Follow TV Tropes

Following

Context YMMV / DonkeyKong64

Go To

1----
2* AccidentalInnuendo:
3** "His coconut gun can fire in spurts! IF HE SHOOTS YA, it's gonna hurt!"
4** The “Don-Don-Donkey Kong” jingle that plays upon collecting a [[PlotCoupon Golden Banana]] can easily be misheard as “[[GagPenis Dong-Dong]]-Donkey Kong”. This is not helped by the various “Expand Dong” memes associated with the game.
5* AnnoyingVideoGameHelper: Squawks. He likes to turn up to dump tutorials on you. Normally you can skip them without incident, but the problem arises with Lanky's Orangu-Stand Sprint. There are two barrels for it in the area where you gain the potion to use it (Crystal Caves), and one of them just so happens to be a race against the beetle from Angry Aztec. If you do the race before the cabin that has the other one, then Squawks will drop in to patronize you, and since the game doesn't freeze what's going on to let him do this, the Beetle will be long gone no matter how fast you tell Squawks to sod off, basically forcing you to restart the race to stand a chance.
6* BaseBreakingCharacter: Tiny Kong. Some fans liked her for being a spunky LittleMissBadass, while others disliked her for [[ReplacementScrappy replacing Dixie]].
7* BestLevelEver: Creepy Castle is considered the game’s best world even by its detractors, due to its more focused level design, reduced backtracking, and fun puzzles, even if navigation within the castle itself can be a pain.
8* BreatherBoss: Army Dillo in Crystal Caves, he's almost the same as in Jungle Japes except you have three melons now, making him a bit easier in that regard. The only upgrades he has are the jet pack and heat-seeking missile. Despite that, he's only a smidge harder than the first two bosses.
9* BrokenBase: The game's greater focus on exploration and item collection than [[VideoGame/DonkeyKongCountry the games that came before it]] is the single biggest dividing factor of the game. Some love it due to the humor and creative worlds that come with it, arguing the presentation and varied gameplay prevents the massive amount of collecting from becoming dull. Others hate it for feeling bloated and at times arbitrary, owing to how segmented much of it can become due to it being split between five characters.
10* CameraScrew: Basically any time you need to make a precise jump (Frantic Factory and Creepy Castle come to mind), expect to spend ten seconds lining up the camera.
11* CommonKnowledge: The Expansion Pak being required to fix a game-breaking bug or memory leak is a tale that has spread through several gaming enthusiast circles, but according to one of the game's main programmers in a Facebook group, the true purpose of the accessory was mostly to improve graphical effects, particularly those involving lighting, and in fact the Expansion Pak's inclusion was mandated from near the beginning of the game's development. While there ''was'' a critical bug discovered close to the ship date, it was still far away enough that they were able to easily patch it normally.
12* ContestedSequel: Easily the most divisive game in the ''Donkey Kong'' series. Those who love the game praise the massive amount of content and charming humor, with the similarities to ''VideoGame/BanjoKazooie'' especially appealing to fans of those games. Others despise the game for its exhaustive collecting that takes up a huge amount of its gameplay, finding it bloated and a poor disguise for the often wildly varying gameplay changes, and resent that the game is basically a dolled-up ''Banjo'' sequel instead of a proper continuation of the DKC formula.
13* CriticalBacklash: The DK Rap has gotten this over time. Upon the game's release, it was derided as one of the [[TotallyRadical cringiest attempts at "hipness" to ever grace a video game]]. IGN and many other gaming publications were quick to call it one of the worst pieces of video game music ever made, and it was even used as ammunition by a number of [=PlayStation=] fanboys in Console War debates. Over time, however, the song has developed a cult fandom for its [[NarmCharm endearing cheesiness]] and for being a good representation of the different Kongs. And it was impressive that Rare managed to fit a full-on rap song onto a Nintendo 64 cartridge.
