all that effort in an actual console platformer is what I'd liked to see... and the end result in Barrel Blast was just a fine at best, a chore at worse, racing game, that wouldn't ever live to expectations of Rare's Donkey Kong Racing.
 
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Drybones2015 said:
Konga probably played a significant part in those game's poor sales.
Ports of Rare DK games repeatedly out-performing your new games had to have been a wake up call for Nintendo.
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This post-Rare period was very experimental, both on home consoles and handhelds, which is cool and led to some very nice projects like King Of Swing, but it also gave the impression that Nintendo didn't really know what to do with DK, that there was no guideline. I mean, it's creative and cool to make a platform game using a rhythm game prop, but it's also completely eccentric. Using DK to try things out is very Nintendo, but at the same time it kind of undermines the importance of the license by blurring its image.

To relaunch the machine, they needed to go back to Country and return to development outside EPD. This has resulted in two great games, but it also confirms the impression that Rare has left such a mark on DK that it's complicated to make it exist differently. That's why I'm absolutely looking forward to the next DK game. I like Country a lot and I don't want it to stop, but I do want EPD to finally have a strong vision, worthy of the importance of the series of which Mario is, after all, just a spin-off ^^.

Whatever they're cooking, I want it to be the start of a real new series, not just another fun but random experiment.
 
Donkey Kong in general is an interesting series in regard to Nintendo's view on it vs that of the fans. The former (at least in the 2000s) seemed to treat it like many first party series, one that was open to different emphases and experiments, not unlike how Kirby was in the same time frame. It wouldn't surprise me in the least if they thought that even with the loss of Rare that it could still be maintained on brand name alone and be taken into interesting directions via stuff like the bongo controller.

The issue was that the DKC series was so popular and cast such a shadow over the rest of the IP that the more releases drifted from that, the less the mass audience seemed interested in it. So much of the output was a good faith earnest effort by the company to try new things with their vision of DK that never really seemed to take off partially because it simply wasn't the kind of Donkey Kong media many wanted, nor did it manage to grab enough new fans to effectively make up for the loss of old ones.

It's fascinating because I wonder how much Nintendo themselves became aware of it and when. There was little doubt that the Country series was popular, but that it effectively was Donkey Kong to so many people could be a phenomenon that it may have been a while for it to be effectively realized. That it took a fan ballot for K Rool to get into Smash might in some ways be illustrative of both how much the devotion to these games escaped at least some Nintendo figure's notice and that the Rare era still remained significant nearly two decades after the SNES trilogy.

I'm reminded a little bit of TMNT where the 80s animated series became so big and so ingrained to popular culture that each subsequent TV show has been compared to it because it was so massive. You can almost imagine the 2003 4kids series as what the 00s era DK could have achieved if things had gone differently; winning over a new generation of fans and getting appreciated during its time rather than being more fondly viewed after the fact.
 
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What happened to DK is very close to what happened to Kirby, Wario, and Yoshi around the same years.

Wario
  • Due to the restructuring of EAD and the team being more interested in the 'Ware line, Wario Land lost its internal team;
  • Nintendo commissioned Master of Disguise to Suzaki, which was, by all accounts, extremely bad;
  • The series re-surfaced with Wario Land Shake, developed by Good-Feel, establishing a long partnership between the two companies.

Kirby:
  • Both Sakurai (DL1, Adventure, Super Star) and Shimomura (DL2, 3, 64) left the company;
  • HAL/Nintendo commissioned two games to an external company. Amazing Mirror was confusing but overall OK and interesting, Mouse Attack was... very bland and forgettable. Internally they made a well-received spin-off (Canvas Course), and by a series of coincidences, Good Feel created the good Epic Yarn;
  • The series found its foot again when Kumazaki became a director with Super Star Ultra first and Return to Dream Land later, kick-starting a new golden age.

