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Nintendo EPD working on the new DK is good news for Dixie Kong. Hyle seems to believe this won't be a Jungle Beat 2.0 meaning they will most likely welcome the other Kongs with open arms, just look at MKT. She will remain in the public conscious for awhile, hopefully for good. Not super confident in her appearing in this fighters pass, but surely the next game/pass will be different.
The only problem to worry about is will the Odyssey team stick with DK. Hyle says the direction for DK is now set so there must be some confidence at Nintendo that they are able to produce DK games in conjunction with whatever Mario title they have cooking up.
Yeah that is something to think about. The only games the 3D Mario team have made outside of Mario were Jungle Beat and Captain Toad both of which are fantastic however neither set the sales charts on fire.
Assuming this new DK game is legit and performs well sales wise. It is interesting to see if Nintendo continues to develop DK in house and the team alternates between 3D Mario and DK from now on. DK gets a dedicated studio again and becomes a gaming icon once more like he was in the 90's. Also with DK being developed in house that also increases the chances of other Kongs appearing in Mario spin-offs on a more regular basis.
If DK does become in house for good from now on I guess that leaves Retro Studios to become the Metroid Prime studio from now on. Churning out Metroid Prime games to the end of time (since clearly they struggle to make new IPs or work on anything that isnt Metroid or DK).
Ya know if Nintendo was this buy happy with studios working under their wing back in 2002 or earlier, they could’ve still had Rare... Had that bitter realization at the Next Level news too before going to sleep earlier.
Odyssey was far from perfect, but still welcome for a mainline Mario being worked on by fresh blood. I’d be more than fine with that team doing a 3D DK.
Nintendo buying Next Level Games probably has the same relevance of Sony buying Insomniac. Their projects won't change. But after the acquisition, Insomniac managed to release Miles Morales and Rift Apart close to each other. So maybe NLG gets the same upgrade of budget and staff and we will see more games from them instead of one each 4 years (Mario Strikers sequel please!!).
BTW In the supposed timeline where Nintendo bought Rare, I don't think the british studio would have mantained the same quality from the N64 era judging by late-Gamecube / Xbox output. But at least Nintendo would have gotten the full rights to a ton of characters, Banjo & Kazooie would have been added in Brawl and Dixie / K. Rool probably would have been added in Smash 4. Diddy Kong Racing and many Rare games would have been released on the Wii / Wii U VC as well. But in the other hand, it's a timeline where DKC Tropical Freeze never existed.
If the Stamper Bros tried to sell in 1998 or something I'm willing to bet that Nintendo would have bought up Rare no questions asked. By the time Rare went to Microsoft the wheels were starting to fall off. It's a shame Nintendo lost all those IPs though.
Here's an interesting read regarding this subject:
There was a problem fetching the tweet
In the end...as sad as it sounds, I guess Nintendo picked the right time to give up on Rare.
Unfortunately for Microsoft, they picked the wrong time to buy them. It took years and years for the company to finally be fixed and make successes like Sea of Thieves again.
Looking at the comments to that tweet, some people still treating MS/Xbox like the devil on the subject while ignoring the big picture. MS could’ve pulled the plug on skeleton Rare at any point but gave them all the time they needed to pick themselves back up. Since Nintendo didn’t buy the remaining shares of Rare despite the Stampers wanting them to, Rare surely would’ve gone the way of Alpha Dream if Microsoft or someone else hadn’t bought them, and MS bought them at a loss as pointed out.
I still don’t agree with Nintendo for letting Rare go (also dumb for them to expect Rare to still release a game every year with how bigger games were becoming to develop by the point of the Xbox/Gamecube/PS2 era), but is what it is.
If it wasn't for RARE, the 64 would've been the Mario 64 and Ocarina of Time console. They practically carried that console with major successes like Goldeneye, DK 64, Diddy Kong Racing, and Banjo Kazooie. Not buying RARE was a mistake regardless of how you look at it. No telling how great some games like Grabbed by the Ghoulies or Perfect Dark Zero would've been if they were under the guidance of Nintendo, and I stand by games like Viva Pinata and Kameo are genuinely good and would've found a better success with the Nintendo audience.
Then again we wouldn't have Retro make DKCR or Tropical Freeze. In a perfect world, we would've gotten both.
Just finished the most recent playthrough of DKC3. I have to say this recent session did illuminate a few points about it to me.
First it has a bit more flow than I had previously given it credit for. While not up to DKC2's level the gimmicks aren't as intrusive across the board and you can get some momentum in them with practice. Secondly it does have the advantage over Diddy's Kong Quest in the bonus barrels locations are less obtuse and are typically signaled by some sort of visual clue. I overall felt far less tempted to consult a guide for the more out there spots and was far less prone to hugging walls looking for invisible openings like I did in its predecessor.
Finally the overwhelming aesthetic impression is that while no level ever feels lacking, a great deal of them don't really pop visually. Especially after the distinct set pieces of DKC2 (pirate ship, deep swamp, ghostly hills, honeycomb, stickerbush) stuff like the caves and forest sections in Double Trouble (even though they're even better designed than such offerings in DKC1) can't help but feel a bit standard. Its why stuff like the waterfalls, cliffs, and mill stages stand out all the more because it feels like real new ground for the series in terms of settings.