14* CriticalDissonance: The DK Rap is frequently lambasted by critics for being a cheesy rap song, while fans view it as [[StylisticSuck deliberately cheesy]]. Many enjoy it without a sense of irony.
15* DemonicSpiders: Koshas are well-known for their giant, spiked clubs. Not only are they tougher to take down even more than Kasplats, but what makes them a pain to deal with are the said clubs. These clubs not only deal ''two'' melon slices per hit (the most out of ''any'' regular enemy and even boss in the game) but can also [[AttackReflector reflect]] one of their only weaknesses, orange grenades, back at a Kong or simply out of the way. It's even worse in later levels, where Koshas are often found alongside other Koshas and/or in tight spaces where their infamous swing attack can almost guarantee a hit. They act as a BossInMooksClothing due to their insane power (and a giant Kosha ''does'' appear as a sort of MiniBoss in Crystal Caves).
16* EnsembleDarkhorse: Mad Jack is considered a highlight not just among the game's bosses, but the ''Donkey Kong'' franchise as a whole. His design as a creepy jack in the box with a suitable laugh and a decently fun boss pattern made him very memorable to players.
17* FountainOfMemes:
18** Lanky Kong, the infamously goofy Orangutan who has become [[DepartmentofRedundancyDepartment infamous]] for his portion in the theme song.
19** The DK Rap's lyrics are infamously and religiously utilized in a variety of parody songs or YoutubePoop music videos.
20* FridgeHorror: It can be inferred that K. Rool attempting to blow up Donkey Kong Island with the Blast-o-Matic is his payback for Crocodile Isle being destroyed at the end of ''VideoGame/DonkeyKongCountry2DiddysKongQuest''. With that said, however, are there any other hospitable nations in the area besides Donkey Kong Island and Crocodile Isle, or is K. Rool attempting to eradicate all life in this corner of the ocean?
21* GameBreaker: The instruments trivialize all combat in this game. It's a screen-clearing attack that no {{Mook|s}} is able to resist, and its "ammo" can be easily restored by just finding Candy's headphones (which can be reused infinitely) or simply visiting Candy herself.
22* GeniusBonus: Lanky Kong is associated with water. Orangutans are the ONLY non-human primates, in Real Life, to actually enjoy water and swimming.
23* GoddamnedBats:
24** Zingers are as bad as ever in this game. Sure they might not be as hard to kill as in the ''Country'' games (although they're still annoying to hit), but they now compensate for that by dropping grenades on your face while having the most irritating buzzing you'll ever hear from a videogame insect.
25** The starfish enemy Shuri, mostly because you're defenceless underwater where they live. This becomes more obvious in the Splish Splash Salvage minigame, where they cause you to instantly lose if hit by them.
26** The Gnawties of Beaver Bother are irritating beyond belief, although for a [[ArtificialStupidity whole different reason]].
27* GoddamnedBoss: Mad Jack isn’t a very difficult boss but he’s extremely tedious and repetitive due to needing to jump from platform to platform as he chases you for a very long time before he becomes vulnerable. Falling off doesn’t damage you but it restarts the cycle. It doesn’t help that towards the end he becomes so fast that you have little time to jump to safety (which opens your finger up to slipping off the analog stick or misjudging a jump) and when he does become vulnerable he uses an attack that predicts what platform you’re gonna land on and is guaranteed to knock you into the pit.
28* GoodBadBugs:
29** Using Lanky's arm stretching attack, you can enter worlds with B. Locker on them, allowing you to access worlds you don't have enough golden bananas for. Chunky can do it too thanks to the Primate Punch.
30** The last Banana Fairy to be photographed is in the final room and is nearly impossible to capture on film due to her frantic flying. ''However,'' she only flies about when you're actually in the room, and you can take her picture through a window with no trouble at all. It's unclear if this is actually a glitch or a treat for thinking outside the box.
31** Using Donkey Kong's air attack while approaching a slope and then immediately using his grounded kick attack (it makes sense through actually playing) might cause him to soar through the air. It has been dubbed the "Moonkick" and is useful for sequence breakers and speedrunners.
