Donkey Kong Country Returns Hands-on Preview

The 2D revival is well and truly under way: Mario has returned to his two dimensional throne in New Super Mario Brothers. Wii; a certain blue Hedgehog in set to do the same in Sonic 4; and XBLA hits like Braid and Limbo are valiantly fighting the games-as-art war without the help of that overrated extra dimension. Gearing up to join the revolution is Donkey Kong, a Nintendo mascot who has dabbled with numerous perspectives over the years, but arguably found the sweet spot with the 2D Donkey Kong Country series. Donkey Kong Country is a return to DK’s heyday, complete with updated graphics, motion controls and full cooperative play.

Depending on your age or console alignment back in the 90s, it’s possible you might not be familiar with the Donkey Kong Country series. A quick history lesson, then: the first DK Country hit the SNES back in 1994, and was the first DK game to leave the watchful eye of Shigeru Miyamoto. This marked the start of an era shaped by the incredibly talented chaps at Rare, who took DK from strength to strength, establishing the big dumb ape as a household name. Donkey Kong Country Returns is obviously not developed by Rare (which is now part of the Microsoft family), but continues in very much the same vein as its 16-bit ancestors.

Enlisting the help of VideoGamer.com’s very own Neon Kelly at a recent Nintendo event, I took a couple of levels through their paces. Neon had dibs on DK, so I took control of the much more hip-and-happening Diddy Kong. While DK boasts pure brute strength, Diddy comes equipped with a jetpack and peanut gun, which – although he refused to show it – Neon was incredibly jealous of. Diddy isn’t much use by himself, however, and requires the muscular power of his uncle to take down many of the game’s enemies. More so than before, this is a game is about teamwork.

The premise and moment to moment gameplay remains pretty much the same as it was sixteen years ago. All the running, jumping and swinging you’d expect from the series remain firmly intact, and Donkey Kong Country Returns is still an experience driven by collecting. As well as gathering all of their stolen bananas, DK and Diddy are on the lookout for treasure and the elusive K, O, N and G letters. It’s the authentic retro DK experience with 2010 visuals and a few other tweaks here and there to ensure the game is relevant for a modern audience.

One such tweak allows players to switch between the foreground and background, achieved by jumping in barrels that act as explosive transitions between the two areas. In the beach level, for example, players can blast from the shore to a half sunken ship out in sea. This added depth doesn’t bring a whole lot to the experience, but it’s a pretty cool trick nonetheless. The other level we played was jungle based, with palm trees, rickety old bridges and Aztec-y ruins. Both levels looked fantastic, and even with the graphical overhaul it still felt distinctly like the originals.

Being the smaller of the two Kongs, Diddy is able to grab hold of DK and let his uncle transport him about the level like a big hairy taxi. While Diddy is hitching a ride, DK is free to make use of his nephew’s jetpack, which makes navigating particularly treacherous sections of a level a little easier. Make no mistake though; the game is butt-clenchingly difficult. Not in the same way something like Demons’ Souls is, but in that traditional throw your controller at the TV after dying for the eighth time in thirty seconds kind of way. Therein lies the addiction though; the one-more-try mentality that games such as these are able to induce.

Thankfully, if one Kong dies, he can choose to expend a balloon to jump back into the action. This balloon will carry a barrel back onto the screen, which the surviving Kong must burst in order to drop the barrel. Neon and I only found out about this handy feature at the very end of the demonstration, however, after wasting a fair amount of time repeating huge great chunks of a level. Clearly the game is designed to be challenging, but a slightly awkward control scheme threatens to push things into the realm of frustration.

The game uses the Wii-mote and Nunchuck as its preferred control scheme, and while this is fine for the majority of the apes’ moves, the ground pound attack (which you’ll rely on a lot) is slightly ruined with waggling. When timing is introduced, as it is when trying to kill the crab-like enemies of the beach level, this proves particularly distressing. To down said foes, you need to ground pound at exactly the right moment, and as waggling lacks the instant response of a button press, this can be surprisingly difficult. With any luck the finished game will support the classic controller, which to my mind seems far more appropriate for a game with such retro inclinations.

This is a minor problem though; the game is a horrendous amount of fun. Donkey Kong Country was a hugely influential platformer back in the 90s and Returns is a stark reminder why. It’s actually quite shocking to think that Nintendo has taken this long to revive the franchise, but it let’s just be thankful it’s here at all. E3 2010 has proved that Nintendo hasn’t forgotten about the core demographic, and after patiently sitting through years of mini-game compilations and fitness titles, we’re finally being rewarded. Along with Kirby, Metroid and Zelda, Donkey Kong Country Returns is a reason to get excited about Nintendo again.

Donkey Kong Country Returns will be available exclusively on Nintendo Wii this winter