Why the DKC trilogy is platforming bliss, and how Retro missed the point...

I feel bad that I blog for the first time in over a year and a half to say something partially negative. When it comes to games, I try to look for the good first... some game designer thought their feature/mechanic/whatever was a good idea, so I try to look at games from that perspective. Sometimes, a game's appeal is completely lost on me, but I'm one of the rare people that like nearly every single Final Fantasy game, so I can handle it when games throw different ideas my way. People are too quick to classify well-made games as "garbage," never trying to adjust their expectations or wonder why the game is designed the way that it is. This is why I feel bad that, try as I might, I couldn't enjoy playing Donkey Kong Country Returns, a technically sound platformer from a development studio that I have tremendous respect for.

I say that this post is only "partially negative" because it is also a celebration of just why the Donkey Kong Country trilogy is so dang great. When DKCR was announced at E3, I was happy to not be the only person overwhelmed with excitement. I had been under the impression that no one else really liked DKC anymore... that everyone looked back and said, "Oh those games were just about the graphics," and forgot that they were really great games too. In my opinion, they are actually more than great... they come as close to perfection as any games ever have.

In 1994, the original Donkey Kong Country grabbed attention with its innovative use of pre-rendered graphics, using advanced technology to scale down more impressive graphics for use on the Super Nintendo. Beyond that, DKC was also far more atmospheric than other games of the era, partially thanks to a hauntingly memorable soundtrack (also quite unlike game music of the time). These things were DKC's outward aesthetic, but you could change all of them and the game could still be Donkey Kong of the country variety. Awed as I was by all of these things at the time, it was still gameplay that made Donkey Kong Country (and its sequels) stand tall among my favorite games, from 1994 to today.

Thinking on it, I identified three elements that define Donkey Kong Country's gameplay: control mechanics, level layout with a strong emphasis on deliberate item and enemy placement, and level gimmicks. When Retro Studios did their research for Donkey Kong Country Returns, they either completely missed these points, or believed they were not important, because if DKCR is supposed to be a true sequel, it utterly fails at implementing these elements.

First, control mechanics. Donkey Kong Country is much like Mario... you run and jump on enemies, for the most part. It's not a complicated game to learn. There is also a roll, which can seem less useful than jump attacks at first, but its brilliance comes from its unique mechanic of gaining perpetual speed with each enemy that is plowed through. A good player can take advantage of this to blast through levels at lightning speed. The roll also has another unique property, which is that after rolling off a ledge, you can perform a mid-air jump. This latter point, DKCR does implement. The former, it does not. DKCR's roll is a quick burst of speed that isn't very useful for plowing through lines of enemies, because the roll will stop, and you'll get hurt. As the roll starts off quickly, it also makes using it frustrating because it always creates an extremely long jump, making it much less precise and versatile than the classic variable speed roll-jump. It certainly doesn't help that DKCR forces the roll onto waggle controls, but even if it were on a button, it's just a quick dash rather than the deceptively useful classic roll. The roll is DKCR's greatest control misstep, but in general, Donkey Kong's mechanics are just very different. Don't get me wrong... the controls are not bad by their very nature, but I don't see why the fanbase has to be alienated. To most people, it would probably seem like just another new game to adjust to, but I couldn't shake off my expectations for how DK should move. When games like New Super Mario Bros. emphasize making sure their predecessors' perfect controls are kept in tact (while still implementing new moves), I think it's inexcusable that DKC has not been preserved in the same manner. The game kept trying to tell me that it was something wonderfully nostalgic and familiar, but the controls made it feel like it was just another game... not Donkey Kong Country.

The second key element is Donkey Kong Country's brand of level design. I never realized the formula was so fragile, because Rare consistently delivered a high level of excellent action with each entry in the classic trilogy. I believed that Retro had done their research and would do fresh things with the DKC style of level design, but it seems to me that they didn't pay too much attention. Rare had enemy and item placement down to a science. If you relied on your instincts and trusted the designers, you could do amazing things. If you throw a reinforced barrel from here, you can plow through this huge string of enemies. If you time your first jump right, you can bounce all the way up to here. If you roll through these guys, you can leap all the way over this platform. Players who get into the DKC rhythm are rewarded by discovering bonus rooms. There is usually a perfect difficulty curve through each level. The level teaches you its tricks early on, and then you have to deal with the mounting challenge through to the end. Many games do this, or at least attempt to do so, but I truly believe that the original DKC trilogy has more precise level design than any other platforming series. As for DKCR? Yeah, it's got good level design. It's good. But what a wasted opportunity, when Retro had a chance to follow master level design and made just another platformer with enemies to bop here and stuff to dodge there.

