Donkey Kong Country (video game)/YMMV

A list of subjective tropes from Donkey Kong Country:

• Accidental Innuendo: The name of the first game's second boss's level: Necky's Nuts.
• And the Fandom Rejoiced: Retro Studios taking over for Donkey Kong Country Returns.
• Awesome Music: Enough for its own page.
• Breather Boss: None of the first game's bosses except for maybe King K. Rool are all that difficult by any stretch of the imagination, but Dumb Drum is especially easier than not just the bosses he's sandwiched between (Really Gnawty and Master Necky Sr.), but more than any boss in the game! His crushing attack is insultingly easy to dodge, with his other attack being to spawn two easy to defeat enemies that somehow count as hurting him when they're defeated. Even in the GBA remake where you had to toss a TNT barrel at him to inflict damage, Dumb Drum is still incredibly easy.
• Broken Base:
  • The soundtrack of Donkey Kong Country 3, composed mainly by Eveline Fischer (now Eveline Novakovic), was rather divisive among fans of the series for its noticeably different tone from the other games. Some enjoy it for its dark, ambient quality, while others consider it too quiet and/or a bunch of random notes warped to sound ambient. Similarly, the entirely new GBA version's soundtrack, composed entirely by David Wise, was also divisive. Some loved it for being more energetic and melodic than the original's, and others hated it for not having the ambient and profound feeling of the original soundtrack.
  • Also, fans either view the original as a classic, or an overrated Mario clone.
  • A few fans miss Tiny Kong's old Donkey Kong 64 design, while others much prefer her aged up redesign. You will rarely find a person who likes both designs.
• Demonic Spiders:
  • Kabooms from Donkey Kong Country 2. If you're even a second late from jumping, they run right into you and explode. Black/dark gray Klobbers steal lives away from you on contact. Their cousins, the Klasps, which are found in both Donkey Kong Country 3 and Donkey Kong Land III also qualify. Cat o' Nine Tails sweep you away into a Bottomless Pit or into brambles with great accuracy. Thankfully, they're not in Donkey Kong Land 2.
  • Zingers are lethal on contact and cannot be harmed except by projectile attacks or while under the effect of an invincibility barrel. Donkey Kong Country 2 introduces reinforced red Zingers that can only be killed with TNT or invincibility. The Buzzes in Donkey Kong Country 3 serve the exact same purpose.
• Disappointing Last Level: Chimp Caverns, the last world of the original game, features nothing much new you haven't already seen before. It looks kind of... shoveled onto the end of the game after some cool settings. The difficulty also seems to be a bit of a step down from the previous two worlds (not counting the very last level Platform Perils, which is a massive Difficulty Spike in comparison).
• Ear Worm: Most of the songs in Donkey Kong Country 1, Donkey Kong Country 2 and both versions of Donkey Kong Country 3.
• Ensemble Darkhorse:
  • Funky Kong, while Rambi proved the most popular of the animal buddies, likely since in the original game he was the most useful, and continued to make the most appearances of all of them.
  • King K. Rool nowadays (as he is not the Big Bad anymore), to the point that his absence from Donkey Kong Country Returns and Donkey Kong Country: Tropical Freeze is seen as a detriment. He's also a very popular request for Super Smash Bros.; his receiving a Mii Brawler costume was seen as a very poor consolation prize and borderline insulting.
• Even Better Sequel: Donkey Kong Country 1 did things with graphics that no one had seen before, but Donkey Kong Country 2 streamlined that gameplay (for the most part), fixed what minor problems there were, got much more creative and fair with the bonus stage locations, included about a half dozen Platform Hell levels and a Bonus Boss for players dedicated enough to go for 100% Completion, and in general made it seem less of a Super Mario World clone and more of its own game.
• Fandom Berserk Button: People will often mistake Diddy and Dixie for siblings. They're supposed to be an Official Couple. This bugs fans, especially shippers.
• Germans Love David Hasselhoff:
  • The Japanese love Funky Kong.
  • The series itself may not be a complete example because Donkey Kong originated in Japan, but the Donkey Kong Country games did very well in Japan despite their Western developers. The third game actually sold significantly more in Japan than it did overseas, probably because it was a SNES game released after the Nintendo 64, and unlike everywhere else, Japan tends to continue supporting consoles even after their successors come out.
• Goddamned Bats: Zingers in the first two games, and Buzzes in the third.
• Good Bad Bugs:
  • A glitch in the first game's level can cause Rambi's sprites to be mistakenly replaced with a copy of the player's character with a messed-up palette. This can be combined with another glitch which causes Donkey Kong to get stuck in a certain animation while riding "himself", making the situation resemble something else...
