Cranky Kong confirmed for Donkey Kong Country Tropical Freeze

For the first time ever, Nintendo makes an appearance on VGX. For their portion of the show, they decided to announce the return of an old friend.

If you’ve played the Donkey Kong Country games, then you’re obviously familiar with Donkey Kong‘s grandfather, Cranky Kong. Cranky Kong is the original Donkey Kong; he served as the villain for the arcade classic released in 1981 simply known as “Donkey Kong”. He is reintroduced as Cranky Kong in the Donkey Kong Country series. In his old age, he lectures his grandson DK, giving him hints, items, and scoldings about his performance in the games. He’s also known for complaining about modern video games, lamenting their easier difficulty, and how spoiled gamers are today. He even tells you that in his youth, he would have beaten these games so much faster than kids in this day and age.Now, Cranky gets to strut his stuff in Donkey Kong Country Tropical Freeze, showing us whipper snappers how it’s all done.At VGX, Reggie Fils-Aime confirmed that Cranky Kong is a playable character in DKCTF.

One wonders how Cranky could get around so easily, be he manages quite well for an old ape. He uses his cane to jump high in the air, and can even use his beard to bounce on, enabling him to travel across hazards such as spikes with ease. In the demo, Geoff and Joel play as Donkey Kong and Cranky, showing Crank Kong’s new abilities as well as a special attack that two players can pull off after collecting 100 bananas. The attack is pretty cool looking; both kongs combine their strength to release powerful blast that eliminates all enemies on screen. There’s also a little footage of a second stage, known as “Bramble Scramble” which shares the same name as a stage not so different from it in Donkey Kong Country 2. True to its name the level is filled to the brim with brambles; spikes as far as the eye can see, and a hard looking level to boot. It’s a promising looking stage, and it gives us a taste of things to come in regards to difficulty. Keep on the look out for some more juicy info on Donkey Kong Country Tropical Freeze. With its release date in February 21st, we’re sure to see some more revelations to come.