I have a cool little question concerning your intro Which games have you learned to appreciate more as they got older, that you wouldn't have considered old 7 years ago (i.e. bioshock infinite, gta 5, witcher 3)
Ah yes, my favorite kind of niche content creator who solely focuses on one hyper-specific game that hasn’t been popular in decades but loves it so much that they put their whole heart into it
I didn’t mind the collectathon, I found that it kept me busy. This game is seriously underrated. I loved every minute of it, the challenges, the gameplay, the busty mermaid, the comedic energy in the kongs (especially Chunky), and the music.
Its one of the best games by design, I always hoped we would have a Mario Game like this. But with the reception it has by yougner generations, I can forget about it.
Considering the time the game was released is important to consider; because at the time, most kids had to play to heck out of the games they had. Therefore, longer games gave you more to play. Nowadays, people have the opposite problem: they have so many games, they don't even get to playing lots of them. There's a difference between a game being "bad", and a game being built for a different audience.
Donkey Kong 64 is the type of game I want to see. When I dedicate myself to a game, I want it to pay off. I want to be immersed and absorbed. I do not want flashy lights with tiny dopamine bossts every 10 sec and repeat it over 50 hours and then consume the next game, learning control, fight through a tutorial, just for 10 sec. interval of dopamine bossts for the next 50 hours. I want a game I can think and feel myself into, with learning progression increasing difficulty, back tracking, exporation, and something I think about in reallife, being excite to play it at the end of the month too.
I think there’s something to be said about the satisfaction of mentally keeping track of different Kong collectibles. It seems like a lot of players slowly comb through a level and tag out for every single banana or coin they encounter instead of coming back to them at a more convenient time. Tagging out at any time makes collecting feel a little too simple, whereas the base game forces you to really get acquainted with the level and slow down. And it’s fun to plan out your next moves to cut down on tagging out too frequently! Honestly, it’s well designed. (The dupe mini games are harder to defend)
"t seems like a lot of players slowly comb through a level and tag out for every single banana or coin they encounter instead of coming back to them at a more convenient time. " Yeh, this is my impression as well. They simply act on input and immediate perception and not thinking for themselves, WHEN something might be convinient for them. They do as they are told and then cry that they have to do so much. I mean, with all the game snoways having litteraly a glowing shiny arrow hovering over the point you need to go, can we really blame them for being so co-dependent?
Playing this for the first time in about 10 years, there really isn’t any backtracking. It’s easy to play the level through as one Kong at a time, only changing if you ABSOLUTELY need to activate a switch or something. Just finished Gloomy Galleon and this method works pretty well so far
DK64 isn't a bad game. It just has some bad moments in it. It's a good thing you don't HAVE to 100% the game, so you don't HAVE to deal with the Beavers, the Beetles, the Rabbit, that mechanical fish that you shouldn't have waited until the last real level in the game to do. The only bad parts you HAVE to deal with are the Tag Barrel (which I've honestly never had a problem with) and the Coins, namely the Nintendo one you're never once told or even hinted about whereas you're steered towards the Rare Coin pretty early on.
That’s right, the game isn’t badly made its just DK64 hasn’t aged well mostly due to too much to collect. DK64 will always be my childhood game back at the time and i didn’t even know how big the game was but still very fun.
granted the game doesn't really tell you need the Rare and Nintendo Coins to finish the game since your only hinted about those in Hideout Helm to open the door to get the final key for K. Lumsy in order to fight King K. Rool but since you only need 100 gold banana's to beat the game, yeah there is a lot of wiggle room to get only half the total banana's there are unless you wanna 100% the game
@@bulborb8756actually the game does tell you with hints in the ghost doors at the start of the level for DK telling him about where his golden bananas are and the coin in factory lobby. It’s how the hint system works in rando which I never knew
Definitely! The coins are arguable the toughest requirement of out this game. I totally agree Beaver Bother is a bad challenge! But, ya know... just walk away from it haha. It's totally cool to decide you don't want to beat it. You can still beat the game! 😁
I think the real problem here is the way we discuss media tends to be in a polarized manner. We try to reduce the media we consume to "thing good" or "thing bad" and don't really examine the why or how we come to that conclusion and what it really means. Quality is not determined by the absence of bad, but by the presence of good and it comes down to whether or not the good outweighs the bad. That's tricky there, because it's so subjective to what one values in game experience. There's a certain amount of objectivity. For example, it's pretty easy to say that Sonic 06 is objectively bad because of how much of that game's controls are just non-functional, and how frequently it bugs out in ways that completely break the game. Conversely, there's not a Rare game I've played that doesn't master the most objective markers of quality for a game - at least once you account for certain limitations of the time (the lack of a dual analog stick on the N64 controler means games on that console always had a certain amount of problems due to an inability to get precise camera controls). But once you get past those objective elements, there's whole areas of experience to these games that are highly subjective and whether or not they bother you while playing will come down to what you want out of the experience. This is why the good/bad paradigm is really a flawed lens to examine most games from. Instead, the examination should come from the question of how well does it accomplish what it's trying to do, is what it's trying to do valuable to the gaming experience, and it should all be done with an awareness of what you value as a player when you discuss it.
this is phenomenal! it really has me rethinking this video and how I view games in general. I find myself asking these questions more for current modern games. Thank you for sharing this!
This game seems to be so unfairly scrutinized for certain dated aspects of it, when other old games are given so much grace and this game is given none. It’s a great game.
I think it's because DK's flaws are more frustrating, like having to backtrack and switch Kongs just to hit a couple buttons, or ridiculously hard challenges needed to complete the game. Like Mario 64 has a pretty bad camera for today's standards, the flying hat controls a bit like ass, and the 100 coin stars are a bit annoying to get, but the game holds up because what it does well is done really well, like Mario's movement and control is unmatched in its feel by current platformers including other Mario games, there's good momentum and precision that gives players a lot of freedom in simple stuff like jumping obstacles, on that front it's like pure platforming in a sense. And I'd say that game handled its pacing nicer overall as most stars rely on player skill rather than arbitrary obstacles and challenges requiring you to just stand in one spot and slam a button or completing a minigame, not that having a game that revolves around challenges instead of "pure platforming" is inherently bad, Banjo Kazooie executed that idea pretty well, but when the levels are massive, you gotta handle 5 different Kongs, challenges are repeated, and level design will some times ask you to switch kongs just to open a switch for ither Kongs to get their collectibles it starts feeling a bit frustrating, especially if you want to 100% the game or you just haven't played it before. There's still situational powerups in Mario that do little more outside of granting you access to specific stats, which makes them feel kinda wasted to me, but you'll be able to get most stars with your starting moveset no new skill required, while DK64 makes a whole song and dance about everything you need to get, which makes sense for a collectaton, but like I said, it gets a little annoying when pacing and scope get out of control.
@ You see I actually only played Mario 64 as an adult, and I personally got FAR more frustrated by getting booted out of the level after every star than I ever got frustrated by back-tracking, switching, mini games, and all the other things people dislike about DK64. In fact I personally don’t get frustrated by any of those things at all, but that seems to only be a me thing. I did still like Mario 64, but I personally felt like that aspect of it was much more of a pace killer than anything in DK64. The only thing I ever really found annoying in DK64 was changing day/night in Fungi Forest, and water levels in Gloomy Galleon to access things, but that was still relatively minor. That being said, I usually put on podcasts and long-term listening content while playing games, so long as Im not playing something that is highly narrative/dialogue centric, or requires heavy focus, and neither of these games are like that. I think this is why I generally don’t mind these sort of monotonous “dead air” moments in games, cuz I usually just use them as an opportunity to pivot more attention to whatever I’m listening to. I also think I just generally have a different perspective of the game than most people. I’ve beaten it 101% over 5 times, and so Im highly familiar with the game, and don’t really look at it as an “adventure” anymore. I look at every playthrough as more of an elaborate multi-layered scavenger hunt, and everything I do is another thing on the check list. I personally just really enjoy that, and I honestly feel like Im due for another 101% playthrough cuz its been close to 5 years lol Another thing that I think differentiates me from the average person is that as a gamer I am a glutton for challenge. I basically don’t do anything casually. Prior to 2020 I was a pro-level competitor in 2 different esports, and I even have another YT channel that I actually upload to where I do Nuzlockes with extreme parameters. For me nothing beats the satisfaction of overcoming a real challenge. The more difficult, the more satisfying. A lot of people talk about how daunting of a challenge it is to complete a full playthrough of DK64 in a negative connotation, and I can even acknowledge that things like the Rareware and Nintendo Coins were objectively bad game design, but for someone like me this is very much a positive and why I have consistently come back to this game throughout my life. I was genuinely shocked when I found out how negative of a reputation this game has, but I guess different strokes for different folks 🤣
@@Yvs8962 it is a little annoying but it's mitigated by the fact that the leves are much smaller and not needing to worry about coins unless you want extra lives or the 100 coin stars, which are the only stars that allow you to keep playing the level after getting them. One thing I wish I mentioned earlier that another comment pointed out is how arbitrary and artificial some of the gating can feel, which adds to frustration for those who don't like the backtracking. Like for example all Kongs have some sort of projectile, yet the buttons you need to press with those projectiles can only be shot by specific Kongs so even tho the action is the same you need to switch Kong to do it with a specific character, there's also buttons to butt slam on the ground also made for specific Kongs but they all do the same thing and there's no gameplay reason to not make it so either every Kong can slam any button or only one Kong can slam all buttons other than to make you waste time switching characters. And even the colored bananas feel pretty arbitrary when they could have simply made them universally collectible but put a bunch of them in paths accessible only to certain Kongs, that way the character requirements feel more natural and like a fun challenge instead of feeling like doing paper work and presenting documents just to get legal permission walk through a bunch bananas on a normal walkable path, or to open up sections of the level. People don't dislike the backtracking so much because it's backtracking, but for the reasons WHY they need to backtrack in the first place, it sucks to run all the way to a part of the level only to find DK's coconut gun isn't good enough and you need to use Diddy's peanut gun, a lot of "puzzles" if we even wanna call em that, rely on the game's arbitrary decisions on who should collect what, rather than using the Kongs' unique abilities to overcome obstacles in a natural way. Not to say that the Kongs don't have unique abilities or that they're meter used, but the game relies heavily on artificial gating and I feel it detracts from the game. Compare that to Mario 64 where the majority of the stars can be collected simply by using Mario's basic moveset with enough skill, there's some stars where the flying, metal, and transparent caps are needed. I do wish the caps had more use for platforming in general outside of getting those stars, but even then, the powers are actually different and make sense for the obstacles they're made for, you get a hat for flying and reach stars floating in the air, you get the transparent hat to go through walls, and you get the metal hat to walk under water against the current or to press buttons you otherwise can't press. Now imagine if all the caps did waa giving you projectiles of different colors and you need the right color to shoot a button to open up an area, that's what a bunch of DK's obstacles ultimately amount to, filing the right paperwork, not all of DK is like this but a considerable amount is, and it gets hard to justify the backtracking when this is the kind of stuff you need to backtrack for.
@ I can see your point about the character gating and how someone could find it annoying that the Kong’s share abilities that essentially function the same, but are arbitrarily restricted in what they can do, it just personally never really bothered me. I think part of it is that I just kinda know the game so well that I pretty much never have moments where I take the wrong Kong somewhere and have to be like “aww dang it, gotta go find a barrel”, and I am also good at maximizing my routes through levels with minimal backtracking. The other part is that I just kinda view it as a byproduct of the games overall goal and vision that I very much enjoy. Undoubtedly attempting to make a platformer with 5 playable characters that all have delineated, yet interwoven tasks within a singular playthrough was a very bold design to go with. I overall feel like they executed well on a lot of things with this vision, and so much of what I love about the game comes from this design choice. Any undesirable outcomes that came from this design choice I just see as a small price to pay for how much good comes from it. Mainly I just love how big every world is and that each one has so much to do in them. I could never really get into the Mario worlds that much cuz a lot of them just felt small and like you were boxed into one area, and so long as you knew what to do for each star you could just be in and out of them so quickly without there being much to see. Now do I think there is no room to discuss how they could’ve executed on this better and remedied some of these things? Of course not, nothing is perfect, and this game absolutely could benefit from various tweaks and quality of life changes. But all of these “not fun” things about the game just become minor to me when compared to the good it has to offer, and how much fun I have when I get to the “meat” of the game. Would it be nice to not have to go back for a tag barrel when there is something in front of me that I need a different Kong for? Im sure it would be nice, but the minor inconvenience just isn’t nearly enough to ruin my good time. I kinda view it similarly to other games like older Pokemon. Compared to all the modern day quality of life the series has, it can be annoying to play the old games and not be able to run… and only be able to teach your strong TMs once (without glitches lol)… and having to either teach your team AWFUL HM moves that cant be deleted OR hinder your party by taking out actual members for bad Pokemon that you just use for HMs… And while were talking about changing out Pokemon at the PC, how much of a pain the old box system is having to manually switch boxes and save EVERY TIME you do it… In spite of all of that, I think the games offer enough positives to ultimately be fun and good games… Personally I really just don’t like to blame old games for being old games, and let datedness take away from what is good about them. DK64 has its problems and dated aspects, but I really feel like it gets singled out and overly scrutinized for them, when that is true of every old game, and I really dont think DK64 is a particularly egregious offender of that.
