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Or, a Brief Review of Donkey Kong (1994) for the Gameboy
2023-02-07 | #game design #gaming
I'm really struggling to come up with my own ideas for games, or stories, or art.
My partner and I have been fooling around with some of our retro video game systems lately. We have a Retrotink 2x-Pro and we finally managed to get our fancy smart LG OLED TV to stop mangling the signal. I pulled out my copy of Donkey Kong for the Gameboy and her Super Gameboy and Super Nintendo, and I've been really enjoying replaying the game. It was originally released in 1994, and that's about when I got the game too. Somehow the battery has survived for nearly 30 years, my childhood save is on there still! As a kid I never thought I'd beat it. The game has 97 different levels and some of them are just plain mean. However, I persevered and did complete the game as a kid. I can't recall if it's the first game I ever beat, but it was among the earliest and definitely was one of the satisfying.
I decided to do a playthrough from the beginning again because of how much I remember loving this game. There's been an unfortunate trend where some of my beloved games just don't hold up well ten, twenty, thirty years later.
Donkey Kong for the Gameboy, however, has held up incredibly incredibly well. There are a few factors, in my opinion, that make the game so good:
I haven't played this game since I was a preteen, but I had no trouble picking it up. Like riding a bicycle, perhaps.
the title screen with the Super Gameboy enhanced color palette
And that's when inspiration, or lack of it, hit me: I wanted to make a game like this. I wanted to recreate Donkey Kong for the Gameboy. What an absolutely unoriginal idea. Just recreating a thirty-year old game 🙄
a level from the game, in grayscale
But it's a project, I'm learning even more, and -- most importantly -- I'm having fun. I'm also slowly figuring out how to make the game my own, whether that's thematic or by differences in gameplay. Very slowly figuring that out. I did find a few free-to-use-if-you-credit-the-author graphics and music packs that I will probably take advantage of as my game takes shape, because this being my main character is not something I want:
a little orange ball guy, vaguley shaped like a friend
Like, he's serviceable, he helps me test things, but he's not.. hm, I don't even know what I'm looking for in a main character! I gotta figure that out. I have a lot to figure out. Especially when it comes to story, and level design. Donkey Kong does both incredibly well. The story is quite simple: Donkey Kong himself keeps snatching Paulina just moments before Mario can save her. He runs through areas and locks a door behind him. Mario has to find the key in each level to open the door so he can continue his chase. After a tough journey, and a final fight with Donkey Kong (who you fight many times throughout the game), you finally save her.
The game opens with the first few levels of the arcade Donkey Kong title, which is a cute throwback, sets up that this is a direct continuation of the arcade game, and acts as a really great misdirection. After you complete the arcade levels, the game expands greatly. You explore 9 different worlds with eight to twelve levels each. Each world introduces a new concept or relies on a specific movement of Mario's. All of Mario's moves are available from the beginning, and you can use them to speedrun the early levels even though they aren't required that early, but you will be making heavy use of them in later levels. The progression is incredibly well done, and the player always feels like they have the tools to complete any level. From enemy types to placeable blocks to vines, to monkeys with tails that act as vines, to conveyer belts with or without switches that control them, there's so much variety in the levels and the puzzles you're presented with that the game always feels fresh and challenging. And some of the levels really do challenge you.
During the time I wrote this, I have used and modified some of the artwork (including this new player sprite) by:
I, of course, have the option to -- pardon the pun -- ape the story with different characters (say, an evil witch who has kidnapped your lesbian lover princess for an evil spell (maybe the witch is also a lesbian and is in love with your princess)), but that doesn't sit well with me. I want to put more of my own mark on it. Donkey Kong tells its story entirely without dialogue. From the first level to the last there is absolutely no written text telling you how to play or what the story is. Introduction of gameplay mechanics is conveyed in short little cutscenes between worlds, and incredibly little story is presented each time (again, the story is wildly simple, there's never anything to reveal). There are also attract mode cinematics that show demo level play as well as showcasing Mario's acrobatics. It is incredible to me that a game of this caliber with this depth has no text at all. I don't have confidence that I can achieve that yet, so I'm trying to figure out other ways to convey a story and progression.
Something else I'm working to accept is that projects take time. I might be working on this game for a while. The original game had a team of SEVENTEEN. I'm taking on a LOT doing this entirely on my own! They had seven people working on course design! I am just one woman, and if this project takes months or even years, that's okay.
my work-in-progress first level using more of Kicked-in-Teeth's tileset
I feel like more than several of my game design posts are me telling myself that it's okay to suck at something because I'm just one woman and not a whole entire team of game designers. Hopefully that's something other people appreciate hearing too.
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