Donkey Kong Bananza Review - Oohh, Banana!

During the Switch era, Nintendo managed to capture lightning in the bottle twice as Breath of the Wild was iterated upon to become Tears of the Kingdom. After playing hundreds of hours of Super Mario Odyssey and knowing that Donkey Kong Bananza was looking to be built with the same framework in mind, I was excited to see if Nintendo could do this once again, and I'm so happy to say they've managed to not only create another incredible experience but altered enough to make it a wholly DK adventure.

DK and Pauline's Big Day Out

The game opens where most Nintendo adventures do, a world at peace and our protagonist enjoying what they do the most. For Donkey Kong, this is to head into the mines to uncover Banandium Gems, a resource that seems to do everything from filling bellies or allowing you to power up your abilities, and even power gigantic drilling machines capable of reaching the center of the Earth.

When Void Kong, CEO of the Void company, shows up with a massive vacuuming machine to absorb Banandium energy and begin drilling to the center of the Earth, DK first gets trapped, finding Pauline as a companion along the way. DK then learns about the Banandium Root, which will grant wishes and allow Pauline to get home and Donkey Kong to experience his greatest dream… more bananas.

This adventure takes DK and Pauline through a variety of themed layers as they descend through the Earth's crust. You've got the staple video game worlds filled with sand, lava, and ice, but also some fun and unique twists on the idea like a Resort Layer, Racing Layer, and even a Feast Layer (which immediately made me think of Super Mario Odyssey's Luncheon Kingdom).

This narrative is surprisingly deep as you learn more about Pauline, who at this point is just a child and prone to stage fright, and her dream to return to her city after being captured by Void Kong. You also get to learn about each of the different races that live in the different layers, how they've made homes for themselves, and what troubles they have.

I loved all of the rock NPCs, essentially just sentient rocks with signature Rare-style googley eyes. It was so nice to see the lifeblood of classic collectathon titles like DK64 and Banjo-Kazooie live and well in the colorful world of DK Bananza.

A Big Destructible World…

DK Bananza takes a lot of inspiration from Super Mario Odyssey. Each Layer (the levels of this game) is themed with is own enemy types, common mechanics, and materials. They're also filled to the brim with collectibles.

The biggest change for Donkey Kong Bananza is that a lot of the world is destructible. As DK, you'll be able to dig down, punch through mountains, and pick up and hurl chunks as a weapon. Immediately this gameplay change felt as groundbreaking as some of the building mechanics in Tears of the Kingdom. A level of technical achievement and flexibility that I was not expecting.

Each world felt so much more complex, and confusing at times, as you'd sense a Bananium Gem through a wall and just start digging straight towards it.

A downside of the environment being so breakable was the number of times I found myself tripping into a Bananium Gem only to look around and realize that I'd missed some kind of platforming or laser puzzle by reaching the banana through the wall.

For a lot of players this ability to shortcut a puzzle or challenge could bring its own level of reward, but it felt like I was cheated out of a gameplay experience.

While there were more than enough Bananium Gems I obtained by reaching them 'correctly,' I'd assume a good 20% of the bananas I encountered were ones I didn't even realize I had run into until I was already punching them.

…Filled With Collectibles

Each Layer is filled with the Bananium Gems collectibles, which can be used to upgrade DK's abilities, as well as fossils of varying levels that can be used to purchase and upgrade outfits that provide additional boosts to different abilities.

In my time playing Donkey Kong Bananza, I collected around 500 Bananium Gems by the time I reached the ending, and I think I would have been hard pressed to find a gap of longer than five minutes where I wasn't hearing the classic "Ooh, Banana!" to signify picking up a new one. [Editor's note: Some quick math on the 15 hour play time means our reviewer found a banana about every two minutes!]

Much like Super Mario Odyssey, especially when first reaching a new area, you can pan the camera and spot half a dozen objectives. By the time you reach one of those, you're normally able to whip your camera around and find another dozen.

While I was always progressing towards a goal marker, the path that I took to reach them probably looks like one created by a madman.

Upgrade Your Outfit And Abilities

As you pick up collectibles, you can level up DK's abilities with Bananium Gems, or purchase outfits that deal incremental increases to DK's powers, defence, or abilities.

The Bananuim Gem abilities were fantastic to unlock. You can punch faster, recharge your meter quicker, and take your Bananza abilities and turn them up to 11. The costume abilities were far more underwhelming.

You might move 20% faster in mud, or take 20% less damage. Each of these outfits can be upgraded further, but they're so situational unless you knew what was going to be ahead of you there likely wasn't much reason to change. Those slight increases in speed or defence could be helpful, but I feel the time to reach a shop and get changed would almost take as long as just getting through that muddy patch, especially when something like surfing can allow you to mitigate the speed loss regardless.

It also doesn't help that probably the most useful piece of DK attire, a tie that makes chests appear more frequently while digging, is arguably the best upgrade for the whole game and you get it in the first world. Chests appearing can net you additional gold or treasure maps that put collectibles on your map.

Music To Make You Clap Your Bongos To

To top off the fun gameplay and charming visuals, the soundtrack is always good to tap your toe to. Whether you're exploring a world as DK, getting to jam along to any of the Bananza vocal tracks, or you've warped into a Donkey Kong Country-inspired sidescroller and get to hear reimaginings of tracks like "Jungle Japes," you'll always be having a good time.

It was so important not just for the game, but also narratively to link with Pauline and her love of singing and confidence issues, that the soundtrack would be a large part of this, and DK Bananza absolutely nails it on every front.

Donkey Kong Bananza Review | Final Thoughts

For Donkey Kong, who hasn't had a true 3D platforming outing since Donkey Kong 64, DK Bananza is an incredible return to form. Capitalizing on everything that Super Mario Odyssey did so well — unique open worlds, fun platforming challenges, and an over abundance of quick to obtain collectibles — DK Bananza then spins off to create its own novel genre-bending game with destructible environments and a return of DK specific features like transformations.

While I did feel the destructible environment robbed me of experiencing some of the platforming puzzles of the game, the destructible environment still did far more to enhance the overall experience.

If you own a Switch 2 and you are a fan of Mario Odyssey, then this should be a game you pick up immediately, whether you're wanting to marathon through the story or pick it up for 10-15 minutes at a time collecting a few Bananium Gems along the way.

Donkey Kong Bananza was reviewed on Switch 2 with a copy purchased by the reviewer over the course of 15 hours of gameplay - all screenshots were taken during the process of review.