![]() Commanded by a returning Dave Wise, famous for his work on the original DKC trilogy (although he should be more famous for his work in Battletoads), Tropical Freeze offers one of the best soundtracks of all time. However, being that amazing, the presentation is nothing compared with the music. This is taken to the limits in some levels, like Grassland Groove, Amiss Abyss or Busted Bayou, which are levels that a non-gamer could just watch and be completely astounded and delighted. The level mechanics are exquisitely blended with the Donkey Kong's surroundings, the camera adds a little depth with 2.5D kinds of angles, and all the creatures and landscapes are insanely alive. The literally impressive presentation comes from its planning, from its art conception. Glorious high definition makes the visuals look absolutely gorgeous and detailed, but the upgrade doesn't come just from the graphical enhancements, neither from the execution. Talking about presentation, that is where we have the next visible upgrade and is one of the highest points in the game. For instance, in the fifth island, we discover that the reason of the invasion was tropical fruit harvesting for making ice lollies, which is funny and is told just by level mechanics and the presentation. Nevertheless, they make the progress in the six islands of the game have a little story beyond "You stole my bananas!" but in a very subtle way. More than the Kremlings? Sadly, no, but it's a good try. Then, there is the plot, starring our beloved Kong family and the new villains, the Snowmads, a troop of penguins, owls, walruses and many others, which invade the DK island, blowing Donkey Kong and friends out of it, making it entirely of ice and cold, while being iconic, funny and memorable. This new feature is very welcomed, and it does impact the gameplay to some extent in the early game, giving a little variety and replay value. The most notorious (because it was one of Tropical Freeze's selling points) is the addition of more playable sidekick characters: Dixie and - for the first time - Cranky Kong. However, let's start with some differences. The collectible puzzle pieces and KONG letters, the unlockables, the world map, the checkpoints, the in-game models, time attack mode, and the Kong sidekick gameplay mechanics are all alike, but many of them are upgraded. Bravo.As a direct sequel to Donkey Kong Country Returns, also developed by Retro Studios, Tropical Freeze shares more similarities with its predecessor than with its older SNES brothers, which is neither good or bad. Overall the game is very fun and it's definitely a VERY worthy Donkey Kong Country "4". ![]() Being a perfectionist, I can already tell this game is going to take me a looooong time. I've only done time attack on 1-1 so far, and that alone took me 15-20 minutes for me to get the Gold DK coin on. Time attack, of course, is you completing the level as fast as you possibly can, but there are predetermined times that you have to beat that will fill that third hole with either a Gold, Silver, or Bronze DK coin. The third gets filled when you do time attack in an area. The second one gets filled when you find all the puzzles pieces in that area. The first one gets filled when you collect the letters that spell out KONG. They appear in each area of each world (1-1, 1-2, 1-3, etc.). ![]() As I'm sure you've noticed, there are 3 holes in the top left corner when you're exploring the world map. And so far, at world 5 (out of 8) I'm already finding multiple ways to die in every level before hitting that wonderful completion barrel at the end. World 1 isn't that hard, and then you definitely see a difficulty curve from World 2 on. I gotta say, the difficulty curve is very high. So far, I'm at world 5, 1 level away from the boss there. I bought it as soon as my local Gamestop opened at 11:00 AM.
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