Yoshi
  • Due to the restructuring of EAD, Iwata wanting 2D Mario games and maybe the leader of Island & Story moving the Pikmin, the Yoshi series de-facto lost its team;
  • Nintendo commissioned some games to the external company Artoon, which were bland and derivative. Internally, the made Touch & Go, a glorified tech-demo;
  • Concurrently with another derivative Artoon (now Arzest game), they gave the series to Good-Feel, which finally made a well-received Yoshi's Island successor.

We have enough data point to prove that for Nintendo it's not easy to find someone else when a series loses (for a variety of reasons) its main developer, and they often get stuck in a "throwing everything at a wall and hoping it works" mentality. Donkey Kong at least had Jungle Beat, which - for all the criticism you can make - at least was a very good game on its own right (though perhaps not what the series needed), and it was made internally by an all-star director, proving that Nintendo still really cared about the IP.
 
Gingerbread Man said:
What happened to DK is very close to what happened to Kirby, Wario, and Yoshi around the same years.

Wario
  • Due to the restructuring of EAD and the team being more interested in the 'Ware line, Wario Land lost its internal team;
  • Nintendo commissioned Master of Disguise to Suzaki, which was, by all accounts, extremely bad;
  • The series re-surfaced with Wario Land Shake, developed by Good-Feel, establishing a long partnership between the two companies.

Kirby:
  • Both Sakurai (DL1, Adventure, Super Star) and Shimomura (DL2, 3, 64) left the company;
  • HAL/Nintendo commissioned two games to an external company. Amazing Mirror was confusing but overall OK and interesting, Mouse Attack was... very bland and forgettable. Internally they made a well-received spin-off (Canvas Course), and by a series of coincidences, Good Feel created the good Epic Yarn;
  • The series found its foot again when Kumazaki became a director with Super Star Ultra first and Return to Dream Land later, kick-starting a new golden age.

Yoshi
  • Due to the restructuring of EAD, Iwata wanting 2D Mario games and maybe the leader of Island & Story moving the Pikmin, the Yoshi series de-facto lost its team;
  • Nintendo commissioned some games to the external company Artoon, which were bland and derivative. Internally, the made Touch & Go, a glorified tech-demo;
  • Concurrently with another derivative Artoon (now Arzest game), they gave the series to Good-Feel, which finally made a well-received Yoshi's Island successor.

We have enough data point to prove that for Nintendo it's not easy to find someone else when a series loses (for a variety of reasons) its main developer, and they often get stuck in a "throwing everything at a wall and hoping it works" mentality. Donkey Kong at least had Jungle Beat, which - for all the criticism you can make - at least was a very good game on its own right (though perhaps not what the series needed), and it was made internally by an all-star director, proving that Nintendo still really cared about the IP.
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If y'all don't mind. I'm going to be sharing a response I made on another forum here discussing about why I think that Nintendo EPD Tokyo's new 2D platformer that they've been hiring jobs for is likely Donkey Kong (or maybe Yoshi, but probably DK).

"I'm betting that EPD Tokyo's new 2D platformer is either Donkey Kong or a new Yoshi game for a couple of reasons.

1.) Super Nintendo World at Universal has rides that are directly inspired by Donkey Kong (Country) and Yoshi's Island. In addition, those two series have also been or will be a big part of the Mario Movie series. I'm betting that they want to make games to market those rides and movies.

2.) Nintendo EPD in general has been referencing those series in Mario games. Super Mario Odyssey from EPD Tokyo has New Donk City with all of the Donkey Kong references. Meanwhile, Mario Kart 8 Deluxe's Booster Course Pass from EPD 9 had that Yoshi's Island track that features references to the SNES game. In addition, the two games referenced has not had a new entry in their series by internal Nintendo.

Personally, if I have to guess what the 2D platformer from EPD Tokyo is, it's probably Donkey Kong, due to the fact that EPD Tokyo made a DK game around 2004/2005 with Jungle Beat, as well as the New Donk City references in Mario Odyssey being done by EPD Tokyo.

Also, on a sidenote that may or may not be related, maybe this image from the Nintendo Recruitment Book, published in 2020, may have some hints to it, I don’t know..."

