Donkey Kong Country 2: Diddy's Kong Quest is a 1995 platform game created by Rare and published by Nintendo for the Super Nintendo Entertainment System (SNES). It was released on 21 November 1995 in Japan, 4 December 1995 in North America, and 14 December 1995 in Europe. It is the second part of the Donkey Kong Country series and the follow-up to Donkey Kong Country (1994).
Players control Diddy Kong and his girlfriend, Dixie Kong, who must rescue Donkey Kong after he is kidnapped by King K. Rool. The game takes place on Crocodile Isle, which includes eight worlds with different environments and 52 levels total. The game uses the same Silicon Graphics (SGI) technology as the original, which includes pre-rendered 3D imagery.
Diddy's Kong Quest received praise and is considered one of the greatest 2D platformers of all time. It was praised for its graphics, gameplay, and soundtrack. It was the second best-selling game of 1995 and the sixth best-selling game on the SNES.
The game was re-released for the Game Boy Advance (GBA) in 2004. It was also available to download on the Virtual Console for the Wii in 2007 and for the Wii U in 2015. It was followed by Donkey Kong Country 3: Dixie Kong's Double Trouble! in 1996.
Gameplay
Donkey Kong Country 2: Diddy's Kong Quest is a 2D side-scrolling platformer where players control Diddy Kong or Dixie Kong as they complete 52 levels across eight different worlds. The main goal is to rescue Donkey Kong from King K. Rool. The game includes many enemies, such as land-based Kremlings, rats, porcupines, bees, and vultures. Underwater enemies include pufferfish, stingrays, starfish, and piranhas. Each world ends with a boss fight that must be won to advance. Players can defeat enemies by jumping on them, rolling over them, or throwing barrels or other items. If a character is hit, they run away, and control switches to the other character. Players can retrieve their partner from barrels marked "DK." If both characters are defeated, the player loses a life and restarts from the beginning of the level or the last checkpoint, which is a star-painted barrel. If all lives are lost, the game ends with a "Game Over."
Diddy Kong moves faster, while Dixie Kong jumps higher and can spin her hair to glide. Players can pick up and throw the other character in any direction, like throwing a barrel. The game includes "animal friends," returning from the previous game. Playable animals include Squitter the spider, Rambi the rhino, Rattly the snake, Enguarde the swordfish, and Squawks the parrot. These animals have special abilities, such as Rambi charging at enemies, Squawks flying and spitting eggs, and Rattly jumping very high.
Some levels include environmental effects like fog, rain, and thunderstorms. Other levels have unique features, such as underwater sections, a roller coaster shaped like a skull, grappling vines, and beehive levels with sticky honey. Barrels can push players in any direction. Checkpoint barrels help players restart from specific points, while other barrels offer temporary invincibility or an "animal friend." Hidden barrels, breakable walls, and cannons can lead to bonus games where players complete challenges, such as defeating all enemies to earn a "Kremcoin." Some barrels can only be activated by specific characters. Players can earn extra lives by collecting balloons, gathering 100 bananas, or collecting four letters that spell "KONG."
Players can achieve a maximum completion score of 102% by finishing all levels, defeating all bosses, completing bonus challenges, collecting all DK coins in the Lost World, and visiting each of the four Kong family members at least once.
This game marks Dixie Kong's first appearance in the Donkey Kong series. Other characters include Cranky Kong, who lives in the "Monkey Museum" and shares game secrets and jokes. Wrinkly Kong, Cranky's wife and Donkey Kong's grandmother, runs "Kong Kollege," an educational center that helps players. Swanky Kong hosts a game show where players answer questions to earn extra lives. Funky Kong provides an airplane to revisit completed worlds. Players can also meet Klubba, a large Kremling at "Klubba's Kiosk," who requires 15 Kremkoins to access the Lost World and a secret level.