While I still need to do a replay of Returns to really settle it (maybe a Dolphin emulated version where I can get 60fps and no waggle), I think I feel safe in putting DKC3 as a solid number 3 behind Tropical Freeze and Diddy's Kong Quest overall, so its definitely gone up in my eyes.
Honestly, if EPD is working on a new DK game and is planned for a 2021 release, there's a good chance we could see another Kong in the Fighter's Pass. It's crazy how many people are talking about this rumoured game on the ResetEra forums.
I have thought for ages that it is the only real possibility to see our dream coming true. A new DK game that makes Dixie also the dish of the day once again. I was however pessimistic thinking about the fact that tropical freeze was overlooked in TWO releases (and 4 different smash moments: smash4 vanilla, smash 4 dlc, ultimate vanilla and first fighter season pass) in a row, despite Dixie was very relevant; so the odds she would be overlooked again despite a game in 2021 would be still high... but then I thought: ok, why tho Fire Emblem is always considered for smash even if its games aren't released yet or are the newest around, even more recent than games like Xenoblade 2 or ARMS (in ultimate vanilla times)? The reply I gave me was: because Sakurai has a good relationship with FE studios and he has an easy possibility to study their work much before it is publicly released. So it's clear why, in the same timing, Dixie was overlooked again and again and Tropical Freeze always ignored: because it was much much harder for Sakurai having access to Retro Studios work. Very likely he neither knew they were working on a new DKC!
But now... now the things could change! It's much easier that Nintendo put Sakurai and one of their most important internal studios in communication; EPD is in Japan and they are japanese, so there aren't any languages obstacle or other logistic obstacle for Sakurai to see their work in progress, and so he could have chosen Dixie from their plan of the new DKC game (because planning for FP2 was finished at least months before Terry release. So it's pointless for Dixie chances to have a new DKC game releasing in 2021 if Sakurai couldn't have access to their planning within the time he and Nintendo chose the characters for FP2).
Moreover, since EPDX (I don't remember the number of this EPD... 8, maybe..?) is one of the most important Nintendo studios (they made Super Mario Odyssey!), it's only natural to think that, if Nintendo for FP2 wants to represent a new releasing game, they could choose a character from the game this EPD is developing!
The fact itself that Nintendo gives DK to their most important studios (with Aonuma's one, of course) would mean their consideration of DK is much higher than it was previous years, when they put in working with DK an external studios (arguably it could mean they are seeing the importance of DK even more of how much they saw it during Rare times...)
Of course, obviously this is just theorycrafting. I mean, we don't have yet the certainty EPDX is working on a new DK game, we don't know if it's a DKC-like game or not, we don't know if Dixie is in their game, we don't know if this game is scheduled for 2021 (this piece of the puzzle is fundamental! Without a 2021 release Dixie's chances for FP2 would be abysmal), we don't know if Sakurai had access to the game plans, we don't know if Nintendo wants to support this game with a character in FP2, and, and it would be the weirdest irony of all time, we don't know if, if all the things up were true, they would choose Dixie and not another kong from that game!
...neverthless now we have a slight hope. If the series we are looting for was FIRE EMBLEM, of course we would have had a total certainty, but we aren't so lucky, so we have to be satisfied with just a slight hope.
It's much more than we ever had in the last years, tho, so I'm starting to be quite euphoric!
Sorry for the wot, even more because english isn't my first language, so I'm sure it has been a bit of a pain for all of you. But I'm sure its contents deligthed you!
Really need to catch up with the current discussion here... in the meantime, I'll be bringing this lost media that I got ton of kick out of discovering:
Just watched Resetera's Nate the Hate's podcast (well skipped to the discussion about DK), and while they were overall negative about the prospects of DK appearing this year, they also don't seem to know jack about it either.
You could tell they are not are diehard DK fans when they discuss DK's popularity. They're not exactly wrong that DK has probably fallen off the core Nintendo community's tier list, but they are absolutely no way indicative of DK's popularity overall. Once Nintendo pulls out all of the stops for DK, this tune within the community will change.
Just watched Resetera's Nate the Hate's podcast (well skipped to the discussion about DK), and while they were overall negative about the prospects of DK appearing this year, they also don't seem to know jack about it either.
You could tell they are not are diehard DK fans when they discuss DK's popularity. They're not exactly wrong that DK has probably fallen off the core Nintendo community's tier list, but they are absolutely no way indicative of DK's popularity overall. Once Nintendo pulls out all of the stops for DK, this tune within the community will change.
I'm literally dying for DKC to rise to the top again and become as respected and popular as it was during the 90s. I'm tired of a good number of Nintendo fans calling lesser successful Nintendo franchises more popular than DKC just because those IPs have been more relevant over the years and DKC hasn't despite DKC still being Nintendo's 5th best selling franchise. I really hope a renaissance of DKC's glory days is soon upon us.
