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64 in 64: Episode 13

By Mento September 6, 2022 8 Comments

It's back again and about time too, and this time I'm in the mood. The mood to review some more N64 games, that is. That's right, I'm going to be bringing back 64 in 64 for another couple of months at least, inspired by Giant Bomb's sudden interest in older Nintendo properties. (Man, I wish I was set up to do a GameCube version of this feature. When are those games coming to Switch Online?) Our goal as always is to see what other games from the Nintendo 64's eclectic catalogue, or eclectalogue, are best deserving of a revival on Nintendo's own Switch Online Expansion Pak subscription tier.

But yes, it has been a while. Since the end of April, in fact, when I had to free up some time for the rigours of May Madness/Maturity/Millennials/M-whatever-I-called-it-this-year and the summer anime hijinks that followed. For as much as this series challenges my patience with some exquisite trash, it's so far been an eye-opening exploration of what made the N64 a compelling (to observe, at least) mix of the highest highs and the lowest lows in a grunchy period for pop culture around Y2k that is really only now starting to look good in comparison because it didn't have any tin-pot dictators or plagues in it.

That's my excuse for why I can't stay away from 64 in 64 forever, a hundred badly-aged sports and racing games notwithstanding, and why I'm ready to jump right back in with our first game since the break. But first! We should probably clarify the rules again:

Each episode of 64 in 64 covers two N64 games taken from the system's entire library including all the JP exclusives. I know my watashis from my bokus, so I'm sure I'll muddle through. Probably. Rakukanteki janai.
The first episode is one pre-selected by yours truly, taken from a range of classics and some less-classic guilty pleasures. The second choice I leave entirely to an impartial random selection process that nonetheless seems to hold great animosity towards me. Some real I Have No Mouth, and I Must Scream sass every time I hit that randomize button.
Each game will be played a total of sixty-four minutes; no more and no fewer. My impressions are jotted down in sixteen minute intervals, for a total of four impassioned defenses/cries for help. I'll also consider the likelihood of it joining the Nintendo Switch Online service's Expansion Pak tier, and whether or not it actually deserves to.
Given the above, we won't be considering any N64 game that is presently already available for Switch Online subscribers. Since April 30th, that list now includes the following: Kirby 64: The Crystal Shards, Pokémon Snap, Custom Robo, Custom Robo V2, Pokémon Puzzle League, and Wave Race 64. (NB: I'd already covered those first two games prior to their addition to the service.)

Finally, if you're new to this series you can find links to the previous episodes both here and in the master list at the bottom of the page: Episode 1, Episode 2, Episode 3, Episode 4, Episode 5, Episode 6, Episode 7, Episode 8, Episode 9, Episode 10, Episode 11, and Episode 12.

Donkey Kong 64 (Pre-Selected)

Rare / Nintendo
1999-11-22 (NA), 1999-12-06 (EU), 1999-12-10 (JP)
275th N64 Game Released

History: The seventh video game Rare released on the Nintendo 64, Donkey Kong 64 sees the English developers adapt the franchise that put them on so many radars - the Donkey Kong Country trilogy for the SNES - to a 3D environment, using their critically-acclaimed Banjo-Kazooie as a template for its traversal and combat mechanics and its reward-based progression format. Introducing a whole new set of protagonists to the growing Kong clan, Donkey Kong 64 divides its time between platforming challenges and mini-games and uses a circuitous, backtracking-heavy structure where its enormous stages have areas that can only be accessed by one or two Kongs at a time due to requiring specific skills to access. In essence, the game plays much more like a puzzle where figuring out who you need and where is as much a part of the objective as all the leaping and fighting; a design conceit that would be explored further in the even more abstruse Banjo-Kazooie follow-up, Banjo-Tooie.

The only thing to ever exasperate Hbomberguy more than Ben Shapiro's circular logic, Donkey Kong 64 is either held up as the zenith or condemned as the nadir of Rare's approach to 3D platformer design: that is, stacking every one of its levels with enough collectibles and other random junk to fill a whole season of Hoarders. DK64 in particular makes the Collyer brothers look like Marie Kondo. There have been infographic artists who worked with the brightest minds at NASA in an attempt to visualize just how much detritus there is to be found across Donkey Kong 64, beginning from the five hundred bananas lying around every stage - one centenary for each of the five protagonists - and moving on to the many golden bananas, banana coins, banana hammocks, banana fairies, banana grabbers, and banana medals that all provide some sort of benefit somehow and somewhere.

Needless to say, I adore this game for attending to the very small audience of obsessive-compulsive scroungers to which I belong. That affection is not universal, however, and you don't even need to leave this very site to watch a group of beleagured souls become thoroughly enervated by the game's collectathon grind in real-time. Will a single hour spent hoovering up yellow fruit be enough to exonerate it in the eyes of the Giant Bomb community? Nah, but I'll have fun and that's what matters.

16 Minutes In

I have a theory that all Rare's ancillary characters are like the utility dinosaurs in The Flintstones: limited career opportunities have forced them to take on demeaning jobs they hate. This guy is just a signpost, what else was he supposed to do? Take that Ocarina of Time gig and get bisected by Link every time he walked past?