32** [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pDeqTIWBeDE Tag Barrel Storage]]. Want to use Diddy's Rocketbarrels with Donkey Kong? Want to transform into a boulder? Want to walk around as Lanky while holding his trombone and his grape blowgun while the seasick screen effect is happening? Want to walk around with Diddy's peanut-shooting guitar? Go nuts.
33** For whatever reason, if you press all four of the d-pad buttons while in a level lobby (normally only possible on an emulator) or press each direction in a specific order[[note]] Up, down, left, right when standing near B. Locker[[/note]], the homing shot firing sound effect will play. This triggers what appears to be a [[https://tcrf.net/Donkey_Kong_64#B._Locker_Development_Cheat developer shortcut]] left in by mistake. After the homing shot sound plays, approaching B. Locker as a specific Kong (Depending on the level) will lower that level's Golden Banana requirement, allowing the player to enter the level early. This works for every stage except Jungle Japes. Oddly, entering Hideout Helm this way has the added step of needing to hit B. Locker with a Primate Punch after inputting the code.
34** It's possible for the player to walk through any wall at will exploiting a bug in the game's collision detection code, wherein the angle the game thinks the player is facing doesn't match up with the angle the walls push back the player. This is called "phasewalking", and it's an important part of speedrunning the game.
35** Another glitch that allows the player to walk through any wall at will is called lag clipping: the game lags very easily, and when it does collision detection gets very wonky. Spamming oranges creates just enough lag to allow the player to very easily phase through any given wall.
36* HarsherInHindsight:
37** The [[AnimatedOuttakes 101% ending]] has the cast of this game auditioning for a game on the Platform/NintendoGameCube - something that became awkwardly poignant when Creator/{{Rare}} was shortly thereafter sold to Creator/{{Microsoft}}, resulting in Donkey Kong only seeing spinoffs with very little of his supporting cast coming with him for the duration of MediaNotes/TheSixthGenerationOfConsoleVideoGames and a decent chunk of the [[MediaNotes/TheSeventhGenerationOfConsoleVideoGames seventh]].
38** While getting a GameOver in this game thankfully doesn't show what happens to DK Isle after King K. Rool uses his Blast-O-Matic on it as it fades to black before it fires... [[VideoGame/SuperSmashBrosUltimate 19 years later]] it becomes ''a lot'' more clear what it will do with King K. Rool's Final Smash. The Blast-O-Matic is essentially a ''giant laser gun which [[TheresNoKillLikeOverkill vaporises DK Isle on impact]]!''
39* LowTierLetdown: Rarely will you find someone who speedruns this game and also likes Lanky. This is mostly due to being attached to some of the hardest minigames and his weird hitbox and abilities being really bad for speedrunning tech.
40* MagnificentBastard: Snide was once King K. Rool’s chief technician who helped him create the Blast-O-Matic to destroy DK Isle, but when he was fired by K. Rool out of paranoia, Snide sought revenge. Secretly collaborating with the Kongs to put a stop to K. Rool’s plans, Snide is able to stall the Blast-O-Matic’s firing process long enough for them to stop the machine and eventually ensure K. Rool’s defeat.
41* MemeticLoser: Poor Lanky gets dissed by his own theme song. "He has no style, he has no grace..."
42* MemeticMutation:
43** The "[[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I4ckUXSMBiI Puzzle in the Caves]]" and "[[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-G9ChcF8qcc Demon Resident Mine Cart]]" themes have gained more notice than others [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WBuggMdUbog thanks]] [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iwuBiy98BCs to]] WebAnimation/PainisCupcake.