Unfortunately thats nothing new. Their are very few Nintendo youtubers that actually give DK the time of day. Gamexplain and Nintendo Life are like the only two I can think of that actually give the series some acknowledgement and respect. Everytime a Nintendo predictions video is made DK is absent, everytime someone makes a Top 10 Nintendo games list DK is 95% of the time absent. Everytime a Nintendo music medley/playlist is made it features none to very little DK misic. Its sad that most Nintendo youtubers just view DK as nothing more than a joke and Mario spin-off character. I've noticed the rare times DK is brought up in Nintendo videos its always only about Returns/TF, or meming with DK Rap quotes or Expand Dong jokes.
- Arlo never mentions DK when he talks about Nintendo franchises. He did a Tropical Freeze Switch review (praised it) but thats it...
- AbdallahSmash is very condescending towards the franchise and characters. Before K.Rool was announced he was basically ****ting on the character asking "Why its unnecessary" but as soon as he was revealed he starts acting excited talking about "His boss fights use to be amazing" despite clearly never playing any of the Rare developed DK's besides the original DKC. Also when Dixie and Funky were announced for Mario Kart Tour he legit felt insulted by their inclusions and kept making backhanded remarks in his videos especially towards Dixie.
- The now defunct Bitblock use to **** on the original Rare games constantly. He says the original DKC had mediocre gameplay but a good soundtrack. He said he never played DKC2 and DKC3 because of how bad the original was to him. He hates DK64 (though thats fair) and claims until Returns/Tropical Freeze came out that Jungle Beat was by far the best DK game and was glad K.Rool/Kremlings got left behind. But like Abdallah once K.Rool got announced for Smash he changed his tune towards the croc.
- Commonwealth Realm makes the same type of speculation/prediction videos every couple of days and they never once mention DK being a possibility.
- Nintendo Voice Chat from IGN. We know how IGN feels about the Rare DKC games. Hell Brian Altano originally gave Tropical Freeze a lower end score because the "bosses were too hard and went on too long." I was originally watching the most recent 2021 predictions episode and Peer was the only one who suggested DK being a possibility. The other panel members brushed it over and was like "yeah okay I guess" and then doing classic DK64 being terrible jokes then classic Brian Altano went to arcade DK as inspiration since he doesnt like the country series very much.
- HMK is just very indifferent towards the series claims hes played the series but some how I doubt it. If he did and it wasnt his thing thats totally fine but it still comes off as disingenuous when you start "reacting" to K.Rool in Smash in such a positive way.
I could go ON and ON luckily their are still people like Andre Segers, Uncle Al, Alex from Nintendo Life, Jon Cartwright, and Ash Paulsen still on the platform to spread the DK love and awareness of the IP. Sadly its only a small handful of hundreds of Nintendo youtubers that give a **** about the franchise.
Much like he has with Sonic, Metroid, and now Mario RPG, I think Geek Critique is a content creator who not only gets the appeal of DK but also is in a great position to explain its strengths:
While I fully admit I'm somewhat a fan because he shares a lot of my tastes (loving the Country titles and not so enthusiastic about DK64) its that very passion that makes him effective in demonstrating why the series is so distinctly good.
I don't watch Dunkey much but he sometimes plays music from the series. The Completionists also adores the franchise.
It does get annoying when someone brings up a 3D DK, and we get some bull**** retort about how ****ty DK64 is. I understand the game has problems, but c'mon. Why must this be brought up just to bring us DK 64 fans down. There are dozens of us I tell yuh! Dozens!
Unfortunately thats nothing new. Their are very few Nintendo youtubers that actually give DK the time of day. Gamexplain and Nintendo Life are like the only two I can think of that actually give the series some acknowledgement and respect. Everytime a Nintendo predictions video is made DK is absent, everytime someone makes a Top 10 Nintendo games list DK is 95% of the time absent. Everytime a Nintendo music medley/playlist is made it features none to very little DK misic. Its sad that most Nintendo youtubers just view DK as nothing more than a joke and Mario spin-off character. I've noticed the rare times DK is brought up in Nintendo videos its always only about Returns/TF, or meming with DK Rap quotes or Expand Dong jokes.
- Arlo never mentions DK when he talks about Nintendo franchises. He did a Tropical Freeze Switch review (praised it) but thats it...
- AbdallahSmash is very condescending towards the franchise and characters. Before K.Rool was announced he was basically ****ting on the character asking "Why its unnecessary" but as soon as he was revealed he starts acting excited talking about "His boss fights use to be amazing" despite clearly never playing any of the Rare developed DK's besides the original DKC. Also when Dixie and Funky were announced for Mario Kart Tour he legit felt insulted by their inclusions and kept making backhanded remarks in his videos especially towards Dixie.
- The now defunct Bitblock use to **** on the original Rare games constantly. He says the original DKC had mediocre gameplay but a good soundtrack. He said he never played DKC2 and DKC3 because of how bad the original was to him. He hates DK64 (though thats fair) and claims until Returns/Tropical Freeze came out that Jungle Beat was by far the best DK game and was glad K.Rool/Kremlings got left behind. But like Abdallah once K.Rool got announced for Smash he changed his tune towards the croc.
