Donkey Kong Country Returns

by Gregory Moffett

If any of you remember the 1994 film ‘The Santa Clause’, starring Tim Allen, you’ll know that he causes the ‘real’ Santa to fall off his roof one Christmas Eve night and, upon pulling on his big red outfit, quickly begins to turn into Santa Claus himself. His waist expands at an alarming rate, facial hair starts to take over his face and everyone begins to suspect that he’s gone a little bit crazy.

For all of these reasons, and more, I believe that my brother is transforming into the new Santa Claus, presumably having taken Tim Allen out of commission a few years ago.

I first suspected this to be the case in the winter of 2010 when Donkey Kong Country Returns appeared, labelled for me, below our Christmas tree in the living room on the Christmas morning of that very year.

The game had only been released a few weeks previously but I was prepared to wait for an eventual price drop, something you can’t always guarantee with a Nintendo release! My brother, however, surprised me with it that year and I was delighted to see Diddy Kong’s face peeking out at me through the wrapping paper as I ripped it open.

I was certainly excited to play it, though I always felt that I should have been even more hyped given my love for the original Donkey Kong Country on SNES, one of my all-time favourite games. I never played the two sequels until I downloaded them on the Wii Virtual Console and, whilst great, I didn’t have quite the same attachment to them as with Rare’s first release in the series.

Donkey Kong Country, Diddy’s Kong Quest and Dixie Kong’s Double Trouble all had a particular vibe that felt unique to this particular franchise. With K. Rool and the Kremlings supposedly missing from Donkey Kong Country Returns, replaced by the Tiki Tak Tribe, I was worried that it wouldn’t feel quite right and, as a result, spoil some of my love for the world of Donkey Kong Country.

Slipping the disc into the Wii reinforced these fears as my first impression of the game wasn’t particularly reassuring. Playing with Wii Remote and Nunchuk meant using an analogue stick to control a 2D platformer, something which had never really felt great in the past, as well as the much-maligned ‘waggle’ to roll your character and blow objects. The atmosphere was also a little irksome as it seemed like a huge deviation from the SNES originals and wasn’t appealing, initially. Jumping on the Tikis also ‘arose such a clatter’, making a noise that wasn’t quite meaty enough to be satisfying.



Thankfully, any and all fears were washed away the further I delved into the first world and got to grips with the experience. In fact, flicking the Wii Remote to roll became so natural that it’s the only way I could play Tropical Freeze on Wii U as the more traditional control options don’t feel natural.

Donkey Kong Country Returns is an outstanding challenge, particularly when hunting down the puzzle pieces and K-O-N-G letters, throughout a variety of locations. Seeing the return of the mine carts that were so popular in the original game was also a highlight.

This game is one of the best experiences on Wii and Retro Studios done a brilliant job of putting their own spin on the Donkey Kong universe. Returns is still an absolute joy to play and there’s still plenty of collectables to pick up on my save file, something I must get back to some day soon!