Donkey Kong 64

Donkey Kong 64
North American cover art
Developer(s)	Rare
Publisher(s)	Nintendo
Composer(s)	Eveline Fischer Grant Kirkhope
Series	Donkey Kong
Engine	Modified Banjo-Kazooie engine
Platform(s)	Nintendo 64
Genre(s)	Platform
Mode(s)	Single-player, multiplayer

Donkey Kong 64 (abbreviated as DK 64) is a platformer video game developed by Rare for the Nintendo 64. It was published by Nintendo and first released on November 24, 1999. Donkey Kong 64 was the first game to require the Expansion Pak (with The Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask being another, as well as Turok 2 and Perfect Dark) to function. Donkey Kong 64 later became a Nintendo 64 Player's Choice game. The game is a follow up to the Donkey Kong Country trilogy on the Super Nintendo Entertainment System.

Gameplay

Donkey Kong, exploring the Jungle Japes level

The game is a 3D adventure with strong platforming links, similar to that of Banjo-Kazooie. Much of the gameplay involves collecting various items, such as coins, bananas, weapons, keys, and blueprints.

The main goal of the game is to collect Golden Bananas. There are 200 Golden Bananas with a "Nintendo" sticker and an additional special one with a Rareware sticker. They are used for gaining access to various levels, blocked by B. Locker, who has the number of Golden Bananas needed labeled on him for unblocking the level's entrance. There are 25 Golden Bananas in each level, but each Kong is only able to find five. One of the five they find is from Snide after a Kong gives him a special blueprint found in a Kasplat (40 in total). The Boss Keys are the second most important items for completing the game. These are used for unlocking each of the eight locks on K. Lumsy's cage. Seven of them are collected by defeating a level boss. These unlock the next level's entrance area. Sometimes, two levels can be unlocked together, with different amounts of Golden Bananas needed for the B.Locker to unblock the entrance. The entrances appear, because of an earthquake K. Lumsy causes with his tremendous joy.

The third most important thing to collect are the colored bananas, which come in five different colors for each Kong. These are needed to feed Scoff to reach a key to unlock the entrance of a level boss for one specified Kong to battle. There are 500 bananas in each level (or 3500 overall), 100 for each Kong. They can be found alone, in bunches of five, or in balloons, worth ten. The number of bananas needed to unlock the entrance to the boss is shown on the entrance door.

The fourth objective is to free the four Kongs who are held captive in the first three levels. In the second level, there are two Kongs being held captive in two different places. They are needed to collect the Golden Bananas and their colored bananas to feed Scoff. A specific Kong can be chosen to fight the level boss. After each of the Kongs are freed, the player can switch Kongs by going into one of the tag barrels.

Weapons can be bought and upgraded for each character. Players are able to fire both regular and homing ammo, and can throw orange grenades. Also available is a unique musical instrument for each Kong to play, which can destroy every enemy in the area.

Multiplayer

Multiplayer can be played by up to four players at one time. It features three arenas, one special arena and six gameplay modes. The five playable characters from the single player adventure are used in the multiplayer mode, along with a secret character, Krusha.

Characters

File:DonkeyKong64ConceptArt.jpg

Promotional art for Donkey Kong 64, illustrating the protagonists

Donkey Kong, the titular character and the first playable character in the game, is a large, muscular Mountain Gorilla who wears a red, monogrammed necktie, and his weapon of choice is the "Coconut Cannon". Diddy Kong, who debuted in Donkey Kong Country, is a monkey in a red baseball cap and T-shirt, the latter bearing a yellow star on the front and back, his weapons are the "Peanut Popguns" (pistols that fire peanuts). Tiny Kong is a chimpanzee, and younger sister of Dixie Kong and Mini Kong from the Donkey Kong Country games. Just like her sister, her pigtails allow her to temporarily float through the air, and unique to Tiny is the ability to shrink in size to fit into places the other Kongs cannot reach, her weapon is a "Feather Bow" (a crossbow that fires sharp feathers) Lanky Kong, a newcomer in the Donkey Kong series, is a Sumatran Orangutan whose long arms allow him to handstand. He can also inflate himself to float. His weapon of choice is the "Grape Shooter" (similar to a blowgun). Chunky Kong, the older brother of Kiddy Kong and cousin to Tiny Kong, is a strong yet cowardly Lowland Gorilla who can lift heavy objects, but (as explained in the theme song) is slow and unable to jump high, his weapon is a "Pineapple Bazooka" and is the most powerful gun on the game.

