Topic: Donkey Konga 2 Releases Monday

[Karl Castaneda #2]

Get ready for some more bongo-bumping action!

DONKEY KONGA 2 JAMS WITH HIP-HOP, ELECTRONICA AND ROCK TUNES    

Good Charlotte Appears in, Plays a Chart-Topping Song for Nintendo's Commercial    

REDMOND , Wash., May 4, 2005 – Are you ready to crank your next party up a few notches? Donkey Kongaâ„¢ 2, the bongo-beating Nintendo GameCubeâ„¢ sequel to last fall's hit, ups the cool factor by making use of some of today's hottest hip hop, electronica and rock tunes.    

Music lovers can still rock out using their DK Bongos controllers, only now they can groove to hip-hop and R&B hits like "Rock the Boat" and "No More Drama," dance and electronica tunes like "High Roller" and rock hits like "All Star" and "The Anthem."    

"We chose these new, popular songs to give consumers the chance to play along to their favorite songs, ones they hear on the radio every day," explains George Harrison, Nintendo of America's senior vice president of marketing and corporate communications. " Donkey Konga 2 provides a video game experience that crosses age barriers to expand the playing experience to the widest possible audience."    

The television commercial for Donkey Konga 2 features the music and musicians of rock band Good Charlotte. The spot shows band members delaying the start of a concert because they are occupied backstage playing Donkey Konga 2.    

Just as in the original game, up to four players beat the bongos and clap their hands in time to the music; the player with the best rhythm wins the round. Players can compete in a drum roll contest or earn coins to spend on new songs at the in-game shopping mall.    

Donkey Konga 2 , Rated T for Teen, launches May 9. The game is available bundled with a DK Bongos controller or individually. For more game information, visit www.donkeykonga.com .

[gally]

T for Teen? The original was E! Is this because of the inclusion of songs with swearing in their lyrics? Nothing in the game's presentation should raise the rating.

[darknight06]

What the crap?  What songs did they put in this thing for it to get a "T" rating?  And another thing, are the songs going to be covers like they were the last time or are these going to be the actual tracks?   As far as the ESRB rating is concerned, well everyone wanted Nintendo to have more "mature" content.

[KnowsNothing]

These songs are most likely covers like the last one.  For the most part though, the covers in the first one were VERY well done, so these should fair well.

I've glanced at the song list a couple times, and I remember seeing only a few recognizable songs.  I think they went with a more modern-pop-crap this time.  Boourns.

[joshnickerson]

I think I might just save my money this time and import the Japanese Donkey Konga 3... mmm, NES tunage...

[WuTangTurtle]

so is there any new game related music in this or is it just all modern pop rock?  Oh and Good Charlotte sucks ass.

[Ian Sane]

Looking at that song list it appears that even Nintendo isn't ammune to the videogame rule of Japan > North America.  Whoever made the song choices totally misses the point.  This is DONKEY KONG game.  No one who likes angsty teen horsesh!t like Good Charlotte is confident enough to play a Donkey Kong game.

[Kamek_X]

Well I really dont have any gripes about it. I enjoyed the first one except for the kindegarten songs, then again it had something to offer for everyone. I didnt know it would attract non gamers to play. For example my room mate who never plays games except for Animal Crossing. Was interested in how to play it. However he still didnt touch it at first. Then I come home from work and he's all into it. He was so absorbed he didn't even hear me come in. Soon after my mother visits and she asked," what are those barrel like things?" I explained and soon after she went out and bought it. So you see I'm sort of being pressed to get it. What I've gathered from those who have played it. Is that they want updated music+more. I'll be happy just having Nintendo tunes in it. Do I hear Metroid Techno, Yeah I wish.

[Mario]

I really hope the PAL songlist is much better (like the first one ), but there hasn't even been a list published yet which fills me with the fear that they're just being lazy and giving us the same songs as you guys for Donkey Konga 2.

[Caillan]

I love the basic mechanics of Donkey Konga but I really don't like the songs much at all. The arrangements are generally unimpressive and the drums sometimes don't sit with the music very well. Most of all I disliked all the popular crap they put in there. I'd like to see specialised versions running exactly the same engine with different soundtracks. Even if there was only two, one with 'cool' music and the other with videogame music, I'd definately be happy. I'd also be interested to see which one sells better.

[couchmonkey]

The commercial sounds like a complete rip-off of the ad for that totally awesome PS2 game, Britney's Dance Beat!!  It was rad.

As for the game, the song list sounds iffy, but it doesn't matter much to me anyway because I'm not through with the original yet and I've heard that Donkey Konga 3 has a much larger playlist than the first two...of course that's just in Japan, but hopefully it'll apply to North America too.

[darknight06]

Wow, this whole thing reminds me of the whole DDR Extreme US fiasco.  I remember playing that for a little bit and then just turning it off and not ever touching it again.  Who knows, maybe the charts for the songs might be good in DK2 and it may make up for the lackluster songlist.  

One last note, in case anyone's interested the European songlist doesn't look too bad at all in comparison.