‘Donkey Kong Bananza’ Review: Lone Ape and Cub

Donkey Kong’s return to full-3D platforming is an expansive, destructive triumph.

It’s funny to think that the last completely 3D Donkey Kong platformer was 1999’s Donkey Kong 64, a game that would be completely unmemorable if not for the pure, uncut cringe of its “DK Rap” introductory music. That was a game from a studio, the U.K.-based Rare, that only barely had time to absorb and apply the lessons in 3D game design that the rest of the gaming industry learned from Super Mario 64 just three years prior.

Donkey Kong Bananza, on the other hand, isn’t just the product of Nintendo proper, but the same development team that made the audacious Super Mario Odyssey eight years ago. Bananza, which marks the Switch 2 debut of Donkey Kong, isn’t just a game that lives up to the standard of greatness set by Odyssey, it’s setting a new one all on its own.

Bananza finds our big lovable galoot of a hero on a madcap chase to stop the evildoing of Void Kong, the ever-shrieking simian president of a mining company that’s drilling into the planet to reach the Banandium Root, a mother lode of—ahem—Bananergy that can grant all of the big bad’s horrible wishes. Turns out, there’s a Hollow Earth situation happening in the depths of Donkey Kong’s world—something of a running theme of late with stories involving giant apes—and his adventure will take him through over a dozen different biomes that are uniquely eye-catching. Oh, and they’re fully destructible on a scale that no 3D platformer has ever attempted.

Using just his fists, Donkey Kong can punch through walls, dig through floors, rip chunks out of the environment to throw at enemies, even surf over debris to traverse faster. Bananza’s colorful landscapes are brimming with good humor and oddball enemies, and there isn’t a single square inch of them that doesn’t have something for you to unearth, be it one of Donkey Kong’s trademark giant bananas, a long-buried fossil, or a doorway to a secret stage.

If the game had been nothing but an endless search for golden bananas, it would be fun, if shallow. But Bananza has an ace up its sleeve in DK’s sidekick: a 13-year-old version of Pauline, the mayor of New Donk City, from Odyssey. A kid sidekick should be the kiss of death for a game like this. But Pauline—a cheery, imaginative, but insecure teenager with an American Idol-ready singing voice—is one of the most joyous companions ever to grace a game.

Throughout Bananza, Pauline is a constant source of exuberance and curiosity, with her songs eventually serving the mechanical purpose of allowing DK to transform into even more powerful mythological animals. Their growing friendship is the lifeblood of Bonanza—not just a reason to keep going, but a reason to slow down, enjoy the world, play around in it, and adore seeing its never-ending cavalcade of sights through the eyes of a kid who’s having the time of her life.