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Donkey Kong Country= Overrated?

Yoshi said:
Who said Banjo-Kazooie, Blast Corps or Diddy Kong Racing were overrated?
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You stole my Post (Although I don't like Banjo quite as much as some people do but I still like it) Rare is fairly over-rated in that they haven't put out a truly good game in many years. (Please nobody bring up Perfect Dark Zero in defense)Microsoft got hosed/was stupid to spend all that money. Nintendo boned them.
 
I'd say it's more like Rare is under-rated now because so many people think that they are so vastly overrated... just like the DKC games. Maybe they (or Rare) aren't perfect, but they're better than a lot of people give them credit for... Rare is a good developer. Their NES/SNES stuff was mostly good, but the N64 was their height... Goldeneye, PD, Blast Corps, JFG, B-K, B-T, DK64, Conker, DKR... all good to great games...

Rare has been worse in this generation though, with the extremely mediocre Star Fox Adventures (boring... and too much collecting even for me, someone who enjoyed DK64...) and not a lot else, of course, but Kameo and PDZ seem at least competent, so we'll see if they can get back to where they used to be. It might be hard with all of the personnel losses they've had, though...

Or RC Pro-Am.
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RC Pro-Am is okay, but Micro Machines is so much better than RC Pro-Am seems kind of bad in comparison...
 
part 1 was not overrated! but part 2-203 was basically all the same and still had those fantastic reviews. I think the followup games were overrated
 
Funny how people dis DKC2. I thought it was MUCH better. Mainly because of the way they handled secrets. In DKC1 it was bordeline impossible to 100% since you have no idea when you've found all the secrets in a level or anything. DKC2 brought in the DK coins which were fun and always challenging to find, and there was only one per level making the replay value much better.

Without the secrets though, the basic platforming was pretty standard. Cannonball stuff and switching characters was interesting, but didn't exactl blow anyone's mind.
 
I had lots of fun playing all three games, especially the second one, so I wouldn't say this game is overrated at all. Playing 2-player co-op mode with my friend was really one of the funnest experiences I've had playing a video game.
 
Donkey Kong Country was nice but DKC2 was mighty excellent!
I seriously don't think it's overrated. The gameplay is tight and well crafted, the secret are nice and the level design is top notch. The world are different and not repetitive, the gameplay involving alot of timed jumps is pure platforming goodness. The difficulty is higher than Mario games wich is also another great detail. The soundtrack was, and still is amazing.

There's 3 games to remember and praise in the good old 2D platformer style imo:

Super Mario Bros 3 / Yoshi's Island / DCK2.
This is the trilogy of 2D platformers Gods.

The only people thinking DKC2 is overrated are probably those graphic whores that were playing the game for the graphics and they realised with time that it wasn't really their game.
 
I've only played the first DKC, but considering I love the game, no I don't feel its overrated. As to why I didn't play the other games in the series, its simple: You don't make a sequel to Donkey Kong Country, call it Donkey Kong Country 2 or 3, and not have ****ing Donkey Kong playable. You want Diddy and whatever that other monkey's name was in DKC3 to star? Fine, but don't call it Donkey Kong.
 
I was so hyped before the release of DKC, but it is hard to sing it's praises after playing it. Not a bad game, but not a great one. Never bothered with the sequels.
 
AniHawk said:
Maybe on the Nintendo side. It's impossible not to have a 2D Sonic up there.
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I think the Megadrive 2D platformer pantheon would have to be...

(either Sonic 2 or Sonic 3 + Knuckles)/Dynamite Headdy/Earthworm Jim

The SNES side would be...

Super Mario World / Yoshi's Island / DKC2.
 
Flipmo23 said:
You know, if GAF existed at the time, you guys would love it regardless solely because of it's graphics.
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QFT. I shudder to imagine a 16-bit generation GAF. "Genesis rocks!" "No way, Nintendo rocks!" "Mario is lame!" "Sonic sucks!" :lol

I rented all three DKC games and easily beat them. I saw no point in paying $60 or whatever it was back then.

DKC is fun which is what games ought to be. I can see why people liked it back then. Without a doubt, it is a solid game (but remembered more for its technical merits than gameplay).
 
Lapsed said:
QFT. I shudder to imagine a 16-bit generation GAF. "Genesis rocks!" "No way, Nintendo rocks!" "Mario is lame!" "Sonic sucks!" :lol
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That's what the newsgroups and bbs's were for back in the day and it was just as childish then as now. Just swap in names like Atari and C-64 and it's been the sos. :D
 
DKC 2 was one of my favorite games of the 16-bit generation.
DKC 3 was also pretty good though not as good as part 2.
But the orginal DKC was a game that never really did it for me, the music was there, the graphics too but everything else was just plain boring.

I even play thru DKC 2 every once in a while just for the fun of it. There are not many
other games out there about which i could say the same.
 
Future said:
Funny how people dis DKC2. I thought it was MUCH better. Mainly because of the way they handled secrets. In DKC1 it was bordeline impossible to 100% since you have no idea when you've found all the secrets in a level or anything. DKC2 brought in the DK coins which were fun and always challenging to find, and there was only one per level making the replay value much better.
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If you got everything an exclamation mark appeared after the level name.
 
I still like DKC... I was smart enough not to be fooled by the prerendered graphics (I know a lot of people who thought that was all realtime 3D back then), but I thought the controls were tight, the platforming was fun, the puzzles/hidden areas were very "Nintendo", and the music (especially the underwater piece) was fantastic.

However, after pounding the ground to find my umpteenth bunch of bananas, I didn't even bother playing DKC2 and DKC3. One day, maybe, but I automatically start pounding every square inch of a level to find all that crap, and to this day, I remember where every damn hidden banana is in the first few areas.
 