- Commonwealth Realm makes the same type of speculation/prediction videos every couple of days and they never once mention DK being a possibility.
- Nintendo Voice Chat from IGN. We know how IGN feels about the Rare DKC games. Hell Brian Altano originally gave Tropical Freeze a lower end score because the "bosses were too hard and went on too long." I was originally watching the most recent 2021 predictions episode and Peer was the only one who suggested DK being a possibility. The other panel members brushed it over and was like "yeah okay I guess" and then doing classic DK64 being terrible jokes then classic Brian Altano went to arcade DK as inspiration since he doesnt like the country series very much.
- HMK is just very indifferent towards the series claims hes played the series but some how I doubt it. If he did and it wasnt his thing thats totally fine but it still comes off as disingenuous when you start "reacting" to K.Rool in Smash in such a positive way.
I could go ON and ON luckily their are still people like Andre Segers, Uncle Al, Alex from Nintendo Life, Jon Cartwright, and Ash Paulsen still on the platform to spread the DK love and awareness of the IP. Sadly its only a small handful of hundreds of Nintendo youtubers that give a **** about the franchise.
I bet you had Rare stayed with Nintendo all these years and DKC was as relavent and popular as it was in the 90s during the 2000s and 2010s, they would all be singing a different tune. I really hope the rumors about Nintendo wanting to make DK big again is true because it's not too late to turns things back around to the glory days.
Basically, unless it's a game that doesn't play itself or has anime in it, nobody cares.
Because the DK games are somewhat challenging, casuals don't get that instant gratification like they'd get from any generic 3rd person shooter pretending to be a movie like The Last of Us. The majority of people sadly aren't interested in side scrolling 2D platformers, meanwhile the New Super Mario games get a free pass for their mediocre gameplay because it says the word MARIO on it.
I run a video game store and I know SO MANY people who picked up that shoddy slapped together All Stars 3D collection, and whenever I asked them how they were getting on with it, literally nobody had even beaten a single game on the cartridge. Nobody cares about actually playing the games, they just wanna put it on their game shelf and watch a speed run or DYKG video instead.
IT'S ALL ABOUT THE BRAND.
Nintendo is going to make such a killing at that Super Nintendo Land 1Up store...
At the end of the day, we know the DK games are great and that's all that matters I guess. I just wish more "video game experts" on Youtube would actually give them a chance.
While most of us would prefer a new mainline DKC game by Retro or Nintendo in house, how would you guys feel about Retro or Nintendo in house remaking the entire SNES DKC trilogy? I think that would be awesome. Of course, they would have to remove all the Rare references such as the Killer Instinct poster in Cranky's house in DKC2 and the Jatpac game in DK64.
A HD release with widescreen and remastered audio like this would be about as far as I'd take any DKC remake. Other than antiquities like paying for saves in the latter two games the lack of a real reward for 100% completion in the first, the gameplay of the trilogy holds up fine.
I feel one of my more personal pet peeves is how the Smash-fandom itself seems to generally ignore DK or Diddy as a whole for so long, mostly in the fanart. They're instead reserved to the current meme formats of DK's Treehouse Reactions or Diddy's outdated Hoo-Hahs... in fact, I think K.Rool's more given better portrayal than them.
On that note, I've long found it kinda sad that Diddy's not even included with the other Smash Kids during fanart dedicated to them - usually featuring Toon Link, Lucas + Ness, Villagers, Bowser Jr. etc. Kinda puts it to interesting perspective how folk see DK-series in the Smash-bubble.
Basically, unless it's a game that doesn't play itself or has anime in it, nobody cares.
Because the DK games are somewhat challenging, casuals don't get that instant gratification like they'd get from any generic 3rd person shooter pretending to be a movie like The Last of Us. The majority of people sadly aren't interested in side scrolling 2D platformers, meanwhile the New Super Mario games get a free pass for their mediocre gameplay because it says the word MARIO on it.
I run a video game store and I know SO MANY people who picked up that shoddy slapped together All Stars 3D collection, and whenever I asked them how they were getting on with it, literally nobody had even beaten a single game on the cartridge. Nobody cares about actually playing the games, they just wanna put it on their game shelf and watch a speed run or DYKG video instead.
What do you know! Hope you have been liking those, to even justify playing the PC Engine-version right after - ot that it's a bad port, but I'm pretty surprised the romp was worth two different takes back-to-back. (I might be mistaken, don't mind me.)
Makes me wonder if to go work on my support thread for titular Holy Maiden Warrior - but seeing what happened to Geno lately, has had me get little less optimistic for pushing characters that might be seen in a bad light due their relative obscurity in the (western) mainstream.
Nevertheless - my current new year's resolution has been practicing the work of finishing what I have started compared to last years. The thread definitely is on that list, with me wanting to fill it in with various interesting stuff Valk's been given by her fans and Namco back in last decades.
____
Back on Dixie Kong:
One big concern I've had regarding her possible re-emerge on this hypothetical "2021 Donkey Kong-title", is the way I've been observing Nintendo be... how I'd put it, more "conservative" with their in-house developed first party games since latter ends of the last decade?