Now, I say DKCR feels like "just another platformer" to me, but it does do something pretty cool that I see a lot of talk about. The levels are very dynamic. Donkey Kong leaves a swath of destruction in his wake. Ancient ruins better not be in the way between him and his missing bananas. It's all scripted, but the levels crumble and change as you move forward, and it's pretty neat. I'd have enjoyed it a lot more if I could have shaken "this doesn't feel like Donkey Kong Country" out of my mind. This is where Retro put the majority of its effort, and I can't deny that care was put into the spectacle of almost every level. Over the course of a game with 8 worlds, however, all of this destruction feels a bit like a one-trick pony... which brings me to the third point.

Almost every level in the original DKC trilogy has a hook... a gimmick. That's a word that can be used to devalue, but in this case it makes the games very memorable. In the second world of the original DKC, there's a level called "Stop & Go Station," a dark mine where these insanely fast red-eyed kremlings chase after you if you don't keep switches turned throughout the level. I'll never forget how freaked out I was when I first got there, the first kremling scaring me so badly that I turned and ran back to the entrance... only to discover that doing so is actually a secret shortcut to the end of the level. Knowing that, it was years before I mustered the courage to play through the level without the shortcut, being pretty much the most frightening thing I'd ever seen in a game at the time. Whether it's minecarts, ropes that slide you up or down, moving platforms that need fuel, blinding blizzards... there's no lazy level, and most levels have something unique that was designed specifically for that level, and defines the level. The sequels do this to greater effect, with updraft-powered balloon rides, gusty mines, sticky giant beehives, dangerous parrot-assisted descents, a tower filling with toxic waste, avoiding a gunman's sights, and dodging a thunderstorm. It goes on and on. I don't wish to imply that DKCR's level designers weren't clever, or were lazy. The dynamic environments are proof enough of their efforts. All the same, the levels rarely felt memorable to me in the same way that the original trilogy's are.

Only a few levels in DKCR had the sort of hooks that made me think, "Yes, this is a DKC level." There's one level where you have to stand behind cover to avoid tidal waves stands out in my mind. A level in world 7 called Switcheroo plays some really need tricks with background switches that alternate between red and blue platforms... sometimes you must avoid passing the switches to keep the ground below you, which reminded me of the challenge of passing through narrow gaps in lines of Zingers in the old games. These levels, along with woefully few others, were straight-up DKC creativity, a glimpse into the game that I was all hyped up to play. Again, there's nothing really wrong with the level design of DKCR as a whole, but it fails to stand up to the classics.

So, there. That's why I feel Retro Studios has done a disservice to a game that is supposed to be Donkey Kong Country. They had the music. They didn't have to. The remixes are great, but they didn't have to use them. I prefer the more realistic style of the SNES games, but if Retro wants to make a more cartoony DKC, that's their call. I knew the style was different, and I was interested to see what they'd done with it. I like kremlings, but I was up for some new enemies. They may have put Donkey Kong in a platformer, but they missed the point. Honestly, I'm shocked, because I have so much respect for Retro Studios. When it was discovered that Metroid Prime would be in first person, so many fans cried that they didn't know what Metroid was all about. They were going to make it a shooter, but Metroid isn't about shooting! Fortunately, that turned out to be dead wrong. Retro may have changed the perspective, but they couldn't have made a truer Metroid game, giving it incredible atmosphere and level design that could hardly be more perfect for the series. Alongside Ocarina of Time, I consider Metroid Prime to be the best conversion of a classic series' gameplay into 3D. They retain the important elements that make those games what they are, while being fresh within the series, and innovative for gaming in general. With DKCR, the opposite has happened. The perspective remains the same, the gameplay claims to be a throwback, but either they didn't understand what DKC's gameplay was all about, or they didn't care about the originals.

DKCR is not a throwback to DKC. If anything, it's just a throwback to difficult 2D platformers, with a little added destructive flair. I can't say it's a bad game. It's actually really solid... but I found it impossible to reconcile with it not being what I expected it to be. Drum has unintentionally given me the best term to describe it with. You see, for whatever reason, he's somehow not a fan of the original DKC games (he's barely played the sequels). He calls the original DKC "a solid platformer, but vanilla to me in every way." A plain platformer. Obviously, I very strongly disagree, but stripped of the key gameplay elements that make DKC what it is... I agree. That's what DKCR is to me. Vanilla.

Vanilla that let me down so hard. :/