1280px-Nintendo_recruitment_book_Daisy_DK_Wart.jpg
 
LiveStudioCrowd said:
Donkey Kong in general is an interesting series in regard to Nintendo's view on it vs that of the fans. The former (at least in the 2000s) seemed to treat it like many first party series, one that was open to different emphases and experiments, not unlike how Kirby was in the same time frame. It wouldn't surprise me in the least if they thought that even with the loss of Rare that it could still be maintained on brand name alone and be taken into interesting directions via stuff like the bongo controller.

The issue was that the DKC series was so popular and cast such a shadow over the rest of the IP that the more releases drifted from that, the less the mass audience seemed interested in it. So much of the output was a good faith earnest effort by the company to try new things with their vision of DK that never really seemed to take off partially because it simply wasn't the kind of Donkey Kong media many wanted, nor did it manage to grab enough new fans to effectively make up for the loss of old ones.

It's fascinating because I wonder how much Nintendo themselves became aware of it and when. There was little doubt that the Country series was popular, but that it effectively was Donkey Kong to so many people could be a phenomenon that it may have been a while for it to be effectively realized. That it took a fan ballot for K Rool to get into Smash might in some ways be illustrative of both how much the devotion to these games escaped at least some Nintendo figure's notice and that the Rare era still remained significant nearly two decades after the SNES trilogy.

I'm reminded a little bit of TMNT where the 80s animated series became so big and so ingrained to popular culture that each subsequent TV show has been compared to it because it was so massive. You can almost imagine the 2003 4kids series as what the 00s era DK could have achieved if things had gone differently; winning over a new generation of fans and getting appreciated during its time rather than being more fondly viewed after the fact.
Click to expand...
Well we know that Nintendo genuinely thought they had a lock on developing DK titles within Japan during the 2000's. Retro Studios was interested in making a Donkey Kong game as far back as 2004 after finishing Prime 2. But Nintendo basically told them "Just stick to Metroid, we got DK covered over here". Then in 2008, after like 6 projects for what was once a tent pole IP for them never even breaking a million each, they straight up told Retro to make a new DKC after their post-Prime 3 plans fell through.
Miyamoto pointed out that they noticed the western fans' desire for DKC. And after DKCR performed better than the entire 2000s combined, I don't see how Nintendo could see DK as anything other than a western-leaning IP. I mean, if rumors are true the next developer after Retro was another western studio.

I am really looking forward to see what a Japan team can do with the IP when they aren't trying to implement niche control inputs and gameplay. And hopefully they recognize that they can do their own thing while still adhering to pre-established aspects from the franchise that fans expect to see or want to be there (mostly looking at you, Jungle Beat team).
 
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LiveStudioCrowd said:
Donkey Kong in general is an interesting series in regard to Nintendo's view on it vs that of the fans. The former (at least in the 2000s) seemed to treat it like many first party series, one that was open to different emphases and experiments, not unlike how Kirby was in the same time frame. It wouldn't surprise me in the least if they thought that even with the loss of Rare that it could still be maintained on brand name alone and be taken into interesting directions via stuff like the bongo controller.

The issue was that the DKC series was so popular and cast such a shadow over the rest of the IP that the more releases drifted from that, the less the mass audience seemed interested in it. So much of the output was a good faith earnest effort by the company to try new things with their vision of DK that never really seemed to take off partially because it simply wasn't the kind of Donkey Kong media many wanted, nor did it manage to grab enough new fans to effectively make up for the loss of old ones.
Click to expand...
I don't think DKC was the problem. It's not like trying this with any other character would have been any more successful. HAL never tried to position Canvas Curse or something as the next big Kirby game even when they were having trouble coming out with one, all of those games were spinoffs. The only mainline entry DK got in this period was Jungle Beat, and if Nintendo thought they could sell an arcade-style console 2D platformer controlled with bongo drums as the next big thing for DK in 2005 the way they did Country in 1994, they were sorely mistaken. You couldn't sell that period.

Gingerbread Man said:
What happened to DK is very close to what happened to Kirby, Wario, and Yoshi around the same years.