  • There's another glitch in Donkey Kong Country 2 where you can avoid the difficult Bramble Race against Screech. If you come up right behind Screech to where the race will not start yet, and you fly upwards (you must have both characters at this point for this to work), you will then hit the the ceiling and hurt yourself causing yourself to blink. Quickly, while you are still blinking, pass Screech and head off to the rest of the level without having to worry about doing it in good time.
  • The Castle Crush glitch is one of the most infamous, scariest and a literal Game-Breaking Bug to go as far as being independently mentioned in the series Nightmare Fuel page, but with so many results and odd visuals and effects upon activating it, it can also be one of the most entertaining. If you have an emulator or a Virtual Console port, go wild, just make sure to try to back up your save files, but do not attempt it with a real console.
• Growing the Beard: It was with the first game that the whole Donkey Kong series came into its own, rather than being little more than Mario's parent franchise.
• Hell Is That Noise: Misty Menace. Makes a couple of already disturbing levels, such as the infamous Stop N Go Station, several times worse.
  • The cave level theme gets really creepy at one part in particular.
• Ho Yay: Several jokes implying that the crocs are gay pop up in "Four Weddings and a Coconut".
• Inferred Holocaust: The "true" ending to Donkey Kong Country 2 features Crocodile Isle exploding and sinking beneath the waves, and the only survivor that we see is K.Rool sailing away by himself on a raft. Obviously, the Kremlings weren't completely wiped out, considering that we see more of them in the following games, but that had to cause a lot of casualties.
• It's Short, So It Sucks: A common complaint about Donkey Kong Country 3. It is more often the main complaint about Donkey Kong Land 1 and Donkey Kong Land III.
• Memetic Mutation: "If you don't buy this game, you are stupid! Yes, I know that's insulting, but it's also the truth."
• More Popular Spinoff: More people seem to be familiar with this series than the original Donkey Kong.
• Most Annoying Sound: Courtesy of the Game Boy Advance port of Donkey Kong Country 3. "NAAA-HAAA-HAAAAA...!"
• Most Wonderful Sound:
  • The "AAUGH" noise that some enemies make when being defeated is always good for a laugh. Especially when it echoes.
  • Also, when you have one Kong, and you are traversing a tough level, the sound of a Kong in a DK barrel makes a great Hope Spot.
  • The chimes you hear when you reach the goal of a level also count.
  • When you beat the bosses in Donkey Kong Country Returns with the right timing, you can flail the wiimote like crazy, which causes DK to massively pummel the Tiki controlling the boss. The more punches he gives, the more awesome it sounds.
• MST3K Mantra: It's probably best not to ask how a parrot can fly around while holding two apes in his claws.
• My Real Daddy: While Miyamoto created Donkey Kong, it is the work of Rare and to a smaller degree Retro Studios that undeniably made Donkey Kong into what he's known for and made this series and its creations such as Diddy Kong iconic to the character and turned him into a hero.
• Never Live It Down: Shigeru Miyamoto will never live down saying "Donkey Kong Country proves that players will put up with mediocre gameplay as long as the art is good." He said this because he was working on Yoshi's Island at the time, and there was a lot of pressure for him to make it look like Donkey Kong Country (the game still turned out awesome-looking though). He stated in a recent interview that he does like Donkey Kong Country, saying that he worked closely with Rare on the project.
• Replacement Scrappy:
  • Tiny Kong from Donkey Kong 64, who is a Suspiciously Similar Substitute of Dixie.
  • Ellie the Elephant from Donkey Kong Country 3, who replaced the series' most iconic animal buddy Rambi the Rhino.
  • Kiddy Kong. Aside from holding things in front of him instead of over his head, being able to bounce off of water, and having tag actions (which weren't possible in Donkey Kong Country 1), he plays exactly like Donkey Kong. There were those who wondered why Donkey Kong was only playable once in a series named after him and felt that there was no excuse to not have those changes applied to Donkey Kong instead of creating an entire new character. Some even felt as if it made him look less badass since he got kidnapped twice in a row by the same villain, whom he's already been shown to be able to beat.
  • The Tiki-Tak Tribe from Donkey Kong Country Returns, who replaced the iconic Kremlings as the villains. Their goofy, unimposing appearance didn't help. They have become so hated that certain parts of the fandom refuse to acknowledge the existence of Donkey Kong Country Returns. This was averted with the Snowmad Tribe from Donkey Kong Country: Tropical Freeze, which were much better received.
