Mario vs. Donkey Kong is a faithful revamp of the GBA original, to a fault

Mario vs. Donkey Kong is a hybrid puzzle-platformer which, while well-crafted like most Nintendo games, never truly excels within either genre and, remade in 2024, doesn’t feel challenging enough to cater to experienced players.

For those much younger than this writer, and those who’ll get additional enjoyment from reliving their own youth, there’s plenty of content within this Switch remake to keep you going, including a generous number of accessibility options to ensure that players of any skill can take on the mighty DK.

But for those used to the tight controls and challenging difficulty of the 2D Super Mario games, you might be better off waiting for a full sequel rather than what is a faithful-to-a-fault remake of a 20-year-old game, which many will argue could’ve done with a bit more demolition work.

Created by Nintendo’s American arm, NST, Mario vs. Donkey Kong was originally released for Game Boy Advance as a spiritual successor to the arcade Donkey Kong game, and its subsequent Game Boy follow-up. Players navigate a series of small platforming levels, with the objective of finding a hidden key and bringing it to a locked door, avoiding enemies and obstacles along the way. Simple.

In each of the game’s eight worlds, you’ll complete six of these kinds of levels before taking on a bonus stage where you lead a group of ‘Mini Mario’ robots through an obstacle course to a goal, and then a boss battle against Donkey Kong himself.

Playing Mario vs. DK in 2024, with vibrant, HD graphics unrecognisable from its pixelated GBA origins, is initially a jarring experience. Despite looking like a traditional sidescroller, Mario vs. DK plays nothing like a traditional 2D Mario game. The plumber’s movement feels slow and clunky, reminiscent of the original Donkey Kong arcade game this pays homage to, and there are no power-ups to be found on stages other than the iconic hammer from the 80s classic.

Mario can perform a few special moves, such as flipping onto his hands to deflect falling projectiles and acrobatic triple jumps, but these feel redundant for most of the game outside of a few challenges and late-game levels.

Instead, the gameplay here is very much about the puzzles. Each world introduces several different mechanics players will need to learn in order to reach the hidden key and transport it to the locked door (each level also contains three optional present pickups for those looking for some moderate extra challenge).

These mechanics include Bob-ombs which can be thrown at destructible walls, flowers which blow wind strong enough to carry Mario (and items), pesky birds which drop eggs on your head, friendly Rhinos which can be picked up and used as moving platforms, and a lot of colour-coded switches for summoning platforming blocks.

“Despite looking like a traditional sidescroller, Mario vs. DK plays nothing like a traditional 2D Mario game. The plumber’s movement feels slow and clunky, reminiscent of the original Donkey Kong arcade game”

However, while I remember the core experience of Mario vs. DK as fairly novel on my GBA handheld with its 16-bit graphics, it often felt rather run-of-the-mill on a Nintendo Switch.

The game’s core levels – which span eight worlds, including two new ones exclusive to the remake – are, for the most part, incredibly easy for anyone familiar with 2D Super Mario games, with neither the platforming nor puzzles presenting much of a challenge. Neither are they particularly inventive within their genres: Super Mario Bros. Wonder – released just four months ago – is both a better platformer and a better puzzle game than this.

That doesn’t mean Mario vs. DK is badly made, because it’s not: mechanics are frequently introduced and clearly signposted, and the new visuals are pleasingly crisp (even if a lot of the world designs feel very un-Mario-like – and especially the soundtrack). But in the last year Nintendo has become known for remakes that stick faithfully close to their source material, warts and all, and in Mario vs. DK’s case, a lot of it hasn’t aged terribly well.

Thankfully, beyond the core campaign of levels, the experience is redeemed somewhat. The second unlockable ‘plus’ story offers more compelling gameplay for experienced players, with Mario tasked with guiding a Mini-Mario carrying a key through moderately more difficult stages. These levels are pint-sized and still don’t challenge as much as we’d like, but they offer a welcome deviation from the core experience with more thoughtful iterations of the main mechanics. As somebody who 100-percent’ed Mario Bros. Wonder, I enjoyed playing them.

In addition, there are also just over a dozen Expert levels, which are unlocked by wracking up perfect scores throughout the main stages (by finding all collectibles), and which are genuinely great. It’s just a shame there aren’t more of them and that to get to the more challenging content, core players are forced to autopilot through a significant amount of less enjoyable levels. So there is a worthwhile experience here for core players, you just have to work to get to it.

Conversely, for kids, Mario vs. DK is much more worth considering as an accessible entry point to the Mario world, even if Mario Wonder is the clearer first-choice option. Not only are the slower paced, bite-sized levels more accommodating to younger fans, but the Switch version does a fantastic job of offering further guard rails in the form of a new ‘Casual’ difficulty, which adds checkpoints and eliminates the time limit. A two-player mode means families can also play together to solve challenges.

There will be those who maintain that the original Mario vs. DK is an underrated moment in Mario’s lengthy repertoire, and that this Switch interpretation is all the better for its refusal to change too much mechanically. Those players will be delighted with what’s on offer here. For those who don’t have that nostalgia to fall back on, however, the game doesn’t fit as neatly into modern gaming sensibilities as something like Metroid Prime Remastered or Super Mario RPG do.