Now don't get me wrong, I feel Odyssey did a lot of interesting new takes on Mario's portrayal and character, and BOTW was a smash-hit with it's currently on-going fandom. But I might be afraid that this new take on Dixie and other Kongs, might be their so-called "fully modern" portrayal mandated by Nintendo itself.
And as far as I've been going through the rather tragic journey of watching Paper Mario essentially die and be resurrected in relatively more "Nintendoish" form with it's approach to story and world, there's a high chance I might not end up liking Nintendo's "modern take" on Dixie Kong in their new game, depending on how she'll end up depicted like under Nintendo EPD's hands, and how much these supposed mandates can be seen around this characterization of her.
The bigger elephant in the room however (), would be that incase Nintendo would ask Sakurai to add Dixie to FP2, she'd be probably stylized after this new take on DK-franchise with this upcoming game - which would, thorugh Smash's easy widespreading of character portrayals, bode perhaps the completely eradication of Rare's + Retro's Dixie Kong up to this point. Everyone would only be seeing Dixie through this new take on her by Nintendo and/or Smash-portrayal, whether it'd include nods to her character from Rare-titles or not.
I dunno how Nintendo would exactly go "neuter" Dixie in means of her original charm and strong portrayal as one of their finest platforming heroines, but as far as I've watched Mario-franchise get heavily "brandificated" and tons of more "simple yet marketable" character portrayals be done on Mario's cast (including Donkey Kong) - I'm rather worried how this bodes on Dixie when we'll see her possibly featured in this new installment of DK (and if built that way for further marketability, Fighter's Pass).
Now, I can still say she looks pretty fine on Mario Kart Tour, so I hope that's good sign for things to come if that's what Dixie's portrayal will be based on (aside from her voice, not too much cup of my tea)
While most of us would prefer a new mainline DKC game by Retro or Nintendo in house, how would you guys feel about Retro or Nintendo in house remaking the entire SNES DKC trilogy? I think that would be awesome. Of course, they would have to remove all the Rare references such as the Killer Instinct poster in Cranky's house in DKC2 and the Jatpac game in DK64.
The DKCs have aged incredibly well so the only thing I would change is maybe if they could up res it, make it look like Killer Instinct arcade. That would require cooperation from RARE and if they even have the old resources.
Or you could go crazy with it and do a reimagining of the games. Like Resident Evil 2 and Final Fantasy 7 remake, they could recreate the games as a 3D platformer. That would be wild!
As amazing as it all sounds, Nate seems more confident in Super Mario Odyssey 2 than a new DK. Praying that he's wrong.
Looking at the comments to that tweet, some people still treating MS/Xbox like the devil on the subject while ignoring the big picture. MS could’ve pulled the plug on skeleton Rare at any point but gave them all the time they needed to pick themselves back up. Since Nintendo didn’t buy the remaining shares of Rare despite the Stampers wanting them to, Rare surely would’ve gone the way of Alpha Dream if Microsoft or someone else hadn’t bought them, and MS bought them at a loss as pointed out.
I still don’t agree with Nintendo for letting Rare go (also dumb for them to expect Rare to still release a game every year with how bigger games were becoming to develop by the point of the Xbox/Gamecube/PS2 era), but is what it is.
That reminds me of the direct live reaction at Nintendo World NYC from Banjo-Kazooie's Smash presentation, I was pretty annoyed that some of these stupid fans had to boo Microsoft just because they owned the IP (2:20)
Nintendo deserves some of the blame as well. Since they had first dibs to buy Rare out, But declined to do so. Yes they cheered when Sakurai said that Microsoft was happy for them to join Super Smash Bros, But it still really annoyed me and made some of them look like stupid, ungrateful, immature Nintendo fanboys.
Of course I would have liked Nintendo to own Banjo-Kazooie and Rare, But many of them should be grateful that Phil Spencer and Microsoft were willing to play ball with Nintendo even though they didn't have too.
I know I am appreciative of their cooperation and have a newfound respect for Microsoft and Phil Spencer.
Hey boys and girls, what's this I'm hearing about a new DK game from EPD? I've seen Hyle Russel and a few other big-name DK fans talking about it on Twitter, and I'm sure Hyle has heard something, but whenever I google "new DK" all I get is years-old YouTube videos and Reddit threads. What's the word on that mystery game? Why are we so sure it's real? Someone please illuminate me!
And yeah, it absolutely sucks that DK gets no respect from most Nintendo fans. 99% of the time, not even fake Direct leakers think to include him. I have my theories about why that is (many popular Nintendo YouTubers grew up during the GameCube years when Nintendo themselves **** on DKC, general weebery, etc) but I think I'm done trying to figure it out. As long we get to play new DK games, even if it's one per decade, I don't care if literally no one else likes them.
What do you know! Hope you have been liking those, to even justify playing the PC Engine-version right after - ot that it's a bad port, but I'm pretty surprised the romp was worth two different takes back-to-back. (I might be mistaken, don't mind me.)