  • An example of Replacement Scrappy music. Opinions on the soundtrack from the GBA version of Donkey Kong Country 3 are mixed: some think it's better, some worse, but almost everyone agrees the music to the tree and ice stages are a significant downgrade to the originals, if not outright awful.
• Rescued from the Scrappy Heap: Squawks went from being pretty much useless in Donkey Kong Country 1 to fulfilling a vital role in Donkey Kong Country 2. Also, Squawks' purple Palette Swap (named Quawks, according to Donkey Kong Barrel Blast) goes from being basically a prop in Donkey Kong Country 2 (and blue) to a playable character with a separate, equally useful moveset in Donkey Kong Country 3, able to grab barrels and use them instead of shooting eggy-nut dealies. In Donkey Kong Country Returns and Donkey Kong Country: Tropical Freeze, Squawks can hint the player on where hidden puzzle pieces are. For many beginning players and completionists, Squawks is frequently purchased in shops.
• Scrappy Mechanic: Happens in all games except Donkey Kong 64 (more commonly occurring in the Donkey Kong Land trilogy due to hardware limitations), when any of the character(s) fall down from a great height faster than the game can keep up with them. The game mistakenly thinks you fell down a bottomless pit, resulting in you losing a life. Have fun repeating part of the level again due to Fake Difficulty! This was fixed in the GBA ports, since the GBA has a more powerful processor than the SNES.
• Sequelitis: It's generally agreed that Donkey Kong Country 3 is the weakest of the original trilogy. Those who like the game find it to be just as fun and enjoyable as its predecessors (though you'd be hard-pressed to find anyone who thinks it's better). Those who dislike the game do so mainly for the Lighter and Softer treatment (especially compared to Donkey Kong Country 2), the absence of fan-favorite characters and the Replacement Scrappies in their stead, and both versions of the soundtrack, with the original featuring little to no input from longtime Donkey Kong Country composer David Wise.
• Squick: Tiny Kong's redesign, to some. The aging and fanservicing up of an underage character disturbed a few fans, while others are repulsed by the idea of making an ape attractive at all, though the latter case is not to the same degree as Candy Kong.
• That One Boss: A handful of them qualify.
  • A notable example is Krow's Ghost in Donkey Kong Country 2, as half of the fight consists of climbing across ropes to chase after him, all the while having eggs shoot at you from multiple directions. If you're Diddy, you can speed past the ropes with some skill. If you're stuck with the slower Dixie, you're pretty much screwed.
  • K. Rool in the original game manages to pull this off simply because unlike the other bosses in the game, his difficulty is more scaled to the point you actually fight him. He's even tougher in the second game, and takes this Up to Eleven there.
• That One Level:
  • "The Squawks part of Animal Antics" could easily be the laconic entry for the article. What makes that part worse is that it's somewhat easy to screw up a jump over a spike pit in the ensuing Rattly area. If you have only one hit left after Squawks' area (and you likely do) and screw up, you have to start the Squawks area all over again.
  • Web Woods from the second game also qualifies for this in spades. It's extremely long, and most of it requires you to set up temporary platforms across long expanses as Squitter the Spider while fending off flying enemies on your way. What's really awful though is that the Hero Coin, needed for 100% Completion, is located on the goal roulette, and appears for only a split second. If you mess up the timing, you have to start the entire stage over.
  • Bramble Blast. It's a long, drawn out maze of barrels that you can't tell which way they fire until you enter them and see they go in every direction except the way you want to go. Also some of the barrels pivot 360 degrees and if you mess up the timing, you are launched into the spiked wall or floor. Compounded with a DK coin hidden in a place you could never look unless you are really, really, really Genre Savvy.^[1]
  • Toxic Tower in Donkey Kong Country 2 and Lightning Lookout in Donkey Kong Country 3 are also potential examples. Toxic Tower is a Rise to the Challenge level, and Lightning Lookout involves dodging lightning bolts that actively try to hit you. The source of the lightning even leads the bolts if you are running (the lightning is slow and telegraphed, and if you run nonstop, the lightning will aim ahead of you so you run right into it). Also, if you are underwater when lightning strikes, you will always get hit. In Donkey Kong Land 2, Toxic Tower isn't particularly hard... but the earlier, similar level Slime Climb is almost impossible. It's also a Rise to the Challenge level where falling into the water leaves you scrambling to get away from an invincible and souped-up Snapjaw.
