The Donkey Kong series is most renowned for being a platformer, aside from the popular Diddy Kong Racing on the N64. While Barrel Blast was originally intended for release on the GameCube using the DK Bongos, the Wii’s motion capabilities pose as a worthy alternative. Although the racing here doesn’t offer the same adventure as Diddy Kong Racing did, it’s still worth checking out if you’re interested in an unorthodox racing game.

A Barrel Full of Fun

Now don’t try to waste your time trying to figure out the premise here because it won’t make any sense. Apparently, the feuding Kong and Kremling families have had enough of each other, so now they’ve decided to take their problems to the sky by flying around in barrels. There’s no real story mode except for a series of four tournaments, and there’s no explanation of why monkeys and lizards are flying around with bongo drums, but this is just one of those games where you aren’t supposed to over think things.

The control scheme is pretty simple on paper, though it’s much harder to actually apply what you know. First, to get up to speed you shake the Wii Remote and Nunchuk as if you’re pounding two drums. Once you’ve reached your maximum speed, shaking the controller in your right hand will steer you right, while shaking the one in the left steers left. Lifting both remotes up at the same time will make your character jump, and pulling either the B trigger or Z button will fire your weapon or activate a power-up. Instead of steering your character, the control stick is used to activate Wild Moves, which are powerful speed bursts. The only other thing you have to worry about is the attack button, which will make your racer take a swing by pressing A.

As you can see, this setup doesn’t seem overly complicated, but don’t expect to pick things up right away. For starters, telling when you’ve reached the maximum speed isn’t too apparent. This is because Barrel Blast has a painfully slow speed when you’re just coasting along in the air. While it’s almost instinctive to keep flailing your arms in the air thinking that you should be moving faster, as you’ll come to realize this isn’t the case.

Before you give up hope on this game already though, you have to understand that not everything is slow. Every time you collect fifty bananas, you’ll earn one Wild Move. By holding back the control stick for about a second then flinging it forward, your racer will shoot forward in a fiery ball. The initial burst of speed is nice, but the real fun comes when you try to combo moves together. To combo, you simply have to steer your enflamed character into wooden barrels, enemy creatures on the track, or even other flyers. Each time you hit something, it restarts your Wild Move. As you familiarize yourself with the controls, you’ll be able to complete incredible chains that will have you boosting across the track instead of flying around lazily.

Items are divided into two broad categories of power-ups and offensive attacks. Power-ups can make it so your character is invincible, allow you to perform an infinite amount of Wild Moves, or even give you a bonus of thirty bananas. Offensive items, such as the lock-on rocket launcher, banana stealing monkey, or Wild Move preventing squawk can put a hurt on an opponent. While it’s nice to see a variety of items at your disposal, they don’t play a crucial part to the flow of the game. Sure it’s nice to stop someone else in their tracks from time to time, but it isn’t really fun to try out different items. In Mario Kart 64 it was a blast to get three green shells or a row of banana peels to try and trip up others, but you won’t find yourself hoping to find pick-ups here. Most of the items are automated in how they work and you rarely see somebody else get hurt, which undoubtedly takes a lot of the pizzazz out.

As far as turning goes, it can be difficult to have any idea as to how to maneuver around bends at first. With no user input at all, your character will still turn automatically and make his way around a corner, but by shaking the right remote you can turn a lot quicker. If you’re trying to keep a certain line of path in order to keep a Wild Move combo going, it’s hard to tell when the computer will turn and to what extant. As a result, you’ll find yourself taking turns too sharp, missing special shortcuts, and not collecting bananas you were aiming for because you can’t tell when the computer will takes its course. After some time you’ll get a basic understanding of how turning works, but sometimes the controls can be a tad unresponsive so you’ll miss your mark anyways.

To Blast or not to Blast?

There’s no denying that Barrel Blast has a funky control scheme that takes a lot of adjusting too, but that doesn’t mean this game is always unforgiving. If you take the time to complete Cranky’s Flight School, an in-game tutorial explaining all of the controls, after you first few tournaments you’ll be hooked.

In the Grand Prix mode, there are four trophy tournaments spanning across three difficulties. Regardless of what side you choose, Kong or Kremling, your goal is simply to rack up the most points throughout a series of three, four or five races. Although these families are at each other’s throats, this isn’t played upon at all during the game aside from the fact that different items are more effective for different characters.

