Moving Past Nostalgia | Donkey Kong 64 Retrospective 

NOTE: Okay so obviously the number of collectables at 08:24 reads 4,800 (the correct number) but I accidentally said 48,000 (a big wrong number that only a dumb idiot would say). Some of you have already pointed this out, but obviously this is a silly mistake on my part. Just acknowledging it here!

As a kid who grew up in a home without a lot of money floating around, this era of Rare games packed to the brim with collectables were the world to me.

In summary: They need to make another 3D Donkey Kong game dammit

the "fun" of this game was getting into the mindset of "i am kong now and i collect things"

This game literally blew my mind as a kid. I didn’t know anything could be that fun and the open 3D world was magical. I played it on an emulator in college and still had a blast. Would absolutely LOVE a remake with new assets.

38:08 I'm so glad you brought up getting scared by the voice yelling "GET OUT!" after some of the challenges in Angry Aztec and Crystal Caves, cause not enough reviewers do. That call out scared the hell out of me the first time I heard it as a kid, and the follow-up target sight zoning in on you with a 30 second timer running had me panicking every time.

Maybe not the most polished game BUT the music and character is on point

The whole time he’s talking crap about the game I’m like wow this game is so awesome.

Everyone has opinions for this game, and i respect their opinion. I grew up playing this game and still playing it until this day.

a remake / reimagining of this would be great imo

I absolutely loved this growing up. It was massive took me ages to complete.

Controversially, this is my favorite game of all time. I think most complaints about the game can be said about most other popular games in the N64 era. What I love most about this game is that every single thing about it goes back to the personalities of the characters. Everything down to how they stand when talking to other characters, or how they look when being healed by a banana fairy. Theoretically, golden bananas could be done by any kong. Some other kong could have helped the mermaid, but it was Tiny. Some other kong could have done the burping Kremlings, but it was Lanky. And it was choices like these that made me absolutely love this game. My biggest gripe about the game would be the banana barrels, because it was the one aspect of the game completely unconnected to the characters. Which kong did which barrel was an extremely arbitrary decision, and it ruins what makes the game fun. I personally think the fact that the game has different collectables spread all over the level that can only be picked up by a specific kong actually makes the game fun. To some people, it's tedious, but to me, it makes the game more exciting. When you explore the world with different kongs, you can go, "Oh yeah, I saw that with this kong, but now I can finally pick it up!" And it's that feeling of excitement and satisfaction that gets you to explore the entire level with every kong. Also, besides the banana coins, there is a celebration of some kind when you collect all of a collectable in a level. I loved hearing that sound when I collected the 100th banana, even if that's all I got for it. I still play the game with regularity to this day. Fungi Forest is my favorite level and Lanky is my favorite kong :)

I don't care about critics, i love it

“DK64 was the beginning of Rares downfall” * Rare proceeds to release Tooie & Conker 1/2 years after DK *

Playing dk64 is like visiting your grandma for cake After 1 piece of cake youll gladly take more, after 7 pieces you want to go home

There’s a lot that went behind the scenes with this game. The lag part though, they did the best they can to counter it. They couldn’t have the game like they wanted it to without lag, so they created lag frames to where the kong will keep moving even if it isnt rendering, so when the frames drop, they speed up the game to make it as smooth as it can

This is an S tier masterpiece and I will not tolerate anything less than that. Still waiting on DK 65 Edit: a year later I finally get a notification for this comment and wow some (one) of you take things way too seriously.

Compulsory DK Arcade was the most sadistic thing Rare ever did

The ID Cards analogy is a really smart way to explain many of the moves

The level of depth in this video is insane.

The soundtrack to this game is easily in my top 3 of all time. Frantic Factory is a personal favorite

Maybe this is an unpopular opinion but I enjoyed the backtracking in this game. I like the concept of step by step and list of tasks to accomplish the goals.

I found this channel just the other day thanks to the excellent Banjo retrospectives, and I must say, this fellow provides some of the better game reviews I've seen in quite a while. Cheers! I am looking forward to more from here on out.