This whole video explain my whole childhood game. The graphic, the world, music and how big the game is despite many collectables. Nobody force us to complete a game to give a full verdict, sure DK64 has flaws but its a strong 9/10 in my opinion.
It’s because of Nintendo I think. Remember all the memes and videos for decades of “Luigi wins by doing nothing with 1% brain power” in Mario Party? Well Nintendo took that and the memes of Sepiroth against the bros losing to their cartoony powers and made a game all around it called “Mario and Luigi Brothership.” The Luigi logic is genius and inspired by us memers from over long years. Look up all Luigi logic moments😂 I think if we get enough DK64 videos out there so at least Nintendo see it and the memes they might consider porting over DK64 to the switch or doing a spin off with all the kongs back. It’s worth a shot like they did with the Mario and Luigi series that died and had no hope of returning to the switch. 😂
I congrat you for bringing a +/- 5 hour retrospective in this format. 30 times 10-minute videos releasing over a month period is such a cool concept for giving love to a special game with so much memories.
I still love it to this day. King K. Rools Bossfight will always have a special piece in my heart. Everytime I wear boxing gloves, I catch myself screaming: "YEAHHH, Thank you!".
I think you make a strong point about not being expected to 100% this game. I beat this game as a kid and vividly remember trying my best just to meet the minimums for progression, and felt genuinely rewarded/satisfied after beating the final boss. And I think this Donkey Kong December video project is a testament to that point. I've been able to watch most of your videos about this game all month, and i know from experience that you didnt talk about every single thing this game had to offer. You mainly focused on the highlights and things you found interesting. Yet you were able to create 32 videos about this game, all around 10 minutes each. Thats at least 5+ hours of DK64 content, and you were genuinely only scratching the surface for most subjects. If that's not a testament to this game's scope and quality, I dont know what is. Thank you for taking the time and effort to complete a project like this. You have reminded me why this game has stuck with me for all these years. And thank you for taking the time to engage with your audience in the comment section. You're literally the only person I've interacted with that has a tangible connection to this game, and I feel so validated after all these years.
I think it's interesting that after this game did the multiple character thing, then Mario did the same in Mario 64 DS, allowing you to play as Luigi, Wario, and Yoshi.
Lego games also let you play as multiple characters with different abilities, but you don't need to go to a specific place to switch character or find a specific power-up to change character. 5 years after DK64 and 1 year after SM64DS.
It's also interesting how the DS remake is also less popular than the n64 version. It's mainly due to the lack of analog controls rather than the different characters, but it's interesting nonetheless.
@@ginogatash4030 Not really surprising that the DS version of SM64 isn't as popular as the N64 version. Original versions of games are almost always the more well known and popular versions.
So a little history. DK64 was actually the first N64 game I ever played back in the day. I definitely had a blast with it back in the day and even today's standard I still enjoy DK 64 despite some flaws. Are there annoyances? Yes. Are there things that can be a bit improved? Yes. Do I still have a fun time with all the good stuff in the game? Absolutely yes.
A lot of the DK64 hate came from G4. Go back to the mid 2000s and watch stuff like icons or countdown. They took every opportunity to bash the game. Then slowly over time those same talking point slowly found their way online and “gaming TH-camrs” without their own opinion decided to parrot them.
@@Xgp_15A2just goes to show most people only cared about what there favorite funny or good looking tv personality said. Not thought, cause most probably were fed their lines anyway.
Same thing happened to the band Nickelback. This one radio guy just gaslit an entire generation of people into thinking that Nickelback was bad simply because he said so, and he *insisted*.
@@NickzstuffI don't think it's fair to blame reviewers entirely for negativity surrounding DK64, the game has some annoying stuff in it, like the Nintendo coin challenge, the beaver minigame, and the frequent use of artificial gating to force players to play as all Kongs without making the puzzles themselves challenging or even logical. Like why can some buttons only be shot with coconuts while others need peanuts? So you play as both Donkey Kong and Diddy. Why do I have to float as Lanky Kong to get the banana when Diddy Kong would be able to get it much more efficiently? So you play that challenge as Lanky. Why are there different colored bananas and buttons with each character's face to slam? So you play as all kongs. It's all arbitrary to make sure no Kong is left unplayed even when abilities are redundant, or the extent of a Kong's usefulness is to open a path for another Kong, not helped by repetitive stuff like having to back track, switch Kong, and play instruments as each character every time you have to enter the ship in Gloomy Galeon and get all the colored bananas instead of just being able to open the ship once and have it open for all Kongs or something. Banjo Kazooie's puzzles had much more organic gating, like if you needed to fly you obviously wouldn't use Banjo, if Banjo could fly on his own but the game still arbitrarily required you to fly as Kazooie it would feel arbitrary and redundant. I wouldn't call DK64 outright bad, but these are real flaws that help make stuff like the backtracking and collectibles feel more annoying than they should be, it's not so much the backtracking itself that rubs people the wrong way as it is the reasons WHY you backtrack in the first place, the requirements ti get stuff can get more time wasting than fun, especially if you aim for 100% completion. Not to mention that parroting is an issue among DK64 fans too, most people parrot what others say but that doesn't make the arguments inherently bad.
@@Boomblox5896the issue that made nickleback as hated as they were wasn't so much that people thought it was bad, as it was how people felt their success was disproportionate to their merit as they were an at best mediocre lowest commond denominator band but was played everywhere to push their fame. It degenerated into saying negative stuff for the sake of it, but the core issue was that detractors felt their fame was undeserved and artificially inflated by overbearing marketing, it's easy to forget now but they were spammed everywhere in their heyday. Same reason singers like Justin Bieber were also harshly criticised, they are pretty mid commercialised singers that were made famous by marketing and their looks rather than because of organic audience reception. Their songs are fine ear worms, but they were pretty much the MCU of the music industry, 6/10 products that got shoved everywhere and got annoying because of it.
DK64 is an amazing game, that game can’t even be in a Top worst games which prove players who disagree. The game is my childhood game and was very fun and didn’t even know how big the game was in 1999.
I don't think anyone has ever said to my face that this game is terrible 😅 maybe a simple "it's not my cup of tea." But never a full blown "this game is bad and you should feel bad" lol That's what makes me feel like a lot of the rage on the internet is unnecessary group built up hate
Yep I literally just commented the same shit lol the game has over 800 power moons but because its mario nobody saids nothing. People can definitely be on some bullshit.. I'm fine with critiquing a game but be fair all around the board though
Difference is in Mario you don't have to backtrack just to switch and hit a couple buttons as Luigi or something. The issue isn't the quantity of collectibles or game length itself, it's how the game makes you spend that time, if it was constantly engaging throughout people would not bitch about it, but it stretched itself too thin to really do that.
I feel this exactly! Super Mario 64 being a few years before DK64, I'm just blown away by how that game gets way more love. In my honest opinion, it has more flaws 😬 but nobody wants to talk about that haha
@@derekrequiem4359 audiences never truly know what they wanted or why, but it's easy to create a situation where to make a game big you end up filling it with boring busywork so you can say it's 60 hours. Short games are kinda rare, especially from triple A, and the default bias usually favors long games, but honestly I can't really get behind it, like nit every game needs to be 60 hours long. If they can make those 60 hours consistently fun then that's great, but otherwise I'll take a fun 8 hour game over a bloated 60 hour slogfest, pacing is important.
I put DK64 in the same catagory as Sonic Adventure series. Very flawed, did not age well, but has a lot of fun and stellar moments. Honestly a BJ Tooie fan-but I have to acknowledge the bullshit that is Canary Mary.
🧅Cranky Kong's been warning all of us, we'll outgrow the appreciation for the magnitude of DK64 - Only to revive the obsession later: A gamer (Isotarge) came back like 17 years later and rediscovered a secret Rainbow Coin! Who knows what stones we didn't turn!
I love DK64, and the mod where you can switch kongs on the fly is amazing for playing. Admittedly I think you should also make every kong capable of grabbing everything as being able to switch on the fly sort of makes the specific colors meaningless. The obvious issue to this is that Tiny Kong basically becomes your most dominant character, being the one who has the easiest time platforming thanks to her twirl. If the other kongs had more open movement options, say like, Diddy being able to use his tail spring at any time for good vertical height, then you could swap between them as the platforming necessitates it. If the kongs could use more of their abilities without needing to be on a pad or needing a barrel, then there would be a real sense of choice between who to use when traversing a level.
5:53 I have to disagree with your oppinion about the seamless switch of the kongs. In my oppinion, this would completle dismiss the need for different characteres all together. Why should there be more than one Kong, if there is no challenge to switch between them? I would say the problem is not the tag barrel, it is the level design and the distribution of the collectables. It is just frustrating to collect some bananas with one kong, just to switch to open a gate by shooting a switch with an other kong two times in a row (I am looking at you Fungi Forest). If the collectables were better distributed over the level, a lot of people would not mind to switch a kong. Creepy Castle and Frantic Factory are good exaples for this: Most of the collectables are in areas specific for one Kong.
This 100%! Especially if you are doing a timed challenge with a Kong. You might be able to completely break it using a different Kong that could get there faster and change back right at the banana, completely eliminating that Kong’s purpose to make it a bit tougher of a challenge.
Normally, people go the path of least resistance. And the path of least resistance here is to make it possible to swap out anywhere over redesigning the entire game. And the reason why there are multiple characters remains that any one of them does not have all of those abilities at once with no reason we could rewrite that.
It kinda does. It barely has any "puzzles" anymore because they get erased upon implementing the change, but you yourself said that they kinda suck anyways.
I've been making this point- the gameplay experience for the majority of the players was a bunch of literal children who were pretty new to 3D gaming and who would revisit these worlds with different primates for an hour or so at a time. To that end, it was an excellent experience, as there was always something for you to discover, as you weren't necessarily meant to stop an backtrack, but to revisit an old section in a new play session. Sitting down and beating an entire game in a few intense sessions was simply *not* how the majority of people played video games back then. Partly because the univeral skill level was lower, partly because game design wasn't oriented in that way, and partly because it felt pretty wasteful. You basically only did that for big event games, and even then, the expectation was that there would be tons of extra content that would keep you coming back to the game for months on end. I mean, those $9999 Golden Bragging Rights grindfest reward items common in so many games of the era were there for a reason- they were a feature. I guess part of the reason DK64 gets it so bad is that its at the tail end of things, when gaming culture really started to shift and take on the first inklings of its modern incarnation- and bears the jaded burden of early online gaming discourse, instead of being lauded as a formative 3D platforming experience like its earlier ilk. The OG Donkey Kong challenge was total BS though. I feel like developers would take it as a point of pride to make a player want to re-enter an existing save instead of restarting a game back then, but they flubbed it there.
No one ever seems to talk about the biggest flaw with DK64's game design: artificial gating. Theres a ton of artificial gating in DK64 that could probably be removed outright and not hinder the game at all. Artificial gating vs. Organic gating: Banko Kazooie is a good example of Organic gating. If theres a boulder in the way, beak bust it. If theres a glass window, smash it with Kazooie. Need to cross a swamp, use the swamp boots. These solutions to problems feel organic, natural, logical. But DK64 has a lot of artificial gates. Need to get past the gate? Shoot the peanut button. What is a peanut button? I dont know. Why does the button only react to peanuts? What magical property of peanuts activates this button that a coconut or pineapple wouldn't?? Who knows. Makes no sense. You have to use the Peanut gun just because "video game." Just because the game wants to force you to use a specific character. And theres other examples. Like why are there certain buttons that can only be pressed by Diddy's skull bash, but not Chunky's punch? Shouldn't Chunkys punch be stronger? Who knows. Or why do some doors open based on musical instruments? And why not just use a peanut/coconut button instead for it? They're functionally the same: an arbitrary button that requires a specific character. You could just as easily put a force field wall with the characters face on it that prevents any other character from passing. It would be no different. These kinds of "puzzles" aren't very intelligent, and don't require any skill or knowledge from the player. They're just mindless busy work. And unfortunately DK64 has a lot of these "puzzles." Other than that, its a great game. The most memorable puzzles are when you have to use the characters abilities in novel interesting ways.