Makes me wonder if to go work on my support thread for titular Holy Maiden Warrior - but seeing what happened to Geno lately, has had me get little less optimistic for pushing characters that might be seen in a bad light due their relative obscurity in the (western) mainstream.
Nevertheless - my current new year's resolution has been practicing the work of finishing what I have started compared to last years. The thread definitely is on that list, with me wanting to fill it in with various interesting stuff Valk's been given by her fans and Namco back in last decades.
____
Back on Dixie Kong:
One big concern I've had regarding her possible re-emerge on this hypothetical "2021 Donkey Kong-title", is the way I've been observing Nintendo be... how I'd put it, more "conservative" with their in-house developed first party games since latter ends of the last decade?
Now don't get me wrong, I feel Odyssey did a lot of interesting new takes on Mario's portrayal and character, and BOTW was a smash-hit with it's currently on-going fandom. But I might be afraid that this new take on Dixie and other Kongs, might be their so-called "fully modern" portrayal mandated by Nintendo itself.
And as far as I've been going through the rather tragic journey of watching Paper Mario essentially die and be resurrected in relatively more "Nintendoish" form with it's approach to story and world, there's a high chance I might not end up liking Nintendo's "modern take" on Dixie Kong in their new game, depending on how she'll end up depicted like under Nintendo EPD's hands, and how much these supposed mandates can be seen around this characterization of her.
The bigger elephant in the room however (), would be that incase Nintendo would ask Sakurai to add Dixie to FP2, she'd be probably stylized after this new take on DK-franchise with this upcoming game - which would, thorugh Smash's easy widespreading of character portrayals, bode perhaps the completely eradication of Rare's + Retro's Dixie Kong up to this point. Everyone would only be seeing Dixie through this new take on her by Nintendo and/or Smash-portrayal, whether it'd include nods to her character from Rare-titles or not.
I dunno how Nintendo would exactly go "neuter" Dixie in means of her original charm and strong portrayal as one of their finest platforming heroines, but as far as I've watched Mario-franchise get heavily "brandificated" and tons of more "simple yet marketable" character portrayals be done on Mario's cast (including Donkey Kong) - I'm rather worried how this bodes on Dixie when we'll see her possibly featured in this new installment of DK (and if built that way for further marketability, Fighter's Pass).
Now, I can still say she looks pretty fine on Mario Kart Tour, so I hope that's good sign for things to come if that's what Dixie's portrayal will be based on (aside from her voice, not too much cup of my tea)
Im actually not that worried about Dixie being "neutered" shes already a squeaky clean and innocent character as well as cutely designed. The only way Nintendo could "Nintendofy" her is if they gave her pants. Lol
King K.Rool is my biggest question. Will he appear given the past 3 DK games with Nintendo's supervision? Remember it was Nintendo that told Retro not to bring him or the Kremlings back and make new villains which in turn led to the Snowmads and Tikis which were more sterile and cutesy. The opposite of what Nintendo's villains were with Jungle Beat so you honestly dont know with Nintendo.
Anyway what I was getting at was after Rare left K.Rool's next couple appearences (the few that were) his characterization took a massive hit. In King of Swing/Jungle Climber he felt nothing more than just a generic Bowser knock-off. He lacked all of his edge/menace but also lacked his over the top goofiness as well. It wasn't until Ultimate/Sakurai where the King gained all of his personality back. I just fear Nintendo doesn't "get" his character. So he will either be missing again or be so neutered that hes unrecognizable.
Yeah. I'm still not 100% convinced the Kremlings are definitely coming back just because K Rool's now in Smash Bros. Looking at the theme park layout, it still looks very much like DKC Returns. If they were planning to reinvigorate the franchise with the Kremlings in mind, why would they not feature them prominently in the DK section of Super Nintendo Land?
A lot of the DK perception by fans comes down to generational divide to a degree.
The really older fans circa the NES largely saw Donkey Kong in the context of the arcade games (with most non-gaming media mentions of DK being in reference to that and not games that came after to this day). In that sense the DKC games were interesting curiosities but also significant departures from what they knew of the IP.
Younger fans of the Gamecube and Wii eras were exposed to him via Mario spin-offs and somewhat goofy gimmick titles while Country releases were being seen by certain parties in gaming press and various hardcore Nintendo circles as overrated titles that coasted on graphics rather than depth. That's on top of Rare being bought by Microsoft and the goodwill of that company's output often being dismissed.
Its the SNES/N64 fans that were in the perfect time to not be too old to reject DKC's departure from the arcade game roots while not being so young that their major experience with it was its wacky controller games rather than tricky platformers. Its the fandom that sees DK as modern without being a meme.
- AbdallahSmash is very condescending towards the franchise and characters. Before K.Rool was announced he was basically ****ting on the character asking "Why its unnecessary" but as soon as he was revealed he starts acting excited talking about "His boss fights use to be amazing" despite clearly never playing any of the Rare developed DK's besides the original DKC. Also when Dixie and Funky were announced for Mario Kart Tour he legit felt insulted by their inclusions and kept making backhanded remarks in his videos especially towards Dixie.
