Free bananas and opening at midnight – Donkey Kong celebrated in style at Nintendopusheren – Donkey Kong Bananza

Donkey Kong is back. And with a bang!

The highly anticipated Donkey Kong Bananza has been released for Nintendo Switch 2 and the reviews are already out. And they are certainly worthy of the great ape.

Of the dozens of reviews on the Metacritic website, the weighted average is 90/100. This means that Donkey Kong actually surpasses its old rival Mario, since Mario Kart World “only” has a Metascore of 86.

Interest is also high among the series’ many fans. Late last month, IGN reported that Donkey Kong Bananza was the best-selling game on Amazon thanks to many pre-orders.

One of those looking forward to the game is Mads Jacobsen, who runs the Copenhagen game store Nintendopusheren.

“It’s probably the Switch 2 game I’m most looking forward to, since I usually play single-player games. It was fun to play Mario Kart World, which I also did a lot of, but this is what I was really looking forward to. Now that we don’t have a Mario game, Donkey Kong is the next best thing”, he tells Gamereactor.

Although Donkey Kong Bananza is not a Mario game, the game still contains some DNA from the Super Mario series. The game was made by the same people who gave us the successful Super Mario Odyssey, but the inspiration doesn’t end there. Donkey Kong Bananza contains several references to previous games in the series, the most prominent of which is probably the character Pauline, who made her debut in the 1981 original Donkey Kong.

Another obvious source of inspiration is the last Donkey Kong game in full 3D, Donkey Kong 64, developed by the legendary Rare and released for Nintendo 64 in 1999. And it is these parallels in particular that helped raise Jacobsen’s expectations.

“What I remember best are the Game Boy games. Donkey Kong Land 1, 2 and 3. I also played it on the Nintendo 64, which Bananza is probably most similar to. I really look forward to running around and collecting things. I love those collect-a-thons from the Nintendo 64 days.”

Maybe Jacobsen felt a little like Donkey Kong today? In conjunction with the launch of Donkey Kong Bananza, the Nintendo retailer is staying open until midnight so customers can get their hands on the game at the time of its release. In connection with this, the store owner cleaned his Donkey Kong costume, and as if that wasn’t enough, he bought a whole bunch of bananas to hand out to customers in the store.

“With midnight events, you can play a little bit and wear crazy costumes. I also bought bananas for everyone who comes. Just to have a little fun and give people an experience. There may not be as many people showing up as with Zelda, or when Switch 2 was released a month ago. But again, you get a little fun and mischief.”

Jacobsen says there have been about 40 pre-orders for the game with in-store pickup, but he expects only half of those will show up, now that many people are on summer vacation.

“If 20 people show up, I would say it’s a success. And if fewer show up, it’s still great to hold.”

Although the launch of Donkey Kong Bananza is a joyous occasion and the midnight launch is mostly about fun and games, Jacobsen also has a concern.

Microsoft, Sony and Nintendo still release consoles with physical discs, but the first two have also experimented with purely digital consoles in the form of the Xbox Series S and PlayStation 5 Slim Digital Edition. Nintendo has traditionally been more cautious and has stuck to physical releases. But with the Nintendo Switch 2, they have now introduced the concept of Game Key Cards, where the physical game is really just a license key to download.

Jacobsen therefore fears that the Nintendo Switch 2 may be the last Nintendo console with significant physical releases.

“They’ve kind of jumped on the digital pleasures of Game Key Cards. There are also more and more games here in Europe that are only released as downloads. So you get a box, but it’s just an empty box with a code in it. Personally, I think it’s completely irrelevant. I fear that Switch 2 might be the last console where we get the chance to do this kind of midnight launch. But fortunately, there’s still a long time to go before that happens.”