That's a really good point, people focus a lot on the amount of collectibles or the backtracking but not why those things feel frustrating to detractors of the game, it's not about how much time is spent playing, or how many you need to switch Kongs, it's about WHAT you do in that time, and WHY you gotta do all that stuff to begin with. One thing I really like about Mario 64 other than the moveset and controls, is how most stars rely entirely on your platforming skills, there's some stars that do require specific powerups, and I do feel it's a bit of a shame that they don't have much platforming use outside of getting the stars that absolutely need them, but otherwise you can figure out how to get most stars simply with your starting moveset, no new skill unlocking required. And the need for the cap stars is still logical, like you need to get a star behind a particular wall, you turn transparent, you need to push a button under water, you turn into metal Mario, you need to reach a star that's up in the sky, you fly, just like Banjo Kazooie the obstacles make sense. DK's challenges/puzzles in contrast feel like they were encumbered by the amount of playable characters and didn't know how to make each Kong needed without some arbitrary gating, like both DK and Diddy have projectiles but they're only good for their own specific buttons, Chonky can smash through some obstacles but only as long as said obstacles doesn't require a different Kong's smashing ability even tho Chunky is supposed to be the strongest, and Lanky Kong's floating gimmick is just an inferior version of Diddy's jetpack, and there's no reason he shouldn't be able to complete the challenge instead of Lanky other than the game going "this banana is for Lanky Kong because I say so". The game could benefit from removing redundant skills and make the obstacles more organic, but with 5 characters it's obviously hard to balance the game in ways where all Kongs feel important, perhaps they could have cut the number of Kongs to 3 so it's easier to manage, but alas in their quest of making the game as big as it could be they got carried away and the scope of the game got out of hand. I wouldn't say it's an outright bad game, but the arbitrary gating is a big flaw that kind of exacerbates issues of backtracking and all the other stuff people complain about, it never feels good when the solution to a challenge feels like atbitrary game logic.
@@ginogatash4030 Yep. I wish more moves were used more interestingly. As you said, Lanky's balloon float is often used in places where Diddy's spring-tail or jetpack would/could be used. So it effectively is just a weaker spring-tail or jetpack alternative. I feel like they could have differentiated it by making it float more horizontally, but then its also overlapping use with Tiny's helicopter spin. Lanky's inflate move is just there to give him something to do... a solution looking for a problem to solve. I like the move itself, but it doesn't stand out as useful on its own. Funny enough, Mario 64 DS added an inflate move for Mario, and its used more effectively there. It goes mostly vertical, and has a bouncy physics to it. Which contrasts to the Wing Cap which is more horizontal. I feel like NOT trying to force balance all the kongs would maybe be a better solution. Just let players use their favorite Kong, and let abilities naturally gate collectibles. Thats's what DKC series did. It didn't matter if you favored DK or Diddy, or Dixie, etc. The player could use whatever character they liked. And the game even kept track of who beat which levels.
To be fair, DK64 is a video game, and using logic that only applies to the real world is a moot point. Why can't Banjo and Kazooie/Donkey Kong just fly up to the enemy base and break through the window and confront the villain right then and there? Using arguments like that won't lead anywhere. Why only Diddy break this block? Because it's a challenge only for Diddy. Why can't Chunky get over the gap? Because it's not a challenge for Chunky, come back with Tiny. The reason why there's so many types of switches and keys is because the game wants to make use of every tool it gives to you. It's a pretty neat feeling unlocking new switches and keys to unlock, especially since there's more use to these abilities than just progress.
@@GiantBluebird I get game logic is not exactly logical, but even game logic has to make gameplay sense. For example why should the Kong face buttons on the ground be slammable only by the Kong pictured in it when the act of butt slamming the ground is identical between Kongs? Forget real life logic, there's no gameplay reason why the same exact action done to achieve the same exact goal should be gated between the different characters, it's not even challenging you just press a button which all Kongs are able to do equally as well as each other. It would be like if Banjo could fly on his own but the game still demanded you arbitrarily fly as Kazooie in some sections without giving you a real reason beyond the game going "cause I say so", it's the platforming equivalent of obtuse puzzles in old point and click adventure games where instead of figuring out a logical solution, the real challenge is figuring out what the devs thought would be a logical solution. I'm fine with not all collectibles being universal, but there should be at least a practical gameplay reason for it, like a character's ability being uniquely useful instead of an arbitrary character portrait determining who gets to get what collectibles when another character's moveset is perfectly good to achieve the same goal in an arguably more efficent manner. Like the other guy said, a bunch of abilities feel like solutions looking for problems, and having to backtrack over stuff like shooting a button as a specific Kong when they all have projectiles that function the same feels like shit, it feels less like overcoming a challenge and more like presenting the right paper work and documents to access parts of the level. You can break logic to make a game fun, but it has to be fun.
@@ginogatash4030 Banjo Kazooie is basically DK64 with one character. The way that DK64 handles its collectables and challenges is by making all Kongs completely equal. Every Kong has the same number of things to do as the other. While some see this as padding, like "oh I have to play this level 5 different times, that's lame", I personally see it as a way to explore the level in different ways in the same playthrough. It's easy to hover around a level as Tiny, but Lanky can travel up slopes that even Tiny can't get to. It's fun to note where a boulder is in a level, so that when you get Chunky, you can easily find that boulder and break open a secret. It's a similar thrill to finding a barrel in DKC 1, like "oooh, what secret do I break open with this?", but on a much bigger scale.
The amount of collectables in the game is one of the reasons why I love it. It gave me a sense of achievement once I eventually collected everything the game had to offer.
I can’t believe we’re at the end of this amazing journey already. Feels like yesterday I was watching your very first video of the month. Time sure flies when your having fun. I’ve already stated my opinion on this game countless times via your streams and on comments on the videos. So I won’t really go into much depth here again. Although I loved seeing my comment from your very first video. That was awesome. Lol This game was definitely a product of its time. A lot of people seem to forget that this game came out in 1999. I think the more that people understand how old this game is, they can appreciate it more. At least that’s what I would hope to see. Either way you look at it. This game has definitely left an impact on so many of us. DK64 will always remain as one of my favorite games of all time, despite a lot of the issues it has. Thanks for this nostalgia trip my dude. You are awesome and I’m looking forward to what’s going to happen next year and beyond! 👍🏻
you rock, Luigi! 😁 it's been an awesome month! Really fun to do a deep dive into this game and get loaded with nostalgia! Can't believe you've been subbed for 6 years! That's really amazing 🍌
I definitely agree with modern games not having enough stuff. When the game is truly fun, and it's not heavily narrative driven, I don't think anyone would mind if it gives you more content. I just reached the Ziggurat in my first playthrough of Tunic, and if I finish the game only for it to say "Hey, check out this second island with even more stuff to do, upgrades to collect, enemies to fight, etc." I would absolutely love that, because playing Tunic "blind" is probably the most fun I've had with a game in several years.
This is the closest any reviewer has been to sharing my opinion of this game. I wasn't a kid when it came out, but I grew up with older consoles and never got new games. I managed to 101% complete this in about two years and loved it-and I still do. I hope it's added to NSO soon!
Spyro the dragon is the real goat of that generation. Better draw distance better textures better framerate voice acting better sound 5x the levels, it puts the rare games to shame
Nah Spyro isn’t a better game although it’s still a good game. And I completely disagree with you on the better textures, better draw distance, better sound and voice acting. The Nintendo 64 was a lot more powerful than the PS1 and that’s evident with the graphics of the games
It makes me chuckle on the inside when I hear how repeating bonus barrels is a fault in the game. Even if a few repeat sometimes, there's 15 different types of minigames. I'm currently working on DKC Tropical Freeze, and I am very sick of seeing the same 5 bonus rooms over and over again. It's funny how old games are criticized for something that magically doesn't apply to these newer 'better" games.
My cousins in Mexico had Dk 64. They couldn’t understand what the subtitles were saying but it was so easy to figure out what you needed to do in the game. I played with them for hours trying to beat the first beetle race lol
I just finished and 101% DK64 for the first time a week ago, after trying and failing to beat it like 8 times since I was a kid. One idea that stuck out to me is they should've kept the tag barrel, but done a "Kong Squad" method with it instead. You can tag anywhere, but only between 3 Kongs that you choose in the tag barrel, and you can change your roster at any tag barrel. This still creates a fun version of backtracking where you see stuff you cant interact with at the moment, and you think about the most efficient way to pick your Kongs for the fastest possible backtracking and exploration. You could even expand this by giving the Kongs more unique movement abilities (like Orangustand Sprint anywhere) to provide incentive for picking certain Kongs in your squad, besides just needing to complete their sections of the map
Man when I was a kid donkey kong 64 was a favorite game of mine along with the banjo kazooie/SM64 I always love the adventures and uncovering the secrets in each world. Especially when it comes to backtracking I always apricate coming back to same levels and see what more these levels have to offer and seeing what each kong can uncover. But of course it does have its stressful moment like beaver bother which can be stressful but still I see them as a challenge as a kid and when I beat the stressful challenges I felt so accomplished. But overall I will always hold DK64 as one of my favorite adventure games along with both BK and SM64.
I got an N64 just for this game this holliday season. I have always enjoyed how broken it is. Im excited to be able to try and use Krusha in Adventure.
Joe! Got a lot to say💚. 34 here, Xmas 99 I got my n64 w/ Dk64,, one of my happiest days everrr. Tho I used to take the bus to blockbuster when I was 7 to rent Dkcountry, so the original trilogy are closest to my heart but 64 is riight there next to them. Apples and oranges 2d and 3D so glad we have both. My gut tells me Nintendowill be putting 64 on the switch soon, like your buddy said in a previous vid u made, esp. with country returns coming soon (can’t wait that’s the one game I never played!) I’m not ganna lie I’m ganna miss getting a video everyday but this month you have made the best donkey 64 content a fan could ask for. And lastly when u said at the end that the kongs will aways be family I teared up. Facts. See u next video brother 🍻🫡🙏
heck yeah, man! Appreciate all the support 😁 this has been an amazing month! Love love LOVE reading everyone's stories! I'll be experience the DK Country games for the very first time next year. It's going to be epic!
I absoutley loved DK64 as a kid. I remember it came with my n64 as a bundle. Out of all the collectables I highly enjoyed would have to go to would have to be photographing the banana fairies and the blueprints for that weird fox friend of ours. But I must agree the other collectables that were basically forced to beat the game though was attrocious for us kids to deal with though like the coins by a long shot big time. Glad to have discovered your channel this month. I sure hope Nintendo releases DK somehow on the next console in some way i so would love that very much.
Still one of my favorite N64 games, Di key Kong games and possibly my favorite RARE game. There's always going to be a special place in my heart for this game, flaws and all. Thanks so much for this daunting task you undertook with all these videos. You brought together a community that loves the game all the same. Cheers to next Donoey Kong December 🔥
Much like you, SJB64, when I think "Donkey Kong," _this_ is the game that comes to mind. I really wish Nintendo would make another DK game with K. Rool and the rest of the Kremling Krew as the villains again.
I played it for the first time last year and I enjoyed every minute of it. I'm someone who has the patience to run around a level in circles for hours, so collecting everything is no problem.
This is the one game from my childhood that I refuse to take the rose-tinted glasses off of. I don't care if it's got glitches up the wazoo or if certain parts of the game could've been executed better, this game will always be perfection in the eyes of my inner child. It's far and away the game I've played the most from the N64 era and maybe even overall.
I looked forward to your video every day this month, thanks for the effort! Besides a couple golden bananas and the coins, this is my favourite game of all time and it’s awesome to see someone making so much content covering it
This game was my childhood. Recently found my old 64 and copy of the game. Bringing back so many memories! Love to see there is a community of people who still enjoy this game. Thanks for DK December!!!
I believe DK64 is usually compared to more modern games, and people forget its one of the first ones in 3D, but to be honest I think most "hated" aspects of DK64 is poor (or segmented) testing (Yes, I'm looking at you Beaver Bother and Beetle races) - I think this because Beaver Bother could be fixed with some collision testing and the Beetle race being more balanced. Then again, as you mentioned in a previous video (the best bananas i think), they did a good racing segment with the racecar, so maybe in the playtesting I could be wrong Too much game? Said by who? Those who play the next CoD Every.Single.Year? 60$ base or 100$ "full" version Also, about the glitches...ANY game will have glitches with enough time and technology available (like Zelda's 20/60 fps or RE4 Ditman's glitch) 6:32 I kinda disagree on that a bit. Yes, its brutal, but I (either lost or won) always got an adrenaline pump from that Cabin experience, and made me take decisions carefully on how to defeat them - personally, kinda felt more of that would have been great! - with other Kongs too! 8:41 and thank you for making them! December was a blast because of these vids!
My favorite game of all time. Thank you for making this video. I've grown so attached to this game. I debunk the back tracking frequently because I don't see it as a legit criticism due to not having to do everything in the game. I'll defend this game till I die.
