Donkey Kong Bananza will add much more chaos to the confounding timeline of the Donkey Kong video games, which over the previous 40-plus years, has been a tangled mess of contradictions and confusion.
However Nintendo’s revelations about Pauline and its coyness about her age — she’s simply 13 years outdated on this recreation — performs into the story of Donkey Kong Bananza provide a glimmer of hope that the Change 2 unique may assist clear some issues up. And that is huge information for weirdos who take into consideration the Donkey Kong timeline.
In fact, that is Nintendo in any case, an organization that has each contorted itself to attempt to clarify away the diverging timelines of The Legend of Zelda franchise but additionally loves a paradox wherein Child Mario and grownup Mario exist in the identical time interval and race karts towards one another. The corporate is right here to make enjoyable video games and put smiles on faces, even when it means frowns for the individuals who attempt to dissect whether or not Cranky Kong is Donkey Kong’s father, grandfather, or an older model of Donkey Kong himself.
So as to perceive (or attempt to perceive) the Donkey Kong timeline, we have to begin firstly: 1981’s Donkey Kong.
Who even is Donkey Kong anyway?
Nintendo’s unique arcade platformer recreation establishes that Mario (aka Jumpman) should rescue damsel-in-distress Pauline (aka Woman), who has been kidnapped by Donkey Kong. It wasn’t established on the time why DK desires to safe Pauline — Love? Hatred of Mario? — as a result of arcade video games of the ’80s didn’t have ROM house to waste on issues like “narrative.”
Later video games would set up occasions within the Donkey Kong timeline that happen previous to the occasions of Donkey Kong. 2006’s Yoshi’s Island DS confirmed the existence of Child DK, an toddler model of Donkey Kong roughly the identical age as Child Mario, Child Luigi, and Child Peach, which might assuredly put that recreation within the distant previous. Keep in mind: Mario is canonically (completely?) about 25 years outdated, which implies the Yoshi’s Island recreation happens many years earlier than Donkey Kong. Anyway, Child DK wears a pink bib with the initials “DK” in yellow, just like how grownup Donkey Kong wears a monogrammed pink tie. (I’ll additionally observe right here that Child DK and grownup Donkey Kong exist in the identical time-space, as established by 2005 baseball recreation Mario Tremendous Sluggers.)
Child DK’s connection to the newborn Mario Bros. and different Mushroom Kingdom infants is fleeting, and he’s presumably returned to his ape troop after the occasions of Yoshi’s Island DS.
Picture: Artoon/Nintendo
Someday between the occasions of Yoshi’s Island DS and Donkey Kong, Mario and Donkey Kong cross paths once more in Donkey Kong Circus, a 1984 Recreation & Watch recreation wherein Donkey Kong is pressured to carry out whereas in captivity, juggling pineapples (and avoiding fireballs) whereas birling on a barrel. Ought to DK fail in his activity, Mario proceeds to chuckle his ass off on the ape’s misfortune.
Donkey Kong Circus seems to supply correct justification for Donkey Kong to hunt revenge on Mario, specifically by kidnapping Pauline and throwing barrels and sentient fireballs at her would-be rescuer.
Donkey Kong Jr., which introduces the idea of Donkey Kong as a father and presents Mario as an enormous dick, follows Donkey Kong. Junior should reclaim his father, who has been kidnapped by a whip-wielding Mario after the violence of its predecessor. In video games set after the occasions of Donkey Kong Jr., the senior Donkey Kong breaks into Stanley the Bugman’s greenhouse — from Recreation & Watch recreation Greenhouse — and having escaped Mario and Stanley’s fixed harrying, pauses to show Junior primary arithmetic (see Donkey Kong Jr. Math).
At this level, the Donkey Kong timeline shatters.
Picture: Uncommon/Nintendo
Donkey Kong Nation for Outdated Males
After greater than a decade out of the highlight, 1994’s Donkey Kong Nation establishes that the Donkey Kong seen in Donkey Kong and subsequent arcade and NES video games has aged significantly, and is now often called Cranky Kong. The Donkey Kong that stars in and is playable in Donkey Kong Nation is the grandson of Cranky Kong (the unique Donkey Kong) and the son of Donkey Kong Jr.
Including to the confusion is that, just some months previous to Donkey Kong Nation’s debut on Tremendous NES, Nintendo launched Donkey Kong, a Recreation Boy reimagining of the unique Donkey Kong that expands Mario’s quest to rescue Pauline right into a globetrotting puzzle journey. So, two solely separate apes often called Donkey Kong get video games that 12 months.
Donkey Kong Nation builds the muse for a protracted listing of Kongs, together with the “new” Donkey Kong, Diddy Kong, Dixie Kong, and Wrinkly Kong — Cranky Kong’s late spouse and due to this fact Donkey Kong’s grandmother, who can be a ghost. Later video games within the Donkey Kong franchise, constructing on the brand new canon established by developer Uncommon, add much more Kongs, however hold a lot of the motion centered on Kong Island and surrounding lands and the brand new Donkey Kong.
Regardless of Uncommon’s intention to show the unique Donkey Kong into Cranky Kong and set up a brand new id for Donkey Kong, evidently Nintendo, Uncommon, and different builders behind video games like Tremendous Smash Bros. and Mario vs. Donkey Kong can’t agree on the entire Crank-Junior-Donkey Kong lineage. Older video games declare that the Donkey Kong that appeared within the arcade unique is the Donkey Kong we all know and play as right this moment. Some latest video games, like Tremendous Smash Bros. Final, nevertheless, affirm the concept that Cranky Kong is grandfather to the character Donkey Kong, however the latest Tremendous Mario Bros. Film makes it fairly clear that Cranky is DK’s father, not grandfather. In some Uncommon-developed video games, Cranky confusingly refers to Donkey as “son.”
Suffice it to say, the Donkey Kong household tree and timeline is complicated, and one ought to most likely resign oneself to the canon established by the Uncommon video games, wherein the unique Donkey Kong seen in 1981’s Donkey Kong is now Cranky Kong.
Picture: Nintendo
Nonetheless! Donkey Kong Bananza seems to happen between the occasions of Yoshi’s Island DS and the unique Donkey Kong, primarily based on the age of Pauline. She’s simply 13 years outdated within the Change 2 recreation, a lot youthful than her look in Donkey Kong and subsequent video games, like Mario vs. Donkey Kong and Tremendous Mario Odyssey. Precisely how Nintendo plans to elucidate that is unclear, particularly since Cranky Kong, Diddy Kong, and Dixie Kong from Donkey Kong Nation video games set generations after the unique Donkey Kong are additionally in Bananza!
Given Nintendo’s liberal use of time journey shenanigans within the Tremendous Mario universe and a normal “You guys actually care about this shit?” angle relating to gelling many years of canon, don’t anticipate a satisfying reply to how Teen Pauline suits into the bigger Donkey Kong timeline. Or why Donkey Kong in Bananza has been barely redesigned to match his traditional look. Regardless of the rationalization, it’s engaging sufficient to care about seeing by way of Donkey Kong Bananza’s story, and uncovering what lies beneath the sport’s deep layers.