Wednesday, April 14, 2021

Smash Character Review: Mario vs. Donkey Kong Series

MARIO VS. DONKEY KONG SERIES


There's not a lot to go over this time. For the most part, Mario, Donkey Kong, and Pauline were the main recurring cast in the story. Mario only appeared as playable in the first game, relinquishing the role in subsequent games to the Minis, with Mario only acting in a commanding-type role. During that first hammer, he had a lot of moves that mostly hearkened back to those original Donkey Kong games, using hammers and springs to get around, while climbing and swinging on bars, and doing a whole lot of jumping. His handstand that protected him from falling objects was kind of a new feature, but that's about it.

Donkey Kong likewise played the role of villain throughout most of the games, but most of those fell into the same basic vein as those old arcade games. He threw barrels, swung around on chains and vines, hit buttons to make things happen, and generally had a penchant for kidnapping people when things didn't go his way. He could also toss bananas, a bit more of a modern feature of the big ape, and in at least one battle, he had a giant mech he could pilot.

Pauline was largely just the "living goalpost" character, the person Mario had to save from DK, and outside of that, her role in the games seemed to suggest a smart businesswoman using her skills to help Mario open up toy factories and run amusement parks, skills that I'm guessing later made her a shoe-in for the mayoral position a few years later. Other characters only kind of appeared. Mini versions of Peach and Toad were regular features, and minis for other characters such as Luigi, Yoshi, Diddy Kong, Rosalina, Bowser, and Bowser Jr. all cropped up toward the later games, and most had some kind of skill reminiscent of their full-sized counterpart, but I guess I really can't count them much, can I?

Last but not least, we saw a handful, not many, of common enemies appear, including Shy Guys and Snifits, Boos, Bloopers, Bob-Ombs, Piranha Plants, Ninjis, Pokeys, and Thwomps. Obviously all of these have made their way onto my roster already, and I didn't really see anything here that I haven't seen before.

That's it for now! Tomorrow, we'll have two new characters to go over!

No comments:

Post a Comment