2025 | Donkey Kong Bananza Direct (18th June) (2pm UK // 6am PT // 9am ET)

Banana chips are concerning but I'm hopeful things aren't going to be as bad as odyssey's moons. Them ripping off BotW's clothing system is kind of uninspired though. Other than that it looks good aside from Pauline's VA and shitty rapping.
 
Looks solid, the 2D sections, minecarts, and physics-style puzzles were the highlights for me.

Cringe Disney style music though, could do with less of that tbh
Same. I could honestly do without the Pauline voice acting altogether..
 
Banana chips are concerning but I'm hopeful things aren't going to be as bad as odyssey's moons. Them ripping off BotW's clothing system is kind of uninspired though. Other than that it looks good aside from Pauline's VA and shitty rapping.


This person is acting bananas; someone send him to the Nintendo Bunker for 3 days of indoctrination.
 
Looks incredible, like a millions time better and funnier Super Mario Odyssey. It seems like pure fun, really we are blessed that Nintendo still care releasing big budget games like that to carry their consoles, is such a fresh breath of air today.
 
Hot damn. If Astro Bot could win GotY over how great gaming was last year, there's no way Bananza doesn't sweep....

I mean, it's not a Sony game so that's stacked against it come award season.
 
Uh, this looks awesome. They really are leaning into the heart/storytelling aspect a lot more than expected here so it's nice to actually have a Nintendo game with full voice acting. The whole DK as a goofy big bro to a young girl is a winning combo although it makes me feel like someone on the team was a huge fan of Wreck-It Ralph.

I'm hoping we get answers as to why DK kidnapped Pauline in the "future" though. Forget the Kremlings, I'm all in on this arcade DK lore now.
 
I really like how you can chain together the transformations. Hopefully they'll make good use of that with the puzzles.
 
Yeah, I don't know about this. Still feels to me like they've shoehorned DK into something (a terrain destruction tech demo) that isn't a DK game at all. And apart from some of the challenge levels I don't really see what's interesting gameplay-wise here. Everything, including fighting enemies and bosses, is about SMASHING, and I don't know for how long that will be fun. Seems like it's not really a platformer at all anymore. Plus, the visual design is pretty dreadful.

EDIT: Also, that performance. A LOT of really heavy drops all over the place.
 
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Wow! That's more than underwhelming. It's just a graphical mishmash with nothing pleasing the player at all. Also those framedrops and bad art. For me, it looks more like a wireframe of an unfinished game, made from way too many different teams at the same time, put together with bad glue.
 
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Holy shit wut

I thought 15 mins would be a stretch to explain a game but this is fucking jam packed to the brim

Never doubt Nintendo Tokyo for platformers, fucking insane team
 
Yeah, I don't know about this. Still feels to me like they've shoehorned DK into something (a terrain destruction tech demo) that isn't a DK game at all. And apart from some of the challenge levels I don't really see what's interesting gameplay-wise here. Everything, including fighting enemies and bosses, is about SMASHING, and I don't know for how long that will be fun. Seems like it's not really a platformer at all anymore. Plus, the visual design is pretty dreadful.

EDIT: Also, that performance. A LOT of really heavy drops all over the place.
DK eas always about smashing things… 🙄
 
Looks great. People are comparing it to Odyssey for obvious reasons but I like the obvious BotW influence too. Nintendo are really taking advantage of the added power of Switch 2 to do interesting things with environmental manipulation and that's much better than just trying to max out the visuals. I expect the Splatoon spinoff to be the same.
 
I totally ignored DK Bananza in the big Apr 2 Direct, but very soon after I heard it was made by the same dev team that did Galaxy and Odyssey and I've been all in ever since. If I can't find a Switch 2 in time for launch, I won't be held responsible for my actions.
 
Pauline is with you......no respect for the lore of the 80s. :)


Looks cool and what a song to open with.
 
Yeah, I don't know about this. Still feels to me like they've shoehorned DK into something (a terrain destruction tech demo) that isn't a DK game at all. And apart from some of the challenge levels I don't really see what's interesting gameplay-wise here. Everything, including fighting enemies and bosses, is about SMASHING, and I don't know for how long that will be fun. Seems like it's not really a platformer at all anymore. Plus, the visual design is pretty dreadful.

Wow! That's more than underwhelming. It's just a graphical mishmash with nothing pleasing the player at all. Also those framedrops and bad art. For me, it looks more like a wireframe of an unfinished game, made from way too many different teams at the same time, put together with bad glue.

Both Swedish. WTF is going on over there. You guys don't like fun clearly.
 
I totally ignored DK Bananza in the big Apr 2 Direct, but very soon after I heard it was made by the same dev team that did Galaxy and Odyssey and I've been all in ever since.

We don't know that, it's just what people are guessing based on how it looks. It very clearly resembles SMO tech-wise.

It might be part of that team, but I don't think it's the full or main team. They are working on the next 3D Mario. This looks like a smaller team to me, it's clearly not as high budget as a mainline Mario game.
 
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