I don't know if you remember this, but back in the mid 90s playing old games was not something that people would easily admit. When the SNES and Genesis were in their prime most people would get made fun of for still playing the old 8 bit Nintendo, and the Atari was just a strange old curiosity that everybody's uncle had hidden away in his closet.
Of course the kids of the mid 90s are now the adults of today, and there's no end to the amount of nostalgia they will take in. Because of this, practically every old game franchise has gotten a modern adaptation. Maybe modern day versions of Rygar or Toejam and Earl weren't really necessary, but we've got 'em. Prince of Persia got so popular during its modern day run that it even got made into a movie with Jake Gyllenhaal doing his best Persian guy. Trust me, you don't want to see his worst. There are even some modern day revivals that keep the classic style graphics. The mere thought of this would've made a 1994 kid throw up. It was in this climate that Nintendo released Donkey Kong on Game Boy.
Even over 15 years later I think that this is a very special and important game. I was one of the last kids in the world to give up on the NES. My parents didn't make us sell off our old systems like so many others did, so I had a hard time saying goodbye to the old games. I still thought they were great. At the same time I could see the world changing around me, and I thought that in the near future people wouldn't even know of games like Berzerk, Q Bert, and Donkey Kong. Thankfully Nintendo showed us that not only were the old games still fun, but they could be expanded into whole new concepts that worked great.
So the Game Boy version of Donkey Kong shares the same name, but it is only the same as the arcade classic for the first four levels. After this Mario has to pursue Donkey Kong over 9 large worlds. There are a total of 101 levels in this game which would've been impressive on the more powerful SNES let alone the puny Game Boy. This game is an action/puzzle game where in each level Mario has to find a key and unlock the door. Sometimes this is more about outrunning monsters and sometimes it is more about puzzle solving.It has many elements of the old DK games. Mario has hammers, dodges barrels, and collects Pauline's accessories for bonus points. He also has moves that make it feel more like a Mario game. It is a great mix of styles and genres.
I had this game for years before I actually beat it. The first time was when my brother got in a car accident and we had to drive to the hospital to be with him. I think he was happy that something productive came out of his accident. This time through I had less trouble overall, but I'm happy to report that it was still quite a challenge. I died plenty of times, but I always wanted to try the particular level one more time. It has a high replay value for an action game because there are so many levels that you're likely to forget a bunch of them.
So a few months after this game Nintendo released the highly successful Donkey Kong Country on the SNES. Suddenly Donkey Kong started appearing in all the Mario spin off games as well. Then, other obsolete characters started returning. Today the classics have a place in just about every gamer's heart, and they will likely never disappear. When this game came out, though, just admitting that you knew who Donkey Kong was could get you beat up on the playground. Everyone always wants to grow up as fast as possible and throw away everything from their pasts. DK's creator Shigeru Miyamoto has done many great things in his life, but I think that the greatest may be never letting us forget how much fun we had as kids.
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