Wario
  • Due to the restructuring of EAD and the team being more interested in the 'Ware line, Wario Land lost its internal team;
  • Nintendo commissioned Master of Disguise to Suzaki, which was, by all accounts, extremely bad;
  • The series re-surfaced with Wario Land Shake, developed by Good-Feel, establishing a long partnership between the two companies.

Kirby:
  • Both Sakurai (DL1, Adventure, Super Star) and Shimomura (DL2, 3, 64) left the company;
  • HAL/Nintendo commissioned two games to an external company. Amazing Mirror was confusing but overall OK and interesting, Mouse Attack was... very bland and forgettable. Internally they made a well-received spin-off (Canvas Course), and by a series of coincidences, Good Feel created the good Epic Yarn;
  • The series found its foot again when Kumazaki became a director with Super Star Ultra first and Return to Dream Land later, kick-starting a new golden age.

Yoshi
  • Due to the restructuring of EAD, Iwata wanting 2D Mario games and maybe the leader of Island & Story moving the Pikmin, the Yoshi series de-facto lost its team;
  • Nintendo commissioned some games to the external company Artoon, which were bland and derivative. Internally, the made Touch & Go, a glorified tech-demo;
  • Concurrently with another derivative Artoon (now Arzest game), they gave the series to Good-Feel, which finally made a well-received Yoshi's Island successor.

We have enough data point to prove that for Nintendo it's not easy to find someone else when a series loses (for a variety of reasons) its main developer, and they often get stuck in a "throwing everything at a wall and hoping it works" mentality. Donkey Kong at least had Jungle Beat, which - for all the criticism you can make - at least was a very good game on its own right (though perhaps not what the series needed), and it was made internally by an all-star director, proving that Nintendo still really cared about the IP.
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What I find interesting is that this isn't limited to Nintendo. Damn near every single 90's platformer series collapsed around the same timeframe, often for similar reasons. Even Mario saw a sharp decline in significance (from revolutionizing the industry with every game, to Sunshine), with some sort of changing of the guard that eventually resulted in the Jungle Beat team taking control of the series. I'd say "as soon as they were no longer the big thing in the industry, a ton of people no longer wanted to make mascot platformers", but while you can sort of apply that reasoning to Naughty Dog and Insomniac's trajectory and their explanations for why they switched gears, most of these developers weren't exactly going all survival of the fittest here. Nintendo and co. sure as hell weren't chasing that GTA money.
 
Pretty much the only platformer series that have continued without interruption are Mario, Kirby and Sonic. Just about every other series has gone 5+ years without a new game (many over a decade by now).
 
Donkey Kong has the privilege of being a brand of value for Nintendo equal to Mario's.. it's even a bigger deal for legacy than Zelda; It's truly the game that put Miyamoto in the map, their biggest star director. So they putting efforts internally doesn't come across as that weird..

The sad truth is that almost ALL the previously internally made Nintendo IPs of the 80's and 90's became homeless; It happened to Star Fox, to Metroid, to F-Zero, and as mentioned, Yoshi and Wario too.

Difference with DK is that Rare made a much bigger impact with their contributions and while EPD taking the helm once again is a good sign, it can't be ignored that Donkey Kong Country is what the franchise has become; the iconography, the characters, the world. And tiny issues and surface level worries aside, seeing stuff like the Mario Movie and the park, I feel very confident that Nintendo is well aware of that.
 
Stilt Village said:
I don't think DKC was the problem. It's not like trying this with any other character would have been any more successful. HAL never tried to position Canvas Curse or something as the next big Kirby game even when they were having trouble coming out with one, all of those games were spinoffs. The only mainline entry DK got in this period was Jungle Beat, and if Nintendo thought they could sell an arcade-style console 2D platformer controlled with bongo drums as the next big thing for DK in 2005 the way they did Country in 1994, they were sorely mistaken. You couldn't sell that period.
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To be fair, Zelda's "Canvas Course" (Phantom Hourglass) was a mainline game, and it was the most successful one since Ocarina of Time. Koizumi's talking points about Jungle Beat were the same used during the Wii / DS era -- wanting a simple interface and something everyone (even someone not playing) can enjoy.