44** The DK Rap, which has gained fame for its SoBadItsGood quality, inspired an ExpospeakGag parody.[[note]]"The fourth letter of the basic modern Latin alphabet that represents the voiced alveolar or voiced dental plosive and the eleventh letter which represents the voiceless velar plosive. [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WdcAISQdhhA The gorilla who refers to himself as an ass is present within the facilities of this place of business.]]"[[/note]]
45** Music/SiIvaGunner also cemented the "coconut gun fires in spurts" line into memehood by playing it into DepartmentOfRedundancyDepartment territory in the [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FKDlqdsw1i8 "unused version"]].[[note]]CG! Coconut Gun![[/note]]
46** "Expand Dong", an image of DK's face with words from the boxart rearranged underneath to form the titular phrase. It's inspired a ton of penis jokes, and became the originator of its own meme style where words and letters are [[CutAndPasteNote taken]] from boxarts, dialogue, and such in other games and works to form silly or lewd phrases, such as "[[VideoGame/SuperMario64 suffer more]]" or "[[VideoGame/ShadowTheHedgehog Ow the edge]]".
47** Also popular are DK Rap edits where syllables from the song are used to say other things, essentially the auditory version of Expand Dong. For example, [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZazNbG_3m9A not funny didn't laugh]], [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v0f4RetWmeQ the original Scooby-Doo theme song]], [[https://twitter.com/vangel5541/status/1153779904443404288?s=19 Revenge]], [[http://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/468916221975199745/645474495250956328/best_song_2.mp4 September]], [[http://twitter.com/DitzyFlama/status/1209670227933351936 Last Christmas]], [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vX9NVkagtEs Happy]], [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XQPZwYHNnnk One Winged Angel]], [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N9cSaKCuaos Bohemian Rhapsody]] and even [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u-ratvu8vmQ Rap God]]!
48---> "So he's here for you/Know the words, join in too!/So you wanna clap? Take you through Monkey Rap! Donkey Kong!" (As sung to the beat of One Winged Angel)
49** One Winged Kong deserves particular mention for having inspired [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mkm8E8YVrJc Advent Country]], [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=83caHdfJOAQ Rebirth]], [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nJKeOQilDkU&ab_channel=St.Franklin Kongdom Hearts]], and [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jv4fdb3cdC8&ab_channel=St.Franklin Krisis Kore]] remixes, which get more and more threatening, with Krisis Kore stating that [[OhCrap Donkey Kong is after you]]. It's partly due to the timing of Sephiroth's invasion of ''VideoGame/SuperSmashBros'' to torment Cloud ''again''.
50** It's also become a meme on [=4chan=] to post pictures of [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TGm39CweSj4 Lanky Kong accompanied by the word "HE"]], as if to start his verse of the DK Rap. Quoting Lanky's verse is also applicable whenever anyone says "he".
51** Related to the above: [[AndIMustScream "He has no eyes with which to see,]] [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vt13gePxwDE his every waking moment is misery..."]]
52** Thanks to WebVideo/HBomberguy's livestream of the game, a few memes for it have spawned:
53*** HOW DO I BEAT BEAVER BOTHER?
54*** Donkey Kong saying "Trans rights, okay!". [[note]]Grant Kirkhope (The voice of Donkey Kong) came on the stream at one point, and was asked to say "Trans rights" in Donkey Kong's voice. While it wasn't perfect (The actual voice was made from his voice pitched down), he actually did say it. It's become a popular thing for people to say when their tweets go viral.[[/note]]
55*** #thanksgraham, used to poke fun at Graham Linehan for inspiring the livestream by trying to block a donation to trans charity Mermaids, thereby indirectly raising far more money than they would have gotten without his interference.
56** The "Where Are They Now?" parody by Music/{{brentalfloss}} has spawned a few memes of its own:
57*** 'If he shoots ya, you'll [[SubvertedRhymeEveryOccasion probably die.]]'
58*** 'SHE'S KILLING ALL THE BEES! SHE'S KILLING ALL THE BEES! We don't know why but she's killing all the bees!'
59*** 'And then there's Chunky! He's ''dead''. ''([[{{Beat}} long pause]])'' [[MoodWhiplash ...HUH! D! K! Chunky's dead!]]'