All right, we're off. Skipping the DK rap. I only have sixty-four minutes with this game, I'm not going to burn two of them hearing about pineapple smells. However, I cannot skip the game's looooong intro as King K. Rool's mobile island fortress nears Kong Island, nor can I skip the tutorial mini-games that need to be completed before DK - the only playable character initially - can acquire the first upgrade in the game, required to get out into the open world hub. After that, I needed to visit the enormous lug K. Lumsy whose elated dancing at the prospect of being freed from his cage produces the tremors that open each new level. I barely took a step into the lobby for the first stage of the game, pictured above, when the first timer went off. Starting to think I might not make a whole lot of headway in an hour.

The tutorial did serve a purpose in getting me acclimated to the basic controls, including the always awkward 3D swimming, and the game's whole trick - as it is for most of the other Rare platformers - is that the other techniques are handed out as rewards for progress. This means the DK crew can have about twenty different abilities with their related button combinations and not necessarily lose the player in the weeds, since they're doled out (banana pun?) incrementally well after you've become acquainted with the powers already at your disposal. That said, DK64 does kind of overdo things by giving you five protagonists each with their own assortment of skills, but overdoing things is pretty much this game's whole modus operandi as we'll soon find out.

32 Minutes In

I always, always, always go the wrong way on this screen. Pressing right here will make the spotlight jump four positions to the left before settling on DK. I guess the idea is that you're moving the Kongs rather than the spotlight? Either way, it just makes a process you'll already have to repeat a hundred times even longer.

My goal for this time block was to save the second Kong family member and only other returning playable character: Diddy Kong. Rescuing the jetpacked wonder requires you first to visit Funky Kong, who has now abandoned his peaceful surfer lifestyle and now sells you guns and bombs to defend yourself with, a transformation that manages to presage post-9/11 America. Buying DK's Coconut Gun (it fires in spurts, did you know) allows him to hit coconut-emblazoned targets on walls as well as defeat enemies and pop banana balloons, the latter worth ten of the level's 100 banana total. Between those and the banana bunches, which are worth five apiece, the game keeps its amount of clutter down to... well, I won't say a minimum, but it's not filling every square inch of the geography at least. Poking around this level you're also introduced to Snide, who is attached to a set of blueprint collectibles (one for each Kong per level) that can be exchanged for golden bananas, the main progression currency. You're also told that you need those smaller bananas to feed the two guardians - a pig and a hippo - to open the way to the level's boss. Doing that nets you a key for K. Lumsy's cage, which in turn will open up a new level somewhere else. It's... a lot to take in all at once. I think I recall playing along with a notepad on my first playthrough, if only to track all the places and items I couldn't reach yet.

As if there needed to be a reminder how big these levels can get, each one has a teleport system that includes five pairs of pads that you can warp between. This cuts down on much of the running around, but it still means you have these huge areas you have to explore five times over to acquire everything. I'm torn between continuing to see how much progress I can make through Jungle Japes - probably not too much more, since the other three Kongs are trapped in separate levels - and bailing out to see more of the game. For now, I'm going to play as Diddy for a bit.

48 Minutes In

A side-view of Cranky's Lab, one of the numbered teleport pads (my N64's old so it didn't load in the number texture), and a beaver's whole ass. The rain effect here is kinda neat though, if a pointless embellishment.

My OCD assumed control once again and so I spent most of this sixteen minutes sweeping up what few items I could still get as Donkey Kong, including the potion power-up for this level which lets me access the Blast Barrel courses as well as my first banana medal, obtained by collecting 75 of the regular bananas across the level. I forget how many collectible types I've seen now and there's still more to find. After that, I jumped into Diddy's shoes and remembered that the coins I'd used to purchase Donkey Kong's gun and potion were yellow - like all coins, I stupidly figured - but for some reason these vendors only accept red coins from Diddy. That meant finding another six before I could kit him out with the same upgrades: his trademark twin peanut SMGs and a charge move used for hitting low wall switches.

Something I've come to respect while playing this game again is that you really have to build a mental map of where everything in a level is through thorough exploration because you'll probably need to come back to any given area with a specific Kong, possibly at a later part of the game when they have the necessary upgrade(s). Without an actual in-game map or much in the way of an UI giving you directions, you're left to rely on your spatial awareness and sense of direction to recall the path to any unobtained collectible. Obviously this is going to be nightmarish for many players, especially those spoiled by modern UI conveniences, so I don't see Donkey Kong 64 appreciating in value as the years go on. At least, not unless Nintendo and Rare decide to mod in a bunch of QoL stuff when it hits the Switch Online store, and I can't see either of them wanting to put in the effort for a 23-year-old game everyone denigrates. (Though speaking of mods, there is that one that lets you tag in different Kongs anywhere rather than at specific tag barrels. I didn't use it here for purity's sake, but I wouldn't be surprised if Nintendo made use of it.)