- The now defunct Bitblock use to **** on the original Rare games constantly. He says the original DKC had mediocre gameplay but a good soundtrack. He said he never played DKC2 and DKC3 because of how bad the original was to him. He hates DK64 (though thats fair) and claims until Returns/Tropical Freeze came out that Jungle Beat was by far the best DK game and was glad K.Rool/Kremlings got left behind. But like Abdallah once K.Rool got announced for Smash he changed his tune towards the croc.
- Nintendo Voice Chat from IGN. We know how IGN feels about the Rare DKC games. Hell Brian Altano originally gave Tropical Freeze a lower end score because the "bosses were too hard and went on too long." I was originally watching the most recent 2021 predictions episode and Peer was the only one who suggested DK being a possibility. The other panel members brushed it over and was like "yeah okay I guess" and then doing classic DK64 being terrible jokes then classic Brian Altano went to arcade DK as inspiration since he doesnt like the country series very much.
- HMK is just very indifferent towards the series claims hes played the series but some how I doubt it. If he did and it wasnt his thing thats totally fine but it still comes off as disingenuous when you start "reacting" to K.Rool in Smash in such a positive way.
THAT type of s**t genuinely pisses me off. To have bandwagoners f***ing pretend they were always rooting for a character like nobody will notice earlier statements is infuriating. I brushed off Bayonetta when people at my community college speculated about her; I didn't troll them and say only "losers" supported her, I just made it well known that I doubt she'd get in ("Really? Her? Y'all just want a sexy lady"). Obviously I was wrong and it blew up in my face. I took the L and kept it moving; I was disappointed but AFAIC she's in the game and I'm not being forced to play as her. She clearly has fans so somebody's happy she got in. I just wasn't gonna hate on her or pretend she was my number 1 pick either.
Anyway, that rant aside it annoys me how people can just pretend they never opposed a character getting in. I'm sure that if a new DK game drops and it's a massive hit, a lot of the people you mention will pretend that they always knew how great DK was throughout the decades. Hypocrites....
Fellow King K. Rool main Kulty
and I recently played both Donkey Kong Country 2 and 3 in co-op to celebrate the new year! Last year, we also played through Donkey Kong Country 1 in co-op. Playing through both DKC2 and DKC3 recently further reminded me how much Dixie Kong deserves to be a fighter in Smash. Hopefully she can join the battle someday, but regardless, I had a blast playing through these classics in co-op. Cheers!
Yeah. I'm still not 100% convinced the Kremlings are definitely coming back just because K Rool's now in Smash Bros. Looking at the theme park layout, it still looks very much like DKC Returns. If they were planning to reinvigorate the franchise with the Kremlings in mind, why would they not feature them prominently in the DK section of Super Nintendo Land?
A lot of the DK perception by fans comes down to generational divide to a degree.
The really older fans circa the NES largely saw Donkey Kong in the context of the arcade games (with most non-gaming media mentions of DK being in reference to that and not games that came after to this day). In that sense the DKC games were interesting curiosities but also significant departures from what they knew of the IP.
Younger fans of the Gamecube and Wii eras were exposed to him via Mario spin-offs and somewhat goofy gimmick titles while Country releases were being seen by certain parties in gaming press and various hardcore Nintendo circles as overrated titles that coasted on graphics rather than depth. That's on top of Rare being bought by Microsoft and the goodwill of that company's output often being dismissed.
Its the SNES/N64 fans that were in the perfect time to not be too old to reject DKC's departure from the arcade game roots while not being so young that their major experience with it was its wacky controller games rather than tricky platformers. Its the fandom that sees DK as modern without being a meme.
I was born in '94, the same year DKC came out, and by the time I was really paying attention to video games and their trends, the DK series was just starting to enter the PAON/spinoff era. Donkey Kong's identity was being absorbed into the Mario spinoff franchise more and more, and it definitely affected the way I and many others saw the series at the time. But at the same time, I had a hand-me-down SNES with DKC2 that showed me the series at it's peak. It proved to me that the Donkey Kong franchise absolutely did have something going for it; it has it's own identity that Mario can't claim.
As much as Returns and Tropical Freeze are great games and DO have a good sense of atmosphere, they still somewhat retain the PAON aesthetic; more colorful and cartoony than the SNES games, which is also the direction that the Mario series moved in around the same time. I think this still contributes somewhat to the narrative that the Donkey Kong series is just "Mario in a jungle".
Yet despite all of this, I know lots of people in their late teens and early 20s who genuinely love the SNES DKC games. Through Virtual Console and NSO, they've reached a younger audience that see these games and appreciate them in the same way we do. More than anything, that's what gives me hope for the future of the franchise.
That's the element that's allowed DKC to still have resonance and why a return to the challenging platforming eventually happened. Great gameplay has a way of enduring long after graphics stop wowing people and the novelty of a concept has worn off. Its how the 2D Metroidvania could explode long after its namesakes have moved away from it, why a Bug Fables being inspired by decade old titles could achieve notable sales, and why the biggest successes of the DK franchise in the past 20 years have been those in the Country mold.