At least on a concept level, Jungle Beat seemed like a populist move. The rationale behind such a move during the final years of your least-selling console, and without a more traditional game to balance it (like PH had TP), is another matter...
 
Jungle Climber should be regarded as a "mainline" game tbh, it's actually good and it has normal movement controls unlike King of Swing. Super underrated. Not mind-blowing but a decent game that hits a lot of what you'd expect out of a "traditional" game. It's kind of strange how forgettable it became lol, almost too plain. I think if it had had console level graphics we'd actually be talking about in the same breath as Jungle Beat.
 
Stopdoor said:
Jungle Climber should be regarded as a "mainline" game tbh, it's actually good and it has normal movement controls unlike King of Swing. Super underrated. Not mind-blowing but a decent game that hits a lot of what you'd expect out of a "traditional" game. It's kind of strange how forgettable it became lol, almost too plain. I think if it had had console level graphics we'd actually be talking about in the same breath as Jungle Beat.
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I think it’s a shame we never got a third peg game. Those spin-offs could exist alongside the Country games in a perfect world.
 
Gingerbread Man said:
To be fair, Zelda's "Canvas Course" (Phantom Hourglass) was a mainline game, and it was the most successful one since Ocarina of Time. Koizumi's talking points about Jungle Beat were the same used during the Wii / DS era -- wanting a simple interface and something everyone (even someone not playing) can enjoy.

At least on a concept level, Jungle Beat seemed like a populist move. The rationale behind such a move during the final years of your least-selling console, and without a more traditional game to balance it (like PH had TP), is another matter...
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Thinking the bongos were "a simple interface" is one of the miscalculations of all time, lol. Never mind the completely unintuitive nature of doing anything related to the actual movement with them, those things are the most physically demanding controller I've ever used and require a lot more reflexes and coordination than anything else Nintendo has made. It's more in the direction of DDR than the easy simplicity of the touch screen or Wii Remote. Which I suppose makes sense with its overall arcade influence, but I feel like they had to have known at some point that there was no way this was going to capture the masses, because looking at it from the outside, none of it should have. I feel like Donkey Konga's greater success has a lot to do with how much more intuitive sense it made than Jungle Beat, which is saying a lot because nobody has ever thought playing 99 Red Balloons on the bongo drums was a logical idea with mass appeal.
 
I dug up this old thread post about Jungle Climber I made back on GAF in 2017

I played King of the Swing on GBA recently, and thought it was pretty good. Weird but fun concept where you spin and jump with L and R, some interesting level gimmicks, a bit frustrating. Sort of interesting cartoon art style that works for the GBA, I guess.

So I just recently picked up Jungle Climber thinking it'd be more of the same. But wow, it's pretty much one of the best sequels you can get. The core swinging mechanic is the same but tightened up in all the right ways - you spin at a much more satisfying pace, the grabbing is just a bit more lenient, the health system is re-worked in a way that makes much more sense and feels even more like classic DK, Diddy is incorporated in ways that increase the depth of the gameplay as health, a long-range attack, a scout, and other power-ups.

It uses the DS dual screens in an extremely natural way to give you more of the level to see and work with. The level design gimmicks continually change it up in smart ways, with some really awesome stuff that sometimes seem like platformer cliches but given a whole new perspective in this gameplay style. And again, some use the DS dual screens in a way that only works here, like a level where you can't see the handholds and need a map on the bottom screen, and a level where you're mirrored on both screens but the handhold layout is different, forcing you to synchronize the two.

If the game ever annoys you too much, you're always slowly building up this invincibility power-up you can use to skip it and grab collectibles. But it's the type of power-up that's easy to forget about and ignore if you want to challenge yourself.

