Tuesday 12 May 2009

Donkey Kong platformers are nothing if not interesting these days – he is the character Nintendo seem to use when they want to experiment with a new idea. In Jungle Climber, a sequel in spirit to the GBA’s King of Swing, the control scheme is what is new and interesting, but it’s unable to carry the fun through for the full length of the game.

The story, which at times gets in the way a little (this is a platformer after all), involves a giant banana on top of a mountain near where the Kong gang live. They all get hungry looking at this huge banana floating in mid-air and set off to make it theirs, but it turns out to be some sort of power source belonging to an alien race of anthropomorphic bananas. Yes, anthropomorphic bananas. One is named Xananab. King K. Rool has captured these banana-like power sources and plans to take over the world with them, and it’s up to Donkey (and Diddy) Kong to stop him. This would all be highly entertaining if the game had the style, pace and charm of Donkey Kong: Jungle Beat, but it doesn’t so it’s probably for the best if you skip the cut-scenes.

And so we go swinging through the forest to stop K. Rool. The control scheme is simple but clever and intuitive: the left shoulder button makes DK’s left hand grab, and the right shoulder button makes his right hand grab. The air is littered with spots that you can swing around, so platforming involves grabbing on to things, spinning around them, letting go at the right time to go flying through the air and grabbing on to the next available spot. In addition DK can do an attack (by pressing the A button) which involves him somersaulting through the air in a straight line for a bit, during which he cannot grab onto anything. There are birds, bees and lizard guys that try to stop your progress, so timing your jumps and attacks are important, but the most likely way to die is to fall out of the jungle heights. Bananas are found floating around just like coins in a Mario game – collect 100 of these and you’ll get an extra life.

The game starts off very easy with a number of stages that simply let you get used to the control systems. There are a lot of ideas in the game, and for a long time each stage seems to introduce a new one, along with an explanation from Grampa Kong. These explanations are sometimes a little long winded – I would prefer a short animation in between stages like in Mario vs Donkey Kong. To enhance the challenge of stages there are a number of items to collect that are usually harder to get and involve some exploration. To move on to the next stage all you have to do is make it to the end, but if you want to 100% complete the stage you will need to collect five coins, an oil barrel and a big DK sign. The coins are really just for the kudos, but collect all the oil barrels on an island and you’ll unlock an extra stage. Collect enough DK signs and you’ll unlock a cheat.

The overall structure of the game is standard – each stage follows one after the other in linear fashion, and after every five there is a boss to fight. The later boss fights show up the limitations of the control system – they can be unnecessarily hard simply because you have very limited control over DK. You do get better at the swinging mechanic as you play, but dodging flying bullets or bombs is frustrating because you have to plan long before they get anywhere near you. Fortunately there is an alternative – you can collect gems as you travel through the forest (and other dimensions: the Xananabs have portal devices that take you to playrooms and other odd places), and if you collect 100 gems you get a Crystal Star. You can store up to three stars, and when you tap one of them DK flies for a short time, and becomes invincible. Deploying these during boss battles makes them far easier, and much less frustrating. Note, I don’t mind difficulty in games, but when the difficulty arises from very cheap tactics and less than ideal boss design considering the controls, I do find it frustrating. The controls afford a straightforward learning curve and some highly entertaining early levels, so the game would be ideal for new players in the beginning, but I can’t imagine that many new players will be able to finish the game due to the difficulty of the later levels.

There are also some mildly entertaining mini-games that you unlock as you adventure such as a juggling game, a speed-climbing game, a rock throwing game (hold on to a handhold and grab a rock with your free hand, letting go when you want to throw), an orange picking game, and a couple more. There are also multiplayer games that can be enjoyed by up to four players with only one copy of the game, and while they are enjoyable they won’t last for more than a few quick races.

Jungle Climber is innovative in its control scheme, but it doesn’t offer a lot that is new if you compare it with DK: King of Swing on the GBA, the obvious difference being the increased play area afforded by the two screens of the DS. The graphics style is very similar too – most of the sprites look like pre-rendered 3D models and don’t have the charm of other platformers on the DS like New Super Mario Bros, Kirby Mouse Attack and Yoshi’s Island DS. The DS has a big library of top quality platforming games, so Jungle Climber has a lot to compete against, and while it has a number of interesting ideas (in particular the first few hours are very entertaining and clever), it becomes less interesting and fun as you progress further in the game as the limitations of the control scheme become apparent.

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Contributor:	Peter

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