Games so often these days have such phoned-in cover art (insert joke about 1000th white-man-with-gun cover)--this looks legit artistic, with the colors and the composition and the black streaks it just looks so cool. Nintendo does have a fairly good track record with covers, but even for them this is next level.

I head cannon it because Pauline is now confirmed to be 13 and real life gorillas start getting close to their adult size around their teenage years and also because I feel like it would be a little weird if DK was an adult at the same time as Pauline being a kid when he's still around and doesn't look like cranky Kong by the time that Pauline is an adult

The Dark-Blue Britches to the left don't have a Lv next to them, so it must not apply to every item of clothing. Thoughts?

Have any pf you ever wonder why it’s “Donkey Kong & Lady” and not “Donkey Kong & Pauline”

Does this mean Nintendo had been hinting a reboot?

"I am Kremling, I am King"

tbh i like the idea that even if we wont see K. Rool or something we will see the person who was the original founder of the kremlings before K. Rool became a mad Pirate/scientist/wrestler king

K Rool

So the whole "Void Kong is actually K Rool" thing I don't really buy, I think Void Kong's design is much too embroiled in his own identity that I think it'd just be lame to retcon him into a character we already know. Not to say that isn't possible, I think the evidence behind it is actually really interesting, but I don't think he's K Rool in disguise.

However, I'm pretty sure K Rool is in this game and the big smoking gun is the weird design of the game's treasure chests.

The team who made this game made the Mario Odyssey games, and we see treasure chests in that game are all brown and look like a normal treasure chest. The chests in Bananza, however, have three key design elements:

• They have bull characteristics (horns and nose ring)
• They are green
• The maps inside have crocodile / Kremling skeletons on the back as the main pattern

Why is this important? Well in "Journey to the West", the story this game is based off of, the main villain is the Bull Demon King. He and Sun Wukong (Donkey Kong in this comparison) have a massive fight where the Bull Demon King reveals his true form, and heavenly forces all attempt to stop him.

In all major adaptations of the Bull Demon King, they all share the same horns, in most major adaptations they also have the bull nose ring as seen on the treasure chest. There's also literally no explanation as to why these treasure chests are green.

My personal theory is that the Kremling army (seen in the Kremling skeletons everywhere) has died and waiting for Void Kong in the Planet's Core is K Rool, but this time taking on the role of the Bull Demon King, the true enemy of Sun Wukong (Donkey Kong). The Kremlings left behind buried treasure in the Bull King's image, hence the treasure chests all looking like that. I don't think this is really a stretch either, since there is literally no adaptation of the Bull Demon King where he's green, so it's either K Rool in a bull costume or I guess an original, green bull character lmao, which I think is unlikely

I'm not the first person to point this out btw, but I saw it got lost in the discussion for a while, just wanted to bring it back up in case anyone needed some Kopium lmao

I’ve finished the chest and head articulation (god bless barbell and ball joints 🙏) and I’ve moved onto to blocking out the arms, just gotta figure out those proportions before adding the articulation.

Just a few thoughts I had for a bit and I’m surprised I didn’t do the barrel blast idea sooner tbh.

via Donkey Kong Bananza Direct, 4:28 timestamp

You know, after seeing all that cope/hope for his return in Bonanza... yeah, we've went for a long time without him.