Donkey Kong Country Snes Box Art Sonic Chaos Emerald Art

Boxed Pixels: MegaBites, my Sega-gaming nemesis, information technology's Christmas over again – a time of goodwill and cheer to all. This in mind, I idea I'd transform you into Kris of Super Play fame. How exercise you like your new look?

MegaBites: Kris? Super Play? Wasn't that a Super Nintendo magazine?

BP: It's what people had instead of blogs twenty years ago. Though it was much more effort as yous had to turn these things called "pages"

MB: Perfect, just perfect. Happy Christmas to me and a Merry Mode-seven holiday to you!

BP: MegaBites, a piffling Twitter bird tells me that this Christmas marks your 20th ceremony as a Mega Drive gamer. Any intention of getting your younger brother to marker the occasion as he did in 1993?

MB: Yous'll be happy to know that Christmas 2013 has every intention of a being vomit-free matter. That is, unless you lot program on bringing the SNES over...

BP: You leave my imperial white box alone!

MB: You see, although the unfortunate events of that Christmas still haunt me to this day, I fondly call up Sat 25th December 1993 for one thing – the solar day my obsession for all things Sega Mega Drive began. That entire 24-hour interval was an ballsy 16-bit odyssey, one that ultimately shaped my future as a gamer and all round Sega obsessive. How was the 90s Christmas experience from beyond xvi-scrap enemy lines?

BP: For me Christmas was the i fourth dimension I got to come across my games on the big-screen TV – if you indeed consider 22" to be 'big'. Donkey Kong Country looked fantastic on it. You've heard of Donkey Kong Country right?

MB: Ass-who?

BP: You lot know, it'due south that game with pre-rendered graphics that would never have been possible on your beloved Mega Drive.

MB: I'thousand sorry, I must take been too decorated eagerly anticipating the smash-processing prowess of Ristar. That'due south right blast-processing!

BP: Is that actually even a matter? Anyway, I'll let you in on a fiddling secret MegaBites, Donkey Kong State was the last affair I ever got from Father Christmas. For that reason alone, it holds a special place in my middle. Why don't you requite information technology a become?

MB: MegaBites? Nintendo? Are you mad?... Only if y'all promise me i thing.

BP:Name it.

MB: I'll play your Donkey Kong if y'all play Ristar and write all nigh it on this weblog. Deal?

BP: Deal.

MB: Where'due south the sick bags?

" Back in my day, we used to have real game play. We never had whatsoever of this fancy 3-D stuff! Oh no, we had to survive on what we had! And what picayune nosotros did have, we were happy with! That's right, iv shades of gray, in a 2x2 character block. Games never looked like this when I was a lad! " – Cranky Kong. Ass Kong Land , 1994.

Deep in the tranquility and isolated Warwickshire English countryside sits an old Victorian hall. A dilapidated horse-driven cart stands stationery in the back yard, whilst the hall's serene grounds are scatted by grazing cattle, wading ducks and apple groves. Contrary to first impression, this is not a scene from a Jane Austen novel, nor Charles Dickens. This is 1994, the headquarters of Rare and a rather inconspicuous setting for a software house that is shortly ready to revolutionise the gaming manufacture forever... or for the next couple of years at least.

I'll always call up a particular episode of 90s video-game testify Bad Influence, where in one feature, presenter Violet Berlin paid a visit Rare'southward HQ. Inside, she was presented with monitors that displayed pre-rendered wire-framed imagery, slick silicon graphics and a gargantuan slice of computer hardware adorned with a hand-written sticker that simply read 'The Death Star'.

My eyes couldn't believe what they were seeing as the characteristic showcased a meticulously animated primate and his baseball hat-wearing sidekick, as they leaped their way through lush jungle, crashed through caves and dived down into the murky depths. The graphics and level fine art were only breathtaking. Surely this was the piece of work of those 32-chip consoles I'd heard so much almost, 64-scrap at the very near? Wrong, this was a sixteen-bit affair. The game was Donkey Kong Country. The console? My arch-enemy, the Super Nintendo. As I sat, slack-jawed on the living room sofa, my Mega Drive was virtually likely upstairs, tying its RF cablevision into a noose in anticipation.

Back in 1994, I had firmly established myself within the Sega camp. My consoles had to be sleek and black, and my games had to exist lightning-fast. The words mega, chief, chaos and emerald were amongst the most important in my vocabulary. If information technology was 'produced by or nether license from Sega Enterprises Ltd,' you lot only couldn't get wrong (**cough** **cough** Shaq-Fu **cough** **cough**).

In hindsight, it'south easy to cite my love for the Mega Drive on its boom processing prowess

and the thumping electro beats from its Yamaha YM2612 chip, but in 1994 I was simply a kid. At that time, I didn't know my audio fries from my oven fries (although, I could probably take chances a guess at which tasted all-time). Back in those days there was i affair that mattered above all – the Sega Mega Drive was super fast and super cool. When you're 10 years old that's all that matters, right? Nevertheless, thank you to Miss Berlin, the Super Nintendo and Donkey Kong State had grabbed my attention.