These are my ideas for a DK64 remake: Priority 1 (mandatory): * All collectibles can be taken by all Kongs. * Patch the broken physics of Beaver Bother. * Fix any other glitches. * Rambi and Enguarde can collect things. * No Nintendo Coin or Rare Coin. * Donkey Kong Arcade is played once for a Golden Banana, but not a second time. * Jetpak replaces the Rambi and Enguarde high score challenges in the bonus content, or is removed altogether (depending on copyright). Priority 2 (highly recommended): * Switch Kongs at any point (less necessary if the collectibles point above is addressed). * Move Lanky's Sprint potion to Fungi Forest. * The Rambi and Enguarde high score challenges are now in-game bonus barrels that require you to get a certain number of points. * Crystal Coconuts are no longer necessary in certain challenges (i.e., the Rabbit Race). * Add a New Funky Mode for casuals and Japanese audiences and have Swanky Kong run the ammunition shop instead. Funky Mode does not require the tag barrel whatsoever (so he has a whole bunch of abilities, or certain Kong-specific puzzles can be completed by him alone). * The multiplayer mode has online capability. * Replace the stalagmite hazard in Crystal Caves with a mini-boss, using Kudgel from DKC2 instead of a giant Kosha. * Add a mini-map to the UI. * Relocate Lanky's Gloomy Galleon Kasplat so that it doesn't interfere with Chunky's cannonball challenge. * Make the Lockjaw banana easier to set up. * Improve the controls of Diddy's jetpack and have the ring challenges use polygons instead of sprites. Priority 3 (nice-to-haves): * Replace Tiny with Dixie. This may seem controversial, but in a modern context, it would make more sense because of Tiny's updated design and Dixie being more recognizable. * Chunky's Primate Punch can now knock out Koshas, Klumps, and Kasplats. * Add more animal buddies (Winky in Aztec and Caves, Squitter in Factory + Night Forest + Castle, Expresso for the second Rabbit Race and second Beetle Race). * Donkey's Coconut Gun is much stronger (Chunky has the strongest projectile) and he takes less damage from enemies, making him more of a "tank". * Replace some of the repeated bonus barrels with unique challenges, whether the aforementioned animal buddy games, or even relocated Golden Bananas from other worlds. * Replace Diddy's Dogadon fight with a brand new boss. Chunky's version the fight is a lot more iconic and is the one with a K. Rool cutscene, anyway. An airborne fight that requires Diddy's jetpack would be perfect. * Replace the second Army Dillo fight with the aforementioned Kudgel battle. Now, you have to dodge stalagmites while traveling across some level geometry to access barrels to throw at the boss. Priority 4 (personal preferences): * Move the Super Simian Slam potion to Gloomy Galleon (which has a switch in the lobby, anyway). * Klaptraps are official recognized as Krimps (their DKC3 variant), since their design here is MUCH closer to Krimps than the DKC1 Klaptraps. * Officially confirm Lanky as a misfit Manky Kong, since he's otherwise the only playable Kong with no specific family origin tying to the original DKC trilogy. Now, Lanky's linked to DKC1, Tiny/Dixie is linked to DKC2, and Chunky is linked to DKC3.
@@NL-X Won't deny that, but people always act like they HAVE to collect every single collectable they see right away. It's an issue with the person, not the game. If you're constantly switching kongs and scouring the entire level to satisfy your OCD, that's on you.
Donkey Kong 64 does have its flaws, but in presentation it is absolutely a cultural touchstone of its era. I do feel like if a game like it came out today, it wouldn't fly given how much modern games have spoiled us. But for what it was DK64 was a banger. While if I were to play it today vanilla, it would feel like a grocery shopping list, that randomizer really keeps it running. Rare didn't even know that while a game with such complicated collection structure may stress you, throw in the randomizer and it turns a great game into a godly game. Because the DK Rap Guy is the voice of god.
The heavy critique against DK64 is squarely against the idea of a 100% playthrough, something 99% of people don't feel the need to do. But a very vocal 1% has felt the need to say this game is "bad" for the presence of multiple options to get to the end boss instead of giving it credit for recognizing not everyone will like every minigame or golden banana. I get that switching kongs anywhere is easier and more smooth, but that alone shouldn't discredit how good the game was and how much fun it could be doing the bananas you wanted to do. I don't see people saying SM64 is bad for letting you get stars in one world over others, or people dogging on bad levels in the OG Super Mario for forcing you to play some bum levels since you had to play certain levels to reach the end. I hope people start to appreciate what DK64 did - gave you hundreds of ways to reach the end with whatever appealed to you the most. Maybe you loved the barrel minigames, or maybe you loved solving puzzles in the world or working on more exploraiton focused bananas.
I played it for the first time like a year ago and I never found the Kong swapping that bad. If there’s not a swap barrel near you there’s almost always a warp pad that lead you to one. Swapping on the spot would be more convenient sure but I hardly think it wastes that much time anyway.
Good video! Yeah, getting a new game as a kid was something special and I think I got more out of each new game as getting another was so infrequent. I usually got one (or sometimes two) games for birthdays or Christmas, so I had to make sure it was something I really wanted to play. I remember being over the moon when Donkey Kong 64 was announced and I received it as a birthday gift way back when it was released. I spent way too many hours exploring ever nook and cranny of each world to find everything. It was tedious to have to hunt down Tag Barrels, but I don't think I minded too much since I had more time to play as a kid. I did end up beating this game like 3 separate times over several years (as I said, getting a new games as a kid was few and far between). Honestly, it would be great to get a remaster and and have them polish up some of the design choices with new quality of life improvements. While we're at it, I'd love Banjo-Kazooie and Banjo-Tooie remasters as well! 😄
The best thing about acquiring the Rareware/Nintendo Coin is if you can beat the original Donkey Kong game, THEN YOU CAN BEAT THE ORIGINAL DONKEY KONG GAME. And with only 1 life.
This is honestly why I wish this game was on NSO (which I know is a whole other can of worms). I remember as a kid having a tough time with this game at certain points, but I overall really liked it a lot. Would love to give it another go to see how well I personally think it holds up. I also always had a blast with multiplayer.
DK64 randomizer literally fixes all the problems the original had. I highly recommend checking it out. They even have a vanilla but better option I highly recommend playing that
The points you shared in the beginning, about why a typical gamer child in that time period would less likely be bothered by DK64’s padded backtracking, actually summed up how I felt back when I first played the game. That never entered my mind as an inconvenience, until I revisited the game at a much older age through the Wii U Virtual console, then managed to 100% the whole game on said emulator. That being said, if the exploration/collecting was more streamlined to allow a person to progress more efficiently and beat the game faster, I would have gotten the same enjoyment as a kid by simply replaying the campaign more times, as I did with other games. So in hindsight, I think DK64 could have been designed more efficiently for those would prefer a one-and-done experience, without compromising a typical kid’s enjoyment. For example, I think it would have made a big difference, if players had the option to toggle whether differently colored bananas are tangible to all Kongs or not. That way, if they wanted to have certain bananas remain as a guide/reminder to backtrack with a different Kong later or simply collect all bananas on their first go, both camps are satisfied.
I'll love it if this game got more references like the weapons and musical instruments that are used. Especially in Smash, I feel like I'm DK 64 they gave DK and Diddy good personalities that makes them stand out than just being monkeys that only use their arms or grab onto others.
Personally I was mostly fine with the tag barrel. The only issue I had was with bananas and coins being restricted to one kong--that was a bit excessive.
I would like to add and emphasis the characterization and plot, each Kong and main character is given characterization that wouldn't be out of place of Kirby or Sonic, they could've reused Kiddy and Dixe but instead fleshed out the family tree more, to the point of even making a reference to Mankey Kong and finally K Rool is the most crazy and desperate we've seen so far which makes sense if you played DKC2. The Kongs destroyed the Kremlings home and then they lost the only other territory they had in DKC3 its no wonder why he would eventually try to do the same to the Kongs. To this day DK64 remains my favorite DK title and possibly even my favorite Mario franchise game altogether. (Despite growing up a Nintendo kid in the 90s, I never was a gameplay first kind of guy)
Im just about 30. Ive played DK64 since i was 3 or 4. It was in my first literally my first 5 or 6 games ever played. Its been my favorite 64 game, my favorite DK game made by Rare (still love all the DKC and Diddy Kong Racing) , and in general a favorite game of mine in my top 50.
Hey since you cover a lot of Donkey Kong 64, could you record and upload the Kong Tag selection screen? I've seen NO ONE uploading all the animations. I'd love to be able to share the Kong Animations so you can see them calling for you to pick them, or in the case of Chunky, having him urge you to pick someone else.
I think that most people don't even realize how exceptionally ambitious and cutting edge videogame DK64 really was. If compared to any other multicharacter platform -game from the nineties, DK64 is on another level. Even Sonic Adventure's many "playable" characters were total joke in comparison.
I have consistently maintained that while this game has its shortcomings it's nowhere near as bad as everyone says. Thank you for this, and for a month of great videos!
I think you can say the same for Tooie. That game's one of my all-time favorites, and even with some of the worst jiggies, you don't have to beat Canary Mary to get to Cauldron Keep. While yes, it can be a nightmare for completionists, do you seriously need to 100% a game to fulfill your life?
Exactly this! Beating the game is what most players are after. And if you're looking to 100% complete a game, you should be mentally prepared for challenges.
The DK64 Randomizer fixing the tag barrel issue, the difficulty and balance of the broken mini-games, and streamlining the objectives on top of the Randomizer features… truly the definitive way to play this game in the Year of our Arceus 2025.
Man. I miss when i would spend hours and hours in a game, not trying to beat it or anything, but just running around aimlessly, just having fun exploring. The worlds were a sandbox and i was a kid just having fun in them
DK64 and Banjo Kazooie are the reasons I always wanted to experience the N64 as a kid but by the time that console ended I wasn't even born yet lol so I had a gamecube and could never play those games. I did get to experience Super Mario 64 on the Nintendo DS and Ocarina of Time/Majora's Mask on the Gamecube Collector's Edition but the only time I ever got to play DK64 or Banjo Kazooie was when my cousin brought it over
So I’ve only recently subbed and bell, to your channel, and I’m really loving every bit of it, you’ve honesty nailed everything I’ve loved and hated about this game. And I kinda want to participate with the crowd and just have fun counter arguments and what not, never the less, This is more or less out of curiosity, but what’s your plan post DK December? Will there be more DK related content (not just exclusive to 64 but all of DK) or will you just end up seeing how the views go and ride the wave from there?
You'll have to chime in for tomorrow's video! 😁 But the short answer; definitely more to come! More DK! Other games that are similar (Banjo, Conker.) Just not daily anymore haha. That is sooooo much work. Thank you for subbing and watching! 🍌🐒
DK64 is an awesome game and no one can tell me otherwise 🙂Thank you all for making DK December 2024 so special! ❤
Thank you for making DK December so groovy!
I have a cool little question concerning your intro
Which games have you learned to appreciate more as they got older, that you wouldn't have considered old 7 years ago (i.e. bioshock infinite, gta 5, witcher 3)
🦍Thank YOU for giving us DONKMAS! 💝May you bask in the glory of 101%!
Agreed! DK64 was my childhood along with other staples like Majora’s mask, OOT, and Chunky Kong 64😉😂
Next video should be a compilation of all known DK64 memes to end the year off 😉😂
Ah yes, my favorite kind of niche content creator who solely focuses on one hyper-specific game that hasn’t been popular in decades but loves it so much that they put their whole heart into it
New here?
this made my day 😁 love that we're all here for the Kongs haha
I didn’t mind the collectathon, I found that it kept me busy. This game is seriously underrated. I loved every minute of it, the challenges, the gameplay, the busty mermaid, the comedic energy in the kongs (especially Chunky), and the music.
Its one of the best games by design, I always hoped we would have a Mario Game like this. But with the reception it has by yougner generations, I can forget about it.
Considering the time the game was released is important to consider; because at the time, most kids had to play to heck out of the games they had.
Therefore, longer games gave you more to play.
Nowadays, people have the opposite problem: they have so many games, they don't even get to playing lots of them.
There's a difference between a game being "bad", and a game being built for a different audience.
Absolutely this! It makes a huge difference
Donkey Kong 64 is the type of game I want to see. When I dedicate myself to a game, I want it to pay off. I want to be immersed and absorbed. I do not want flashy lights with tiny dopamine bossts every 10 sec and repeat it over 50 hours and then consume the next game, learning control, fight through a tutorial, just for 10 sec. interval of dopamine bossts for the next 50 hours.
I want a game I can think and feel myself into, with learning progression increasing difficulty, back tracking, exporation, and something I think about in reallife, being excite to play it at the end of the month too.
I think there’s something to be said about the satisfaction of mentally keeping track of different Kong collectibles. It seems like a lot of players slowly comb through a level and tag out for every single banana or coin they encounter instead of coming back to them at a more convenient time. Tagging out at any time makes collecting feel a little too simple, whereas the base game forces you to really get acquainted with the level and slow down. And it’s fun to plan out your next moves to cut down on tagging out too frequently! Honestly, it’s well designed. (The dupe mini games are harder to defend)
Actually Beaver Bother is very well defended as the glitched and bugged mini game there is 😂
this is a great point! you'll have a much better time playing the game like this. otherwise you'll feel overwhelmed
"t seems like a lot of players slowly comb through a level and tag out for every single banana or coin they encounter instead of coming back to them at a more convenient time. "
Yeh, this is my impression as well. They simply act on input and immediate perception and not thinking for themselves, WHEN something might be convinient for them. They do as they are told and then cry that they have to do so much. I mean, with all the game snoways having litteraly a glowing shiny arrow hovering over the point you need to go, can we really blame them for being so co-dependent?
Playing this for the first time in about 10 years, there really isn’t any backtracking. It’s easy to play the level through as one Kong at a time, only changing if you ABSOLUTELY need to activate a switch or something. Just finished Gloomy Galleon and this method works pretty well so far
Yes and taking notes of where everything is at and clearing areas out fully before moving into the next
DK64 is the reason why i love 3D platformers and collectathons :)
I’m so glad you hit on the point that players who really enjoy it played it as a kid. There was a magic to those polygons back then.
