Super Nintendo Entertainment System. Sure, you could have fun just tramping through the jungles with Donkey Kong, gleefully squashing enemies and making a beeline for the goal. But odds are good that you’ll get addicted to exploring each level carefully to find all the cleverly buried treasure.

Yes, you get rewards for finding everything. But it’s fun just for the sake of it. Letters that spell out K-O-N-G are usually placed tantalizingly in plain sight, but figuring out how to get to them is the tricky part.

Other items are hidden in much more devious ways, but I never found myself getting frustrated or aimlessly trying different things to make a final puzzle piece appear. That’s because Retro has taken care to leave hints, rewarding players’ curiosity and making each discovery immensely satisfying.

The level designs in Donkey Kong Country Returns are more dynamic than any I’ve seen in a 2-D platformer. They burst at the seams with color and detail, and most levels visibly change as you progress through them. Pillars rise and fall in the distance. Precariously placed platforms shift beneath your weight. Walkways crumble as you walk on them. The attention to detail would make Square Enix blush.

This dynamism transfers to the gameplay, with each new level introducing at least one new element. For example, in one level you will be riding in a mine cart that careens forward on its own, leaving it up to you to jump with perfect timing in order to dodge obstacles and pitfalls. Another level places Donkey Kong inside a rolling, hollow egg with gaps in the shell. You can fall through the gaps, so you need to plan your jumps accordingly.

The variety in the level design means that Donkey Kong Country Returns feels fresh every time you return to it. And the game keeps one-upping itself: Every time you think you’ve seen the best it has to offer, it throws something new and better at you.

The levels can be fiendish, too. Donkey Kong Country Returns is not quite as hard to master as the Donkey Kong Country games on the Super NES, but it’s close. Like most everything else in Returns, the difficulty is carefully crafted. There is never a point where the game suddenly becomes nearly impossible. It’s challenging but fair; every death felt like it was my own fault. Even that time when I lost more than 20 lives on a single level.

The one big problem with Donkey Kong Country Returns is the motion controls. The button-based controls are great; they feel responsive, and Donkey Kong himself has a sense of weight that makes every action feel satisfying.

But one of the gorilla’s main moves — rolling forward — is activated with a shake of the Wii remote. I don’t like this. It feels completely unnecessary, and shaking the remote takes longer than just pressing a button. I got used to it eventually, but until I did, I would sometimes accidentally roll forward into bottomless pits. It would have been nice if Retro Studios had included an option to use the Wii’s Classic Controller, because the motion controls add nothing to the game beyond gimmickry.

Given Retro Studios’ penchant for big, bombastic boss battles, I would have liked to see the same in Donkey Kong Country Returns. Instead, the bosses are repetitive. Most require the standard three hits to take down, but they don’t change up their patterns in any significant way after you get in the first couple of hits.

Despite these issues, Donkey Kong Country Returns is the best 2-D platform game I’ve played in ages. Its level design meets the gold standard set by the 2-D Mario games. Retro Studios can add another feather to its cap.

WIRED Staggering attention to detail; imaginative level design; constantly introduction of new gameplay elements; high level of difficulty that doesn’t frustrate.

TIRED Unnecessary motion controls; disappointing boss battles.

$50, Nintendo

Rating:

Read Game|Life’s game ratings guide.

See Also:

• Hands-On: Donkey Kong Country Returns Tickles Nostalgia Bone
• Nintendo Trademarks ‘It’s On Like Donkey Kong’

Authors: John Mix Meyer

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