64 Minutes In

Wouldn't be a Rare Donkey Kong game without minecarts. They could've certainly tried to make a game without them, and people would've been happy, but it was not to be. It's integral to the lore that a bunch of monkeys have a thriving mineral extraction industry.

Now, I realize this thrilling minecart challenge area for Diddy Kong looks like it might come from a stage separate from the outdoorsy first one, like maybe a place that's set underground and full of tunnels and called something like Subterranean Subterfuge, but no. We're still in Jungle Japes. I just... I... look. Look.

Look.

I don't see the need to apologize for being what I am. Which is overly anal about these damn collectathons. This level still had treasures on it I could reach, and so I was compelled - honor-bound, practically - to stick around until it was thoroughly exhausted of its shinies. I actually found all of DK's - there's five golden bananas per Kong, which are what you need to open the barriers to new levels - and completing this not-great minecart mini-game (which was like the trolley problem except all the people were coins to collect and yet it was somehow every bit as stressful) would've netted me Diddy Kong's third golden banana for the stage. However, the distraction was enough to keep me away from the stage's boss and the subsequent stages (and Kongs) to come, which would've been debatably more intriguing to read about, so... well, you can see a small handful of what other content is out there across Donkey Kong Island by watching Burgle My Bananas. Or, if you're not a fan of schadenfreude, just find some screenshots somewhere I guess. As always, we leave another 64 in 64 playthrough on a very enthusiastic note.

How Well Has It Aged?: Depends. As I said mid-playthrough there's a certain amount of backtracking, confusion about objectives, and an overwhelming amount of abilities/controls to learn and remember that didn't do the game any favors at launch and will be even less well-received today in an era where games are more accessible and straightforward than ever. At the same time, there's something rewarding about a game this expansive with this many collectibles to find and challenges to overcome: it's very much not a short game, and if you were going to go full 101% completionist maniac on this rough customer expect it to take you the wrong side of 50 hours. It's punishing in a way most tough platformers aren't: while the Super Meat Boy/Celeste masocores of the world throw all kinds of reflex- and timing-intensive ordeals at your feet, Donkey Kong 64's approach is much more geared towards testing your meticulous note-taking, your capacity to maintain mental maps, and, sure, let's also say your patience. (That mod I mentioned that lets you switch Kongs anywhere might actually be indispensable if you want to keep the busywork to a minimum.) It has its problems but it's also the N64 game with the most content for you to enjoy, save perhaps a big RPG like Ogre Battle 64: if nothing else, the value proposition alone is a potent selling point.

Chance of Switch Online Inclusion: Very High. I've said this several times, perhaps with less conviction each iteration, but I'm sure Microsoft and Nintendo are still hammering out a plan to bring Rare's N64 library to Nintendo's online service; they probably just need to agree on a price. Now that Banjo-Kazooie is already available and GoldenEye 007 might be tied up in any number of movie licensing agreement issues and/or references to the presently-unpopular Russian military, Donkey Kong 64 and its kart-racer sibling Diddy Kong Racing make the most sense for Rare's next Switch Online debuts, given that both use characters based on a Nintendo franchise. More a case of "when" rather than "if".

BattleTanx: Global Assault (Random)

The 3DO Company / The 3DO Company
1999-10-12 (NA), 2000-04 (EU)
=236th N64 Game Released

History: A long time ago, a few years after the 3DO console had already come and gone and concurrently with their harrowing 500-part dramatic series on the misery and trauma perpetuated by war, otherwise known as the Army Men franchise, a little 3DO company called The 3DO Company put out a couple of semi-OK tank simulator action games on the N64. This... is the second one of those.

The 3DO company was a bold gambit by Electronic Arts founder Trip Hawkins and a coalition of moneyed types looking to break into the burgeoning CD-ROM console market in the early '90s on their own terms, developing and distributing specifications for a CD-based system that other companies, like Panasonic, would pay them to use. After its 1993 debut, the 3DO was soon overwhelmed by the popularity of Sony's PlayStation (and Sega's Saturn to a lesser extent) and the company spent the next decade instead focusing on third-party game development until they eventually went kaput. There are many theories online as to what "3DO" actually stands for as an acronym: I can tell you after some research that the D stands for "Dimensional," as in three-dimensional, while the O stands for "Oh no, all our money is gone."

BattleTanx, though, might be one of the better-regarded franchises from their otherwise cursed second-life as software developers and publishers (personally, I'm indebted to them for putting out New World Computing's heavy-duty Might & Magic CRPGs from VI onwards). I had no idea what the BattleTanx games entailed, beyond that tanks would probably feature, but the plot of this series is absolute cuckoo nonsense seemingly aimed at pre-teen boys with "no girls allowed" signs on their treehouses. In the original BattleTanx, a virus is created and distributed that kills over 99% of all female humans - like an inverted Y: The Last Man - and the few women that remain are venerated as matriarchal "Queenlords." The protagonist's wife is one such survivor, and she's spirited away by the US Government one evening which forces the hero to give chase in a tank he found. This sequel, as you might expect from the name, expands beyond the continental United States to include the rest of the world (or mostly Europe).