60*** 'Cranky, take it to the fridge! Cranky? Aw man, Cranky's dead too! Cranky's IN the fridge!'
61** "Mmmmmmgh"/DK grunting[[labelnote:explanation]]DK makes a noticeable grunting noise while rolling. While it's not too big a deal by itself, the fact that many {{speedrun}} tactics require almost constant rolling means that the sound gets repeated ''a lot'' during them. As you can guess, with clips of a cartoon gorilla flying through walls while sounding like he's either [[GruntingOrgasm having a really good time]] (''Website/DKVine'' refers to the audio as sounding like "a climaxing Grant Kirkhope") or is [[UnusuallyUninterestingSight just really bored doing so]], the jokes write themselves.[[/labelnote]]
62* MoralEventHorizon: K. Rool's plot tosses him over this as it involves blowing up the entire Donkey Kong Island, [[BadBoss even if his own minions are on there.]]
63* MorePopularReplacement: In stark contrast to Tiny for Dixie, Chunky Kong is universally more beloved than his brother Kiddy, with his LovableCoward and GentleGiant personality.
64* SugarWiki/MostWonderfulSound:
65** ''Ohhh, banana!''
66** The monkey sounds that show up whenever you solve a puzzle. Often followed up by the above sound.
67** "Don, Don, Don-key Kong!" Played whenever you get a Golden Banana, and certain other items.
68** DK's "YEAH" voice clip, which he uses after the aforementioned Golden Banana sound.
69** DK's voice is overall very well-received, fitting DK's laid-back tough guy persona he has in this game.
70** Two words: "WELL DONE!" Especially relieving after completing Beaver Bother.
71* NarmCharm: The DK Rap was deliberately written to be SoBadItsGood. It actually succeeded on that front to the point where people like it unironically.
72* NightmareRetardant:
73** For as horrifying as Frantic Factory's boss, Mad Jack, can be, defeating him causes him to utter out a small "Uh Oh..." while waving to the camera, before he stumbles to the ground. The [[WesternAnimation/DonaldDuck Donald Duck]] quacks he makes also kill the fear factor.
74** Dogadon loses a lot of his scariness in the cutscene where he talks to K. Rool. Despite being a giant dragonfly monster, he whines about his defeat as if he were a nerdy bullying victim.
75* ObviousBeta: While the game is largely in a sound state, it does have a few cracks:
76** You can swim through walls, dive under islands, and walk around in voids without any cheating device if you manipulate the first-person view. Beaver Bother's mechanics are also quite unpolished.
77** Especially notorious is Hunky Chunky, who can clip through almost anything.
78* {{Padding}}: The game's GottaCatchThemAll mechanic is seen as a rather notorious example of this, especially some objects can only be picked up by certain Kongs for seemingly rather arbitrary reasons, which necessitates the player to [[CharacterSelectForcing frequently switch characters]], which again is only something that be done in certain locations, if they want to accomplish it. Making things even worse is how often it happens that collectibles for one character will be hidden behind a door that only ''another character'' can open, so you can't even just scour the whole level one time each per character. Even if you are not going for [[HundredPercentCompletion 101% Completion]], it is still rather time consuming to even get to the point where the FinalBoss is unlocked.
79* ParodyDisplacement: Thanks to MemeticMutation, the "He has no style" line from the DK Rap is rarely remembered as a parody of "Vogue" by Music/{{Madonna}}.
80-->''They had style, they had grace, Creator/RitaHayworth, gave good face.''
81* PolishedPort: The Wii U release doesn't have any of the framerate lag the N64 original did, making it feel smoother, and allows players to create "restore points" so they can redo sections more quickly. The only drawback is that, because of the absence of slowdown derived from the faster pace, some parts of the game that were balanced to fit the original framerate are made more difficult than intended (though making use of the built in "restore point" feature of the Wii U's Virtual Console can help mitigate the problems).
