Here we are again! Another Donkey Kong review that someone did not get to! This was my second wii game and stands as one of my all time favorites. This Donkey Kong was not like all the others and is one of the few games that I feel accurately shows Donkey Kong's strength and power. I wish Nintendo would do more of these, but unfortunately they keep making the Donkey Kong countries. I absolutely loved the style of this game and have grown to become quite the master. I even got good enough to fight the Kong of the Mountain battle (where you fight all 4 Kong enemies and ghastly king in one level with 500 banana points.) without taking one little scratch! That was awesome! Getting a little bit off track here, so without further ado, I present my review of Donkey Kong Jungle Beat.

Graphics: The graphics of this game are awesome. Some of the better graphical moments include the Kong battles, space level (of course!) and the ocean levels. The levels were all designed very beautifully, and there is not one character that is not a masterpiece of design. The cactus king was very well designed (though I must say he is quite creepy) The creators awe you with levels that can take place in space, in the jungle, ocean, in a tree, a volcano or even the arctic. I like how they do the little intro to the levels. In the battle for storm hill, you can see the rain as it hits Donkey Kong and you can see his hair blowing in the wind. Probably a better one though is the battle with Ninja Kong (at least I am pretty sure that is what his name is) In the course of the battle, as the rain hits them, you can see it as it turns to steam. That was a great way to show that things were heating up! I enjoy the little cut scene at the end of the two levels of the world where they show you the enemy that will be the boss. Another thing is the deaths, well not the deaths themselves, but if you should happen to be carrying one of those little exploding pineapples (since when does fruit explode?) and you die, as you do the falling scene, you will see that Donkey Kong actually still has the pineapple on his head. The reason that I mentioned that is the fact that I think that they did a good job paying attention to a little detail like that. They could have just ignored it and showed the regular death scene, but they did not.  I also like the fact that a little tear drops from the donkey Kong symbol's eye when you die. That was pretty ingenious.  Really, everything was extremely well done and I cannot find any flaws with the graphics. They undoubtedly deserve a 10.

Sound: The sound was really good! I loved every ounce of the music, sound effects, tunes that would play as you did or entered different things; it was all awesome. I liked the sounds during the battle--especially the Kong battles. They really made some realistic punch sounds that made it feel like you were really kicking this boss's tail. All the music was good, probably one of my favorites, though was the battle with cactus king. That music just felt epic, and made the huge boss that much more awesome to fight. There is one tiny little thing that can get on my nerves sometimes. When start getting some high combos and a lot of points, you will here multiple voices that are cheering for you. The only thing is that it can sound like chanting and can be irritating, but not all the time, only when you can hold the combo throughout the entire level. After a minute it can get a little old. One sound that I really like though is the air grab. It is just so satisfying to hear that you are getting all those bananas! The sound wave is also a really good one. I will say this though, the sound effect for the helibirds really does not make any sense to me...but it is funny. When you ride flurl, they make it sound like he is spitting out bubbles or something like that. I like some of the sounds that you just here from  going past characters in the game, like the Helibird. They just kind of squawk at you to let you know "Hey I am over here!" A really good sound though is from the orcas that you can find in the pristine seas. They have such a soothing little squeal that they let out that almost seems to let you know that they are on your side. The paradise sky level music level really sounds like party music--which seems appropriate. Even though the cheering/chanting bit can get on my nerves, all of the other sounds are really good, and I still feel compelled to give the sound guys a 10 for their work.

Addictiveness: There is no way that this game can earn any less than a 10 for the addictiveness. Everything that is good about this game combines to make one of the best games ever--at least the best Donkey Kong ever for sure--The gameplay is fun and unique. And when you win this game, you really feel as though you are on top of the world as master of all the kingdoms. I have played this over and over--even after mastering every aspect of the game.

Story: Well, there really is not too much of a story line, other than a bunch of bad guys came along, stole all the bananas, and took over the jungle. I do have to give them credit, though that they did not use the same old King K Roole. That is better than what Mario has been able to pull off anyways. It is good that they tried to develop the story indirectly with those little cut scenes that give you a silhouette of the next boss. This at least gives you the feeling that you are going somewhere in the game and that there is a story. The way that they made the most story of this game was actually through the levels themselves. It made it feel as though that you were controlling the story. You could choose to talk to the monkey and find out what was going on or not. It really was a somewhat unique thing for me to see in a game like this. Even though there really is not much of a story, what they did with it and how they developed it was pretty good. I would have to give the story a 7.

Depth: Nintendo just seems to have a knack for making more things open up for you when you play more and more. For every level except the bosses, you can try to collect as many bananas as you possibly can. For the boss levels, your goal is to take down the boss without losing very many banana points. If you collect 200 bananas by the end of that kingdom, you will earn a crest, there is also one at 500, but there is also one that Nintendo sneakily decided not to tell us about, and I do not want to spoil their secret. But if you collect all three crests...well I shall just say that the more you play, the more you can play! I think I may have already let the cat out of the bag twice, but oh well...The game really has a lot to do and a lot of things that you can master. I myself mastered all the barrels of the game and have played it through a couple of times since. I just love how you can pull off different stunts to increase your combos and earn a lot of bananas. There is one level that I can play through the entire way without dropping the combo! By the end of the level, I wind up with a combo of 15 (maybe even higher, but only by a couple digits) and like, two or three thousand bananas! There are a lot of different things that you have to master in this game to become one of the best, and that is one of the things that I love about it. There are a lot of things that enhance the game play sometimes. First, we have Flurl, that odd looking cat-squirrel thing that can let you hover for great distances. There is also the Helibird, as I had mentioned earlier, this guy, of course lets you fly through the level--though quite slowly, because Donkey Kong is so heavy! (Maybe he should lay off the bananas for a while!) There are also the orcas (killer whales) that I had mentioned earlier. Come to think of it, he might actually be called Orco. These guys will take you along a set path to new places in the ocean. There is also that buffalo thing that you are able to ride in some levels. I am not sure what he is called right now, but he has got quite a mean run on him. He is great for those Olympic type jumps where you have to see how far you can go. There is one more vehicle-type enhancement...the bubble. Yes, as silly as this may sound, Donkey Kong can be contained in a bubble (as long as he does not move around too much!) You use the wii remote tilt to roll the bubble back and forth as it continues to steadily rise. All of the enemies have a different strategy for defeating them, and some of them you can hitch a ride on. It is all of these things put together that make for the number 10 rating that I give the depth department. 

Difficulty: The first time around, I struggled with this game forever! But now that I have mastered the whole thing, it seems like a piece of cake. If you are not used to this fast-paced style of game play where you sometimes have to make split second decisions to keep that combo climbing, it can be extremely tough. Some of the bosses were tough for me to figure out, such as the first hog boss that I battled. I could not seem to figure out that I could de-electrify his watermenlons...whoops! I had better not say any more! I should wrap things up here before I get banned for being a blabbermouth in my reviews! Anyways, the game has a lot of different points and concepts that take a lot of work to master, so I would definitely rate this about an 9.

Sheesh, you keep pulling together so many long reviews in such a short amount of time. This one is great, though I think that you could have made it a bit better if you had broken down some of the categories into multiple paragraphcs to make it look cleaner. Other than that, I love this review because it's full of detail and effort.

However, did you forget to give this one an overall grade and addictiveness?

I never played this game, but it sounds like it can be a lot of fun.

zanderlex : I actually just realized that I had forgotten to do the addictiveness while I was doing another review...I came back here and found that you had noticed that too. If only I had remembered...could have gotten a few more Viz...

Wait a minute... So you are already working on another review? Sheesh, you're just like me back before I ran out of games to review.