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It's fascinating to know that Diddy Kong originally was just meant to be a redesigned DK Jr.
Nintendo looked at this and didn't like how so different Rare's Junior was in comparison from theirs, so they requested for it to be either redesigned back to resemble the old design, or for it do just be its own original character, which Rare opted for, which resulted in Diddy Kong. Just got rid of the "J" on his shirt and gave him a tail.
Ironically Diddy more or less ended up replacing Jr. anyways. I guess that's probably the main reason why Diddy is the one Rare created character Nintendo actually formally accepted into "the family".
Nintendo looked at this and didn't like how so different Rare's Junior was in comparison from theirs, so they requested for it to be either redesigned back to resemble the old design, or for it do just be its own original character, which Rare opted for, which resulted in Diddy Kong. Just got rid of the "J" on his shirt and gave him a tail.
Ironically Diddy more or less ended up replacing Jr. anyways. I guess that's probably the main reason why Diddy is the one Rare created character Nintendo actually formally accepted into "the family".
Once Jr frees himself from the 16 bit prison, its all over for you Fuckers
Ape War II starts soon
Ape War II starts soon
I thought you of all people would appreciate DK Jr more for his retro old school roots and also his fighting against the oppressor that is Mario.
the lever opens a pit beneath you and you are sent to Bad Opinion Prison
If his arms and legs were covered he would literally be indistinguishable from Kiddy.
the lever opens a pit beneath you and you are sent to Bad Opinion Prison
Anyway Rare's Donkey Kong Country trilogy is always going to be my Donkey Kong, but I agree with I think it was NotLiquid who said that those games weren't really about DK himself or a good fit for him and only really carved their identity when the latter two games moved onto Diddy and Dixie.
DKC is a little too nimble for this big lumbering ape, and because it's a one-hit death platformer where your characters act as health points, Donkey Kong doesn't ever get to throw down with any of the bosses so you just bounce on their heads and run away.
This is still kinda there with Retro's Donkey Kong games, the emphasis on serene visuals is definitely a prominent part of the identity of both Rare and Retro's games, but they do a much better job integrating Donkey Kong's weight and physicality into his kit and turning the other Kongs into power-ups kinda makes DK feel more important, like he's the only one big and tough enough to beat the bad guys.
DKC is a little too nimble for this big lumbering ape, and because it's a one-hit death platformer where your characters act as health points, Donkey Kong doesn't ever get to throw down with any of the bosses so you just bounce on their heads and run away.
This is still kinda there with Retro's Donkey Kong games, the emphasis on serene visuals is definitely a prominent part of the identity of both Rare and Retro's games, but they do a much better job integrating Donkey Kong's weight and physicality into his kit and turning the other Kongs into power-ups kinda makes DK feel more important, like he's the only one big and tough enough to beat the bad guys.
In all seriousness though, while I definitely agree that Kiddy's design is not great, I like Kiddy's animations in DKC3, they have a really satisfying weight and flow to them.
Your mecha for today are the Testa Road, Sky Cats, Mega Diver, Night Walker, and Gran Buster from Battle Skipper. Normally I'd go with the main one but this is a little vague about who that is and doesn't really give too much focus to anyone, so I didn't think that was enough to work with.
Battle Skipper is a toy first series, I was to say something like an advancement on Rock 'Em Sock 'Em Robots. As a result, they're kind of uniquely blocky and inarticulate, which actually isn't bad.
The hero in the second commercial hero appears to be from the manga. I'm not sure if the toys have included lore like Zoids or Gundam, but if it does, I think it would match that rather than the anime. The manga appears to be targeted to elementary school kids, younger than shounen manga.
The OVA, however, is separate. Supposedly it was made based on market research finding that Sailor Moon was popular with adults, even beyond parents. The OVA goes into a shower scene faster than anything I've ever watched, but aside from that and the transformations, it generally seems like it's trying to ape the presentation and tropes from shoujo. I believe it later got a manga in a shonen magazine as well as one drama CD.
Essentially, the company is about power struggles around a family-owned industrial company, a la Tekken. The villain is the heiress of the main family, who seems to engage in crime at a whim. She goes to a private all-girl's school that the company funds, and her club is more powerful than the school itself. The hero are from a club led by a branch of that family, but they're not popular or powerful at all, and instead are barely hanging on. But they serve instead as a vigilante group, having inherited some advanced mecha when the patriarch of their family decided that his conscience wouldn't allow him to submit them to the military.