82* ReplacementScrappy: Tiny Kong to some people, as she acts as a SuspiciouslySimilarSubstitute to Dixie Kong.
83* ScrappyMechanic:
84** The '''abundance''' of [[GottaCollectThemAll macguffin]] collection in this game has caused some tedium, which isn't helped by the fact that certain collectibles (bananas and coins, for instance) [[CharacterSelectForcing can only be picked up by a particular Kong]], even if a different Kong can reach them. Essentially, you're required to scour the same level with all five characters to get everything, making it feel like you're playing the same game five times rather than once with the team of five Kongs... and that's if you remember where those collectibles are and make efficient use of your time. Many people note that the sheer number of collectibles would actually be tolerable if you could switch characters on the fly. The ''real'' problem is the fact that it's only possible to switch through tag barrels; tag barrels that are often way out of the way of the collectibles for most of the Kongs. So, with frustrating frequency, it often goes that you'll encounter a Golden Banana with a Kong that can't collect it, have to backtrack to an out-of-the-way tag barrel, ''then'' backtrack to the banana in question, which, once collected, frequently means you'll end up going through the same cycle again soon afterwards.
85** The fact that many of the Golden Bananas are locked behind Bonus Stages. This wouldn't be a problem if the minigames were simple like the ones in the original trilogy, but this time a lot of them employ GameplayRoulette and can be a rather obnoxious chore to play through. Notable offenders include Big Bug Bash, Teetering Turtle Trouble and the infamous Beaver Bother.
86** Believe it or not, the removal of the lag in the Wii U virtual console release. Because the developers knew the original game was laggy, they designed the pace of minigames around it, this can make some minigames like Krazy Kong Klamour (the one where you shoot the banana, but not the Kongs), the second beetle race, and the second rabbit race in Fungi Forest nigh-on impossible to beat without abusing savestates or losing so the game gets easier. Ironically, Beaver Bother itself benefited from the removal of lag because it somehow killed the ridiculous EdgeGravity to the point Gnawtys can fall in by complete accident.
87** The Donkey Kong Arcade game in Frantic Factory, which must be completed twice in order to finish the game, automatically kicks the player out into the hub world when the player dies. Considering the player must pull a lever to activate the game and is preceded by a ten-second cutscene, activating the game can get very tiring and annoying fast. Fortunately, the Wii U virtual console release's save states make it significantly easier and more bearable.
88** Diddy Kong's Jetpack. While riding it freely is fun, trying to beat his two obstacle races with it can be a nightmare. Getting him into the rings is a big challenge since they are very small and hard to enter, plus the camera has a nasty habit of messing up the players' sight, making it hell to find the rings and if the player allows three to appear, the race ends. To add insult to injury if the player accidentally lands, they have to go back to the barrel to redo a race.
89* SignatureScene: The most beloved part of the game is the DK Rap segment before the game starts.
90* SignatureSong: The DK Rap. [[SoBadItsGood So cheesy and silly]]... and yet, so incredibly charming and memorable that it's still beloved to this day. It ended up being included in ''WesternAnimation/TheSuperMarioBrosMovie'' as DK's introductory song.
91* SoBadItsGood: The DK Rap, the lyrics of which composer Grant Kirkhope has admitted were written to be deliberately cheesy.
92* SuspiciouslySimilarSong: The first part of the [[https://youtu.be/4-dA0eAY4mw Creepy Castle theme]] bears more than a passing resemblance to [[https://youtu.be/AMPzbM1aIso Dauði Baldrs]] by "Music/{{Burzum}}".
93* TearJerker: The fact that Wrinkly Kong died some time between the third game and this game. [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8N3OUFv7rxA Her theme]] is also sad.
