Why Diddy's Kong-Quest Is The Greatest Platformer Ever. Seriously Now.

The Core RPGC Main Forum
1

This, unlike my Tales of Eternia thread, is a serious thread, because I was so impressed by this game again.

I’ve just recently re-played this for the first time since I sold the cart about 7 years ago, and god-damn it hasn’t lost any of what made it great in the first place.

Firstly, the levels. The variety of these are awesome, even within the fairly narrow band of ‘jump-between-platforms-dodging-enemies’. There’s standard get-from-one-end-to-the-other ones, ones in collections of brambles where the merely contact with the ground is fatal, races between Parrots (I kid you not), and ice levels that DON’T SUCK! Some of these, especially the later ones, are a joy to play. My personal favorite is the Krazy Kremland world. There’s rollercoaster levels, levels set in beehives, the aforementioned Bramble levels, and nothing is out of place.

Secondly; the music. Dear God the music. No game I’ve ever played has more appropriate or catchy music. The bonus level tracks are just awesome, and the Overworld Theme is perfectly in tune with the look of the maps. The remixed versions in DKC3 just aren’t the same as these.

Thirdly, the enemies. These range from simple walking back and forth morons to some truly awesome-looking bosses and GIANT BEES, and all of them will kill you at some point. That’s how good they and their attacks have been designed. Even the shitty ones will, at one, point, by accident, kill you.

Fourthly, the bananas. Sirlin.net demonstrated this, and I didn’t even notice it myself, but every single banana is placed with the purpose of helping you. If something looks wrong, then you know there’s something there, behidn that wall, or above/below that one lone banana hanging there. After a while you won’t even notice this happening.

Fifthly, the pickups. This game KNOWS that picking up some small strange spark laying on the ground doesn’t give as good a feeling as picking up a huge, sparkling, spinning golden coin bigger than your characters. Man I love those DK Coins.

Sixthly, a certain I-don’t-know-what. I started playing DCK3 because it was the one game I’d never played for SNES at the time, then I downloaded this and played the first level for nostalgia’s sake. I never went back to DCK3. DCK2 just wipes the floor with it in every way, and I have no idea why. If someone comes up with an explanation, please tell me. Super Mario World has it. Sonic 1 has it, and so does this.

[strike]Seventhly, DCK2 is played by NINJAS.[/strike]

Those are the only reasons I can concretely put my finger on and say ‘That makes this game great’. There’s a ton of other stuff in this game I can’t even put into words. This is one of the games that make me hit myself to remember the time I sold my SNES.

Who else has ever bought a game that gave them the same feeling?

2

I think I played that and enjoyed it, but it’s been a while so I can’t really say.

3

That game was so awesome. And call it Diddy Kong Country you English freak!

4

I never played DK3, but I have 1 and 2. I agree, the second one is damn good, and I enjy playing it., Makes me wish I had an adaptor to my SNES, so i could hook iy up and play it again.

5

DKC2 is awesome. I kinda liked three, though it wasn’t as awesome as 1.

The original will always be one of my favorate games. Long, LONG ago, I got sent that promotional video for it, and I ordered the game a few days later. I got 101%, and I still love the damn game.

6

I’ve got/beaten all 3. They’re good, but i think my “OMG DKC <3333333” opinion is slightly biased because they were the first games i ever had :stuck_out_tongue:

7

I think it’s because the third one adopted a more cutesy character design, for both the enemies and the main characters. The big infant monkey was, shall we say, somewhat lacking in panache. That unfortunate design choice overshadowed the fact that the game still had excellent graphics and pretty good music (the gameplay was pretty much the same as before).

I think DKC2 was a pretty good game, but I wouldn’t give the best platformer award to it. I always thought that the whole Donkey Kong Country series was much more simplistic than Super Mario World or Super Metroid. The levels in SMW could feature branching routes, multiple exits, and often had a lot more open space to them (e.g. how you had to maneuver the coins really high to get to the exit to the Special World). In DKC, you only deviated from the set path to go to the bonus areas, which were all really short and very much alike, and you just got warped back to the normal level after you beat them. But aside from that, there was just less stuff you could do. I mean, in order to beat a Mario game, you had to master all of Mario’s different moves - not only the complicated ones, like all the stuff he could do with his cape, but even the really simple things, like dealing with his slide after a jump, or dashing over a one-block gap, or getting the timing really perfect for a jump, or bouncing off enemies’ backs, or whatever. The thing is, all of them had simple controls, and didn’t require huge button combinations, but they still required a lot of precision and concentration. In DKC, all you really had to learn how to do was getting the timing down for blasting between barrels.

8

Definitely my favorite Donkey Kong game.

9

I’ve never actually played it, but I’ll have to give it a try.

10

I remember when got all 40 DK Coins. I felt so accomplished.

11

I have and beaten all three before, and the second is my favorite one out of all three of them.

What’s better than a rapping monkey?

12

Pie, if you like the music of DC, you should download the Kong in Concert Remixes from Overclocked Remixes. They are fantastic.

13

Oh hell yes. I hated that damned baby. >:(

You are dead right, but I just personally think there’s something about the DKC games that are just… right. There’s honestly no way I could put it that would look right/not make me look like a dribbling idiot.

14

Screw Diddy’s Kong-Quest. Diddy ain’t got shit on DK, yo :stuck_out_tongue:

Seriously though, I didn’t care for the second game.

15

Man, when I pwnd a SNES, I believe DKC2 was one of my first games I bought. Fuckin’ loved it, yo.

<font size=1>Btw, Go back to the old Avatar and Siggy, it was cooler, Pierre.</font>

16

Nothing, NOTHING, beats Akutabi Gamma, Rud. -_-

17

Never played it, so I’m going to assume it sucks.

18

I know the feeling your talking about, Pierson. I get it for other games.

DKC2 was the only one of the series I couldn’t reach the end of (Beat DKC, got stuck on the last boss of DKC3). Since I love all three of the games, I’ll just say that of the threesome #2 would be my pick for the hardest.

19

DK3 really didn’t do it for me, either. I just felt it was even more repeditive than usual, and the music was awful. Plus, what the heck was up with how badly the 2 characters reacted?

20

You’re all missing a very important point:

DKC2 had Pirates.