Plot
After the events of Donkey Kong Country, Donkey Kong is resting on a beach when he is suddenly attacked by the Kremlings. He is captured and taken to Kaptain K. Rool, who demands the Banana Hoard as a ransom. This hoard is something Kaptain K. Rool previously tried to steal but failed. Diddy Kong and Dixie Kong decide to travel to Crocodile Isle, the Kremlings' home, to save Donkey Kong. During their journey, they receive help from various animals to fight Kaptain K. Rool. Diddy and Dixie eventually defeat K. Rool, freeing Donkey Kong. K. Rool escapes, and later, Diddy and Dixie face him again in the Lost World, a hidden area on Crocodile Isle powered by a geyser. They defeat K. Rool once more, causing him to fall into the geyser. The geyser becomes blocked and explodes, leading to the collapse of Crocodile Isle. The Kongs watch as K. Rool escapes on a small boat.
Development and release
The development of Diddy's Kong Quest started soon after Donkey Kong Country was released but before it became popular. Employees at Rare, the game company, wanted to create new ideas. Rare’s founder, Tim Stamper, directed the game, while Brendan Gunn, who had worked on the original Donkey Kong Country, returned to help with the design. Because some experienced gamers said the first game was too easy, Donkey Kong Country 2 was made more difficult. Several names were considered for the game, including DK Rescue!, Diddy's Day Out, Diddy's Wild Country, and Diddy's Wild Frontier. The final name, Diddy's Kong Quest, was chosen to play on the word “conquest.” The game was announced at E3 1995. A version for the Virtual Boy was planned but never released.
Like Donkey Kong Country, Diddy's Kong Quest uses technology from Silicon Graphics (SGI) and Advanced Computer Modelling (ACM) to create 3D objects and turn them into 2D images for the game. The pirate theme and level design were inspired by Gregg Mayles’s interest in the Golden Age of Piracy. The team tried to keep the fast-paced feel from the first game but made the gameplay less linear and more open for exploration.
To surprise players, the team chose Diddy Kong as the main character instead of Donkey Kong. Gregg Mayles, who was 23 during development, said the team felt confident enough to make this change. The game kept the mechanic of controlling two characters, which led to the creation of Dixie Kong. While Donkey and Diddy Kong played similarly, Dixie was given different abilities to encourage players to switch between characters. Dixie could hover and descend slowly. Steve Mayles modeled and animated her. The decision to include a female character was made before adding her ponytail, which was originally meant to create a trailing effect when she ran. The idea of using her ponytail like a helicopter blade came later. Because creating new models was time-consuming, Dixie’s design was based on Diddy’s model, with a ponytail, different clothing, and more feminine features. Nearly 50 names were considered for Dixie, including Didene, Dee, Daisy, and Ducky. The team first chose Diddiane but later settled on Dixie. Shigeru Miyamoto, a Nintendo designer, helped create the characters, as he had for the first game. He suggested adding a logo to Dixie’s beret, and Rare included a small version of their own logo in early promotional art. The character of Candy Kong, Donkey Kong’s fiancée, was removed from the game due to Nintendo’s concerns about her design. The decision to have Diddy and Dixie ride animals instead of clinging to a parrot was made to improve gameplay and reduce the parrot’s movement limitations.
Donkey Kong Country 2 was released worldwide in late 1995. In Australia, Nintendo sold a special bundle called the Donkey Kong Country 2 Pirate Pak, which included the game and an SNES console.
The soundtrack for Diddy's Kong Quest was composed by David Wise and released as The Original Donkey Kong Country 2 Soundtrack in the United States. The music shares similarities with the first game, using strong percussion and a mix of genres like big band, disco, and hip hop. The melodies are mostly humorous but sometimes sad. Some themes resemble music by Vangelis and Phil Collins. David Wise said his inspiration came from Koji Kondo’s music for Mario and Zelda, Geoff and Tim Follin’s music for Plok!, and 1980s film soundtracks. The orchestral style of Donkey Kong Country 2 was influenced by Russian composers like Prokofiev, Tchaikovsky, and Mussorgsky to match the game’s darker tone. The music was made for the SNES’s SPC700 chip to sound like a Korg Wavestation synthesizer.
The game’s soundtrack was remixed by a group called OverClocked ReMix in a project called Serious Monkey Business. The final track, “Donkey Kong Rescued,” was remixed by David Wise himself, with Grant Kirkhope playing electric guitar and Robin Beanland playing trumpet.