My biggest issue with the OVA is the second episode. I'll spare you the details, but the plot of that one is supposed to be along the lines of "one of the heroes is tricked into helping the villains", but the way they went about that is genuinely disturbing and definitely not appropriate for what seems to be meant as a very lighthearted cartoon. It doesn't seem like it was actually meant to be shocking, and the major threat in the next episode is "oh no, the school might close down our club because it's affecting our grades", so I feel like it's an issue of the writer having a bad idea and no one there to catch it.
Battle Skipper is a toy first series, I was to say something like an advancement on Rock 'Em Sock 'Em Robots. As a result, they're kind of uniquely blocky and inarticulate, which actually isn't bad.
The hero in the second commercial hero appears to be from the manga. I'm not sure if the toys have included lore like Zoids or Gundam, but if it does, I think it would match that rather than the anime. The manga appears to be targeted to elementary school kids, younger than shounen manga.
The OVA, however, is separate. Supposedly it was made based on market research finding that Sailor Moon was popular with adults, even beyond parents. The OVA goes into a shower scene faster than anything I've ever watched, but aside from that and the transformations, it generally seems like it's trying to ape the presentation and tropes from shoujo. I believe it later got a manga in a shonen magazine as well as one drama CD.
Essentially, the company is about power struggles around a family-owned industrial company, a la Tekken. The villain is the heiress of the main family, who seems to engage in crime at a whim. She goes to a private all-girl's school that the company funds, and her club is more powerful than the school itself. The hero are from a club led by a branch of that family, but they're not popular or powerful at all, and instead are barely hanging on. But they serve instead as a vigilante group, having inherited some advanced mecha when the patriarch of their family decided that his conscience wouldn't allow him to submit them to the military.
My biggest issue with the OVA is the second episode. I'll spare you the details, but the plot of that one is supposed to be along the lines of "one of the heroes is tricked into helping the villains", but the way they went about that is genuinely disturbing and definitely not appropriate for what seems to be meant as a very lighthearted cartoon. It doesn't seem like it was actually meant to be shocking, and the major threat in the next episode is "oh no, the school might close down our club because it's affecting our grades", so I feel like it's an issue of the writer having a bad idea and no one there to catch it.
Donkey Kong's name implicitly comes from being a Kong that terrorized New Donk City at some point in the past
this implies that Diddy Kong terrorized Sean Combs, and Dixie Kong is the scourge of Pennsylvania's southern border
this implies that Diddy Kong terrorized Sean Combs, and Dixie Kong is the scourge of Pennsylvania's southern border
When you put it that way, the direction EAD Tokyo went with Jungle Beat made a lot of sense, what with emphasizing DK being this big brute that violently pummels everything into oblivion.
I just wish the character/enemy design in that game wasn't ass/nonsensical
"Boy I'm sure glad we moved past those ugly Rareware designs am I right guys"
Donkey Kong games are always better when Donkey Kong beats the everloving shit out of something.
Would Donkey Kong Country 2 still have its reputation as possibly the best Donkey Kong Country game if it didn't end with DK punching K. Rool so had that he bounces all the way down a mountain?
Yeah that's also something NotLiquid put. Jungle Beat was more fitting to the kind of character Donkey Kong is, or at least EAD's interpretation of him; he's a brutish heel who bullrushes into problems because he's so strong he doesn't have to think.
I kinda think that's something Donkey Kong should always have as a character; he shouldn't really care about anything outside his immediate desires. If he wants something he'll go grab it and if someone steps on his turf he'll smash them, but otherwise he's content to just hang out on his island. Donkey Kong as a straight laced hero never really sits well with me in much the same way as Wario; that dude will go on a journey for his own profit and then accidentally perform a grand heroic feat that lands him the reward he was searching for anyway.
Even for old school platformer characters like that, the kind of character they are should be the first thing the entire game is built around.
Super Donkey Kong RPG
The grand tragic story of how Donkey Kong sacrificed himself to prevent harm coming to the people of DK Island, an innocent primate becoming Chained Kong so that others could be free.
Every year I decide that I'm gonna pick back up Valkyria Chronicles 4 and slowly push onwards, and every time I'm like "this is fun" until the game part ends and I have to click through another page of cutscenes (broken up with "a new episode is available!", yeah no shit) involving a shitty cast that, look I'm not saying they're as wack as Tales of the Abyss, but they're on the path there.
I have the Splatoon syndrome with these where I can forgive the first game's oddities (in this case that same cutscene bombardment, mission design that leads you to go for easier cheese instead of systematically tackling the stacked odds, clunky and slow menus because CHARM), but the next one not so much because by this point they should've known that repeating these issues was a no no. Especially egregious for VC4 because it presents itself like its the real VC2 except 10 years later and that the PSP never happened.
