The first thing players will notice upon booting up Donkey Kong Bananza is that its titular ape looks pretty different. Although DK has sported multiple styles before (and the name’s been used for different characters entirely), his core aesthetic has remained mostly the same since the series’ first reboot in 1994’s Donkey Kong Country .

A DK movie is just the icing on the cake for Kong. The fan-favorite character is having quite the year, with the highly anticipated upcoming Nintendo Switch 2 game, Donkey Kong Bananza, coming out on July 17, 2025. The game follows Kong and Pauline as they set out to recover stolen banana diamonds from a gang of evil apes.

Donkey Kong Bananza is the gorilla's first 3D platformer since 1999's Donkey Kong 64 and the first to be internally developed by Nintendo since 2005's Donkey Kong Jungle Beat. In our preview, it was confirmed that it is being developed by the same team behind Super Mario Odyssey.

Donkey Kong Bananza’s director has said he’s aware of occasional performance issues spotted by the press, and said the development team has “prioritized fun and playability”. Speaking to Spanish outlet La Vanguardia, Nintendo ’s Kazuya Takahashi was asked about frame drops the interviewer noticed when playing the game.

As a longtime fan of games Donkey Kong, Donkey Kong Jr., and 1994 Game Boy game Donkey Kong, I’m going to approach the events of Bananza as the next major milestone in that fran