AniHawk said:
Maybe on the Nintendo side. It's impossible not to have a 2D Sonic up there.
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Actually iwas including everything. It's a tough call but for me Sonic3 + knuckles would slide right after the trilogy i've mentionned earlier.
 
Ranger X said:
Donkey Kong Country was nice but DKC2 was mighty excellent!
I seriously don't think it's overrated. The gameplay is tight and well crafted, the secret are nice and the level design is top notch. The world are different and not repetitive, the gameplay involving alot of timed jumps is pure platforming goodness. The difficulty is higher than Mario games wich is also another great detail. The soundtrack was, and still is amazing.

There's 3 games to remember and praise in the good old 2D platformer style imo:

Super Mario Bros 3 / Yoshi's Island / DCK2.
This is the trilogy of 2D platformers Gods.

The only people thinking DKC2 is overrated are probably those graphic whores that were playing the game for the graphics and they realised with time that it wasn't really their game.
Click to expand...

I'd replace DKC2 with one of the Kirby games.
 
Yes it was overrated. I'll even explain why too.

The above ground levels were about 2 screens high by 30 long. There were normally 2 levels of height in any given game level meaning that if were not on the ground you were one platform above it. The game offered almost nothing in terms of multiple paths through a given stage. Sonic, Mario, Ristar, allowed for deeper exploration through their environments...of course, reviewers ignored the level design because they were taken aback by how great the game looked at the time...until they saw SMW2 Yoshis Island which reminded them how good a platformer that was and how empty DKC was in comparison.

Don't get me wrong, the graphics were fantasitic for the time, the music was lovely and the animation was sublime. The basic gameplay felt good as well but otherwise the game didn't move the genre forward. The general mechanics were probably fresh around 1987 for a game that came out in 94?
 
I thought DKC2 was a pretty bitching game. Still a fun game today, especially in 2 player.

3 was garbage imho. And 1 did not age well.
 
DKC1 is really aesome to me, wonderful gfx, perfect and precise controls, a lot of environments, hidden secrets, the different gameplays ( we really feel the weight of DK compared to diddy !! ), awesome soundtracks, one of the greatest SNES game to me ...

I didn't know it had so many "haters" !
 
Sylfurd said:
DKC1 is really aesome to me, wonderful gfx, perfect and precise controls, a lot of environments, hidden secrets, the different gameplays ( we really feel the weight of DK compared to diddy !! ), awesome soundtracks, one of the greatest SNES game to me ...

I didn't know it had so many "haters" !
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GAF is an endless source of hate.
 
I think the idea is that unless a game "moves a genre forward" its shit... unless its a FPS. Then you can remake whatever the hell you want and add exploding cats and its all cool.
 
TigersFan said:
I think the idea is that unless a game "moves a genre forward" its shit... unless its a FPS. Then you can remake whatever the hell you want and add exploding cats and its all cool.
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We're not all saying "its shit", just that it didn't deserve that level of fame, which more often than not requires something new to be done or something already done to be done notably better. Neither of these were really the case with DKC.

Similarly, in a sense, the Crash series, while surely fun in its own right, quite possibly also owes quite a bit of its sales to Sony trying to push Crash as the Playstation's big mascot.
 
underfooter said:
This thread is heresy. The original thread-maker is a witch!
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11.gif
 
shuri said:
This thread should be about Yoshi's Island
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Holy shit, I agree with Shuri. :O :O

edit: To clarify, I'm not knocking YI, but I've enjoyed DCK1 and 2 far more than YI. Also, if we're going "overrated' by GAF standards, I'd also have to give the nod to YI since it relies far more on it's "artsy" look than DCK.
 
Rushmore said:
I would say that DKC was the God of War of its day while Yoshi's Island was the Shadow of the Colossus of its day.
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I'd just say that YI was awesome (and still is), and DKC was shit (and still is). :)
 
TreIII said:
I would think so. As is practically the case with Mortal Kombat and Killer Instinct within the realm of fighting games, DKC's main claim to fame was its graphics and some what humorous appeal; everything else regarding actual gameplay was mostly so blah, and primarily done better in other games within the genre.
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KI and MK are not very good examples. They were famous for other reasons but both had influencial gameplay. A decade later their combo systems have become standard in the genre. Something neither ever get credit for.
 
Oblivion said:
Holy shit, I agree with Shuri. :O :O

edit: To clarify, I'm not knocking YI, but I've enjoyed DCK1 and 2 far more than YI. Also, if we're going "overrated' by GAF standards, I'd also have to give the nod to YI since it relies far more on it's "artsy" look than DCK.
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Hardcore wrong. Yoshi's Island had extremely inventive gameplay with the eggshell tossing dynamic, not to mention arguably the best use of visual tricks in order to shake things up, including the memorable lunar showdown at the end of world 5.

At least the rerelease of YI has quite possibly outsold the DKC rereleases. Revenge is sweet.
 
This thread rules...

When the topic of overrated games comes up, DKC is always my first exhibit. Mediocre gameplay masked with fantastic (for its time) graphics.
 
I disagree with all this "medicore gameplay" bullshit. The controls in it were some of the most fluid and well-done I've seen in a platformer, and it offered a varying amount of challenge that allowed everyone to enjoy it. Getting to the end is easy, and an accomplishment a little kid or newer player would be satisfied with. However, finding all the secret rooms or speeding through the level is what makes it truly fun and still fun to play today.

Also it was IN YOUR FACE to Genesis as the graphics were like, a million times better and it was faster than Sonic the Hedgehog at some parts, and was way more playable. Yes, I went there. :D
 
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