Yes!! There really is something magical about these polygons
DK64 isn't a bad game. It just has some bad moments in it. It's a good thing you don't HAVE to 100% the game, so you don't HAVE to deal with the Beavers, the Beetles, the Rabbit, that mechanical fish that you shouldn't have waited until the last real level in the game to do. The only bad parts you HAVE to deal with are the Tag Barrel (which I've honestly never had a problem with) and the Coins, namely the Nintendo one you're never once told or even hinted about whereas you're steered towards the Rare Coin pretty early on.
That’s right, the game isn’t badly made its just DK64 hasn’t aged well mostly due to too much to collect. DK64 will always be my childhood game back at the time and i didn’t even know how big the game was but still very fun.
granted the game doesn't really tell you need the Rare and Nintendo Coins to finish the game since your only hinted about those in Hideout Helm to open the door to get the final key for K. Lumsy in order to fight King K. Rool
but since you only need 100 gold banana's to beat the game, yeah there is a lot of wiggle room to get only half the total banana's there are unless you wanna 100% the game
@@bulborb8756actually the game does tell you with hints in the ghost doors at the start of the level for DK telling him about where his golden bananas are and the coin in factory lobby. It’s how the hint system works in rando which I never knew
Definitely! The coins are arguable the toughest requirement of out this game. I totally agree Beaver Bother is a bad challenge! But, ya know... just walk away from it haha. It's totally cool to decide you don't want to beat it. You can still beat the game! 😁
Never forget how much of a pain in the ass the nintendo coin was to get and don't even speak of beaver bother @@superjoebros64
Anyone who complains about too many collectables is silly in my book
I think the real problem here is the way we discuss media tends to be in a polarized manner. We try to reduce the media we consume to "thing good" or "thing bad" and don't really examine the why or how we come to that conclusion and what it really means.
Quality is not determined by the absence of bad, but by the presence of good and it comes down to whether or not the good outweighs the bad. That's tricky there, because it's so subjective to what one values in game experience.
There's a certain amount of objectivity. For example, it's pretty easy to say that Sonic 06 is objectively bad because of how much of that game's controls are just non-functional, and how frequently it bugs out in ways that completely break the game. Conversely, there's not a Rare game I've played that doesn't master the most objective markers of quality for a game - at least once you account for certain limitations of the time (the lack of a dual analog stick on the N64 controler means games on that console always had a certain amount of problems due to an inability to get precise camera controls).
But once you get past those objective elements, there's whole areas of experience to these games that are highly subjective and whether or not they bother you while playing will come down to what you want out of the experience. This is why the good/bad paradigm is really a flawed lens to examine most games from. Instead, the examination should come from the question of how well does it accomplish what it's trying to do, is what it's trying to do valuable to the gaming experience, and it should all be done with an awareness of what you value as a player when you discuss it.
this is phenomenal! it really has me rethinking this video and how I view games in general. I find myself asking these questions more for current modern games. Thank you for sharing this!
This game seems to be so unfairly scrutinized for certain dated aspects of it, when other old games are given so much grace and this game is given none. It’s a great game.
exactly this! I don't understand how the criticism isn't fair
I think it's because DK's flaws are more frustrating, like having to backtrack and switch Kongs just to hit a couple buttons, or ridiculously hard challenges needed to complete the game.
Like Mario 64 has a pretty bad camera for today's standards, the flying hat controls a bit like ass, and the 100 coin stars are a bit annoying to get, but the game holds up because what it does well is done really well, like Mario's movement and control is unmatched in its feel by current platformers including other Mario games, there's good momentum and precision that gives players a lot of freedom in simple stuff like jumping obstacles, on that front it's like pure platforming in a sense.
And I'd say that game handled its pacing nicer overall as most stars rely on player skill rather than arbitrary obstacles and challenges requiring you to just stand in one spot and slam a button or completing a minigame, not that having a game that revolves around challenges instead of "pure platforming" is inherently bad, Banjo Kazooie executed that idea pretty well, but when the levels are massive, you gotta handle 5 different Kongs, challenges are repeated, and level design will some times ask you to switch kongs just to open a switch for ither Kongs to get their collectibles it starts feeling a bit frustrating, especially if you want to 100% the game or you just haven't played it before.
There's still situational powerups in Mario that do little more outside of granting you access to specific stats, which makes them feel kinda wasted to me, but you'll be able to get most stars with your starting moveset no new skill required, while DK64 makes a whole song and dance about everything you need to get, which makes sense for a collectaton, but like I said, it gets a little annoying when pacing and scope get out of control.
@ You see I actually only played Mario 64 as an adult, and I personally got FAR more frustrated by getting booted out of the level after every star than I ever got frustrated by back-tracking, switching, mini games, and all the other things people dislike about DK64. In fact I personally don’t get frustrated by any of those things at all, but that seems to only be a me thing. I did still like Mario 64, but I personally felt like that aspect of it was much more of a pace killer than anything in DK64. The only thing I ever really found annoying in DK64 was changing day/night in Fungi Forest, and water levels in Gloomy Galleon to access things, but that was still relatively minor.
That being said, I usually put on podcasts and long-term listening content while playing games, so long as Im not playing something that is highly narrative/dialogue centric, or requires heavy focus, and neither of these games are like that. I think this is why I generally don’t mind these sort of monotonous “dead air” moments in games, cuz I usually just use them as an opportunity to pivot more attention to whatever I’m listening to.
I also think I just generally have a different perspective of the game than most people. I’ve beaten it 101% over 5 times, and so Im highly familiar with the game, and don’t really look at it as an “adventure” anymore. I look at every playthrough as more of an elaborate multi-layered scavenger hunt, and everything I do is another thing on the check list. I personally just really enjoy that, and I honestly feel like Im due for another 101% playthrough cuz its been close to 5 years lol
Another thing that I think differentiates me from the average person is that as a gamer I am a glutton for challenge. I basically don’t do anything casually. Prior to 2020 I was a pro-level competitor in 2 different esports, and I even have another YT channel that I actually upload to where I do Nuzlockes with extreme parameters. For me nothing beats the satisfaction of overcoming a real challenge. The more difficult, the more satisfying. A lot of people talk about how daunting of a challenge it is to complete a full playthrough of DK64 in a negative connotation, and I can even acknowledge that things like the Rareware and Nintendo Coins were objectively bad game design, but for someone like me this is very much a positive and why I have consistently come back to this game throughout my life. I was genuinely shocked when I found out how negative of a reputation this game has, but I guess different strokes for different folks 🤣
@@Yvs8962 it is a little annoying but it's mitigated by the fact that the leves are much smaller and not needing to worry about coins unless you want extra lives or the 100 coin stars, which are the only stars that allow you to keep playing the level after getting them.
One thing I wish I mentioned earlier that another comment pointed out is how arbitrary and artificial some of the gating can feel, which adds to frustration for those who don't like the backtracking.
Like for example all Kongs have some sort of projectile, yet the buttons you need to press with those projectiles can only be shot by specific Kongs so even tho the action is the same you need to switch Kong to do it with a specific character, there's also buttons to butt slam on the ground also made for specific Kongs but they all do the same thing and there's no gameplay reason to not make it so either every Kong can slam any button or only one Kong can slam all buttons other than to make you waste time switching characters.
And even the colored bananas feel pretty arbitrary when they could have simply made them universally collectible but put a bunch of them in paths accessible only to certain Kongs, that way the character requirements feel more natural and like a fun challenge instead of feeling like doing paper work and presenting documents just to get legal permission walk through a bunch bananas on a normal walkable path, or to open up sections of the level.
People don't dislike the backtracking so much because it's backtracking, but for the reasons WHY they need to backtrack in the first place, it sucks to run all the way to a part of the level only to find DK's coconut gun isn't good enough and you need to use Diddy's peanut gun, a lot of "puzzles" if we even wanna call em that, rely on the game's arbitrary decisions on who should collect what, rather than using the Kongs' unique abilities to overcome obstacles in a natural way.
Not to say that the Kongs don't have unique abilities or that they're meter used, but the game relies heavily on artificial gating and I feel it detracts from the game.
Compare that to Mario 64 where the majority of the stars can be collected simply by using Mario's basic moveset with enough skill, there's some stars where the flying, metal, and transparent caps are needed.
I do wish the caps had more use for platforming in general outside of getting those stars, but even then, the powers are actually different and make sense for the obstacles they're made for, you get a hat for flying and reach stars floating in the air, you get the transparent hat to go through walls, and you get the metal hat to walk under water against the current or to press buttons you otherwise can't press.
Now imagine if all the caps did waa giving you projectiles of different colors and you need the right color to shoot a button to open up an area, that's what a bunch of DK's obstacles ultimately amount to, filing the right paperwork, not all of DK is like this but a considerable amount is, and it gets hard to justify the backtracking when this is the kind of stuff you need to backtrack for.
@ I can see your point about the character gating and how someone could find it annoying that the Kong’s share abilities that essentially function the same, but are arbitrarily restricted in what they can do, it just personally never really bothered me. I think part of it is that I just kinda know the game so well that I pretty much never have moments where I take the wrong Kong somewhere and have to be like “aww dang it, gotta go find a barrel”, and I am also good at maximizing my routes through levels with minimal backtracking. The other part is that I just kinda view it as a byproduct of the games overall goal and vision that I very much enjoy.
Undoubtedly attempting to make a platformer with 5 playable characters that all have delineated, yet interwoven tasks within a singular playthrough was a very bold design to go with. I overall feel like they executed well on a lot of things with this vision, and so much of what I love about the game comes from this design choice. Any undesirable outcomes that came from this design choice I just see as a small price to pay for how much good comes from it. Mainly I just love how big every world is and that each one has so much to do in them. I could never really get into the Mario worlds that much cuz a lot of them just felt small and like you were boxed into one area, and so long as you knew what to do for each star you could just be in and out of them so quickly without there being much to see.
Now do I think there is no room to discuss how they could’ve executed on this better and remedied some of these things? Of course not, nothing is perfect, and this game absolutely could benefit from various tweaks and quality of life changes. But all of these “not fun” things about the game just become minor to me when compared to the good it has to offer, and how much fun I have when I get to the “meat” of the game. Would it be nice to not have to go back for a tag barrel when there is something in front of me that I need a different Kong for? Im sure it would be nice, but the minor inconvenience just isn’t nearly enough to ruin my good time.
I kinda view it similarly to other games like older Pokemon. Compared to all the modern day quality of life the series has, it can be annoying to play the old games and not be able to run… and only be able to teach your strong TMs once (without glitches lol)… and having to either teach your team AWFUL HM moves that cant be deleted OR hinder your party by taking out actual members for bad Pokemon that you just use for HMs… And while were talking about changing out Pokemon at the PC, how much of a pain the old box system is having to manually switch boxes and save EVERY TIME you do it… In spite of all of that, I think the games offer enough positives to ultimately be fun and good games… Personally I really just don’t like to blame old games for being old games, and let datedness take away from what is good about them.
DK64 has its problems and dated aspects, but I really feel like it gets singled out and overly scrutinized for them, when that is true of every old game, and I really dont think DK64 is a particularly egregious offender of that.
Oh, I love Donkey Kong 64. To me, it's definitely one of the most memorable games of all time!
Absolutely! Memorable, charming, and so much fun!🍌🐒
@@superjoebros64 It was also one of the first N64 games I ever owned and played. The other being Excitebike 64.
This whole video explain my whole childhood game. The graphic, the world, music and how big the game is despite many collectables. Nobody force us to complete a game to give a full verdict,
sure DK64 has flaws but its a strong 9/10 in my opinion.
This is my favorite N64 game by far. Nintendo really need to add it to NSO.
Any day now 😭
Donkey Kong 64 is one of my favourite N64 games, i'm surprised after this long it's still not on switch.
I really thought it would happen at this point!
It’s because of Nintendo I think.
Remember all the memes and videos for decades of “Luigi wins by doing nothing with 1% brain power” in Mario Party? Well Nintendo took that and the memes of Sepiroth against the bros losing to their cartoony powers and made a game all around it called “Mario and Luigi Brothership.” The Luigi logic is genius and inspired by us memers from over long years. Look up all Luigi logic moments😂
I think if we get enough DK64 videos out there so at least Nintendo see it and the memes they might consider porting over DK64 to the switch or doing a spin off with all the kongs back. It’s worth a shot like they did with the Mario and Luigi series that died and had no hope of returning to the switch. 😂
Imagine a remake or remastered?
@@phillipcraig1120we can dream big but true believers of DK64 keep the game alive in our hearts, memes, and randomizer
@@Justyouraverageguy172 Shame that I don't have a PC 😭
I congrat you for bringing a +/- 5 hour retrospective in this format. 30 times 10-minute videos releasing over a month period is such a cool concept for giving love to a special game with so much memories.
I still love it to this day. King K. Rools Bossfight will always have a special piece in my heart. Everytime I wear boxing gloves, I catch myself screaming: "YEAHHH, Thank you!".
The most entertaining boss fight 😂 I hear his voice even when just wanting to say "thank you" haha
I think you make a strong point about not being expected to 100% this game. I beat this game as a kid and vividly remember trying my best just to meet the minimums for progression, and felt genuinely rewarded/satisfied after beating the final boss.
And I think this Donkey Kong December video project is a testament to that point.