The presentation is again steps above the GBA game and the more rendered-looking graphics are a definite improvement as well. I was reading an old GAF thread on it and it's bizarre to read people 10 years ago swearing off the game because of its "ugly horrendous art style". I guess the graphics and music can't compare to Donkey Kong Country, but really, not much can.

The only thing that lessens the experience is the lame story and characters - the whole DK crew and King K. Rool appears, but the extremely lame throwaway dialogue really puts a downer on what's a great game at its core - the silence of DKC is suddenly appreciated and you start to understand Miyamoto's distaste of plot in these sorts of games. Makes the thing feel more like a lame spin-off going through the motions in that regard, it only hurts it. They went through the effort to bring characters back that went missing when Jungle Beat rolled around, but it just feels so token and cookie-cutter.

The whole L and R button swinging thing is something that just won't gel for some people, but if it wasn't missing that killer atmosphere DKC has at its heart, there's no reason this is any worse than a DK platformer. Didn't expect to write this much, but uh, hopefully I've spread the love. Anyone remember this game fondly?
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Stopdoor said:
I dug up this old thread post about Jungle Climber I made back on GAF in 2017
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I had never really given Climber or Swing much thought until I saw Lonely Goomba's reviews of them both. The nature of those games just kinda gave me the original impression that they were shallow gimmicks. One that sorta had potential but was then squandered by the worst review sequel.

Having seen the actual depth of them and played a bit. Those two games are honestly really solid if you wrap your head around them, and they do really try to make the most of their concepts in creative ways.

I do wonder though if they would be better represented if they were sequels to Clu Clu Land instead of Donkey Kong, because (as hinted by Bubbles being the final unlockable) they are spiritual follow ups to that game.
 
Gingerbread Man said:
What happened to DK is very close to what happened to Kirby, Wario, and Yoshi around the same years.

Wario
  • Due to the restructuring of EAD and the team being more interested in the 'Ware line, Wario Land lost its internal team;
  • Nintendo commissioned Master of Disguise to Suzaki, which was, by all accounts, extremely bad;
  • The series re-surfaced with Wario Land Shake, developed by Good-Feel, establishing a long partnership between the two companies.
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Master of Disguise came out 1 year before Shake It, what resurfacing? Wario World to Master of Disguise was a longer gap of 4 years.
I'd say Shake It killed Wario platformers more than Master of Disguise or losing a developer ever did, it's been 16 years since that game, and massively underperformed because it had a huge budget.
 
JazzyFuture said:
Master of Disguise came out 1 year before Shake It, what resurfacing? Wario World to Master of Disguise was a longer gap of 4 years.
I'd say Shake It killed Wario platformers more than Master of Disguise or losing a developer ever did, it's been 16 years since that game, and massively underperformed because it had a huge budget.
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I didn't check the release dates of the games :p But I think the general point stands, they didn't really have a proper vision for Wario and tried multiple projects with multiple devs.
 
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boodream said:
This post-Rare period was very experimental, both on home consoles and handhelds, which is cool and led to some very nice projects like King Of Swing, but it also gave the impression that Nintendo didn't really know what to do with DK, that there was no guideline. I mean, it's creative and cool to make a platform game using a rhythm game prop, but it's also completely eccentric. Using DK to try things out is very Nintendo, but at the same time it kind of undermines the importance of the license by blurring its image.

To relaunch the machine, they needed to go back to Country and return to development outside EPD. This has resulted in two great games, but it also confirms the impression that Rare has left such a mark on DK that it's complicated to make it exist differently. That's why I'm absolutely looking forward to the next DK game. I like Country a lot and I don't want it to stop, but I do want EPD to finally have a strong vision, worthy of the importance of the series of which Mario is, after all, just a spin-off ^^.

