NSO Retro: Donkey Kong Country (SNES)

For my next retro adventure I jumped into Donkey Kong Country (1994) a game I’d never played before and therefore, like Super Mario Brothers, a game I had zero nostalgia for. But whereas I felt I ‘appreciated’ Super Mario rather than truly enjoyed it, I’m pleased to say I really did enjoy Donkey Kong Country a lot.

You play as both Donkey and Diddy Kong on a quest to get back your stolen bananas. Both Donkey and Diddy play a little differently and you can tag them in and out as you please. They also serve as a ‘safety net’ of sorts because although you can only take a single hit as either one, you won’t fail as long as you have the other in reserve. And on each level you’ll find barrels that will respawn the other.

You also get welcome checkpoints on each level so you don’t have to start from scratch if you do lose both Donkey and Diddy, as well as save points on the world map. Hell, they even give you a fast travel system. As you can guess, I appreciated these features a lot because for me, they encouraged me to play the game the way it was originally intended as opposed to SMB where I frequently abused the NSO restore point feature.

Donkey Kong Country, unlike SMB, doesn’t have quite the same time / score attack vibe to it, but you can play it that way if you wish. Levels are more sprawling with multiple paths to traverse, hidden areas to discover and lots of bananas to collect. It’s amazing how much is packed into each level and how much you’ll miss on your first time through.

There are also multiple ways to give yourself more lives (continues) by collecting said bananas, popping hidden balloons or collecting the four KONG pieces scattered throughout each level. There are 40 levels in all split across a variety of environment types and the game does a great job of introducing new mechanics and little gameplay gimmicks as you progress so there’s always something new to see.

Like SMB, it does have a bit of ‘bullshit’ here and there, but certainly not to same degree and thanks to the Donkey / Diddy dynamic and the checkpoint barrels, you don’t feel like the game is deliberately f**king you over just to waste your time.

Visually, it can be a little hard to read at times on a modern screen, but the graphics do have their charm and the little animations for the characters and enemies are all really good. There are boss fights in the game, some of which do repeat with a slightly more difficult version. They’re all fine, but nothing very exciting.

It’s in the individual levels where DKC really shines, with a lot to discover and explore and I had a really good time working my way through them all. Overall, DKC was a really nice surprise. It’s a game that still holds up well today and is well worth checking out.