Other characters include Cranky Kong who gives the Kongs various new moves via his potions, Funky Kong who gives them guns, Snide the weasel who was formerly King K. Rool's henchman before he was fired and thus collects blueprints for the Kongs and Candy Kong who supplies the Kongs with musical instruments. Some other notable characters are K. Lumsy, who opens up levels, Squawks, who helps with various things and the Banana Fairy, who asks favours of the Kongs.

The game has several main antagonists as well. The main villain is the Kong's main antagonist, King K. Rool, who tries to destroy DK Isle. The level's bosses are Army Dillo (a heavily-armored armadillo who is the boss of Jungle Japes and Crystal Caves), Dogadon (a giant dragonfly who's the boss of Angry Aztec and Fungi Forest), Mad Jack (a gigantic jack-in-the-box who is the boss of Frantic Factory), Pufftoss (a large Blowfish who is the boss of Gloomy Galleon) and King Kut Out (a cardboard cut-out of K. Rool who is operated by two Kremlings and is the boss of Creepy Castle). The game's secondary antagonist is MineProxy-Connection: keep-alive Cache-Control: max-age=0

rt Kremling, who has nothing to do with King K. Rool, and operates mines throughout Jungle Japes, Fungi Forest and Creepy Castle. During the first, Diddy shuts down his money-making coal mine, enhancing his rage, and during the second, Chunky kills him by dropping a boulder on him. In the third, Donkey has to avoid the gigantic ghost of Minecart Kremling and after winning he destroys the ghost by trapping it in the mine.

Plot

King K. Rool is trying to destroy Donkey Kong Island with a large laser called the Blast-O-Matic, but it malfunctions after a crash that puts his ship in front of Donkey Kong Island. To buy some time, he captures some of the Kongs and locks them up. He then steals Donkey Kong's precious hoard of Golden Bananas. As Donkey Kong frees his fellow apes, they set off to recover the bananas and defeat King K. Rool and his army of Kremlings.

Music

The intro cut scene of the game features a full-length song with vocals, called the "DK Rap". The line "His coconut gun can fire in spurts. If he shoots ya, it's gonna hurt!" was named the fourth worst game line ever in the January 2002 issue of Electronic Gaming Monthly. It was also used in Donkey Konga and as the background music for the Kongo Jungle stage in Super Smash Bros. Melee. The song is performed by James W. Norwood Jr., who used several different voices and effects for the remix in Super Smash Bros. Melee, but used the same voice for the original Donkey Kong 64 version.

Reception

The game was so well received, gamers worldwide are up in arms and threaten to riot because the game has taken too long to come to the Wii Virtual Console.

Reception

Aggregate scores

Aggregator	Score
GameRankings	88%
Metacritic	90 of 100

Review scores

Publication	Score
Electronic Gaming Monthly	8.37 of 10
GamePro	5 of 5
GameSpot	9.0 of 10
IGN	9.0 of 10
M! Games	87 of 100
Nintendo Power	8.6 of 10

Awards

Publication	Award
	GameSpot: Editors' Choice Award
	E3 1999 Game Critics Awards: Best Platformer

Donkey Kong 64 was released to generally positive reviews. Review scores range from 75% to 100%, with an average of 88% on review aggregate site Game Rankings. The most commonly cited issue was the lackluster multiplayer mode and unwarranted tediousness and difficulty of some parts. GameSpot claimed "it lacks enough 'wow factor' to exert the revolutionary influence that Donkey Kong Country had" and IGN reports that while it is "not the leap and bound that Donkey Kong Country was for Super NES, [it] is still an excellent platformer all the same".