The First Mario Game and a Platforming Classic
Donkey Kong is the 1981 classic arcade title that put both protagonist Mario and the game designer Shigeru Miyamoto on the map, not to mention Donkey Kong himself. The plot is at heart a video game version of King Kong, a fact which lead to an unsuccessful trademark infringement lawsuit against Nintendo in 1982. The protagonist Mario (called Jumpman at the time) has to save his girlfriend Pauline, who has been kidnapped by the giant ape Donkey Kong and carried up a building under construction. All of this is realized in a world with a charming art style and appealing colorful graphics, particularly the dynamic mix of red and blue on Mario himself against the black background.
During the game Mario must traverse four screens of platforming action while Donkey Kong throws various hazards at him, like the infamous barrel, to block his progress. It culminates in one of gaming’s early final boss battles on the fourth screen before starting your progress over again on the first screen. Donkey Kong is another old arcade title that loops the game until an artifact in the code ends the player’s run on a kill screen. The popularity of playing to the kill screen and competing for the highest score increased in 2007 with the release of the movie The King of Kong: A Fistful of Quarters, which focused on players competing for the top spot and introduced the classic arcade subculture to a wider audience. This makes Donkey Kong a choice game for those interested in getting high scores on games from this era of the arcade.
The bottom line is that the gameplay of Donkey Kong set the industry standard for jumping mechanics and high quality platforming. It introduced a little more storytelling into the medium’s presentation as well. It’s also the first Mario game. These qualities make Donkey Kong an essential game to play for anyone interested in the history of Mario games, Donkey Kong games, platforming, or even just Nintendo’s games in general.
