CLASSIC GAMING
Donkey Kong Country 2:  Diddy's Kong Quest
Developer - Rareware
Publisher - Nintendo
Genre - Platformer
Year - 1995
System - SNES


Donkey Kong is, next to Mario, Nintendo's oldest still-running creation back when they battled in the arcades in 1981 and one of the most famous apes in the world.  However it was rather because of a small British company called Rareware that his popularity soared into mainstream with the coming of a marvellous game, Donkey Kong Country, which was hailed for its astounding pseudo-3D graphics, challenging levels, length, and its memorable soundtrack.  It would be hard to make a sequel able to even BARELY top it.  And amazingly, it happened.

Story - The story is simple.  After his humiliating defeat and failure to capture the DK Isles, King K. Rool kidnaps Donkey Kong while asleep on the beach and leaves a ransom note to DK's nephew Diddy Kong demanding he hand over the legendary banana hoard K. Rool covets so much in exchange for Donkey Kong.  Diddy decides instead to head out to Crocodile Isle, K. Rool's own home, along with his eager to help girlfriend Dixie Kong, to save his uncle.


Graphics - The graphics are very much the same as they were in the first game, which is good, as the wonderfully lush pseudo-3D environment and inhabitants are a major selling point of the first game, only made different by the fact that instead of an old-world jungle with abandoned mines, water worlds, glaciers and natural caves, Crocodile Isle has a pirate ship, swamps, a volcano, forests, a theme park and even beehives as its setting, with some more piratical enemies as K. Rool is captain as well as king of the Kremlins.  The greater range of varying levels adds a somewhat deeper experience than the previous game, each level with their own dangers and navigational rules such as hopping across stones in magma or walljumping up sticky honey-glazed walls within a beehive.


Gameplay - The gameplay, while the same linear platformer of its prequel, is made different by the two facts alone that there are more levels with greater differences, including the secret world, and different abilities.  Diddy Kong can cartwheel into enemies but Dixie can be able to whirl her ponytail and float across distances, adding a difference from its predecessor in strategy of progressing through the levels.  The same rules apply as before, the Kongs can only take one hit and if you lose both, you lose a life.  Your missing teammate who runs off after one hit can be recovered by breaking a DK Barrel.  The barrels continue to remain a mainstay of the series with the same different kinds.  Checkpoint Star Barrels that have you resume after losing a life from that point of the level instead of the level's start, Cannon Barrels that blast you anywhere they point, and the Bonus Barrels which take you to a bonus area to obtain some special coins.


As well as the main quest itself, there are three kinds of coins to obtain in the game.  Banana Coins with the simple bunch of bananas upon them are used to purchase services from the various Kong family members around the game.  Cranky Kong can offer advice, Funky Kong can send you to any area of the island you've been to, Swanky Kong can let you play various trivia games to win extra lives, and lastly Wrinkly Kong would let you save your game as well as offer advice.
There are also Kremlin Koins with the face of K.Rool himself embossed on them, which are used to unlock a secret world guarded by a very brutish invincible Kremlin.  And lastly there are the Hero Coins, with the big initials of DK in them and are a purely optional task for the completionist.  One within each level, Cranky Kong would estimate how much a videogame hero you are by how many you obtain by the end, offering something more to the gamer than just finishing the game but rather trying to COMPLETE the game by not only trying to obtain every single well-hidden DK Hero Coin in the game (and when you find them, the level name will have the coin beside it to remind you), but also trying to conquer the incredibly challenging Lost World.


As well as coins there are animal allies returning from the first game with some new ones to aid you.  Old favourites such as Rambo the Rhino with his brutal charging attack and Engarde the Swordfish with his masterful swordlike appendage return but the new allies are equally entertaining such as Squitter the Spider who can shoot webs to hit enemies or create platforms across chasms, Squawks the Parrot who can fly and Rattler the Snake with his coiled body able to spring upwards towards great heights.  The game sometimes will have you transform into the animals rather than ride them, something that the previous game only did in bonus levels, and is actually made slightly better now for the fact you don't lose your animal when you get hit, but instead of three hits like when riding them, you have the same two hits as the Kongs on foot.

Music/Sound - Donkey Kong Country 2 has perhaps one of the greatest soundtracks ever made on the SNES.  Each level is themed from pirate ships and their rigging to swampy marshes and carnivals.  Each one of the pieces is rarely ever going to be background music that gets on your nerves, with the exception of the short death theme which is different surprisingly for every level.  The carnival has a fantastic disco-style theme, the rigging levels are a jaunty piratical jig and the brambles have a strangely soothing airy theme.  For a platformer this game takes its musical level beyond the simplistic memorability of Mario games and indulges in being more intricate with each level reflecting itself perfectly in combined visual and aural pictures.  It's not RPG quality certainly but it is more grander than most platformers are with music.


Perhaps one of the greatest sequels ever (and Final Fantasy don't have any actual sequels except one, remember), Donkey Kong Country 2 is perfect in what it does.  Its added depth, better levels, greater music and higher difficulty than the first game make it a game to be respected as perhaps Donkey Kong's greatest game of all, and surprisingly not even being touched by Miyamoto's hand.  This game would be one of Rareware's few attempts to make a platformer that would even dare to rival against Mario.  And it is a very competent rival indeed.

Fun and Innovation - 4
Replayability - 3
Gameplay - 4
Presentation - 5

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