Characters are rated based on their boost, speed, and agility. The problem with the character system is that some racers are clearly better than others. For instance, Cranky Kong and King K. Rool both have four out of five stars for every category, instantly making them better almost every other character in every category. In addition, if you complete the Challenge mode you can unlock a perfectly rated DK character, which makes it pointless to select anybody else. This boosted DK travels fast, which somewhat makes up for the exhilarating sense of speed. As such, this discourages gamers from trying out all the characters and getting the most out of what this title has to offer.

Nonetheless, the Grand Prix tournaments are comprised of tracks from locations such as deserts, jungles, and even outer space. Depending on the track the races can take anywhere from less than two minutes to over five minutes, and the computer is capable of putting up a good fight. At times it can be frustrating to be cruising along only to have some arbitrary item bring you to a halt. Then, as you try to build up speed you’ll find yourself stuck in a field of metal barrels that also bring you to halt. In the end, you can spend about ten seconds trying to get up to speed only to see that you’re way behind. It’s never fun to get up to max speed, and it can even be pretty tiring to have to shake your arms rapidly over and over again.

While obstacles and enemy attacks can bring the excitement level to a standstill, Barrel Blast makes up for this by throwing in all sorts of variations into the tracks. Some levels have hidden tracks, such as mine cart shafts and bobsled runs, which will put you in some sort of vehicle and send you on your way. Aside from increasing the speed at which you’re travelling, these little mini-games act as nice respites when you come across them. Furthermore, if you break open an animal crate you can ride around on invincible creatures, such as swordfish and rhinos. There’s nothing like trampling over other racers in a furious stampede, and again it’s nice to see a taste of variety.

While all of the aforementioned factors are crucial to the game, chaining Wild Moves is the one way to ensure victory. It’s not uncommon to find yourself fluttering around trying to collect every last banana, and likewise it’s very rewarding to eventually be able to collect hundreds of bananas at a time, allowing you to keep a constant speed burst for laps at a time. If you don’t take advantage of Wild Moves then of course you’re going to think the pacing of the game is unbearably slow, so the gamers that learn to master this feature will have the most fun.

Barrel Blast in the long run

With games like Mario Strikers Charged and FIFA 08 offering online multiplayer, there’s no excuse as to why Barrel Blast doesn’t have an online component. The split screen racing supports up to four players, but nothing new is offered. The Grand Prix is playable with other human racers, but you can only race with four people on a track instead of eight if two humans are playing. There’s no obvious reason as to why four racers have to be eliminated, and this takes a lot away from the game. If you aren’t interacting with other characters the racing simply isn’t as exciting as it could be. If you’re just looking to compete against some friends then you won’t bet let down, but it’s hard not to find yourself asking for more.

Nintendo, for the most part, always does a nice job in terms of presentation values. The menus not only load quickly and are easily to navigable, but the fitting jungle theme is a nice touch as well. Now the in-game visuals won’t leave you drooling, but what this game lacks in technology it more than makes up for in character. The environments are jovial and detailed, and the brilliant rushes of colors seen as you speed around in the sky look sharp.

You’ll come across different tracks depending on the theme of the level, and the composers did an outstanding job in this regard. From the tribal feeling of the jungle to the futuristic space riffs, everything fits into place on the soundtrack. Unfortunately, the sound effects are repetitive and awkward. The original Donkey Kong sounded like a gorilla, but the character in Barrel Blast sounds more like a goat. It’s almost disturbing to hear the new DK laugh, and the only character that sounds in place is the aged Cranky Kong. The same sound effect for each racer is repeated every time you combo in a Wild Move, so the obnoxious voices will stick out like a sore thumb over time. On the plus side, the Wii Remote emits different sounds every time you hit the barrels for each character, so it’s fun to see what noises different barrels make.

Conclusion

Donkey Kong Barrel Blast doesn’t represent the pinnacle of what Nintendo is capable of creating, but it isn’t exactly a flop either. Although at first it might seem like your character has a mind of his own, with a little practice you’ll find that Barrel Blast can be fun if you’re skilled enough. If Nintendo released a sequel that addressed some of the problems we could have a great game on our hands, but Barrel Blast is at least worth a rent. If you find yourself getting easily frustrated in games or if you need to have you worlds constantly blaring past you in racing games, then this game probably isn’t for you. However, if you’re in the mood for an unconventional racer that offers a different type of challenge, then purchasing this game is definitely an option.