#0024 Donkey Kong

In 1981, a small toy company out of Japan was having a hard time breaking into the gaming industry. They had some small success by releasing home Pong clones, small LCD portable gaming devices, and even a few arcade games such as 1979's Space Fever or Radar Scope. All of which had limited, or no success. The president at the time realized that video games were the future, and that if he wanted his little company to go anywhere, he would have to get in on a piece of this action. So he asked one of his industrial designers if he could create a new game to replace those unsold Radar Scope cabinets. He said he could, and what followed was the beginning of a new era for that small toy company, and almost overnight, new characters were created, a genre was born and this small toy company would one day go down as one of the greatest video game companies of all time. That company, was Nintendo. That industrial designer was Shigeru Miyamoto. And the game, was Donkey Kong.

So yeah, Radar Scope, the game that came before this, was a total failure. So much so that Hiroshi Yamauchi, the ever ruthless business man saw that if Nintendo was to succeed, it need something that stood out. They were actually trying to secure the rights to Popeye, but it never really went through, and they took this opportunity to create new a new Intellectual Property. While Miyamoto had several ideas for games, he settled on a game about a Gorilla/Carpenter/Girlfriend love triangle to make it easier to convert from the Popeye game. Bluto became Donkey Kong, Popeye became Jumpman, and Olive Oyl became Pauline. Yamauchi insisted on an American name since most business at the time was still in America. Miyamoto wanted a cool American name for his game, he decided to name it after the gorilla character, since he felt that this character was the strongest. He basically looked in his Japanese to English dictionary for something that would mean “stubborn gorilla” so he named it “Donkey Kong”. The tiny office of Nintendo of America at the time thought that this game would be a disaster and would ultimately spell out their unemployment, but despite their pessimism, the game was an instant success. It invented a genre, marked the introduction of two of the most famous video game characters, and put Nintendo on the map as a video game company.

After the game was released, Universal Pictures decided they wanted a piece of this Donkey Kong pie that was sweeping the nation. They claimed that Donkey Kong was a trademark infringement of King Kong, the plot and characters of which Universal claimed for their own. But that... Wasn't entirely true. See, back in 1975 when they were going to do a remake of the movie, Universal argued that RKO no longer held the rights to King Kong because it was made in 1933 and was in the Public Domain (but if that was the case, wouldn't it be okay to play on YouTube without issue?). They won that case on those grounds and then had the BALLS to come to Nintendo and tell them to fork up some money over rights they never owned in the first place. This wasn't the Nintendo we know today. Back in 1981 it was little more than a couple of offices and a tiny American headquarters. Most businesses that small would have cowered in fear of being sued by such a huge corporation such as Universal, but Yamauchi, refused to back down and took the case like a samurai took to battle. A man by the name of John Kirby (coincidence?) represented Nintendo at the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York. Kirby argued the differences between Donkey Kong and King Kong. He also argued that Universal had no rights to the film as they had successfully sued RKO Pictures in 1975 where they proved that the name and plot to King Kong was in public domain. The court ruled that Universal had no rights to the name and even if they did, that Donkey Kong was a parody of King Kong at worst. And to this day Nintendo holds exclusive rights to Donkey Kong.

Whew! That was quite a history there. But, being Nintendo, I thought the game deserved the justice. So, after two pages of history, just what is this legendary game about anyway? In Donkey Kong you play as a carpenter named Jumpman (later Mario), who owned a pet gorilla named Donkey Kong. But Jumpman was a real asshole and mistreated poor Donkey. The ape escaped and stole Jumpman's girlfriend Pauline. Your goal is to rescue the girl from Donkey Kong while avoiding barrels, fireballs, pies, weird springs, basically, nearly everything in this game besides umbrellas and purses are trying to kill you. You must clime each structure to reach Pauline at the top.

Nintendo, even back in 1981 was being innovative to the gaming industry. This was the first arcade game to have a real story that unfolded onscreen. Yeah, you know that thing that nearly EVERY game has now? Yeah, that started with Donkey Kong (as far as arcade games go at least). Donkey Kong was also one of the first games to feature the joystick on the LEFT side and the jump button being on the right. I remember looking through an old arcade magazine from the early 80's and they actually sited this as the games only flaw when reviewing it. It was also the first platformer, and one of the first to have real music that played throughout the game and not just at the title screen, it was the first game to have different levels that were visually and distinctly unique. Basically, this game was YEARS ahead of it's time, and one of the most influential games of all time.

So how does such a legendary game hold up after 33 years? Maybe this is the nostalgia talking. From spending hours in Frantic Factory trying to get the Golden Banana from the Donkey Kong arcade game, but I love this game. I mean, I love playing new games that I'd never even heard of, but it's nice once in a while to play a familiar game. It was like a breath of fresh air to play something so nostalgic. And the game was just as good as I had remembered it. The controls are simple, yet effective, the levels are creative and colorful, the characters are fun and lively. Overall, it's really fun and playing all the way to the end, no matter how hard it is, is a very rewarding experience.

I've been rambling on for four pages now and I still haven't covered everything this game has done. I honestly recommend playing it for yourself if you can find it, you will not be disappointed. And welcome to the video game industry Nintendo. I'll look forward to seeing you in the future.

Next up: Qix