History Videogame / MarioVsDonkeyKong

** The character portrayals are a lot closer to their current characterizations as opposed to the [=GBA=] game, with more mean-spirited interactions or quips from the original being changed or replaced.

** In the first three games, there's at least one boss encounter that references ''VideoGame/DonkeyKongJr'' where either Mario or Donkey Kong hang from a series of ropes and the player must drop fruit onto DK's head while avoiding Snapjaws.

** The first game has a lives system, but if you Game Over, you'll just restart the level with five more lives and, if you were on the second section of a level, a reset score. Thing is, when you die normally, you lose the time you accumulated from the first section of the level if it was on the second, which defeats any ability to get a high score. Thus, getting a Game Over doesn't punish you any more than dying regularly would.

* DiscOneFinalDungeon: The sixth world of the first game and its remake is followed by a BossOnlyLevel with Donkey Kong, where players fight him atop a skyscaper and save three Toads, with this feasibly being where the game could have its final boss. Once DK's defeated however, he falls off the side of the building, followed by a quick ClosingCredits roll. The cutscene then resumes, where Donkey Kong crashes into a truck carrying Mini Mario toys, steals that supply, and the story continues on with Mario chasing DK through the Plus Worlds.

** The first game has DLC in the form of e-Reader cards. Both the US and Japanese games have normally inaccessible pre-loaded levels and only 12 levels can be saved at any given time to the e World, which is strange since there are more than 12 pre-loaded levels in either version (13 in the U.S. version and 14 in the Japanese, although the United States' 13 is a dummy level which doesn't exist in the Japanese version). The levels between the U.S. and Japanese are mostly different, with a few only different in minor ways, most of the levels from the U.S. version being heavily altered in the Japanese version, and some levels from the US version being replaced completely. Only five very rare cards were ever released and only in Japan. The e-Reader feature was removed from the Europe version of the game.

* RearrangeTheSong: The music for some of the games' title screens is a combination of the ''Super Mario Bros.'' overworld theme and the ''Donkey Kong'' title screen theme.
* RegionalBonus: Although there were no major gameplay enhancements, the European localization, as well as the Japanese translation of the first game added a few graphical tweaks. Unfortunately, Mario's dialogue during the credits were removed from these localizations.

** Thanks to the remake's ArtEvolution, Donkey Kong Jungle now looks awfully similar to Donkey Kong Island in ''VideoGame/DonkeyKongCountryReturns''.

* ArtEvolution: The remake of the original game brings the character models, backgrounds, and general art style more in-line with modern ''Mario'' and ''Donkey Kong'' games, particularly the Nintendo Switch ports of ''VideoGame/SuperMario3DWorld'' and ''VideoGame/DonkeyKongCountryTropicalFreeze.

** The first game (and its remake) opens with Donkey Kong sitting at home, surrounded by [[VideoGame/DonkeyKongCountry a massive banana hoard]].

** In the first three games, there's at least one boss encounter that references ''Donkey Kong Jr.'' where either Mario or Donkey Kong hang from a series of ropes and the player must drop fruit onto DK's head while avoiding Snapjaws.