Page 34 - Old School Gamer Magazine Issue #43 FREE Edition

ARCADE
After the success of Donkey Kong, Nintendo wanted
to capitalize on it and began development of a follow-up to their gorilla platform game in 1981. Originally, the idea was to create
a new version of the original title that added new gameplay elements and mazes to challenge players. However, eventually, the idea evolved into a totally different game that introduced the son of Donkey Kong, aptly named Donkey Kong Jr., and made Mario (renamed
from Jumpman) the bad guy. The original plan was to use Donkey Kong himself, but the character was too large for the maze settings that had been developed, which led to the creation of the smaller Jr. character. The game was developed by Shigeru Miyamoto with a team that included Gunpei Yokoi, Yoshio Sakamoto, and Yukio Kaneoka.
The latter composed the music for the original Donkey Kong and was tasked with creating the music for this sequel.
Donkey Kong Jr. was released in
1982. This time, Mario has captured Donkey Kong after defeating him
in the original game, and it is up to Kong’s son, Donkey Kong Jr., to free his dad from Mario’s “evil” clutches! Jr. must traverse four stages through a forest to reach Donkey Kong, whom Mario has trapped
in a cage. Each of the stages has different challenges and enemies for Jr. to face, but he will mostly be climbing (vines, chains, or ropes, depending on the stage), jumping over enemies, or running left and right to reach the top of each stage, where Donkey Kong waits in his cage. The enemies that Jr. faces include Snapjaws (which look like bear traps), Nitpickers (birds), and Sparks. These can be avoided by jumping over them, or they can be eliminated by dropping fruits on them. Jr.’s climbing does have its own strategy: Climbing up is faster if he holds two vines, chains, or ropes, while going down is much faster if he holds onto only one.
On the first three screens, Donkey Kong Jr. must reach the uppermost platforms to find the key that will help release Donkey Kong. Mario, however, pushes the cage off the screen before the player advances to the next screen. The fourth screen is different, as there are chains and six keys that Jr. must push up to the locks on the top platform in order for Donkey Kong’s cage to open. Kong will drop to the floor, where Jr. waits to save him from the fall. Father and son leave the screen while Mario follows them, only for Kong to kick him back. This restarts the game with higher difficulty. As in the original
Donkey Kong, there’s a bonus timer that will reward the player but will also cause the player to lose a life if it reaches zero.
Donkey Kong Jr. was very successful for Nintendo, becoming the eighth highest-grossing arcade game of 1982. The game received an award at the 5th annual Arkie Awards, and it is regarded as one
of the Top 100 Video Games by the Killer List of Video Games. Like many successful games of its time, Donkey Kong Jr. received various ports for home consoles. These included ports for the Atari 2600, Atari 7800, Atari 8-bit computers, ColecoVision, Intellivision, and NES. Over the years, homebrew programmers have also created enhanced versions for some of these classic systems or adapted versions to consoles that did not get an official release back then. Let’s now look at these ports...
Atari 2600
This port was programmed by Harley H. Puthuff, Jr. for Coleco and
DONKEY KONG JR.
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OLD SCHOOL GAMER MAGAZINE • ISSUE #43