I still love this game. It’s almost like Mario 64 on steroids. You gotta have the players guide if you play it for the first time

Playing an instrument before entering the water just turns you into Harsh Noise Kong, that was a feature

I agree the collect-a-thon aspects of DK64 gets way too far at times as well as certain minigames(Beaver Bother being the bane of my existence), but the minute I started playing this game for the first time, I fell in LOVE with it! And no, I never had this game as a kid let alone an N64.

This game was amazing bc of the world imo. I love the characters and the whole vibe of the world as a kid. I didn’t care about like how much stuff I had to collect or whatever I just liked messing around in the world and seeing all the different characters. imo that’s the best part about donkey Kong 64.

I once did an entire playthrough of this game where I didn't talk to Snide once. He still showed up im the last level though. Nostalgic feelings might warp my opinion, but I love this game

Your reviews are incredible. I love that you give us a behind the scenes look at the making and backstory. you explain the tech issues with a game, not just point out that they are there- you explain why. The amount of research is amazing!!!!

Did you have to look up what a sword fishes sword was called? I never would have thought it was a “bill”

This game deserves a full remake. I really think this game could be an amazing game with some big changes to the game mechanics.

I didn't beat this game until I was in high school, with my boyfriend and I taking turns collecting banannas and doing phases of the final boss. It felt satisfying to beat it after all this time, and I got to share the memory of it with someone, even if we aren't together any more. That beetle though- We took turns racing, and he finally ended up winning after a million trys. And I cheered for him, and started cackling. He turns, confused. I burst out laughing. When I finally stop, I say "just wait till ya see the next one!" He was like... "oh God there's another one?!" It was pretty funny. I remember we agreed not to do it just cuz we both got frustrated with the first. A good memory for sure. I also remember being very restricted on time I was allowed to play video games. I was only allowed one to two hours a day on Fridays, Saturdays, and Sundays. I would read the instruction manuals for hours about these n64 games and the instruction manual for DK 64 was the best one I had. It details a lot of items and Rare collectibles, along with a few jokes here and there. I miss fun instruction manuals, can we bring those back? I'd classify this game as a broken classic. It's totally broken and flawed, but despite all of them it has its charms and has its moments.

Really enjoyed this video and a good retrospective on the game. Regarding your point on speedrunners/glitch hunters views of the game being broken, I certainly agree that, for the most part, a casual player will not encounter a glitch. I would certainly not want someone to go away and think of the game negatively because of the glitches that we demonstrate or joke about (some being easy, some requiring scenarios which you would never see in normal gameplay). Sometimes we exaggerate the idea of "spending 5 minutes in the game and you'll encounter a glitch". However, it's not one which we believe seriously and is meant in the same way as "The game runs at 2fps" (Obviously it doesn't outside of a few special cases, but it's a note on how the game has lag issues as you have mentioned) and is just meant in jest. In the end, in my eyes, if a glitch doesn't screw you over in terms of preventing completion or making things harder for you, it's no harm in my eyes. There's only one glitch in the game which I would consider negative, and that's because it locks you out of game completion and has happened a number of times to those playing the game casually. The other glitches are just fun ones which are an artifact of it being an old game that was made to push the boundaries at a time when the idea of a 3D Platformer was still somewhat new. In the same sense, we (glitch hunters / speedrunners / TASers) are pushing the boundaries with the game and seeing what we can do within the confines of a game we all enjoy.

"oh the kids like collectathons huh, well lets give them 5 times the collectables" oh no

One thing that isn't really thought of now is that back then if you had a game, it was likely one of your only games out five max. Anything that was stuffed with filler things to do was very much appreciated because it felt like more bang for your buck.

The soundtrack is stuck in my head to this day

I seem to remember someone making a n64 boot up DK64 without the expansionpack. It could indeed run the game just fine. But would crash within 4 hours or something like that. So the expansion pack fix for a bug could still be true

16:11 which lags the game making a certain golden banana nearly impossible to get if you're using it

*Take a shot for every time he says Banana*

Amazed to hear that the unfixable glitch rumor was false.