I've been able to watch most of your videos about this game all month, and i know from experience that you didnt talk about every single thing this game had to offer. You mainly focused on the highlights and things you found interesting.
Yet you were able to create 32 videos about this game, all around 10 minutes each. Thats at least 5+ hours of DK64 content, and you were genuinely only scratching the surface for most subjects.
If that's not a testament to this game's scope and quality, I dont know what is.
Thank you for taking the time and effort to complete a project like this. You have reminded me why this game has stuck with me for all these years.
And thank you for taking the time to engage with your audience in the comment section. You're literally the only person I've interacted with that has a tangible connection to this game, and I feel so validated after all these years.
I think it's interesting that after this game did the multiple character thing, then Mario did the same in Mario 64 DS, allowing you to play as Luigi, Wario, and Yoshi.
Lego games also let you play as multiple characters with different abilities, but you don't need to go to a specific place to switch character or find a specific power-up to change character. 5 years after DK64 and 1 year after SM64DS.
It's also interesting how the DS remake is also less popular than the n64 version.
It's mainly due to the lack of analog controls rather than the different characters, but it's interesting nonetheless.
wow yeah, this is a good point! SM64 in general gets waaaay more love, even though it has similar problems
@@superjoebros64 not really, people don't like the DS remake much, it has its fans but people generally prefer the N64 original.
@@ginogatash4030 Not really surprising that the DS version of SM64 isn't as popular as the N64 version. Original versions of games are almost always the more well known and popular versions.
So a little history. DK64 was actually the first N64 game I ever played back in the day. I definitely had a blast with it back in the day and even today's standard I still enjoy DK 64 despite some flaws. Are there annoyances? Yes. Are there things that can be a bit improved? Yes. Do I still have a fun time with all the good stuff in the game? Absolutely yes.
that's the right attitude! Even with its highs and lows, this game is still beloved!
DK64 is great. But it's not a game I would go back and replay even in an any% playthrough.
This game was the first n64 game I’ve ever owned and I spent most of my childhood playing it
I'm right there with you! 😁 amazing times
A lot of the DK64 hate came from G4. Go back to the mid 2000s and watch stuff like icons or countdown. They took every opportunity to bash the game. Then slowly over time those same talking point slowly found their way online and “gaming TH-camrs” without their own opinion decided to parrot them.
G4TV did that to a lot of games that were really good, Kirby Air Ride is an example of this mistreatment as well.
@@Xgp_15A2just goes to show most people only cared about what there favorite funny or good looking tv personality said. Not thought, cause most probably were fed their lines anyway.
Same thing happened to the band Nickelback. This one radio guy just gaslit an entire generation of people into thinking that Nickelback was bad simply because he said so, and he *insisted*.
@@NickzstuffI don't think it's fair to blame reviewers entirely for negativity surrounding DK64, the game has some annoying stuff in it, like the Nintendo coin challenge, the beaver minigame, and the frequent use of artificial gating to force players to play as all Kongs without making the puzzles themselves challenging or even logical.
Like why can some buttons only be shot with coconuts while others need peanuts? So you play as both Donkey Kong and Diddy.
Why do I have to float as Lanky Kong to get the banana when Diddy Kong would be able to get it much more efficiently? So you play that challenge as Lanky.
Why are there different colored bananas and buttons with each character's face to slam? So you play as all kongs.
It's all arbitrary to make sure no Kong is left unplayed even when abilities are redundant, or the extent of a Kong's usefulness is to open a path for another Kong, not helped by repetitive stuff like having to back track, switch Kong, and play instruments as each character every time you have to enter the ship in Gloomy Galeon and get all the colored bananas instead of just being able to open the ship once and have it open for all Kongs or something.
Banjo Kazooie's puzzles had much more organic gating, like if you needed to fly you obviously wouldn't use Banjo, if Banjo could fly on his own but the game still arbitrarily required you to fly as Kazooie it would feel arbitrary and redundant.
I wouldn't call DK64 outright bad, but these are real flaws that help make stuff like the backtracking and collectibles feel more annoying than they should be, it's not so much the backtracking itself that rubs people the wrong way as it is the reasons WHY you backtrack in the first place, the requirements ti get stuff can get more time wasting than fun, especially if you aim for 100% completion.
Not to mention that parroting is an issue among DK64 fans too, most people parrot what others say but that doesn't make the arguments inherently bad.
@@Boomblox5896the issue that made nickleback as hated as they were wasn't so much that people thought it was bad, as it was how people felt their success was disproportionate to their merit as they were an at best mediocre lowest commond denominator band but was played everywhere to push their fame.
It degenerated into saying negative stuff for the sake of it, but the core issue was that detractors felt their fame was undeserved and artificially inflated by overbearing marketing, it's easy to forget now but they were spammed everywhere in their heyday.
Same reason singers like Justin Bieber were also harshly criticised, they are pretty mid commercialised singers that were made famous by marketing and their looks rather than because of organic audience reception.
Their songs are fine ear worms, but they were pretty much the MCU of the music industry, 6/10 products that got shoved everywhere and got annoying because of it.
Anybody saying that DK64 was terrible is just gaslighting. We all liked this game when we were kids and we know it!
I thought it was disappointing when I was a kid in 1999.
DK64 is an amazing game, that game can’t even be in a Top worst games which prove players who disagree. The game is my childhood game and was very fun and didn’t even know how big the game was in 1999.
People like all sorts of things as kids, not all were actually good.
Not to say DK is outright bad, but it does have some crucial flaws.
I don't think anyone has ever said to my face that this game is terrible 😅 maybe a simple "it's not my cup of tea." But never a full blown "this game is bad and you should feel bad" lol
That's what makes me feel like a lot of the rage on the internet is unnecessary group built up hate
I can understand people making the argument that it's overrated, but to call it "bad" or "terrible" is objectively false. 😂
It genuinely infuriates me that the same people who say there's too much stuff in this game also praise Mario Odyssey for having so much stuff to do.
Yep I literally just commented the same shit lol the game has over 800 power moons but because its mario nobody saids nothing. People can definitely be on some bullshit.. I'm fine with critiquing a game but be fair all around the board though
Difference is in Mario you don't have to backtrack just to switch and hit a couple buttons as Luigi or something.
The issue isn't the quantity of collectibles or game length itself, it's how the game makes you spend that time, if it was constantly engaging throughout people would not bitch about it, but it stretched itself too thin to really do that.
I feel this exactly! Super Mario 64 being a few years before DK64, I'm just blown away by how that game gets way more love. In my honest opinion, it has more flaws 😬 but nobody wants to talk about that haha
gamers: too much content trim the fat game takes too long
also gamers: not enough content not worth the price game is over too quickly
@@derekrequiem4359 audiences never truly know what they wanted or why, but it's easy to create a situation where to make a game big you end up filling it with boring busywork so you can say it's 60 hours.
Short games are kinda rare, especially from triple A, and the default bias usually favors long games, but honestly I can't really get behind it, like nit every game needs to be 60 hours long.
If they can make those 60 hours consistently fun then that's great, but otherwise I'll take a fun 8 hour game over a bloated 60 hour slogfest, pacing is important.
I put DK64 in the same catagory as Sonic Adventure series. Very flawed, did not age well, but has a lot of fun and stellar moments.
Honestly a BJ Tooie fan-but I have to acknowledge the bullshit that is Canary Mary.
🧅Cranky Kong's been warning all of us, we'll outgrow the appreciation for the magnitude of DK64 - Only to revive the obsession later: A gamer (Isotarge) came back like 17 years later and rediscovered a secret Rainbow Coin! Who knows what stones we didn't turn!
Absolutely this!!! Isotarge made an amazing discovery! Who knows what else is out there! 🍌🐒
Thanks for the support Escopeto ✌️
I love DK64, and the mod where you can switch kongs on the fly is amazing for playing. Admittedly I think you should also make every kong capable of grabbing everything as being able to switch on the fly sort of makes the specific colors meaningless.
The obvious issue to this is that Tiny Kong basically becomes your most dominant character, being the one who has the easiest time platforming thanks to her twirl. If the other kongs had more open movement options, say like, Diddy being able to use his tail spring at any time for good vertical height, then you could swap between them as the platforming necessitates it. If the kongs could use more of their abilities without needing to be on a pad or needing a barrel, then there would be a real sense of choice between who to use when traversing a level.
5:53 I have to disagree with your oppinion about the seamless switch of the kongs.
In my oppinion, this would completle dismiss the need for different characteres all together.
Why should there be more than one Kong, if there is no challenge to switch between them?
I would say the problem is not the tag barrel, it is the level design and the distribution of the collectables.
It is just frustrating to collect some bananas with one kong, just to switch to open a gate by shooting a switch with an other kong two times in a row (I am looking at you Fungi Forest).
If the collectables were better distributed over the level, a lot of people would not mind to switch a kong.
Creepy Castle and Frantic Factory are good exaples for this:
Most of the collectables are in areas specific for one Kong.
This 100%! Especially if you are doing a timed challenge with a Kong. You might be able to completely break it using a different Kong that could get there faster and change back right at the banana, completely eliminating that Kong’s purpose to make it a bit tougher of a challenge.
@@iTach455 90% of the Games puzzles are “Get the Kong shaped key to the Kong shaped door” and it really suffers for it.
Normally, people go the path of least resistance. And the path of least resistance here is to make it possible to swap out anywhere over redesigning the entire game. And the reason why there are multiple characters remains that any one of them does not have all of those abilities at once with no reason we could rewrite that.
@@lpfan4491 That still doesn’t really fix DK64’s design issues.
It kinda does. It barely has any "puzzles" anymore because they get erased upon implementing the change, but you yourself said that they kinda suck anyways.
I've been making this point- the gameplay experience for the majority of the players was a bunch of literal children who were pretty new to 3D gaming and who would revisit these worlds with different primates for an hour or so at a time.
To that end, it was an excellent experience, as there was always something for you to discover, as you weren't necessarily meant to stop an backtrack, but to revisit an old section in a new play session.
Sitting down and beating an entire game in a few intense sessions was simply *not* how the majority of people played video games back then. Partly because the univeral skill level was lower, partly because game design wasn't oriented in that way, and partly because it felt pretty wasteful.
You basically only did that for big event games, and even then, the expectation was that there would be tons of extra content that would keep you coming back to the game for months on end. I mean, those $9999 Golden Bragging Rights grindfest reward items common in so many games of the era were there for a reason- they were a feature.
I guess part of the reason DK64 gets it so bad is that its at the tail end of things, when gaming culture really started to shift and take on the first inklings of its modern incarnation- and bears the jaded burden of early online gaming discourse, instead of being lauded as a formative 3D platforming experience like its earlier ilk.
The OG Donkey Kong challenge was total BS though. I feel like developers would take it as a point of pride to make a player want to re-enter an existing save instead of restarting a game back then, but they flubbed it there.
No one ever seems to talk about the biggest flaw with DK64's game design: artificial gating. Theres a ton of artificial gating in DK64 that could probably be removed outright and not hinder the game at all.
Artificial gating vs. Organic gating: Banko Kazooie is a good example of Organic gating. If theres a boulder in the way, beak bust it. If theres a glass window, smash it with Kazooie. Need to cross a swamp, use the swamp boots. These solutions to problems feel organic, natural, logical.
But DK64 has a lot of artificial gates. Need to get past the gate? Shoot the peanut button. What is a peanut button? I dont know. Why does the button only react to peanuts? What magical property of peanuts activates this button that a coconut or pineapple wouldn't?? Who knows. Makes no sense. You have to use the Peanut gun just because "video game." Just because the game wants to force you to use a specific character.
And theres other examples. Like why are there certain buttons that can only be pressed by Diddy's skull bash, but not Chunky's punch? Shouldn't Chunkys punch be stronger? Who knows.
Or why do some doors open based on musical instruments? And why not just use a peanut/coconut button instead for it? They're functionally the same: an arbitrary button that requires a specific character. You could just as easily put a force field wall with the characters face on it that prevents any other character from passing. It would be no different.
These kinds of "puzzles" aren't very intelligent, and don't require any skill or knowledge from the player. They're just mindless busy work. And unfortunately DK64 has a lot of these "puzzles." Other than that, its a great game. The most memorable puzzles are when you have to use the characters abilities in novel interesting ways.
That's a really good point, people focus a lot on the amount of collectibles or the backtracking but not why those things feel frustrating to detractors of the game, it's not about how much time is spent playing, or how many you need to switch Kongs, it's about WHAT you do in that time, and WHY you gotta do all that stuff to begin with.
One thing I really like about Mario 64 other than the moveset and controls, is how most stars rely entirely on your platforming skills, there's some stars that do require specific powerups, and I do feel it's a bit of a shame that they don't have much platforming use outside of getting the stars that absolutely need them, but otherwise you can figure out how to get most stars simply with your starting moveset, no new skill unlocking required.
And the need for the cap stars is still logical, like you need to get a star behind a particular wall, you turn transparent, you need to push a button under water, you turn into metal Mario, you need to reach a star that's up in the sky, you fly, just like Banjo Kazooie the obstacles make sense.
