Donkey Kong

Donkey Kong is an arcade video game created by Nintendo in 1981. This is one of the first platform games, preceded in the same genre by Space Panic and Apple Panic1. Interest is centered on moving a main character across four levels avoiding moving obstacles. If the scenario is simple, it is sufficiently developed for the time: Mario, then called Jumpman, must rescue a damsel in distress, captured by a giant gorilla, Donkey Kong. The two characters he introduces are called to become two icons of the Nintendo brand.

The game was the result of Nintendo’s efforts to impose itself on the North American market; Its president, Hiroshi Yamauchi, gave the project to one of his new game designer, Shigeru Miyamoto. Strongly inspired by American culture, through the characters of Popeye and King Kong, Miyamoto developed the screenplay and directed the programming of the game alongside chief engineer Gunpei Yokoi. The two designers introduced two innovations: kinematics and multiple levels of play.

Despite the initial doubts of the American Nintendo team, Donkey Kong was a huge success in Japan and North America. A license was sold to Coleco, which developed versions for various video game consoles. Other companies have also developed clones of the game while avoiding paying the fees. Miyamoto’s characters appeared on cereal boxes, cartoons on television, and in many other products. Universal City Studios attacked Nintendo in court, accusing him of violating his rights to the character of King Kong with Donkey Kong; However, the trial failed. The success of Donkey Kong helped Nintendo to win in the video game market of the years 1980 until the beginning of the years 1990.

The success of Donkey Kong made it a reference of American culture. In 1982/1983, Buckner & Garcia and R. Cade and the Video victims recorded songs inspired by the game. Artists like DJ Jazzy Jeff & the Fresh Prince and Trace Adkins made references to the game in their songs, as well as an episode of The Simpsons. Even today, the sound effects of the Atari 2600 version often serve as a generic video game sound in movies or on television. KLOV places Donkey Kong in the three most popular arcade games of all time and places it at the 25th place in the list of the 100 best arcade games. Today, Donkey Kong is the fifth most popular arcade game among the Collectionneurs2.