  • The third game has more than its share of brutal levels:
    • Koindozer Klamber in the third game, with Palette Swapped Koin Kremlings. Unlike Koin, there are many of them, they don't carry the DK coin, they can't be defeated, and they run very fast in an attempt to Koindoze you into Bottomless Pits. It's not too tough with Dixie if you're good with her helicopter hair, but god help you if you only have Kiddy.
    • Poisonous Pipeline, which reverses your control of the characters, making an already difficult level even more difficult.
    • Every one of the Lost World levels also count, especially the last one.
    • If you're going for the highest possible percentage of 105%, which requires inputting a code at the start of the game that eliminates all save points and all DK barrels, if you claim to get through the aforementioned Lighting Lookout on one try, you are lying.
• They Changed It, Now It Sucks:
  • Donkey Kong Country 3 on the Game Boy Advance has received flack from fans for having a new soundtrack that sounded nothing like the original. It didn't help that the SNES Donkey Kong Country 3 itself was divisive over its music having more of a darker theme than that of the original two games.
  • Also, Donkey Kong Country 3's GBA version has a much shortened credits sequence with no cast of characters.
• They Copied It, So It Sucks: This is what quite a bit of both reviewers and gamers feel about the original game. Not so much the second and third, since they incorporated ideas that made it seem less of a Mario clone.
• Visual Effects of Awesome: Back in the day, the graphics were absolutely amazing, and they still hold up remarkably well today. And more amazing is that the games didn't use any add-ons, or even the SNES Super FX chip; everything you see on-screen is done on the actual hardware!

And a list of Tropes from the Cartoon:

• Non Sequitur Scene: Bug A Boogie, when after Cranky laughs about the Snipe Hunt he sent Donkey and Diddy Kong on, we cut to Scurvy's ship, where a song and dance routine is taking place.
• Crowning Moment of Funny: Most scenes with Cranky. And the montage of Diddy and Cranky kicking Klump and Krusha out of the treehouse.
  • Or how about the aforementioned Big No?
  • The "cronies" conversation.
• Crowning Music of Awesome: The games' tendency to have awesome music somehow made its way into the show. In general, Donkey Kong has an incredibly lovely singing voice.
  • Skurvy's theme was especially catchy.
  • To know everything, you must give up everything.
  • "I'm Nobody's Hero"
  • "King K. Rool's Finest Hour"
• Ear Worm: Several (if not all) of the songs featured in the show.
• Ensemble Darkhorse: King K. Rool in all is hammy glory is substantially more popular than the heroes, same with his minions Krusha and Klump.
• Evil Is Cool: Ask any fan of the show about Kaptain Skurvy. Go ahead, ask. Or better yet, just listen: Pirate's Scorn and Booty Boogie.
• Foe Yay: K. Rool using a love potion to turn DK and Candy into his servants.
• Fridge Brilliance: In the pilot episode, Krusha is considerably more intelligent than he in all other episodes. Since the last we see of him in that episode is getting beat up by DK, it's possible that the beatdown gave him brain damage.
• Germans Love David Hasselhoff: The show was so popular in Japan that it spawned its own unique merchandise line over there, including a collectible card game.
• Memetic Mutation: K. Rool screaming "WHYYYYY NOOOOTTTT!!!???" from "Bug a Boogie".
  • WEEEELLLLLL LISTEN HERE WHILE I MAKE IT CLEAR
  • Recently, a video called "OH MY GOD WATCH OUT DK" features a snippet from "Kong for a Day" with DK singing "I don't know what's happening to me" edited to look like a plane crashes into DK. There are variations that either have a character dubbed with DK's voice suffering similar disasters or people's reactions to the original video.
• Nightmare Fuel: DK's description of the bog monster.
• Special Effects Failure: Oftentimes, a character's mesh will end up clipping with itself (Especially noticeable with Captain Scurvy).
  • The animators also seem to have taken a page from Beast Wars and made the body parts separate from each other.
• Tear Jerker: Donkey Kong's song in 'Kong For A Day', where K.Rool's machinations gets him alienated from his friends.

I don't know what's happening to me
I'm getting all the blame for things I didn't do
Can anybody tell me just what I did wrong?
I'm all alone and all so confused
I don't know what everyone wants me to be
I only know how to be me
Once I was the ape of the hour
They think I'm a coward
An absolute zero
I'm nobody's hero
An absolute zero
I'm nobody's hero
I'm nobody's hero...

1. ↑ Genre Savvy players know that bananas in impossible-to-reach-without-killing-yourself locations indicate a hidden bonus. A banana hidden behind a fake wall with Spikes of Doom on it is the only indication that said wall is fake, and you have to wait for the camera to pan to see it.