DK's challenges/puzzles in contrast feel like they were encumbered by the amount of playable characters and didn't know how to make each Kong needed without some arbitrary gating, like both DK and Diddy have projectiles but they're only good for their own specific buttons, Chonky can smash through some obstacles but only as long as said obstacles doesn't require a different Kong's smashing ability even tho Chunky is supposed to be the strongest, and Lanky Kong's floating gimmick is just an inferior version of Diddy's jetpack, and there's no reason he shouldn't be able to complete the challenge instead of Lanky other than the game going "this banana is for Lanky Kong because I say so".
The game could benefit from removing redundant skills and make the obstacles more organic, but with 5 characters it's obviously hard to balance the game in ways where all Kongs feel important, perhaps they could have cut the number of Kongs to 3 so it's easier to manage, but alas in their quest of making the game as big as it could be they got carried away and the scope of the game got out of hand.
I wouldn't say it's an outright bad game, but the arbitrary gating is a big flaw that kind of exacerbates issues of backtracking and all the other stuff people complain about, it never feels good when the solution to a challenge feels like atbitrary game logic.
@@ginogatash4030 Yep. I wish more moves were used more interestingly. As you said, Lanky's balloon float is often used in places where Diddy's spring-tail or jetpack would/could be used. So it effectively is just a weaker spring-tail or jetpack alternative. I feel like they could have differentiated it by making it float more horizontally, but then its also overlapping use with Tiny's helicopter spin. Lanky's inflate move is just there to give him something to do... a solution looking for a problem to solve. I like the move itself, but it doesn't stand out as useful on its own.
Funny enough, Mario 64 DS added an inflate move for Mario, and its used more effectively there. It goes mostly vertical, and has a bouncy physics to it. Which contrasts to the Wing Cap which is more horizontal.
I feel like NOT trying to force balance all the kongs would maybe be a better solution. Just let players use their favorite Kong, and let abilities naturally gate collectibles. Thats's what DKC series did. It didn't matter if you favored DK or Diddy, or Dixie, etc. The player could use whatever character they liked. And the game even kept track of who beat which levels.
To be fair, DK64 is a video game, and using logic that only applies to the real world is a moot point. Why can't Banjo and Kazooie/Donkey Kong just fly up to the enemy base and break through the window and confront the villain right then and there? Using arguments like that won't lead anywhere. Why only Diddy break this block? Because it's a challenge only for Diddy. Why can't Chunky get over the gap? Because it's not a challenge for Chunky, come back with Tiny. The reason why there's so many types of switches and keys is because the game wants to make use of every tool it gives to you. It's a pretty neat feeling unlocking new switches and keys to unlock, especially since there's more use to these abilities than just progress.
@@GiantBluebird I get game logic is not exactly logical, but even game logic has to make gameplay sense.
For example why should the Kong face buttons on the ground be slammable only by the Kong pictured in it when the act of butt slamming the ground is identical between Kongs?
Forget real life logic, there's no gameplay reason why the same exact action done to achieve the same exact goal should be gated between the different characters, it's not even challenging you just press a button which all Kongs are able to do equally as well as each other.
It would be like if Banjo could fly on his own but the game still demanded you arbitrarily fly as Kazooie in some sections without giving you a real reason beyond the game going "cause I say so", it's the platforming equivalent of obtuse puzzles in old point and click adventure games where instead of figuring out a logical solution, the real challenge is figuring out what the devs thought would be a logical solution.
I'm fine with not all collectibles being universal, but there should be at least a practical gameplay reason for it, like a character's ability being uniquely useful instead of an arbitrary character portrait determining who gets to get what collectibles when another character's moveset is perfectly good to achieve the same goal in an arguably more efficent manner.
Like the other guy said, a bunch of abilities feel like solutions looking for problems, and having to backtrack over stuff like shooting a button as a specific Kong when they all have projectiles that function the same feels like shit, it feels less like overcoming a challenge and more like presenting the right paper work and documents to access parts of the level.
You can break logic to make a game fun, but it has to be fun.
@@ginogatash4030 Banjo Kazooie is basically DK64 with one character. The way that DK64 handles its collectables and challenges is by making all Kongs completely equal. Every Kong has the same number of things to do as the other. While some see this as padding, like "oh I have to play this level 5 different times, that's lame", I personally see it as a way to explore the level in different ways in the same playthrough. It's easy to hover around a level as Tiny, but Lanky can travel up slopes that even Tiny can't get to. It's fun to note where a boulder is in a level, so that when you get Chunky, you can easily find that boulder and break open a secret. It's a similar thrill to finding a barrel in DKC 1, like "oooh, what secret do I break open with this?", but on a much bigger scale.
The amount of collectables in the game is one of the reasons why I love it. It gave me a sense of achievement once I eventually collected everything the game had to offer.
I totally know this feeling 😁 I love it
I finally tried Tag Anywhere after watching this and the difference really is huge . I don’t think I could ever go back
I can’t believe we’re at the end of this amazing journey already. Feels like yesterday I was watching your very first video of the month. Time sure flies when your having fun.
I’ve already stated my opinion on this game countless times via your streams and on comments on the videos. So I won’t really go into much depth here again. Although I loved seeing my comment from your very first video. That was awesome. Lol
This game was definitely a product of its time. A lot of people seem to forget that this game came out in 1999. I think the more that people understand how old this game is, they can appreciate it more. At least that’s what I would hope to see.
Either way you look at it. This game has definitely left an impact on so many of us. DK64 will always remain as one of my favorite games of all time, despite a lot of the issues it has. Thanks for this nostalgia trip my dude. You are awesome and I’m looking forward to what’s going to happen next year and beyond! 👍🏻
you rock, Luigi! 😁 it's been an awesome month! Really fun to do a deep dive into this game and get loaded with nostalgia! Can't believe you've been subbed for 6 years! That's really amazing 🍌
@ Same to you Joe! I’m glad we met! There’ll be plenty of times to talk about DK64 in the future. 😁
I definitely agree with modern games not having enough stuff.
When the game is truly fun, and it's not heavily narrative driven, I don't think anyone would mind if it gives you more content.
I just reached the Ziggurat in my first playthrough of Tunic, and if I finish the game only for it to say "Hey, check out this second island with even more stuff to do, upgrades to collect, enemies to fight, etc." I would absolutely love that, because playing Tunic "blind" is probably the most fun I've had with a game in several years.
Played it as a kid.
It was a thoroughly mediocre experience.
in what world does 194 round to 100
This is the closest any reviewer has been to sharing my opinion of this game. I wasn't a kid when it came out, but I grew up with older consoles and never got new games. I managed to 101% complete this in about two years and loved it-and I still do. I hope it's added to NSO soon!
Nobody is wrong about DK64
I really don't think that DK64 needs to be defended. A lot of people love it. Happy DK December everyone!
I loved every aspect of this game. Including the collectathon. The music, the atmosphere, the gameplay (mostly), the busty mermaid, the bonus games,
Spyro the dragon is the real goat of that generation. Better draw distance better textures better framerate voice acting better sound 5x the levels, it puts the rare games to shame
Nah Spyro isn’t a better game although it’s still a good game. And I completely disagree with you on the better textures, better draw distance, better sound and voice acting. The Nintendo 64 was a lot more powerful than the PS1 and that’s evident with the graphics of the games
@ common misconception, you couldn’t be more wrong
What an amazing series. Made my December a whole lot better! Keep going dude. :3
The "fridge" of the DK rap lives in my head entirely rent free.
It makes me chuckle on the inside when I hear how repeating bonus barrels is a fault in the game. Even if a few repeat sometimes, there's 15 different types of minigames. I'm currently working on DKC Tropical Freeze, and I am very sick of seeing the same 5 bonus rooms over and over again. It's funny how old games are criticized for something that magically doesn't apply to these newer 'better" games.
Your channel has inspired me to replay the game (with tag anywhere) and I’m having an absolute Barrel Blast! Thanks for the content
My cousins in Mexico had Dk 64. They couldn’t understand what the subtitles were saying but it was so easy to figure out what you needed to do in the game. I played with them for hours trying to beat the first beetle race lol
I just finished and 101% DK64 for the first time a week ago, after trying and failing to beat it like 8 times since I was a kid. One idea that stuck out to me is they should've kept the tag barrel, but done a "Kong Squad" method with it instead. You can tag anywhere, but only between 3 Kongs that you choose in the tag barrel, and you can change your roster at any tag barrel.
This still creates a fun version of backtracking where you see stuff you cant interact with at the moment, and you think about the most efficient way to pick your Kongs for the fastest possible backtracking and exploration.
You could even expand this by giving the Kongs more unique movement abilities (like Orangustand Sprint anywhere) to provide incentive for picking certain Kongs in your squad, besides just needing to complete their sections of the map
This is honestly one of my favorite N64 games, and it would probably be my favorite N64 game if Ocarina and Majora didn't exist.
Man when I was a kid donkey kong 64 was a favorite game of mine along with the banjo kazooie/SM64 I always love the adventures and uncovering the secrets in each world. Especially when it comes to backtracking I always apricate coming back to same levels and see what more these levels have to offer and seeing what each kong can uncover. But of course it does have its stressful moment like beaver bother which can be stressful but still I see them as a challenge as a kid and when I beat the stressful challenges I felt so accomplished. But overall I will always hold DK64 as one of my favorite adventure games along with both BK and SM64.
Lo😂😂 love the Bobby hill reference
I got an N64 just for this game this holliday season. I have always enjoyed how broken it is. Im excited to be able to try and use Krusha in Adventure.
Joe! Got a lot to say💚. 34 here, Xmas 99 I got my n64 w/ Dk64,, one of my happiest days everrr. Tho I used to take the bus to blockbuster when I was 7 to rent Dkcountry, so the original trilogy are closest to my heart but 64 is riight there next to them. Apples and oranges 2d and 3D so glad we have both. My gut tells me Nintendowill be putting 64 on the switch soon, like your buddy said in a previous vid u made, esp. with country returns coming soon (can’t wait that’s the one game I never played!) I’m not ganna lie I’m ganna miss getting a video everyday but this month you have made the best donkey 64 content a fan could ask for. And lastly when u said at the end that the kongs will aways be family I teared up. Facts. See u next video brother 🍻🫡🙏
heck yeah, man! Appreciate all the support 😁 this has been an amazing month! Love love LOVE reading everyone's stories!
I'll be experience the DK Country games for the very first time next year. It's going to be epic!
I absoutley loved DK64 as a kid. I remember it came with my n64 as a bundle. Out of all the collectables I highly enjoyed would have to go to would have to be photographing the banana fairies and the blueprints for that weird fox friend of ours. But I must agree the other collectables that were basically forced to beat the game though was attrocious for us kids to deal with though like the coins by a long shot big time. Glad to have discovered your channel this month. I sure hope Nintendo releases DK somehow on the next console in some way i so would love that very much.
Still one of my favorite N64 games, Di key Kong games and possibly my favorite RARE game. There's always going to be a special place in my heart for this game, flaws and all.
Thanks so much for this daunting task you undertook with all these videos. You brought together a community that loves the game all the same. Cheers to next Donoey Kong December 🔥
Much like you, SJB64, when I think "Donkey Kong," _this_ is the game that comes to mind. I really wish Nintendo would make another DK game with K. Rool and the rest of the Kremling Krew as the villains again.
On the SNES you could change Kongs just by pressing Select, so it's odd that they made it so difficult on the N64.
Even though I find Banjo n’ Kazooie to still be the best collectathon that rare has made, I do appreciate what DK64 tried to achieve.
Great video!! Been watching all of your DK64 videos! Big fan of this game, remember it being my first game for the n64! Keep up the great work!
Thank you for the daily DK64 videos! You have inspired me to start a new playthrough of this amazing game :)
I played it for the first time last year and I enjoyed every minute of it.
I'm someone who has the patience to run around a level in circles for hours, so collecting everything is no problem.
DK64 is awesome because of the Kremlings!!
This is the one game from my childhood that I refuse to take the rose-tinted glasses off of. I don't care if it's got glitches up the wazoo or if certain parts of the game could've been executed better, this game will always be perfection in the eyes of my inner child. It's far and away the game I've played the most from the N64 era and maybe even overall.
I looked forward to your video every day this month, thanks for the effort! Besides a couple golden bananas and the coins, this is my favourite game of all time and it’s awesome to see someone making so much content covering it
This game was my childhood. Recently found my old 64 and copy of the game. Bringing back so many memories! Love to see there is a community of people who still enjoy this game. Thanks for DK December!!!
Love this! Lots of people care about this game 😁 glad you enjoyed the series!
I believe DK64 is usually compared to more modern games, and people forget its one of the first ones in 3D, but to be honest I think most "hated" aspects of DK64 is poor (or segmented) testing (Yes, I'm looking at you Beaver Bother and Beetle races) - I think this because Beaver Bother could be fixed with some collision testing and the Beetle race being more balanced. Then again, as you mentioned in a previous video (the best bananas i think), they did a good racing segment with the racecar, so maybe in the playtesting I could be wrong
Too much game? Said by who? Those who play the next CoD Every.Single.Year? 60$ base or 100$ "full" version
Also, about the glitches...ANY game will have glitches with enough time and technology available (like Zelda's 20/60 fps or RE4 Ditman's glitch)
6:32 I kinda disagree on that a bit. Yes, its brutal, but I (either lost or won) always got an adrenaline pump from that Cabin experience, and made me take decisions carefully on how to defeat them - personally, kinda felt more of that would have been great! - with other Kongs too!
