Rare released a number of quality games for the NES:  R.C. Pro-Am ,  Solar Jetman , Snake Rattle 'n' Roll , and Battletoads come to mind. But all these were surpassed by Rare's masterpiece, Donkey Kong Country (DKC). DKC uses faux-3D sprites to produce an incredibly beautiful and well designed platformer. The game was so successful it spawned two sequels, DKC 2: Diddy's Kong Quest and DKC 3: Dixie Kong's Double Trouble! All three games were such hits they got Game Boy spin-offs (renamed Donkey Kong Land , of course!) and later Game Boy Advance ports! DKC even got a port on the Game Boy Color somehow! Two more recent sequels, DKC Returns and DKC: Tropical Freeze , have brought the series, and the classic character of Donkey Kong himself, back into the limelight for modern gamers. But it all started with the original. Usually I describe gameplay first, but DKC is most notable for its stunning graphics and music. Hype for the game was real: I watched a preview for ...

Thirty years ago Nintendo released an unusual Game Boy game. It was called Donkey Kong. At first blush it appears to be a port of the at-that-time ten-year-old arcade game that put Nintendo on the map. But far more lay beneath the surface. The first four stages recreate the original Donkey Kong, though Mario moves more smoothly. After Mario defeats Donkey Kong, the great ape rises and runs away, again absconding with Pauline! Another world appears (numbered as world 1) with eight new stages! All told, the game features an astonishing 101 levels spread across ten worlds. I do wonder about the marketing strategy of naming the game “Donkey Kong” as opposed to, say, “Super Donkey Kong” or “Donkey Kong 2.” The original Donkey Kong was a platforming game. Mario (or "Jumpman" as he was originally known) could walk, jump over barrels and enemies, swing a hammer, and climb ladders. This game greatly expands the number of things Mario can do. He can do a handstand (press ↓ and A), whic...

Mario Kart 64 brought the fun of go-kart simulator Super Mario Kart into the 3D age. A few chunky polygons notwithstanding, Mario Kart 64 still holds up, even alongside sequels like  Mario Kart 8 Deluxe . MK 64 doesn't alter the fundamental formula laid down by Super Mario Kart. You still choose one of four circuits (Mushroom, Flower, Star, or Special) and an engine speed (50, 100, or 150 CC), then race against seven other racers, trying to place at least in the top four. Whereas the SNES allowed only two players, the N64 was built with four controller inputs, and MK 64 happily can use them all (though the music shuts off with more than two). Battle Mode returns as well, in which players attack one another with items, trying to pop all three of their opponents' balloons. This is always a blast when playing with friends. Lastly, there is the Time Trial mode, in which you race alone trying to set the fastest time. Is this the origin of the "Trollface" meme? MK 64's...

To market the Famicom in mid-80's America, when video game had become a dirty word to retailers, Nintendo branded it an "Entertainment System." Advertising strongly emphasized the R.O.B. and Light Gun. It wasn't a video game system, it was a fancy robot and video gun toy! Which also happened to play video games. This is also why they redesigned it so that the cartridge went into a hidden slot, so that it looked like a VCR instead of an Atari VCS. Similarly, Donkey Kong Jr. Math was supposed to prove the NES could also be educational. All "Black Box" games were divided into series, but DK Jr. Math ended up being the sole title in the "Education Series"! However, it wasn't Nintendo's only foray into educational gaming. In 1994, they released five educational titles starring Mario for the Super Nintendo, two of which also appeared on the NES ( Mario Is Missing! and Mario's Time Machine ). The main game of DK Jr. Math ("Calculate...

Donkey Kong 3 may be the video-game equivalent of The Godfather, Part III. After two  Donkey Kong Classics , Nintendo put out something of a dud. It didn't help that DK 3 hit arcades in 1983, the year when the bottom fell out of both the arcade and home-console markets. This bad timing may have doomed an otherwise decent game. DK 3 changes out Mario for an exterminator named Stanley (from the Game & Watch game Greenhouse). The game is unique in that it combines platforming with vertical shooting. Stanley can jump up and down between three platforms. His weapon is a can of bug spray with which to shoot various bees and other critters, but he can only shoot two sprays at a time, and it has limited range. A screen can be cleared either by destroying all insects or by forcing a dangling DK to the top of the screen by spraying him repeatedly. Even if you focus on the bugs, you need to spray DK occasionally or he will fall on you. Bonus points are obtained by preventing the bees from...

Donkey Kong Jr. may not be as famous as its parent, but as a child I preferred it, perhaps because I identified with the hero being a child himself, on a journey to rescue his father. Or maybe I just liked it because it's easier! Donkey Kong Jr. hit arcades in 1982. As a sequel, it wasn't groundbreaking, and Nintendo sold only a fraction as many as the original. Nevertheless, it mixed up the formula enough to stand on its own. In addition to some platforming, it has a lot of vine-climbing. DK Jr. can climb a single vine or two at once, with his arms spread. He can slide down a single vine quickly, but to ascend quicker, two vines are better. Unfortunately, the vine-climbing is not especially fun, which is probably why this game didn't spawn an entirely-new genre of games called "climbers"! The story is that Mario has DK in a cage, so his son must rescue him. The opening scene (sadly not included in the NES version due to limited storage capacity) actually shows tw...

Like Space Invaders and Pac-Man before it, Donkey Kong was an incredible success when it hit arcades in 1981. It made Nintendo hundreds of millions of dollars and put them on the video game map. It is the reason Nintendo began working on a home console, with the express purpose that it be able to "play a mean game of Donkey Kong." Ironically, the game was created due to a failure: Nintendo of America had thousands of unsold Radar Scope cabinets, and they asked Japan for a new game that could be put into them. Thus was born Donkey Kong, the first game ever designed by the legendary Shigeru Miyamoto. In Donkey Kong — whose bizarre name supposedly results from Miyamoto having looked up the Japanese words for "stubborn" and "ape" in a Japanese-English dictionary — you control a carpenter named Jumpman. During the American release, Nintendo began calling him Mario, the name of their Seattle landlord, Mario Segale . Mario's girlfriend, Pauline, has been kid...