PixlBit

Too bad this was before Diddy had a rocket barrel...

Sometimes, it seemed a bit odd how quickly Nintendo used new characters to star in spin-off games. A bit less than two short years after his debut game, Donkey Kong's nephew Diddy Kong switched his pursuit of tasty bananas to silver coins in this kart racer from the once-proud Rareware. Even stranger, Donkey Kong himself is nowhere to be found. Weirder still, most of the other characters are original creations just for this game. Regardless, this ragtag racing team appeared in a game that offered just enough variation from Mario Kart 64 to have made it worth a look.

My first experience with Diddy Kong Racing happened when a friend brought over the game, having bought it not long after release. I never owned it during the N64's market life, it wasn't until a bit after the GameCube released that I would find it in a bargain bin and finally own it. I had Mario Kart 64 at the time, my third N64 game in fact, but my interest in it was waning at this time. Hearing about a new kart racing game from Nintendo was quite thrilling indeed, so I was excited to try it out.

Seeing the character roster for the first time was baffling to me. I had no idea who any of them were besides Diddy Kong, though even he was mostly unfamiliar as I didn't own Donkey Kong Country 2 at the time and had just played it briefly at a different friend's place. Banjo-Kazooie wasn't quite out yet, and of course, Conker's Bad Fur Day was far from release and was still being made as a more regular platformer. It's kind of funny to see the cheerful Conker in this game in contrast to what his game ended up becoming. Unsurprisingly, I picked Diddy Kong, and stuck with him for a while. We would take turns playing the adventure mode, switching off when we finished one race, win or lose.

At one point we discovered cheat codes, I believe they were in a magazine, and had some fun with them. There was one such code he seemed to take a liking to for some odd reason, the code called “Bombs Away” that turned all balloons into the red, missile-carrying ones. After he saw that, from then on anytime I or anyone said “Bombs Away,” he would jump on them, like a missile. But, uh, that's probably not something to get into here. Ahem. The best code we found was the “Joint Venture” code, which allows the normally one-player Adventure mode to be played with two players. This changed everything. Then, instead of having to take turns or borrow the game, we could play together to make progress. There was one coin challenge we never could manage to complete in that last world, and so we never did get to beat the game together.

Years later, I came across the game in a bargain bin at an EB Games, and bought it for a measly price. Now, older, wiser, spending some time with the game, I had realised things about the game that I didn't notice back then. The first thing I discovered, was just how poor the control is. Steering is rather slippery, and vehicles swing out wide when they turn. Like Mario Kart, holding the R button when turning will perform a drift (or a Powerslide if you're nostalgic), which allows turning without slowing down, but with a wider angle. I guess I didn't notice back then since I hadn't seen anything better yet, but this may be why I thought the game was so difficult.

It didn't take long to see how unbalanced the characters were. The tracks of the game seemed to favour good handling above all else, so of the starting roster, the characters with good control fared far better than those who excelled at speed, despite their slowness. Speedy guys like Krunch never got enough straightaways to show off their speed, and to add on to his bad handling, regular turning already causes slowdown. The middling “all-around” type of character performed decently, but still nothing competed with those top steerers. This became especially true when it came time to collect the eight silver coins scattered along each track and still place first, as they tended to reside on the edges or even just off the road. Quick handling was practically a necessity to veer off course, collect the coins, and still manage to get back on track without losing any significant time. Perhaps if I had discovered the all-powerful Pipsy back in the day, we would have actually been able to clear the whole game.

The first unlockable character, Drumstick the chicken, is about as fast as the speed types, but with slightly better handling; enough to make him the new best character. But none compare to T.T. the clock. That's right, a frackin' clock is the statistically best character in this game, with the quickest acceleration, highest top speed, and best handling. His only downside is his light weight, but it makes no difference as no one will ever catch him. He's effectively the cheat mode for the 1P game and auto-win button for multiplayer matches, the Metaknight of Diddy Kong Racing and should be banned the world over. All shall fear the clock.

The coin collecting was a neat idea in theory. It provided a means to explore the tracks to discover their locations, and then go for that perfect run of snagging them all. But it really doesn't work that well in execution. The AI can get quite cheap in the later races, which would be annoying enough without having to intentionally deviate from normal racing lines to grab the coins. Perhaps if the CPU racers, too, had to collect these coins, things would have felt a bit more fair. Not to mention that some of the locations themselves are kind of cheap, and don't really allow for much racing flow. If the coins became purely about exploration and discovery, where they are actually more well-hidden and harder to reach, but simply need to be collected without worrying about position, that would have been a more interesting twist, at least, over what does exist. It would be like what the Rush series does with its hidden keys, which, ironically, is a better example of “adventure racing.”

The other two vehicles have their ups and downs. The hover crafts have more slippery control than the cars, have the useless ability to hop, and sometimes have trouble accelerating on slopes. Despite all that and the ability to drive on water, they're actually not that different than the cars, and are basically just a more out-of-control version of them. The airplanes are definitely the best part of the game. Not only do they control better than the other vehicles (though still not as tight as they should be), but flight itself provides a different racing dynamic than the ground vehicles and opens up many possibilities for racing lines. It's just a shame that the planes make up a small portion of the races, though they can be selected on most tracks in the multiplayer section.

Things weren't all gloom. The track design, sans silver coins, was mostly well done and inventive. The multiplayer maps left something to be desired, so Diddy Kong Racing was better as a single player affair. The best part though, was when I finally completed the challenge that we never could all that time ago. Somehow, I never found out before that a secret world existed, so it was of great surprise and reward when I first laid eyes on Future Fun Land. Despite its name, it reminded me of past fun, and I couldn't help but wonder how we would have reacted to the place had we discovered it back then.

In the end, I have mixed feelings about the game. Though fun in its time, today, I have trouble getting past the awful controls, the unbalanced characters, and all the other problems that I could overlook when it was new. Perhaps some things are better off left as nothing more than a fond memory. Simply put, Diddy Kong Racing is no longer worth playing.