Episode 129 - The Wheeling Wizpigs - Diddy Kong Racing

You must find 8 podcasts from each level and WIN. Welcome back to the podcast, and to our stupidest themed month yet, Ape-ril! Today, we’re going to be talking about Diddy Kong Racing. This is Rare’s effort in the kart racing genre, and we’re willing to bet that if you’re around our age and had an N64, you probably have some positive memories of this game. Cherish them. Those memories betray how soul crushingly difficult this game is to play. The core concepts at play here in this game are very strong, though. With three different vehicles and a large cast of characters to choose from, this has more variety than other games in the genre at the time, and a unique hub for level selection is a very cool addition. The presentation is colorful and fun in the way Rare is known for, with music that is straight out of their heyday. However, the game demands you to be absolutely flawless, completing challenges that would be optional in most other games and compounds with the N64 hardware not allowing for the most responsive controls to make a game that will kick your ass six ways to Sunday as soon as you finish your first time through each course. We’re going to be talking about how each of the three different vehicles feel to pilot and how this variety helps to make this game stand out, how certain elements of the game feel like they’re there to milk as much runtime out of the content as possible, and we cast a movie to let the game’s best character, Wiz Pig, really shine. Thank you for joining us this week! There’s something about monkeys that makes a game more difficult than most for some reason. Between this and Monkey Ball, we’ve already had two difficult games, but each in their own way. Have you gone back to play DKR at any point in your life? Did you also not remember just how tricky some of the challenges were, or did you stick it out because you aren’t as weak-willed and frail as we are? Let us know down in the comments or over on Discord! Next time, we’re going to be talking about Donkey Kong Country: Tropical Freeze, and after what we’ve already put ourselves through this month, that Funky Mode is looking pretty appealing…