Donkey Kong Country: Tropical Freeze Review

Donkey Kong Country: Tropical Freeze (Nintendo Switch)

Funky, Frozen, Unforgiving Fun - 

Score: 8/10

     One of my first consoles growing up was a Super Nintendo. One of my first games was the original Donkey Kong Country. One of the first times I threw my controller was because of how hard that game was. It was so hard, I had to get my older sister to do the final boss for me. Every. Single. Time. My dignity never recovered. Fast forward to me in my twenties, and I’m happy to report Donkey Kong Country: Tropical Freeze is still so hard I sometimes had to get my girlfriend to do it for me. That said, this romp through the frozen tropics with the leader of the DK crew was a blast, even with a few missteps.

     Tropical Freeze is a remaster of an underplayed entry of the same name for the Nintendo Switch. The Donkey Kong Country franchise was revived in recent years by Retro Games, the overlords of Metroid Prime. They, in turn, helmed this remaster. The reason this entry was so underplayed was that it came out on the Wii-U. The Wii-U was a commercial failure despite some great games, which led to Tropical Freeze going largely under the radar. In order to bring interest back, Nintendo brought Tropical Freeze to the Switch, putting the Kongs back in the spotlight once again.

     The stories told in the DKC franchise are never very deep. They don't need to be either. The originals revolve around something banana related being stolen from one of the Kongs by the evil lizard, King K. Rool. Modern takes on the series have even more banana related products being stolen from the Kongs by various creatures of ill repute. Tropical Freeze truly breaks this mold by having a big snow themed baddie steal Donkey Kong’s island from him, causing him to join forces with Diddy Kong, Dixie Kong, and Cranky Kong to liberate it from their frigid conquerers. Also, its DK’s birthday, which explains why extra life pickups are balloons. Go figure.
     Gameplay is identical to classic DKC games, albeit with modern twists. At its core, it’s a side-scrolling platformer. Donkey Kong runs, jumps, swings, ground pounds, and collects bananas for extra lives. These controls are smooth and fluid, and moving the game to the Switch allows for some actions to be mapped to the built-in motion controls. Shaking the Joy Cons makes DK ground pound in order to break through boxes and hidden areas. Moving DK while shaking the Joy Cons throws him into a roll, increasing his speed and destroying whatever bug-eyed penguin is fool enough to be in his path. Tropical Freeze also incorporates a use of  3-D space. Often times, DK and his crew will be shot into the background and large sections of levels are played from a far-off perspective. This keeps the gameplay fresh, and the player will always be looking behind the Kongs to see if there's any hint of a hidden collectible in the background.

      There are six worlds the Kongs have to battle through in order to reach their goal, not including a hidden one built for the post-game. At the end of each world is a boss who is platforming puzzles all their own. Each of the worlds is beautifully made. Generic jungle levels, tornado-stricken Savannah, a world of giant fruit, and of course the dreaded underwater world all feature that special type of polish Nintendo is known for. The Kongs and the enemies they face are crazy life-like and each character has their own personality. The Kong’s fur seems as soft as my cat’s, who often tried to attack me when I shook the Joy Cons too much.
     To add additional life to these worlds, Retro brought back the original composer of the classic DKC games, David Wise. He’s the guy who created the classic Donkey Kong Country Theme a quick Youtube search will help you remember. His classic jams are front and center and fit well with the new modern take on DKC. Wise also crafted new songs to match some of the more snow centered levels towards the end of the game as well. It is easy to get lost in Donkey Kong’s music. After the 15th time fighting a boss, it’s easy to chill out by listening to the music and forgetting the absolutely brutal ass-kicking laid down on me by a Popsicle loving polar bear.

     Tropical Freeze is hard. Sometimes too hard. Many of the late game levels take an endless amount of tries to the point of frustration. This isn’t to say they aren’t fun. Finally figuring out a puzzle, or nailing that hard jump is satisfying in its own right. There are some exception to this, however. Underwater levels. Did that make you shudder? Did that give you flashbacks? It should. Underwater levels are the worst thing to come from early Nintendo gaming, and they have crawled back in force for Tropical Freeze. Swimming is hard to maneuver in this game. Not because it's badly made, but because it's overly realistic to the point of agony. On top of that, the boss fights are brutal and sometimes tedious. The difficulty for each boss jumped all over the place. In my experience with platformers, bosses tend to scale in difficulty the deeper into a game a player goes. Tropical Freeze’s bosses went back and forth, with the second and fourth being far and away harder than the first or fifth. The final boss is just a tedious mess of waiting instead of it being a puzzle like the others. That said, the music and designs of each boss are fun, and the ability to lay out a combo of ape punches upon defeat adds its own reward to the end of each one.

     One addition I enjoyed, though it does have its own issues, is the addition of a new mode called Funky Mode. In this mode, the player takes on the role of Funky Kong, a chosen ape warrior dressed like the Dojo leader from Napoleon Dynamite. To put the mode into perspective, think of Funky Mode as easy mode. Funky Kong moves faster, jumps higher, can take more hits, and can use all the abilities of the other Kongs. He is a blast to play, but the easy mode high can be short-lived for a fresh player. Funky is only overpowered for about the first half of the game. After that, he is at the mercy of underwater levels, mine cart levels, barrel rocket levels, and boss levels. All these levels limit what Funky can do, sometimes making him no better than those other damned dirty apes he travels with. Funky Mode is my preferred playstyle, despite its faults. I enjoyed playing with physics and seeing how he breaks levels as opposed to playing them the regular way.
     This entry also features a fun co-op mode. This allows two players to take on one of the two Kongs and work together to get through each level. While this is fun, it can be even more unforgiving than playing the game solo. Each death takes away from the overall life total, so if you have someone who isn't very good at the game (me) you will eat up twenty lives in one boss fight. Also, if you pick a Kong whose abilities don’t work well in the level, you have to exit the level completely and change characters. Co-op is fun, but it's for those players who are on the same wavelength and are well practiced.
     Donkey Kong Country: Tropical Freeze is a blast despite some minor frustrations. It’s sad it got overlooked four years ago because it holds its own among the side-scrolling greats. The graphics are beautiful and fun, the difficulty brutal, and Funky Kong is now my spirit animal. It brought back all the memories I had of failing in the original Donkey Kong Country and made me want to call my sister into the room to make her do it all over again. While the game doesn’t change the formula, it doesn’t need to. It is fun for everyone who is okay with throwing a controller and crying a little. This is what Donkey Kong is known for. That, and the Donkey Kong 64 Rap. I might have been playing that on loop while I wrote this. I need help.