Donkey Kong Country 2

This time it's Donkey Kong himself who's in trouble. The crocodile king K. Rool has kidnapped him, and it's up to the nimble Diddy and his friend Dixie to rescue him. Donkey Kong Country 2: Diddy's Kong Quest from 1995 is considered by many players and critics to be the peak of the whole trilogy, and in a series as strong as this one that's quite a statement.

The studio Rare took the excellent foundation of the first installment and refined it in every way. You play as the new duo of Diddy and Dixie, who once again complement each other, with Dixie able to use her hair to glide and slow her fall, opening up new level-design possibilities. The pirate theme, ships, lava caves, thorny thickets and spiky arenas bring a varied range of environments, and the game is generally more demanding, more inventive and denser than the first. Collectible goals were also added for players who want to reach one hundred percent completion. The world is threaded with hidden rooms and bonus challenges, so simply finishing the game is only the beginning, and true full completion demands careful exploration of every nook.

Technically the game continued in the pre-rendered visual style that Rare had mastered and pushed it even further in detail and atmosphere. David Wise's soundtrack ranks among the absolute best of the 16-bit era; tracks like the melancholic swamp theme became cult favorites and to this day appear in rankings of the best game music ever.

Diddy's Kong Quest sold superbly and cemented the position of the Donkey Kong Country brand as one of Nintendo's pillars in the mid-nineties. There is broad agreement among series fans that the second installment best balanced difficulty, level design and music, and it often appears in rankings of the best platformers ever.

The new environments also give the game an unmistakable atmosphere. The pirate theme, sunken wrecks, spooky swamps and abandoned amusement parks give each group of levels its own mood, further heightened by the musical accompaniment. The result is an adventure that feels cohesive while never ceasing to surprise with new ideas right up to the very end.

Culturally it is a textbook example of a sequel that surpasses its already outstanding original. For many players, Diddy's Kong Quest remains the yardstick against which all other 2D platformers of the era are measured, and it still enjoys a reputation as one of the best games on the entire console.

Why play: A masterfully polished sequel with inventive level design and one of the best soundtracks of the 16-bit era, often called the peak of the series.