Donkey Kong Bananza review: Best game I've played this year

Donkey Kong Bananza is my favorite game on the Nintendo Switch 2, and it would be difficult for another title to unseat it. It may not seem like it two months into the new system, but Donkey Kong Bananza is also the best game I’ve played this year. Nintendo’s latest release not only delivers an entertaining story and reimagines one of its oldest icons, it also rethinks how players interact with a 3D platformer.

In this game, players can smash and destroy or pick up and throw huge pieces from the same levels they pass. Not only is this satisfying in a grounded and visceral way, but it also provides players with a sense of freedom in how they approach each objective the game throws their way. Although the camera and frame rate can’t always keep up, they don’t need to for this adventure to be an absolute, unforgettable blast.

Price and availability

Donkey Kong Bananza is available for $70, which is cheaper than Mario Kart World but more expensive than all the other Nintendo Switch 2 games, with the exception of The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom. You can get over 15 hours of amazing gameplay for this price, so it’s worth it. The game is available digitally on the Nintendo Switch eShop and physically at all major video game retailers, where it launched on July 17.

A light but touching story

Move over Joel and Ellie, Donkey Kong and Pauline are my new favorite duo

First off, Donkey Kong Bananza offers a very clean break from previous games starring DK. It starts with him coming to a new location called Ingot Isle in search of bananas that take a gold-like shape there. DK’s new design took some getting used to, but I liked how expressive he was and how he looked, which fits the colorful nature of this game well.

Shortly after DK’s arrival, a new villain named Void Kong and his treacherous corporation VoidCo arrive, steal all the bananas DK and his friends have collected, and send DK and everyone else on Ingot Isle deeper into the planet. From his design to his enigmatic vocal performance, Void Kong looks instantly recognizable, and I hope he shows up in Mario Kart or Mario Party in the future. As Donkey Kong Bananza continues, it finds more ways to pay tribute to the series’ past as well.

Early on, DK encounters a being called Odd Rock who climbs onto his back and begins traveling with him. By the end of the first zone, Odd Rock is revealed to be a young version of Pauline, who convinces DK to embark on a journey to the heart of the planet to fulfill their wish. While Donkey Kong just wants bananas, Pauline wants to return to the surface so she can pursue a career as an actress. It’s very simple, but it’s also my favorite version of any Nintendo console game.

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Although it’s light in tone like most children’s cartoons, Donkey Kong Bananza’s simple story about Pauline embracing what she loves and forming a father-daughter-like bond with DK resonated with me. It’s all the little moments, like Pauline’s cute banter with DK during a break or DK’s reaction when he briefly loses track of Pauline, that make the game for me.

It engages my mind in the same way that father-child stories like The Last of Us and God of War: Ragnarok do, but in a significantly more fun and playful way. Family stories don’t always have to be about the pain that comes with it.

Expansive 3D platformer

There are tons of collectibles to track down

Donkey Kong Bananza is divided into multiple hub-like levels, but in the case of this game, there are sub-layers of the planet each with their own theme and inhabitants. You’ll encounter everything from an ostrich running a hotel above a toxic swamp, reminiscent of Super Mario Sunshine, to a giant theme park where the land is food. The game’s subclass setting provides a clear sense of progression, with players moving through it in a fairly linear fashion.

Nintendo’s industry-leading level design flexes its muscles once again in Donkey Kong Bananza. Some of my favorite areas include Banandium Refinery, where I was able to cruise around on mine carts while throwing explosives at enemies, and Coolstripe Cavern, where I could tear off pieces of the icy terrain I was sliding and sliding on. Each goal rewards players with golden bananas, which come in sets of one, three, or five.

These are this game’s version of Star or Shine Sprites, and are more intertwined with the gameplay because collecting five of them will earn players a skill point to improve their abilities. There are plenty of other collectibles you can find and mine, including gold and panandium stones that can be traded for golden bananas, and fossils that can be traded for cosmetics.

This wealth of collectibles plays into one of the best aspects of playing Donkey Kong Bananza. There was always an objective or platforming challenge to complete, but at almost any time, I could start punishing the ground or walls around me and find some reward. It offers the kind of catharsis that I only get through intense first-person shooters like Doom: The Dark Ages, but in a kid-friendly form.

Impressive destruction

Rethinking how players interact with 3D consoles

How to play Donkey Kong Bananza — Source: Nintendo

The destruction suit in players’ hands is the main attraction of Donkey Kong Bananza, but it’s also a solid 3D platformer in its own right. If you’re trying to destroy as little as possible while playing, you can still have a good time jumping, rolling and climbing in all the different areas of the game. The destruction element is just the cherry on top, a development that forces players to interact with the video game world in a way they’ve never done before in a platformer.

It might be possible to find a way to climb a cliff to get the Golden Banana, but it might also be fun to hack and climb that cliff to get to the same point, picking up other collectibles along the way. Or I could use Bananza, which is one of five special forms DK can take with Pauline’s help that adds abilities like dash, slide, and high jump. There is no shortage of tools available to players at any given time, and Donkey Kong Bananza rarely restricts what players can do.

All of these gameplay features work together to activate a sense of freedom that simultaneously deepens the player’s knowledge of the world. At the beginning of Donkey Kong Bananza, I stopped to check the sturdiness and type of each item I was picking up. By the end of the game, I knew pretty much how to use most of the terrain types I encountered. Playing Donkey Kong Bananza is starting to feel like I’m returning to a favorite childhood game, even though it’s only been around a week.

Performance and camera issues

Low points in Donkey Kong Bananza

Donkey Kong looks shocked at Donkey Kong Bananza

Although Donkey Kong Bananza does a lot right, there are some things it doesn’t quite get right. The most egregious of these is the camera, which often became stuck in unusual positions or failed to display what you wanted to see when navigating through tunnels, especially if they were relatively small or located in an unusual area of the level. Fortunately, it’s never a problem when accuracy is needed, but it’s a bit disappointing that Nintendo hasn’t found a way to solve a problem that’s so common on 3D consoles.

Additionally, for those who care about frame rate and overall performance of your games, Donkey Kong Bananza sometimes struggles to maintain a consistent frame rate. In some frenetic boss fights or moments when I was destroying a lot, Donkey Kong Bananza would squeal noticeably, even when I tweaked the system-wide settings to lower the resolution or disable HDR.

While these are two issues I can’t recommend Donkey Kong Bananza without pointing out, they didn’t hinder my experience enough to ruin the game for me. The controls always remained responsive, and I never had to reset progress or experience an unfair death due to a camera issue. Any moments of discomfort from this game are few and far between.

Should you buy Donkey Kong Panza?

Pauline gives the thumbs up to Donkey Kong Panza

If you own a Nintendo Switch 2, you need to purchase Donkey Kong Bananza. The occasional camera or frame rate issue isn’t enough to distract from the beautiful core of the game. The game is Nintendo at its best, rethinking the basics of interaction in the popular gaming genre in a genius way. If Donkey Kong Bananza marks the beginning of a wave of games focused on environmental destruction, the video game industry will be better for it.

It’s fun to tackle the tough challenges Nintendo has designed for players, and it’s equally fun to jump in and see how deep you can dig when exploring a new level for the first time. And at the heart of it all is a charming story about embracing creativity, overcoming stage fright, and forming unbreakable bonds that I won’t forget any time soon. Donkey Kong Bananza is the best game I played in 2025, and it will be very difficult for any other game to unseat it this year.

Donkey Kong Bananza review: Best game I’ve played this year