Donkey Kong Jungle Beats for the Gamecube Review



While Mario has been driving Nintendo’s consoles into triple digits and beyond, I remember when Donkey Kong and his franchise would do just the same. He had three amazing arcade games and three amazing Super Nintendo games, though seeing how he is slowly having fewer and fewer games, his future seems bleak. In 2004, one of my favorite Gamecube games ever was released to us Americans, Donkey Kong Jungle Beat. So, how does Donkey’s new adventure play out?

The basic plot of Donkey Kong Jungle Beats is, well, just like any other game, which any reviewer can tell you. Donkey Kong got his bananas stolen again by an evil group of Kongs, and it is up to Donkey Kong to get those bananas back! Yeah, it’s nothing special, but think about it. Donkey Kong is a monkey with a red tie…what else would he want to do? It’s not like we will see him going through Hell, like in the upcoming Dante’s Inferno, or seeing him whip werewolves or something.

The game play is a 2.5D side-scrolling plat-forming game like Goemon’s Great adventure, Yoshi Story, and other great 2.5D Nintendo games. You basically go through the levels using the special DK Bongos to make Donkey Kong move. He can punch, jump on enemies, clap, and other stuff that you can find in a classic awesome plat-former. You basically get your array of furry jungle enemies, along with other stuff. At the end of each level, you fight an epic boss at the end, like a giant bird or pig, or even one of the evil Kongs. The levels are also full of plat-forming challenge, which will test you to see how good of a retro plat-former you are.

I think one of the best highlights of the game is the graphics. I mean, these have to be the best graphics on the Gamecube, or it has to be the best looking game on the system besides Resident Evil 4. DK’s fur never looked so real, and everything else just looked so detailed and colorful. A lot of games today could learn a few things about color from this game. The music is also entertaining to listen to, and reflects the action and level on the screen. The controls on the bongos are perfect because this is the only plat-former that you can use the bongos on. It might not be Donkey Kong Country famous, but this game is right up there along with Super Mario Galaxy, New Super Mario Brothers, and other Nintendo plat-formers. The boss fights are some of the best in the history of Nintendo! Each is fun and challenging.

Even though this is one of the best Gamecube games, there are some minor complaints I have with it. First off, the main complaint I have is with the boss fights. Yes, they are awesome and intense, but they seem to repeat with the same four bosses in just different colors in each of the kingdoms. The only boss fights that are different are the ones with the evil Kongs. The game can be short if you’re an old retro plat-former kind of guy. Other than that, I don’t have a lot of things to say that are bad.

Overall, this is a great videogame. If you can find the Gamecube version and bongos, then I say pick it up. If you can’t, you can get the re-released version on the Wii, with controls that are almost the same, but you control Donkey Kong with the control stick on the nunchuk part of the controller. All and al, even though it isn’t Donkey Kong Country 4, it deserves as much or even more credit than those games. So yeah, go check it out!

This game gets a 9.6 out of 10.

Comments

Zaciroth said…
My friend has this.........we didn't use the bongos ........which made a strange and very easy game. But it was the only proper sequel to donkey Kong country series that we have seen in years!