Donkey Kong Country Returns

Donkey Kong Country Returns is an upcoming Wii game announced at E3 2010, and scheduled for release in North America at the end of the year. The game was developed by Metroid Prime series creator Retro Studios.

Characters
The following are major characters in the game:


 * Donkey Kong - The protagonist of the game.
 * Super Kong - Appears in the Super Guide mode.
 * Diddy Kong - Donkey Kong's sidekick.
 * Cranky Kong - Runs the game's shop.
 * Rambi the Rhino - An Animal Buddy.
 * Tiki Tak Tribe - The enemies of the game.

Development
Nintendo had wanted to revive the Donkey Kong franchise for quite some time. There have been many games within the franchise but none have really reached the amount of success that the Donkey Kong Country series had on the Super Nintendo Entertainment System. Nintendo EAD Tokyo made an attempt with Donkey Kong: Jungle Beat but, while the game was a critical darling, it didn't shoot to the top of the charts, possibly due to it being released near the end of the GameCube's life. Kensuke Tanabe, who assisted Retro with the Metroid Prime franchise, suggested the game to Retro's president Michael Kelbaugh who had mentioned prior to the suggestion of his desire to work on the series, that he and his team should work on Donkey Kong Country Returns. Nintendo EAD Tokyo, the developers behind Jungle Beat, were already working on Super Mario Galaxy 2 and to a lesser extent Flipnote Studio in April of 2008 and thus were not available to create the next game.

During the development of the game, the game was codenamed "Fate" or "F8" to represent how the game fell into Retro Studio's laps. Their studio had just lost several key members, which made the company open to various different proposals. Shigeru Miyamoto and Tanabe brought up the idea of Donkey Kong Country, which they quickly agreed upon. When deliberating on how the game should control, the developers initially decided to use the Wii Remote + Nunchuk combination. After the success of New Super Mario Bros. Wii, however, they decided to allow the player to also use the Wii Remote sideways (without the Nunchuk). The developers of the game have stated that they personally prefer using the Wii Remote and Nunchuk. Game director Bryan Walker has stated that he assumes that people will at first use the Wii Remote on its side and then "graduate" to their preferred setup.

Donkey Kong Country Returns was officially unveiled by Nintendo of America's Reggie Fils-Aime during the company's 2010 E3 press conference. A couple of days earlier, IGN reported on a rumor that the Nintendo first-party was in fact developing a new game in the Donkey Kong series but provided no information regarding the then rumored title or the name of it.

Shortly after the game's reveal, IGN had an interview with Retro Studios and Tanabe regarding Donkey Kong Country Returns. When asked about the possibility of teaming up with former Rare (the original game's developer) employees such as David Wise to recreate the soundtrack, they denied it. Instead, they said, they were working with Nintendo's Kenji Yamamoto, who had previously worked with Retro on all of the Metroid Prime video games. Much of the music from the original Donkey Kong Country soundtrack have been reworked into the game. A full orchestration was not used for the game, but some bass instruments and a piano were incorporated into some tracks.

According to Retro Studios, each level in Donkey Kong Country Returns has about three times the amount of detail than a typical room in Metroid Prime 3: Corruption in terms of textures and polygons. Thay also stated that the water levels from the previous installments will be removed because of their repetitiveness and difficulty.

Cameos

 * In one of the early stages of the game, a large structure can be seen in the distance. This structure is based on the sprite of Donkey Kong from Donkey Kong Jr. Math on the NES.
 * A more classic and less visible representation of Donkey Kong's history is present in the form of the construction site from the arcade classic Donkey Kong in one of the industrial stages.
 * Also in the industrial stage is a hammer-wielding Mr. Game & Watch. His appearance is based on Vermin, a classic Game & Watch title in which the character bashes the heads of nasty rodents trying to destroy his garden.

Reception
Donkey Kong Country Returns is a highly acclaimed addition to the series. GameInformer rewarded the title with a 9.5 and claimed that it was the Game of the Month and one of the best platformers ever made. Destructoid was very positive in their review of the game and gave it a 10/10 score. EDGE was more critical and gave the game a 7/10, mirroring the score they gave to New Super Mario Bros. Wii. IGN, who rewarded the game with a 9/10, also nominated it as one of the best Wii games and best platforming games of E3 2010.

Examiner was very favorable of the game, saying that Donkey Kong Returns is not only "one of the best platformers of 2010, but also one of the best Wii games ever made". Their review and Kotaku's were both listed on Retro Studios' website.

External link
Donkey Kong Country Returns at Nintendo.com Donkey Kong Country Returns at Nintendo.co.uk Donkey Kong Country Returns at Nintendo.com.au Donkey Kong Country Returns at Nintendo.co.jp Retro Studios, the developer of the game.