Castle Kong draws inspiration from the ape-infused arcade games of yore

Castle Kong draws inspiration from the ape-infused arcade games of yore

A regal homage to Donkey Kong is on the way

I’m a fanatic for Donkey Kong. It was the first arcade game I ever played, and the first video game I ever owned (on the Atari 2600). Quarters and hours were lost to the game over the decades, and it continues to hold up in quality. The team at Drowning Monkeys seem to think along those same lines, and have developed an homage to the classic — and are asking fans to celebrate along with them.

Castle Kong looks to play similarly to Donkey Kong, in which a hero needs to rescue a princess from the evil Baron. Jumping around platforms and avoiding obstacles across 22 levels is the main goal, but the game throws in a twist: all of it needs to be done with 3 lives. That’s essentially how many tries we could muster on a quarter back in 1983 before being required to pop another in.

Castle Kong is releasing on February 25th, and Drowning Monkeys are holding a tournament to celebrate, in which Switch players can win upwards of $1250 for hitting high scores on its global leaderboard. The top ten players can expect some good dinero.

From Drowning Monkeys’ tournament page:

“The high score tournament begins on Switch launch day: February 25, 2021 @ 9PM EST and runs until May 25th, 2021. The players with the best 10 scores set AFTER LAUNCH DAY will win the prizes.”

We’ll give the game a good spin soon. Castle Kong launches on February 25th on Switch, and is available on Steam now.