Whatever they're cooking, I want it to be the start of a real new series, not just another fun but random experiment.
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The infamous Miyamoto and Koizumi quotes may have been fabricated, but it is clear that Nintendo’s leadership simply did not care about DK Country in the period before they greenlit DK Country Returns

Why else would they experiment with Donkey Konga, Jungle Beat, King of Swing, Barrel Blast, and Mario v DK before even green lighting DKCR? Miyamoto even admitted after DKCR was announced that that was one of the most requested series from fans, and the DKC gba games did better than most of the new DK games released during that period
 
Number1000DKFan said:
The infamous Miyamoto and Koizumi quotes may have been fabricated, but it is clear that Nintendo’s leadership simply did not care about DK Country in the period before they greenlit DK Country Returns

Why else would they experiment with Donkey Konga, Jungle Beat, King of Swing, Barrel Blast, and Mario v DK before even green lighting DKCR? Miyamoto even admitted after DKCR was announced that that was one of the most requested series from fans, and the DKC gba games did better than most of the new DK games released during that period
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I don't buy that one little bit. What the DK series went through before Returns is hardly ideal but the idea that Nintendo didn't care about Donkey Kong Country is silly to me. After Rare there was no main series platformer but that doesn't mean they didn't care about Country. Spin offs are one thing, but at least each of them drew from the Country titles with Kremlings, K Rool, Dixie, NPC Kongs, etc. I'd throw Funky into Mario Kart Wii as well and that came well before Returns.

When DK was without a home for his mainline games, he was given a premier team that would go on to create Galaxy and the other super awesome 3D Mario titles. If the rest of the world had my tastes Jungle Beat would have taken off faster than Wii Sports. It only carried over Rare's general DK design and 1 music track but DK was given immense respect in that game. The idea of a bongo only platformer would have been a hard sell for most of the world but that game was something else. It didn't sell well and that team moved on. DK was going through growing pains but no way that a series that was so iconic during 2 different eras was not cared for.

Man I keep dreaming of a 3D platformer with characters from the Country titles mixed with Jungle Beat characters and gameplay that also draws from both. High speed running, rolling, jumping, climbing and all around parkour system that makes me feel like I'm doing some real(yet dramatized) brachiation.
 
Romancedawn said:
I don't buy that one little bit. What the DK series went through before Returns is hardly ideal but the idea that Nintendo didn't care about Donkey Kong Country is silly to me. After Rare there was no main series platformer but that doesn't mean they didn't care about Country. Spin offs are one thing, but at least each of them drew from the Country titles with Kremlings, K Rool, Dixie, NPC Kongs, etc. I'd throw Funky into Mario Kart Wii as well and that came well before Returns.

When DK was without a home for his mainline games, he was given a premier team that would go on to create Galaxy and the other super awesome 3D Mario titles. If the rest of the world had my tastes Jungle Beat would have taken off faster than Wii Sports. It only carried over Rare's general DK design and 1 music track but DK was given immense respect in that game. The idea of a bongo only platformer would have been a hard sell for most of the world but that game was something else. It didn't sell well and that team moved on. DK was going through growing pains but no way that a series that was so iconic during 2 different eras was not cared for.

Man I keep dreaming of a 3D platformer with characters from the Country titles mixed with Jungle Beat characters and gameplay that also draws from both. High speed running, rolling, jumping, climbing and all around parkour system that makes me feel like I'm doing some real(yet dramatized) brachiation.
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None of those games are DK Country

The only one remotely comparable to it is Jungle Beat which obviously had wildly different gameplay

They could easily have made or commissioned another DK Country in that timeframe, but chose not to

Just for reference, they released another Luigi’s Mansion 12 years after the first one but waited 14 years to release another DKC despite the original series making way more money than Luigi’s Mansion
 
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Number1000DKFan said:
The infamous Miyamoto and Koizumi quotes may have been fabricated, but it is clear that Nintendo’s leadership simply did not care about DK Country in the period before they greenlit DK Country Returns

Why else would they experiment with Donkey Konga, Jungle Beat, King of Swing, Barrel Blast, and Mario v DK before even green lighting DKCR? Miyamoto even admitted after DKCR was announced that that was one of the most requested series from fans, and the DKC gba games did better than most of the new DK games released during that period
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Is that why all but Jungle Beat and MvsDK used Rare's characters better than Retro Studios did?
 
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