I'm non going to lie, but earlier Mr Hill kindly set me this challenge, my beginning-hand gameplay experience of Ass Kong Country was bordering on petty-to-not-existent. I'd seen gameplay and screenshots, I'd read all nigh the game, but the but time I can call up actually playing Ass Kong Country was in a quick run-through at my local Virgin Megastore, in 1994 – that's it. Essentially, I was approaching the game with fresh eyes.

The premise of Ass Kong State was plain and simple. Our hero bursts out of his jungle den to find that his banana hoard has been stolen by the evil croc King Chiliad. Rool. It's a total mystery what a carnivorous crocodile would want with a mountain of bananas. Surely it would merely be a matter of days earlier the stash would rot into a viscid chocolate-brown mush? The Male monarch clearly hadn't idea this through. However, yous're Donkey Kong, you lot're a gorilla and y'all dear bananas, so in that location can simply be i form of action.

Accompanied by his tiny sidekick Diddy Kong, and with the aid of numerous animal friends, the player guides the primal characters beyond Donkey Kong Island, through jungles, caves, blizzards and oceans. Equally the game progresses, the player must defeat a host of banana-hoarding level bosses and pay visits to various members of the Kong family – my personal favourite being the ageing Cranky Kong and his gaming memories, which by today'south standards are positively stone age, let alone retro!

"I say, you can't better the graphics, sounds and playability of a Game & Watch!"

Right, on with the gameplay... Upon the fading of the Rareware and Nintendo logos, I was greeted by Cranky Kong himself, who stood atop a red platform, seemingly harking dorsum to Donkey Kong'south arcade days. The sequence continues as Cranky stands with a walking stick in hand, turning the mechanism on an erstwhile gramophone, tapping his pes to an 8-bit chiptune. Suddenly, a huge CD subwoofer falls from the sky, knocking Cranky from his platform – information technology'due south Donkey Kong. As the scene takes u.s. upwardly into the treetops, the chiptune converts into a Sony SPC700 delight for the ears. The graphics aren't half bad either, as a 3D silicon graphic rendered Donkey Kong dances in the trees... until Cranky seeks his revenge with a TNT loaded barrel.

" It's taken 22 human years, 32 MEGS, 32,768 colours and one super reckoner to make him look this gruesome." – GamesMaster magazine , October 1994.

What struck me the nigh nigh Ass Kong Country wasn't the graphics, nor the CD-ROM-esque soundtrack (though both elements are truly stunning). What stood out for me were the dynamics of the gameplay.

I realise information technology's the soft option, but equally a kid, Sonic 2 was my gaming benchmark. It was the very first game I owned on the Mega Drive and was the standard to which all of my early platforming exploits were graded upon, and even so are for that matter. The fundamental components to consider when it comes to the early on Sonic series' gameplay are 2-fold – speed and momentum. In this regard, Donkey Kong Country takes a much more subtle approach.

One of my enduring memories of Ass Kong Country was the close attention I had to pay to the patterns of my enemy's path, choosing the verbal moment to pounce. It was almost a fine-art every bit I stalked my prey, waiting for them to move to the precise expanse that would allow me to leap, bounce off their carcass and make it onto a platform that would otherwise have been that picayune bit too difficult to reach. It was a similar scenario in the game'south Snow Butt Blast level, which required near millimetre precision and a militarist-like focus on the enemy'southward flight paths – a feat that was fabricated all the more hard by the onslaught of a xiv-layer blizzard. Although the snowfall storm showed no sign of easing, this was a multi-paralax event that would most certainly send my Mega Drive into meltdown!

I have to say that I truly enjoyed my fourth dimension with Donkey Kong Country. My particular highlights beingness the ice-themed levels and the desultory aquatic escapades – highly unusual for me as any level that incorporates water or ice is a big no, no in my book.

Before we motion on, I'd but similar to point out i more affair – the Donkey Kong Country opening theme and Ice Cave Chant have to be 2 of the greatest tunes always committed to cartridge....... On the Super Nintendo. Right, let'southward tie this upward... SWIFTLY!

I would like to conclude where Ass Kong Country begins – with Cranky Kong. In this ageing simian-protagonist, we meet a character completely at odds with progress – a figure reluctant to accept the passing of time and the advancement of engineering science. 1994 was a year when we were all caught upwardly in a cyclone of 3D, 32-bit promise, ane that ultimately changed the face of the games manufacture as we knew information technology. Although Ass Kong Country played a role realising that turning point, it also sought to span the gap betwixt onetime and new, clinging on to its quondam-school arcade heritage, reminding us all that, although progress is inevitable, every once in a while it doesn't injure to look back. For that reason lonely, Ass Kong Country volition stand up pride of place as one of my Wii Virtual Panel downloads of choice. What? You didn't think I'd resort to the Super Nintendo for this, did you?

For all things, all memories, all Sega Mega Drive, read more on the MegaBites Blog: megabitesblog.wordpress.com.

'Kris an d Tell' artwork used with kind permission of the original Super Play artist Wil Overton. http://www.supermonsterclub.com/

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Source: http://www.boxedpixels.co.uk/2013/12/boxed-pixels-vs-mega-bites-donkey-kong.html

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