94* ThatOneAttack: The club swinging attack that the Koshas often use. Unlike their overhead swing which has a lot of start-up and, after used, the club gets stuck into the ground allowing the Kongs to easily take out the defenseless Kosha with an orange grenade, the swing attack is ''much'' more of a pain to deal with. It's fast, has a lot of range, can deflect orange grenades, and still deals two melon slices of damage. And it stuns the attacked Kong for a moment, meaning they're open to another attack potentially leading to stunlocks. Worse, Kosha appears in later levels, and tends to be found in cramped areas (most notably certain cabins and igloos of Crystal Caves) meaning their swing attack will most likely hit. This is one of the reasons why Koshas are DemonicSpiders.
95* ThatOneBoss:
96** Pufftoss. To damage the boss, the player has to pilot a little motorboat through a series of checkpoints. The problem is, it handles about as well as the hovercraft in ''VideoGame/DiddyKongRacing'', and the checkpoints get smaller and smaller, with an increasingly restrictive timer to get them all in each phase. The first phase is deceptively easy, but then it gets cruel. In the second phase, the checkpoints are still as large as the first time where it's easy, but it becomes hard because they're all next to him and he spams the player with shockwaves that stun you. In the third phase, the stars vary from close to far as they will in the last three. His shockwaves are less frequent thankfully, and disappear in the fourth and are replaced by heat-seeking missiles that do half a melon's worth of damage. The fifth stage of the battle near the end can be either almost impossible or easy, depending on if the player has enough health left to take one or two hits since the star reappears in the same location.
97** Dogadon, the second time around. The final "form" of this boss involves him pounding the battle platform into molten lava. It's unclear exactly how much HP he has in the sections where the player needs to get big with Chunky and punch him. Chunky's stronger moves seem to be less effective than [[ButtonMashing using his neutral B move over and over and over again,]] though repeatedly using his charge-up punch does the trick too.
98** King Kut-Out also qualifies for some who haven't mastered the patterns in his third stage. However, King Kut-Out becomes ''much'' easier once the player realizes that they need to shoot him when he's ''actually'' in front of them, not where the player ''predicts'' he will be. Once the player actually sees him at any of the openings, they can shoot freely; once a shot is fired he stops moving, so if he was somewhere else you'll lose a Kong, but if he was right in front of you it's a guaranteed hit.
99** While the final boss isn't a challenge with every Kong, he can be a nightmare with Lanky. The player has to hit switches with his arms, grab a barrel before it drops down and if it ends up happening, you have to do it over again, drop the barrel with the banana peel and pray that he's in the right area to slip on the banana peel. What makes this so tedious is that he can run right next to the banana peel and completely avoid it, while the player takes damage and have to do the whole thing all over again. But the player needs to do this '''four times,''' in just three minutes, meaning that every second counts as the player doesn't have any room to mess up, which is more than likely bound to happen and predicting where he'll run is very hard too in order to avoid taking damage from that. Also, since the camera automatically focuses on the boss, the player ''cannot see the buttons you're trying to hit.'' Worse yet, when the player aims for the buttons, they have to be really careful not to let Lanky start running or he'll do his moving attack instead of his punch. Lastly, if time runs out, the player starts another round with the same amount of hit points left when the round ended.
100* ThatOneLevel:
101** Frantic Factory is where the game's often criticized "corridor" level design rears its ugliest head, regardless of the presence of maps and labels to help with orientation. The place is just incredibly labyrinthine, and unlike other stages that tend to be in "open air", the factory is entirely connected though dark, closed tunnels that all look very samey, with no real landmarks or shortcuts (except for the usual bananaports) to save time between going from one place to another.
102** Gloomy Galleon, as it's one of the largest levels in the game, along with a ''lot'' of backtracking if you're attempting to get everything in it. It doesn't help that in order to obtain bananas and reach Golden Bananas, you have to change the water level very frequently. Even for those that've played it before, it'll take at least a few hours to find everything.
