Nintendo’s big Switch 2 Direct was full of left-field announcements. Kirby Air Ride is returning, another Hyrule Warriors game came out of nowhere, and FromSoftware unveiled a multiplayer spiritual sequel to Bloodborne that’s exclusive to Switch 2 (something that still sounds like a joke when I write it out). For me, though, the biggest surprise was the stream’s final announcement. It did not end with the next 3D Mario game as many anticipated; the last game revealed was Donkey Kong Bananza, the ape’s first 3D game in decades.
It was the very definition of a “pleasant surprise,” and one that left me eager to know more. I wouldn’t have to wait long for that. Shortly following the presentation, I went hands on with the Nintendo Switch 2 and several games coming for it. Donkey Kong Bananza was, surprisingly, on that list. In a 20-minute demo, I got to wreak havoc as DK, destroying everything in sight with my ground-pounding fists. It was the loudest and proudest demo I played out of nearly a dozen games — 20-minutes of sensory overload chaos that left my head spinning.
And I’m pretty sure I loved every moment of it.
Going ape
If the Donkey Kong Bananza trailer you saw this week felt like a lot to process at once, be rest assured that the actual game is just as wild. When my demo begins, I’m given control of DK who is working as a miner in a cave. The demo wasted no time telling me what to do next: start smashing. With the press of a button, I delivered a massive strike that shattered a pile of gold in front of me. I whacked a golden banana several times to collect it, kicking off a traditional Nintendo collect-a-thon hook.
Then things really popped off. I decided to see just how much damage I could do in the cave so I started smashing everything in sight. I took out more gold nuggets, dug myself into a dirt hole, and eventually broke down a wall of the cave entirely. I continued through there, leaving a trail of damage in my wake as I hunted for the next banana. It was much louder and more energetic than any Nintendo platformer I’ve tried since Wario’s adventures. If I had to match its energy to any other Nintendo game, I’d probably go with Wario World for the GameCube. Both share similarities in their power levels and love for shiny treasure.
The very first comparisons that come to mind before that are Dig Dug, and, more recently, A Game About Digging a Hole. I’m able to punch my way through environments, cutting paths through walls and floors to get around. There’s a surprising amount of verticality that happens as I smash my way into giant holes. Fortunately, DK can climb walls, which allows him to get out when he’s (literally) in too deep. The world is designed with verticality in mind thanks to that feature, as the level I played was full of high walls that I could scale.
Once I completed the cave, I was dropped into a proper level. The open-ended zone looked like something pulled directly from Super Mario Odyssey, painted in pastel colors and densely decorated with things to break. That game’s loop is present here, as I started freely roaming around looking for more bananas, as well as hidden fossils (which appear to be a currency of some kind). Sometimes I’d find secrets just by smashing the scenery. Other times I’d need to hold L down to play music on a specific surface, opening Bananza’s version of a challenge warp pipe. In those micro-zones, I’d need to defeat enemies in a certain amount of time to gain a prize. This isn’t Super Mario Odyssey 2, but it sure feels close to its design philosophy.
My moveset isn’t just restricted to punches. I can ground pound to cause more damage, but also to trigger environmental effects on certain spots. In one section, I needed to pound to raise a staircase from the ground. I can also jump in the air and perform a diving attack, which could be used to spring me up in the air on certain platforms. Holding the right trigger allows me to grab hunks of rock and toss them at enemies as a weapon. I had to do that in one area to destroy a shielded enemy and get a key from it to progress. In another section, I pulled explosive rocks off of special surfaces to blow some closed off areas to smithereens. I can also hold a button to start rolling around, letting DK get around quicker. Every action is big, exaggerated, and clumsy. It’s a total counterpoint to the nimble precision of 3D Mario games, which makes it feel unlike anything else in Nintendo’s current franchise lineup.
While I feel like I only pounded the surface here, I’m already digging how this is reimagining what a Donkey Kong game is. Rather than throwing him in the kind of platformer that any hero could inhabit, this feels built around his strength in a unique way. He has the power to tear levels apart and I felt a desire to see just how far I could push that while playing. I tried my best to break the world during my demo, the same way that I try to push my Switch to the edges of its limits when I play a Hyrule Warriors game. It’s a great showcase for the Nintendo Switch 2 in that sense, showing off how much unmitigated chaos its games can handle. Bananza held up fairly well to everything I threw at it, even if I caught some light frame stutters here and there.
I kept demoing more impressive games when my 20 minutes was up, but Bananza was the game I kept wishing I could pop back into for one more go. That’s a testament to how much fun it feels to smash stuff. In the timeless words of Fred Durst: “Just give me something to break.”
Donkey Kong Bananza launches on July 17 for Nintendo Switch 2.
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