8:41 and thank you for making them! December was a blast because of these vids!
My favorite game of all time. Thank you for making this video. I've grown so attached to this game. I debunk the back tracking frequently because I don't see it as a legit criticism due to not having to do everything in the game. I'll defend this game till I die.
These are my ideas for a DK64 remake:
Priority 1 (mandatory):
* All collectibles can be taken by all Kongs.
* Patch the broken physics of Beaver Bother.
* Fix any other glitches.
* Rambi and Enguarde can collect things.
* No Nintendo Coin or Rare Coin.
* Donkey Kong Arcade is played once for a Golden Banana, but not a second time.
* Jetpak replaces the Rambi and Enguarde high score challenges in the bonus content, or is removed altogether (depending on copyright).
Priority 2 (highly recommended):
* Switch Kongs at any point (less necessary if the collectibles point above is addressed).
* Move Lanky's Sprint potion to Fungi Forest.
* The Rambi and Enguarde high score challenges are now in-game bonus barrels that require you to get a certain number of points.
* Crystal Coconuts are no longer necessary in certain challenges (i.e., the Rabbit Race).
* Add a New Funky Mode for casuals and Japanese audiences and have Swanky Kong run the ammunition shop instead. Funky Mode does not require the tag barrel whatsoever (so he has a whole bunch of abilities, or certain Kong-specific puzzles can be completed by him alone).
* The multiplayer mode has online capability.
* Replace the stalagmite hazard in Crystal Caves with a mini-boss, using Kudgel from DKC2 instead of a giant Kosha.
* Add a mini-map to the UI.
* Relocate Lanky's Gloomy Galleon Kasplat so that it doesn't interfere with Chunky's cannonball challenge.
* Make the Lockjaw banana easier to set up.
* Improve the controls of Diddy's jetpack and have the ring challenges use polygons instead of sprites.
Priority 3 (nice-to-haves):
* Replace Tiny with Dixie. This may seem controversial, but in a modern context, it would make more sense because of Tiny's updated design and Dixie being more recognizable.
* Chunky's Primate Punch can now knock out Koshas, Klumps, and Kasplats.
* Add more animal buddies (Winky in Aztec and Caves, Squitter in Factory + Night Forest + Castle, Expresso for the second Rabbit Race and second Beetle Race).
* Donkey's Coconut Gun is much stronger (Chunky has the strongest projectile) and he takes less damage from enemies, making him more of a "tank".
* Replace some of the repeated bonus barrels with unique challenges, whether the aforementioned animal buddy games, or even relocated Golden Bananas from other worlds.
* Replace Diddy's Dogadon fight with a brand new boss. Chunky's version the fight is a lot more iconic and is the one with a K. Rool cutscene, anyway. An airborne fight that requires Diddy's jetpack would be perfect.
* Replace the second Army Dillo fight with the aforementioned Kudgel battle. Now, you have to dodge stalagmites while traveling across some level geometry to access barrels to throw at the boss.
Priority 4 (personal preferences):
* Move the Super Simian Slam potion to Gloomy Galleon (which has a switch in the lobby, anyway).
* Klaptraps are official recognized as Krimps (their DKC3 variant), since their design here is MUCH closer to Krimps than the DKC1 Klaptraps.
* Officially confirm Lanky as a misfit Manky Kong, since he's otherwise the only playable Kong with no specific family origin tying to the original DKC trilogy. Now, Lanky's linked to DKC1, Tiny/Dixie is linked to DKC2, and Chunky is linked to DKC3.
Solid list! A Funky Mode would be so cool
I played and beat it for the first time a year ago on Wii U. I must’ve said about 200 times during play: “IM NOT HAVING ANY FUN!”
dang. gg on beating it.
Complaining about DK64 having too many collectibles is like going to a buffet and complaining there's too much food.
problem is not the amount but the quality. Banjo Tooie did the job 200% better
@@NL-X Won't deny that, but people always act like they HAVE to collect every single collectable they see right away. It's an issue with the person, not the game. If you're constantly switching kongs and scouring the entire level to satisfy your OCD, that's on you.
I feel this 😂
Donkey Kong 64 does have its flaws, but in presentation it is absolutely a cultural touchstone of its era. I do feel like if a game like it came out today, it wouldn't fly given how much modern games have spoiled us. But for what it was DK64 was a banger. While if I were to play it today vanilla, it would feel like a grocery shopping list, that randomizer really keeps it running. Rare didn't even know that while a game with such complicated collection structure may stress you, throw in the randomizer and it turns a great game into a godly game. Because the DK Rap Guy is the voice of god.
The heavy critique against DK64 is squarely against the idea of a 100% playthrough, something 99% of people don't feel the need to do. But a very vocal 1% has felt the need to say this game is "bad" for the presence of multiple options to get to the end boss instead of giving it credit for recognizing not everyone will like every minigame or golden banana. I get that switching kongs anywhere is easier and more smooth, but that alone shouldn't discredit how good the game was and how much fun it could be doing the bananas you wanted to do.
I don't see people saying SM64 is bad for letting you get stars in one world over others, or people dogging on bad levels in the OG Super Mario for forcing you to play some bum levels since you had to play certain levels to reach the end. I hope people start to appreciate what DK64 did - gave you hundreds of ways to reach the end with whatever appealed to you the most. Maybe you loved the barrel minigames, or maybe you loved solving puzzles in the world or working on more exploraiton focused bananas.
I played it for the first time like a year ago and I never found the Kong swapping that bad. If there’s not a swap barrel near you there’s almost always a warp pad that lead you to one. Swapping on the spot would be more convenient sure but I hardly think it wastes that much time anyway.
Dk64 is coming to switch I can feel it
Ugh I really hope so!
@superjoebros64 could you possibly make a short for each Kongs golden banana dance. I’m surprised I couldn’t find it at all on TH-cam
Good video! Yeah, getting a new game as a kid was something special and I think I got more out of each new game as getting another was so infrequent. I usually got one (or sometimes two) games for birthdays or Christmas, so I had to make sure it was something I really wanted to play.
I remember being over the moon when Donkey Kong 64 was announced and I received it as a birthday gift way back when it was released. I spent way too many hours exploring ever nook and cranny of each world to find everything. It was tedious to have to hunt down Tag Barrels, but I don't think I minded too much since I had more time to play as a kid. I did end up beating this game like 3 separate times over several years (as I said, getting a new games as a kid was few and far between).
Honestly, it would be great to get a remaster and and have them polish up some of the design choices with new quality of life improvements. While we're at it, I'd love Banjo-Kazooie and Banjo-Tooie remasters as well! 😄
To be honest, I have fond memories of this game with its promotions from Nintendo magazines and Blockbuster.
Could you do a review on Golden eye. The N64 original no cheats no remakes the down original
Dk 64 is my favorite game from my childhood and still one of my favorites to thid day! Thank you for giving it some love!
The best thing about acquiring the Rareware/Nintendo Coin is if you can beat the original Donkey Kong game, THEN YOU CAN BEAT THE ORIGINAL DONKEY KONG GAME.
And with only 1 life.
Honestly, I think just replacing colored bananas with just bananas that any Kong could collect could seriously help it.
I'd be really curious to see how that could play out
This is honestly why I wish this game was on NSO (which I know is a whole other can of worms). I remember as a kid having a tough time with this game at certain points, but I overall really liked it a lot. Would love to give it another go to see how well I personally think it holds up.
I also always had a blast with multiplayer.
DK64 randomizer literally fixes all the problems the original had. I highly recommend checking it out. They even have a vanilla but better option I highly recommend playing that
Don’t care what this video says ads are still rolling you’re SO right tho and I’ve got your back
The points you shared in the beginning, about why a typical gamer child in that time period would less likely be bothered by DK64’s padded backtracking, actually summed up how I felt back when I first played the game. That never entered my mind as an inconvenience, until I revisited the game at a much older age through the Wii U Virtual console, then managed to 100% the whole game on said emulator.
That being said, if the exploration/collecting was more streamlined to allow a person to progress more efficiently and beat the game faster, I would have gotten the same enjoyment as a kid by simply replaying the campaign more times, as I did with other games. So in hindsight, I think DK64 could have been designed more efficiently for those would prefer a one-and-done experience, without compromising a typical kid’s enjoyment. For example, I think it would have made a big difference, if players had the option to toggle whether differently colored bananas are tangible to all Kongs or not. That way, if they wanted to have certain bananas remain as a guide/reminder to backtrack with a different Kong later or simply collect all bananas on their first go, both camps are satisfied.
I'll love it if this game got more references like the weapons and musical instruments that are used. Especially in Smash, I feel like I'm DK 64 they gave DK and Diddy good personalities that makes them stand out than just being monkeys that only use their arms or grab onto others.
Just found your channel. Loving the passionate dk64 content. Keep it up :)
Now, back to waiting for a dk64 remaster or NSO port or whatever
Hey thank you! Appreciate it! 🍌🐒
Pls Nintendo gives us something!
If they ever decided to give us a DK64 remake I'll name my firstborn child after Shigeru Miyamoto
Personally I was mostly fine with the tag barrel. The only issue I had was with bananas and coins being restricted to one kong--that was a bit excessive.
I would like to add and emphasis the characterization and plot, each Kong and main character is given characterization that wouldn't be out of place of Kirby or Sonic, they could've reused Kiddy and Dixe but instead fleshed out the family tree more, to the point of even making a reference to Mankey Kong and finally K Rool is the most crazy and desperate we've seen so far which makes sense if you played DKC2. The Kongs destroyed the Kremlings home and then they lost the only other territory they had in DKC3 its no wonder why he would eventually try to do the same to the Kongs. To this day DK64 remains my favorite DK title and possibly even my favorite Mario franchise game altogether. (Despite growing up a Nintendo kid in the 90s, I never was a gameplay first kind of guy)
Im just about 30. Ive played DK64 since i was 3 or 4. It was in my first literally my first 5 or 6 games ever played. Its been my favorite 64 game, my favorite DK game made by Rare (still love all the DKC and Diddy Kong Racing) , and in general a favorite game of mine in my top 50.
Hey since you cover a lot of Donkey Kong 64, could you record and upload the Kong Tag selection screen? I've seen NO ONE uploading all the animations. I'd love to be able to share the Kong Animations so you can see them calling for you to pick them, or in the case of Chunky, having him urge you to pick someone else.
No one has uploaded this yet?? That's crazy.
I used it all couple times throughout DK December but I could upload the raw recording!
@@superjoebros64 that would genuinely be awesome! I would love for there to be a raw upload of just cycling through the kong barrel
I think that most people don't even realize how exceptionally ambitious
and cutting edge videogame DK64 really was.
If compared to any other multicharacter platform -game from the nineties, DK64 is on another level. Even Sonic Adventure's many "playable" characters were total joke in comparison.
I have consistently maintained that while this game has its shortcomings it's nowhere near as bad as everyone says. Thank you for this, and for a month of great videos!
Absolutely! This game is lovely 😁 thanks for watching the series! What an awesome month!
I think you can say the same for Tooie. That game's one of my all-time favorites, and even with some of the worst jiggies, you don't have to beat Canary Mary to get to Cauldron Keep. While yes, it can be a nightmare for completionists, do you seriously need to 100% a game to fulfill your life?
Exactly this! Beating the game is what most players are after. And if you're looking to 100% complete a game, you should be mentally prepared for challenges.
The DK64 Randomizer fixing the tag barrel issue, the difficulty and balance of the broken mini-games, and streamlining the objectives on top of the Randomizer features… truly the definitive way to play this game in the Year of our Arceus 2025.
It's the greatest gift to mankind!
I still can't believe they slotted beaver bother twice into creepy castle
That was really cruel- KROOL
Man. I miss when i would spend hours and hours in a game, not trying to beat it or anything, but just running around aimlessly, just having fun exploring. The worlds were a sandbox and i was a kid just having fun in them
Same here! There's a few games here and there that offer this, but these older games really nailed it!
DK64 and Banjo Kazooie are the reasons I always wanted to experience the N64 as a kid but by the time that console ended I wasn't even born yet lol so I had a gamecube and could never play those games.
I did get to experience Super Mario 64 on the Nintendo DS and Ocarina of Time/Majora's Mask on the Gamecube Collector's Edition but the only time I ever got to play DK64 or Banjo Kazooie was when my cousin brought it over
So I’ve only recently subbed and bell, to your channel, and I’m really loving every bit of it, you’ve honesty nailed everything I’ve loved and hated about this game. And I kinda want to participate with the crowd and just have fun counter arguments and what not, never the less, This is more or less out of curiosity, but what’s your plan post DK December? Will there be more DK related content (not just exclusive to 64 but all of DK) or will you just end up seeing how the views go and ride the wave from there?
You'll have to chime in for tomorrow's video! 😁
But the short answer; definitely more to come! More DK! Other games that are similar (Banjo, Conker.) Just not daily anymore haha. That is sooooo much work.
Thank you for subbing and watching! 🍌🐒