30:40 I saw it run "otherwise" when my expansion pak died on me in the middle of a session. The game didn't crash, but the framerate was something like 5.

DK64 is filled with nostalgia for me. That being said, I never finished it as a kid. Just a couple years ago I decided to finish it and realized why I never did as a kid. It's more work than fun for me. While I'll always have fond memories of playing the game with my brother, I won't be playing it again anytime soon - if at all.

There are 48000 collectables Imagine if there were actually that many things to grab But really it's 48 hundred

I don't know how or why I got recommended this, but I played the hell out of this game as a kid and really enjoyed this. Gonna check out some more of your videos!

Thank you for this video. This is the BEST critical assessment of this game I've ever seen. Flawed game, yet still charming and great in it's own ways, especially for people who grew up playing it (such as myself).

Ahhh yes, Christmas 1999. I was 3 years old and would open up a N64, and a copy of DK64. Still one of my favorite memories to this day.

My uncle and I 100% completed this game one summer when I was a kid. It was honestly a really fun game with 2 people. Anytime I would get stuck or frustrated with a challenge then we would trade off. I’ll never forget how hard the end boss was!!! Damn

Great video! I'm so glad this finally pierced through RU-vid's recommendation algorithm, and I'm looking forward to watching more of your stuff! I was older than you when DK64 came out (16), but at the time I was a HUGE fan of the DKC trilogy and adored Banjo-Kazooie, so I was eagerly anticipating this one. I think I made it to the beginning of Crystal Caves before realizing I wasn't having much fun and putting the game down. As you point out, the problem isn't that the game is a collect-a-thon, it's that the game isn't a good collect-a-thon. I remember someone on the internet circa 2000 or so giving one example, which I think sums it up really well: In Gloomy Galleon there's a platform with instrument pads for all five Kongs, each one opening a different part of the ship with a golden banana inside. There's no challenge, no puzzle solving, no ambiguity about what you need to do, no fun or engaging gameplay, it's literally just going through the motions of opening each room one-by-one and swimming over to get the bananas. DK64 has many other problems, but that's always stuck out to me as the biggest distillation of everything wrong with the game. Regarding the glitches/broken section, I definitely see the point you're making, but I think the main issue people have is that it's indicative of the game and its development in general. The game has WAY more glitches and bugs than Banjo or any other similar mid-to-high profile game of that era, and certainly any other Rare game at the time. Yes, in a vacuum that's not going to affect most playthroughs, but I think that's missing the point. The presence of all that stuff points to a rushed, haphazard development cycle, and a team that was either flying by the seat of their pants, showing their inexperience, or didn't have time to test and fix stuff before it was time to push the game out the door. It's not that the glitches are going to crop up for most people, it's that for anyone on the fence about the game, or anyone wrestling with their opinion, it's another indication that it wasn't made with the same level of care, expertise, or design/programming knowledge that people had come to expect from the "Rare" name at the time (as admirable as the team's ambitions may have been). I think that's valid. Anyway, not sure if you'll see this, but I love that you're an information sponge for the design, history, and discourse surrounding these games the same way I am. Subbed and will definitely be watching more of these :)

Been following you since I saw your Banjo Kazooie review almost one year ago! Keep up the good work!

Playing this again now. Love it! They don't make em like they used to.

This was a really satisfying watch! Holy moly. I remember these games well, growing up. I'm so so glad RU-vid recommended this to me. This was fun. Thanks for making this.

Just bought an n64 yesterday to play this game. I'm pretty excited about it.

I absolutely loved this game as a kid, and now? Still love it.

Great retrospective, just as the Banjo ones! Hopefully you keep making more retrospectives because these are awesome. Subbed!

This was an excellent video! Breaking it down objectively and subjectively in separate categories. Very detailed and very well editing. Well done!

Binging all these retrospectives, such great work! So much coverage and measured critique. As a kid i spent 3 years and 62(!) Hours getting 101%. At the time i thought that was insane, these days 62 hrs in a game seems like rookie numbers!

