I remember renting this game and finishing it in a few sittings. I recall being amazed at the graphics, but also a bit let down by the simplistic gameplay. I was almost 17 at the time and I was hoping for something a bit more technical. Still a great time on SNES though!
I probably love this game more than most as I never owned it and could only play it round a friends house after school or at the weekend making it even more special 😆
I can understand that, it takes me a whole afternoon to beat this one my own so I can imagine the frustration of only being able to do that at a friend's house.
Yesss! Eat that banana..... jk jk! DKC was amazing. I remember as a kid playing it with my brother all the time. The first time you fight Rool..... It got us so good. Keep up the good work man!
I wish this game allowed both players in two player to play at the same time like you can in Sonic 2. That is my only complaint aside from the bee's. This game is amazing
That would definitely have been a lot of fun, but since I played most of these games myself it's nice to know I was able to use both characters at the same time too. Maybe someday they'll make a co-op version!
For atmosphere alone we prefer it to the great, but irritating Yoshi’s Island. Yes this game has the letters and secrets, but in Yoshi’s island the red coins, flowers, and star people were all pretty tedious to me, and the transformations like the train felt tacked-on and too bizarre. Nicely-edited and enjoyable video. This game was huge when it came out and is still a fun play.
I don't disagree with the quality assessment of the game, but was Rare ever really an underdog? I feel like the image I've gotten of them over the years have been as Nintendo's secret western weapon- they were among the first western devs to get to work on the NES and were behind some of the best regarded western games. Feels like a "if there were ever anyone we'd let play with our toys, it'd be EXACTLY them"-situation, rather than a total underdog-story. That being said, I still remember playing this way back then and having the music, environments and speed etch itself into my mind. I don't recall if it was clunky to conttol the carts or jumping on enemies or swimming around them, but I do remember it felt so good to run through the game and blast through barrels, and how busting down walls with Rambi or figuring out when to pick up a barrel and carry it and THEN throw it at just the right place to find a secret door... it was a game that felt VAST as only Super Mario World had until that point, but with much moodier music. The level where you have to turn on green lights to run past the invulnerable Kremlins... spookiest thing I had played until then. I also recently saw a video from a pretty big retrotuber called Sega Lord X where he talks about how he preferred Yoshi's Island over this though, which gave me some interesting perspective. Part of it was that he vastly preferred Mario games cleaner sprites over the rendered one, and he always felt rendered sprites makes everything look so grainy and unpleasang. Fair enough, can't really say anything one way or another there- they do look kinda grainy. But the second was quite interesting- he played the game in a way that made a ton of commenters balk and ask what he was even thinking, namely that he NEVER held down the run button... and he answered almost each surprised statement with "I just don't like running in games. I will always move at default speed unless I'm made to, because I want to take my time and feel more in control". And MAN the game transformed before our eyes into a VASTLY less interesting, outright clunky and unfun experience. It made me remembered that in DKC vs SMW, Mario feels MUCH better to control when you're just walking around. Donkey is a bigger sprite with a vaguer outline of where he "stops and starts" so it's easier to make platform-edge mistakes or attack mistakes, and he doesn't turn as sharply or move as smoothly as Mario does. It made me realize just how much of DKC really is dependent on the flow you describe, on how you really ought to RUN when you're playing the game as that's where it feels the game really comes into it's own, you're meant to go fast and jump, bounce and blast through. You can slow down and make sure you get the secrets, but the big part of DKC really is just finding the flow. If you don't gel with that, DKC just becomes a drastically worse experience... and that's not really the fault of the game, but I just thought it was interesting that a game could give such a different impression if you're not meeting it halfway.
That's a really good assessment. First, I will say that yeah, in the beginning, rare was an underdog in my opinion, in terms of major titles. I've reviewed two big games they did and they weren't really used to projects that big (or that ultimately successful) prior to that. Could be a difference of opinion there, but to me they were small and shot for the moon. As far as the gameplay in DKC, 100 percent agree. The game was meant to be fast, and that's where it shined brightest. A lot of games are like that though, I think, and while I agree being fun whether you do it the way the devs intended or not is good, I'm also a fan of artists putting their mark on a gameplay style, which is another reason I loved this game.
I remember renting this game and finishing it in a few sittings. I recall being amazed at the graphics, but also a bit let down by the simplistic gameplay. I was almost 17 at the time and I was hoping for something a bit more technical. Still a great time on SNES though!