So desperate it is to be like the popular (or as popular as niche gets) one, it copied its very own homework.
A small annoyance because as an actual game that you play, its level design and balance is better.
This might be the most "game I like playing that I'll probably never finish" going, or at least in competition with Ninja Gaiden NES for this spot, except that one stops me by pure bullshit as opposed to oppressive cutscene barrage and ANIME in the bad way.
And that's my game with no context or relation to smash post of the week.
I have the Splatoon syndrome with these where I can forgive the first game's oddities (in this case that same cutscene bombardment, mission design that leads you to go for easier cheese instead of systematically tackling the stacked odds, clunky and slow menus because CHARM), but the next one not so much because by this point they should've known that repeating these issues was a no no. Especially egregious for VC4 because it presents itself like its the real VC2 except 10 years later and that the PSP never happened.
So desperate it is to be like the popular (or as popular as niche gets) one, it copied its very own homework.
A small annoyance because as an actual game that you play, its level design and balance is better.
This might be the most "game I like playing that I'll probably never finish" going, or at least in competition with Ninja Gaiden NES for this spot, except that one stops me by pure bullshit as opposed to oppressive cutscene barrage and ANIME in the bad way.
And that's my game with no context or relation to smash post of the week.
There was, it's called the Gamecube era
Lanky used multiverse shenanigans to come back, as he should
this also explains everything about Tiny Kong's redesign
/DKCU
RT i think that we'd see more of the Extended Kong Family if there was more releases but games just takes longer and release less frequently these days
Smash Bros re-established K. Rool as a popular feature though, so obviously the next game will lean into that by having DK team up with K. Rool and Lord Fredrik as a trio of heavies in their own lumbering platforming adventure
Smash Bros re-established K. Rool as a popular feature though, so obviously the next game will lean into that by having DK team up with K. Rool and Lord Fredrik as a trio of heavies in their own lumbering platforming adventure
He has no style
He has no grace
This Kong has entered death's embrace
I'd be intrigued to see the japan side of Nintendo actually design more kongs, I mean outside of the Jungle Beat bosses and the little chimps
Which honestly, aren't that bad at all.
We were robbed of this trophy? what the fudge
Also look on in horror at the beta version of them
the Mario Party "Mini Bowsers" of DK
Which honestly, aren't that bad at all.
We were robbed of this trophy? what the fudge
Also look on in horror at the beta version of them
the Mario Party "Mini Bowsers" of DK
all the gamecube era did was give tiny time to become sexy
The last reference to Swanky Kong before his spirit in SSBU is a billboard in Mario Superstar Baseball that uses his DKC3 art.
Cascade Capers is Pure MOOD, but goobers are too busy getting hung up on stilt village being too jaunty for the googly eyed ape game.
Well one, "grand heroics" was in reference to Wario, and more specifically in reference to how Wario only performs those by accident like in Wario Land 3 or 4, which is more fitting to his character and makes him likeable and funny, because you still get your exciting platformer game and you still do something heroic and praiseworthy, but Wario wouldn't go out of his way to do that, he'd only really figure out he did after the fact.
Otherwise for DK, it's mostly just in the spinoffs where his personality is Main Character.
I like Kiddy Kong.
And let me take the obvious joke off the table right now because I know half of you are thinking it: "Of course the Scrappy-Doo fan would appreciate Kiddy."
Or they bring up the GBA version and I roll my eyes.
The SNES versions hits you with action, which is what you want. You think it'll be a jaunty adventure (Dixie Kong isn't even aware DK and Diddy have been kidnapped by K Rool at the start), but as you progress through the game the music loses that jolly edge as you make your way north.
No offence to Wise, but his DKC3 soundtrack did sound like he just composed some tracks without playing the game to get a feel for it. Maybe it's nice for a YouTube listen (which is how I feel most people judge it), but it doesn't have the right mood for the game.
Yes, I'll defend the original Stilt Village.
Plus they killed one of the best secret tunes:
Also, yes, it's Jangle Bells, not Jungle Bells.
Ah yeah BGBW old chap, who would genuinely enjoy the GBA ost a lot as well? Hah haaaah...
* Fidgets nervously *
NEW TREETOP TUMBLE IS GOOD ACTUALLY, JUST NOT THAT FITTING
* Fidgets nervously *
NEW TREETOP TUMBLE IS GOOD ACTUALLY, JUST NOT THAT FITTING
Oh, hey, that's the exact song I was thinking regarding the soundtrack's mediocrity.
Granted, it's the only one I can remember, but still.
They should remake DKC 3 but then turn it into a parallel universe compaction plot. Fake remakes are apparently all the rage these days.
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