This was the greatest DK game ever made. I sank shameful hours into this thing and loved every minute of it. Nuff said. ✌️

I don't have any childhood nostalgia for this game, but I tried it on the Wii u a couple years ago and I liked it quite a bit. it's flaws were pretty apparent but the amount of charm that each Kong had kept me engaged. "A game being broken and a game being easy to break are not the same thing." Well said! I'd say the same thing about Sonic Adventure.

You def deserve more subs, I really enjoy your vids, and your voice is perfect for these, and it's nice to listen to a straight forward retrospect.

My siblings and I couldn't finish the game for 10 years because of the Rare and Nintendo coins were rally hard to get for us back then. Nowadays, I think I could do everything by myself but, goddamn, is a lot... The bosses were super fun, that one for sure.

I honestly love the DK rap. Memes aside, it shows and represents each of the Kongs extremely well, and the animation makes it a joy to watch! Yooka Laylee's "attempt" at a rap similar to that, has no love or care into it.

Dude this was such a comprehensive video and I agree with so much of it. The worlds in dk64 are surely not perfect but they definitely have a charm that you don't get even in lots of banjo worlds

For a channel this small, the amount of effort put into the videos is crazy, love your stuff!

Cannot lie, my cousin and I ADORED this game when we were kids. We obsessed over it, drawing all the bosses and my cousin drove himself nuts playing the DK arcade

I have so much nostalgia to this game. I love it as a normal game and a speedrun

Here it is! Been waiting for a while for this one, glad it's out.

Just discovered your channel after this vid was recommended to me. I’ve been binging your videos ever since and I really hope to see this channel grow.

Me and my brothers LOVED the multi-player. We used to play one of the maps that had secret caves hidden behind the walls and we'd claim certain ones as our "homes". We'd collect things and occasionally go back and forth between doing house wars and calling truces to play more house and goof off. There was also a giant log tower in the middle and sometimes we'd have gladiator matches or someone would troll by chucking a ton of grenades around the map. It was silly but a ton of fun as a kid!

Jeez why don't you have more subs? Well Done for such a good review bro

I love DK64. Did when I was younger and still do.

Love the videos, man! The attention to detail makes them so enjoyable :)

Normally these small channel video game reviews/retrospectives are surface level analyses and pop rumors. You did a lot of work making this and this shows. Thank you.

Pokemon Sword and Shield: Some crap pushed out to make money off kids. DK 64: Actually a game, from project to product.

Played through dk 64 last year again on my n64 still holds up for me. Im not big on graphics in games i still play my nes now and again lol

The conclusion about nostalgia pretty much perfectly summarized my feelings on this game. I know it has problems - Objective ones at that - but somehow I just can't hate it or even dislike it. My nostalgia is just too strong and I just fondly wander through the worlds, collecting all the bananas along the way. Great video!

That moonjump caught me way off guard lmfao. It’s like angry gorilla throws a fit and than says F*ck you gravity! 🤣

I skipped this one growing up, and while there are some problems, after playing it for the first time 2 years ago I have to say there is a lot to like. I love the visuals... the lighting in particular. I don't think you have to have nostalgia for it to enjoy it.

Obviously again, I know nothing about Donkey Kong 64 as I didn't grow up with the 64 but what really stood out to me was that last paragraph. Nostalgia is often looked at negatively as you and I both test our own nostalgia for different games. But that doesn't mean nostalgia is a bad thing and you can replay a game that you enjoyed in the past see it's problems more clearly after breaking the game down today but still enjoy it regardless. This game to me, looks janky as hell xD But it was really awesome to hear this in depth break down, acknowledge the problems and still say, hey I still really like this game. This was a great video mate

I mustve played this game for hundred of hours as a kid...never got very far...but I have many fond memories. I was very shy as a kid, and Mario and Donkey Kong were my friends. I loved the video! Great info!

Just found your channel through your Banjo Retrospective Series recently. Really enjoy your stuff!

Love this game, a switch 3d Donkey Kong/spiritual successor to this would be so good!