Reception
When the game was released, stores had trouble keeping up with the high demand. Diddy's Kong Quest sold a total of 4.37 million copies in the United States and Japan on the SNES. In Japan, 2.21 million copies were sold, and 2.16 million copies were sold in the United States. It was the second best-selling game of 1995, after Yoshi's Island, and the sixth best-selling game on the SNES.
The game received strong praise from critics and won several Game of the Year Awards. The SNES version has an overall score of 92% on GameRankings. The Virtual Console re-release and the Game Boy Advance version both have scores of 80% on GameRankings and Metacritic, respectively.
Reviewers praised the game’s graphics and gameplay. Scary Larry of GamePro said the game was longer, had better graphics, and was more fun than the original Donkey Kong Country. He gave it a perfect score of 5/5 in all categories (graphics, sound, controls, and fun) but noted some levels were too hard for younger players. Aaron Kosydar of AllGame said the graphics were better than the original game. Dan Whitehead of Eurogamer said the graphics were similar to the first Donkey Kong Country game but called them "impressive." He also said the sequel did not show much new creativity, using the idea of "if it ain't broke, don't fix it." Frank Provo of GameSpot said the SNES version had more detailed graphics, even though they looked similar to the first game. In a review of the Game Boy Advance version, he said the graphics were richer and "livelier" than the original. In a later review, Mark Birnbaum of IGN said Diddy's Kong Quest had better detail, smoother animation, and a more varied color palette than its predecessor.
Jeff Pearson of Nintendojo said Rare improved the graphics, making character movements "smoother and more cartoon-like" compared to the original game. He also praised the background designs as reaching "newer heights" of quality. A reviewer from Cubed3 called the visuals "unbelievable" for a 16-bit game. A reviewer from Jeux Video said the game pushed the console’s limits and praised the gameplay as "pushed to a climax." In 2018, Complex ranked the game 17th on their list of "The Best Super Nintendo Games of All Time."
The music was also widely praised and is considered one of the greatest video game soundtracks ever. The track "Stickerbush Symphony" was especially highlighted. Rolling Stone called it "a dreamy, forlorn, new-age ballad unlike anything we typically heard in console mascot games." Ethan Gach of Kotaku said the track was "melancholic and reflective" but still "up-tempo enough to be a bop." He called it one of the most memorable platforming moments in the genre. Skott of Clash said the song was "good music to cook to. Or drive to," and "one of my favorite moods." Brett Elston of GamesRadar said the theme balanced "somber and inspirational" moods, as if it were "calling us to action but we're too caught up in thought to comply." Luke Winkie of Vice said the track was "one of the best songs ever written," praising its "charisma, otherworldly mystique, and some of the best MIDI sax of all time."
A sequel, Donkey Kong Country 3: Dixie Kong's Double Trouble!, was released for the SNES in 1996 and received positive reviews. In the game, Dixie Kong and Kiddy Kong must find Donkey and Diddy Kong, who are missing after exploring the Northern Kremisphere, which has been invaded by the Kremlings. This was followed by more Donkey Kong games, including Donkey Kong 64 in 1999.
After Microsoft bought Rare and ended its partnership with Nintendo, the company created a remake of Diddy's Kong Quest for the Game Boy Advance in 2004. The remake had simpler graphics due to the console’s limitations but included a more detailed story and exclusive multiplayer minigames.
The original version was released on the Wii’s Virtual Console in 2007 and later on the Wii U and New Nintendo 3DS Virtual Consoles in 2015 and 2016, respectively. It was also available on the Nintendo Switch via the Nintendo Classics service in 2020.
In the United States, the Game Boy Advance version sold 630,000 copies and earned $19 million by August 2006 (equivalent to about $28.4 million in 2024). Between January 2000 and August 2006, it was the 41st highest-selling game launched for the Game Boy Advance, Nintendo DS, or PlayStation Portable in the country.
Super Donkey Kong 2 (Chinese name: Chaoji Da Jingang) is an unofficial version of Donkey Kong Country 2 for the Famicom, made by Ka Sheng for users of Chinese "Famiclones." Game Developer praised the gameplay as "as solid as the original" but criticized the graphics and the inclusion of only four levels from Donkey Kong Country 2.