King K. Rool's reaction is all I need to know that there is indeed a large DK fanbase. Most of us aren't on general forums because we know the experience the series went through during the 2000s. Nothing but disrespect and harassment directed towards us and the series. It's why most of us hide out in dedicated forums or threads. And that contempt still bleeds into places like Resetera, but fortunately people are starting to turn over a new leaf. It took dedication and hard work from the fans, but people are finally noticing that DK is indeed a core franchise.
No amount of industry insiders or entertainment personalities doubting the validity of DK's popularity can deter me after from what I saw when the King finally came back. Aside from potential memes, the "****ing Donkey Kong" reactions will be much more scarce.
And c'mon, we're getting a new theme park for crying out loud! That should tell skeptics to, y'know, stop being skeptical.
I was born in '94, the same year DKC came out, and by the time I was really paying attention to video games and their trends, the DK series was just starting to enter the PAON/spinoff era. Donkey Kong's identity was being absorbed into the Mario spinoff franchise more and more, and it definitely affected the way I and many others saw the series at the time. But at the same time, I had a hand-me-down SNES with DKC2 that showed me the series at it's peak. It proved to me that the Donkey Kong franchise absolutely did have something going for it; it has it's own identity that Mario can't claim.
As much as Returns and Tropical Freeze are great games and DO have a good sense of atmosphere, they still somewhat retain the PAON aesthetic; more colorful and cartoony than the SNES games, which is also the direction that the Mario series moved in around the same time. I think this still contributes somewhat to the narrative that the Donkey Kong series is just "Mario in a jungle".
Yet despite all of this, I know lots of people in their late teens and early 20s who genuinely love the SNES DKC games. Through Virtual Console and NSO, they've reached a younger audience that see these games and appreciate them in the same way we do. More than anything, that's what gives me hope for the future of the franchise.
As someone who was also born in 1994, I have my own take on this. I was fortunate enough to have a SNES and N64 at a young age, and had the first three DKC games after their initial release dates. I remember DK64 released when I was around 5, as well as The Crystal Coconut VHS tape, back in 1999. With those two things alone, King K. Rool instantly became my favorite video game villain of all time.
The cutscenes in DK64 intreged me; why was he so mean to his minions, why did he capture all of Donkey Kong’s friends, and why did he hate the Kongs so much? On top of that, he was silly yet scary enough to be considered unhinged. He also took failure very harshly, as he scolded any bosses that lost to the Kongs hard. These cutscenes made me appreciate King K. Rool a lot even at 5 years old, and made me want to keep playing to see what he would do next.
For The Crystal Coconut VHS, I must have rewatched that over and over multiple times. King K. Rool and Kaptain Scurvy cracked me up so much, and I liked how there was a three-way conflict between them and the Kongs. I also liked Klump and Krusha, and like in DK64, I was wondering why King K. Rool was so rude to his minions. I thought it was interesting how Klump and Krusha always tried to do their best, but King K. Rool would never be satisfied with their efforts. King K. Rool himself also had a great voice and personality in the show in my opinion, he was just straight-up entertaining in my opinion. For the longest time, I thought The Crystal Coconut VHS tape was just a direct-to-video mocie, but I found out years later that it was just a few episodes from an entire show.
After DK64 and The Crystal Coconut, I became a huge fan of King K. Rool early on and looked forward to seeing him again. I thought he was interesting in games like DK King of Swing and Donkey Kong Barrel Blast, but I longed for the days where there would be another Donkey Kong Country game. Returns happened, but the kremlings were replaced with the Tikis. I noticed that right away, but didn’t think much of it at the time, since it had been a long time since Donkey Kong Country 3 and maybe they wanted to experiment a bit. By the time Tropical Freeze came out, it felt very wrong to me, because now it felt like Nintendo was actively avoiding the kremlings. It didn’t help that DK games dried up after the Wii and DS era, not many new DK games in general were released for the Wii U and 3DS era. By the time Smash 4 released, I was upset that only Donkey Kong and Diddy kong were playable once again, and that’s what sparked me to really want King K. Rool to come back.
My point is, since I was lucky to have grown up with Donkey Kong Country’s hey day, I remember King K. Rool from my childhood fondly, and always liked him a ton. But I heavily underestimated how forgotten by Nintendo he actually was after the N64 era. It’s one of those examples of “you don’t know how good you had it until it’s gone”, and King K. Rool’s lack of utilization after the Wii era especially hit me hard. Some may argue that King K. Rool wasn’t even used much after DK64, but I disagree. Since King K. Rool was still featured in spin-off games at the time, it felt like he was still a major reoccuring character, but his absence from the past decade shows that no one should take anything for granted.
), would be that incase Nintendo would ask Sakurai to add Dixie to FP2, she'd be probably stylized after this new take on DK-franchise with this upcoming game - which would, thorugh Smash's easy widespreading of character portrayals, bode perhaps the completely eradication of Rare's + Retro's Dixie Kong up to this point. Everyone would only be seeing Dixie through this new take on her by Nintendo and/or Smash-portrayal, whether it'd include nods to her character from Rare-titles or not.