I don't really see anything wrong with loving this game. Thanks to a majority of negative reviews over the years it seems like it's a crime to even like this game. It just feels like those reviews focused more on the negative while ignoring the positives at the same time. In most cases it just boils down to them saying it's nothing like Banjo Kazooie or Super Mario 64. Did they ever consider that maybe DK64 was trying to do its own instead of emulating the success of those games? It;s why i never took the negative reviews seriously no matter how credible they seemed. Also to those who say it killed the collectathon seem to forget that RARE was the one who mostly making games for this genre at the time. If anything it was Microsoft that killed the genre when purchased RARE.

I would love to see another open world Donkey Kong game, in this vein. It may or may not be a collectathon, but I think there's a lot of potential. They could always go full Metroidvania and have the Kong abilities unlock new areas, on their own.

I played this game with my brothers as a kid and part of the fun was assigning a Kong to a brother and letting them play out the parts that were theirs. It really brought us together to beat the game as a team and for that alone, this game beats any of its kind in my eyes. Also the multiplayer parts are hilarious fun with the right minded group of tenacious teenagers, I can't remember how many gut busting laughing moments we had just screwing around with the Kongs. Man gaming used to be fun lol That statement comes from an Older brothers perspective. I see myself less engaged with recent titles because not many of them have that multiplayer on the couch feel anymore and I think the gaming environment has just shifted in a more isolated or over the net experiences.

The quality of your videos is astounding!

To this day I just still enjoy DK64 more than I do Mario 64.

Only 23 subs left until 1000 subs! You deserve it man. Great videos.

It's nice to see someone actually not over exaggerate the required amount to 101%. The amount of times I've seen people try to make out like you have to get every banana coin, or all 500 bananas in the 7 stages happens a little too often and is very misleading when people do that. Yes DK64 has a lot of stuff to collect, but it never expected players collect absolutely everything. Great video!

08:25 Wow, that *is* an enormous number. 😅

Great review! I played this game recently and really enjoyed it. I've never played it before nor any other Rareware 3d platformer. It can be a tedious game though. The ability to switch characters on the fly whenever you want with a button say... The D-pad might have helped cut down the tedium. I think one of the problems is that people who played the previous N64 3D platformers were going into this with huge expectations when it was brand new. They were also burned out by 3d collectathons. As someone who has never experienced that I really liked the game. I think when I go to pick up Banjo and Banjo Tooie those will be a breeze in comparison.

As a kid, when time is plentiful, I love this game. I loved exploring, fighting bosses, etc. As an adult, my time is at a premium, and the backtracking gets annoying. All those memorable moments of getting to use your cool powers is shown for what you called ID cards, you just remembered them being longer or more plentiful because they were cool, but as you pointed out, you only get to become Rambi and Engarde once each. When I was having my ex play through Banjo-Kazooie, I also planned on her playing Tooie, but I wasn't going to make her play DK64. I wouldn't wish that on someone now.

Great video and just subbed. Looking forward to more videos as in depth as this. I love DK64 personally. Collecting all the items never bothered me as I enjoyed it.

I don't care what the internet says. I love DK 64, I've loved it since I got it for Christmas in 1999. The only games I liked more on N64 were Ocarina Of Time and Majora's Mask, for obvious reasons. I don't care about it's flaws, find me a collectathon at the time that didn't have any. I understand why people like Banjo and Kazooie more, it's also very excellent but there's just something about DK 64 that just wins in my book.

"Moving past nostalgia"? Where did you get these kinds of powers?

I’m so relieved that I’m not the only one who was scared of the Krosshair guy who yelled “Get out!”

Fun Fact about the lag, the game will increase your movement speed to try hiding the lag. The Wii U version gets rid of the lag, but some of the challenges were designed with the speeding up in mind, making some of them near-impossible.

I feel like a lot of the criticism is either due to the limitation of the console (lag/needing expanded memory) or the fact that 3D platformers were brand new with this gen of consoles. Developers were still working on a completely new way of producing game play and therefore the game play has flaws. Spyro comes to mind as well.

Yesss excited about this one

Great review! Very well put together - excellent writing and commentary

Late to the party here but this was an exceptional video and I especially appreciated the conclusion and your thoughts on nostalgia as a whole.