103** Fungi Forest is loathed for its gimmick, which is switching between day and night in order to access areas or solve puzzles. In other words, it's a mechanic similar to the [[ScrappyMechanic Tag Barrel]], where the player is forced to constantly backtrack and satisfy a certain condition (the right Kong/time) before they can properly navigate through the level. Just to make it even more irritating, the two mechanics inevitably blend together; having to switch the time of day at the clock, then find a Tag Barrel and switch to the appropriate Kong.
104** Creepy Castle qualifies solely for its complexity and elaborate puzzles. There are just too many rooms and caves to keep track of, making for a very confusing layout that's nearly impossible to memorize. It also has the audacity of featuring [[ThatOneSidequest Beaver Bother]] twice, something most completionist players do NOT look forward to.
105* ThatOneSidequest
106** Beaver Bother. It's a basic herding game where, as a Klaptrap, you have one minute to scare Gnawtys into a tiny hole in the centre of a round stage. Problem is, the collision detection for the beavers vs. the hole is a little too good, and your Klaptrap can't simply push them in, also due to collision mechanics. The Gnawtys also have a slowish respawn, and frequently get stuck on the wall. There's one game that requires you to herd 12 Gnawtys in the hole, which is difficult, but then there are two, count 'em: ''TWO'', versions that require you to herd 15. As some kind of sick joke, BOTH of them are in the same world (Creepy Castle).
107** Busy Barrel Barrage can be a real pain as well. Basically, all the player has to do is shoot the Kremlings (and later on, Kasplats) using one of the Kongs' weapons. Seems easy, right? Yeah... if it wasn't for the fact that not only will the player automatically lose if hit once, they are stuck right in the centre, unable to even move a single inch from their spot, meaning the player has to continuously shoot at the enemies to avoid getting hit, which, of course, isn't helped by the fact that the Kasplats take much longer to bring down using a weapon, thus giving enough time for the other enemies to walk up to the player and hit them.
108** Any of the races that require you to collect a certain number of coins and still beat your opponent. In particular, ''the slides''. It seems Rare didn't learn their lesson from ''VideoGame/DiddyKongRacing''.
109** The mechanical fish in Gloomy Galleon is an odd example. You have to play Diddy's guitar on top of the lighthouse, get to the other section, dive underwater and get into the submarine and then the fun begins. You have to shoot out all three of the lights (hit them three times to turn them from red to white to busted) but the propeller and respawning Zingers can get in the way. The reason this is odd is that as [[https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=wQspd_6ppO8 this video]] elaborates, the difficulty depends on whether you have Diddy’s Sniper Scope upgrade; if you do, the game lags, and as a result, the propeller stops fewer times and gives you less opportunity to shoot, while the countdown timer gives you barely enough time if you do it exactly right. It's not only much tougher than Beaver Bother but at least with Beaver Bother you can jump right in the banana barrel again, here you have to go back to the top of the lighthouse and do that all over again. However, if you turn off the aiming or do not have the upgrade, the mission is much easier.
110** The DK arcade game sidequest in Frantic Factory would have been a fun inclusion and a decent challenge...were it not for the fact that not only is it mandatory to beat the game, but you are also only given one life to get through all four levels! And after you do it once, you then find out you have to do it ''again'' but in the second phase this time, meaning everything is now more difficult and you still only are given a single life. While a casual player is likely to earn a second life without doing any sort of score farming, that doesn't help terribly much, and the worst part is you are booted back to the stage every time you lose which means you have to pull the lever and watch the animation again every single time.
111* ViewerGenderConfusion: The Beetle is not commonly known to be female, as the game doesn't mention her gender and she has no TertiarySexualCharacteristics. The only known source about her being female is a guide for the game that was on Creator/{{Nintendo}}'s official website.
112* TheWoobie:
113** K. Lumsy. Trapped in a cage where he can't even sit down and all because he refused to destroy DK isles.
114** The Banana Fairy Queen. When you first meet her, she's crying because her Banana Fairies flew away.
115** The Mermaid in the lighthouse cove from Gloomy Galleon cries due to her lost pearls in the jaws of horrifying oysters when you first meet her.

Top