That's fair, it was definitely amazing when I was younger, but it's a lot of fun still
I probably love this game more than most as I never owned it and could only play it round a friends house after school or at the weekend making it even more special 😆
I can understand that, it takes me a whole afternoon to beat this one my own so I can imagine the frustration of only being able to do that at a friend's house.
Yesss! Eat that banana..... jk jk! DKC was amazing. I remember as a kid playing it with my brother all the time. The first time you fight Rool..... It got us so good. Keep up the good work man!
Thanks dude!! Yeah I remember being fooled by Rool too, but he's actually a super easy boss so I wasn't too mad. Just made the victory sweeter.
I wish this game allowed both players in two player to play at the same time like you can in Sonic 2. That is my only complaint aside from the bee's. This game is amazing
That would definitely have been a lot of fun, but since I played most of these games myself it's nice to know I was able to use both characters at the same time too. Maybe someday they'll make a co-op version!
I just came here for games and banana
The best reasons to be here 😆
For atmosphere alone we prefer it to the great, but irritating Yoshi’s Island. Yes this game has the letters and secrets, but in Yoshi’s island the red coins, flowers, and star people were all pretty tedious to me, and the transformations like the train felt tacked-on and too bizarre.
Nicely-edited and enjoyable video. This game was huge when it came out and is still a fun play.
Thank you!!
I don't disagree with the quality assessment of the game, but was Rare ever really an underdog? I feel like the image I've gotten of them over the years have been as Nintendo's secret western weapon- they were among the first western devs to get to work on the NES and were behind some of the best regarded western games. Feels like a "if there were ever anyone we'd let play with our toys, it'd be EXACTLY them"-situation, rather than a total underdog-story.
That being said, I still remember playing this way back then and having the music, environments and speed etch itself into my mind. I don't recall if it was clunky to conttol the carts or jumping on enemies or swimming around them, but I do remember it felt so good to run through the game and blast through barrels, and how busting down walls with Rambi or figuring out when to pick up a barrel and carry it and THEN throw it at just the right place to find a secret door... it was a game that felt VAST as only Super Mario World had until that point, but with much moodier music. The level where you have to turn on green lights to run past the invulnerable Kremlins... spookiest thing I had played until then.
I also recently saw a video from a pretty big retrotuber called Sega Lord X where he talks about how he preferred Yoshi's Island over this though, which gave me some interesting perspective. Part of it was that he vastly preferred Mario games cleaner sprites over the rendered one, and he always felt rendered sprites makes everything look so grainy and unpleasang. Fair enough, can't really say anything one way or another there- they do look kinda grainy. But the second was quite interesting- he played the game in a way that made a ton of commenters balk and ask what he was even thinking, namely that he NEVER held down the run button... and he answered almost each surprised statement with "I just don't like running in games. I will always move at default speed unless I'm made to, because I want to take my time and feel more in control". And MAN the game transformed before our eyes into a VASTLY less interesting, outright clunky and unfun experience. It made me remembered that in DKC vs SMW, Mario feels MUCH better to control when you're just walking around. Donkey is a bigger sprite with a vaguer outline of where he "stops and starts" so it's easier to make platform-edge mistakes or attack mistakes, and he doesn't turn as sharply or move as smoothly as Mario does. It made me realize just how much of DKC really is dependent on the flow you describe, on how you really ought to RUN when you're playing the game as that's where it feels the game really comes into it's own, you're meant to go fast and jump, bounce and blast through. You can slow down and make sure you get the secrets, but the big part of DKC really is just finding the flow. If you don't gel with that, DKC just becomes a drastically worse experience... and that's not really the fault of the game, but I just thought it was interesting that a game could give such a different impression if you're not meeting it halfway.
That's a really good assessment. First, I will say that yeah, in the beginning, rare was an underdog in my opinion, in terms of major titles. I've reviewed two big games they did and they weren't really used to projects that big (or that ultimately successful) prior to that. Could be a difference of opinion there, but to me they were small and shot for the moon.
As far as the gameplay in DKC, 100 percent agree. The game was meant to be fast, and that's where it shined brightest. A lot of games are like that though, I think, and while I agree being fun whether you do it the way the devs intended or not is good, I'm also a fan of artists putting their mark on a gameplay style, which is another reason I loved this game.