DK Island and Emerald Rush is a dichotomous, albeit controversial, DLC addition to the already fantastic Donkey Kong Bananza. The former is a love letter to DK’s past; it’s a letter that is best appreciated by those who want that trip down memory lane. The latter, though, is a highly replayable and ever-so-engaging roguelite mode that takes things up several notches to truly test your mastery of Bananza’s mechanics. You shouldn’t consider this DLC unless you’ve completed Bananza or intend to do so.
Donkey Kong Bananza is a truly fantastic 3D-platformer and worthy of hundreds of hours. While I did not review it for DigitalChumps, I still carry quite a bit of positive feelings towards it since playing it on my own time since its release back in July of this year. The base game alone contains oodles of hours of playtime. Some of that playtime is repetitive, sure, but it’s good fun. It’s dumb fun. It’s a smashing good fun example of a 3D platformer that truly shows off gameplay innovation without relying on some of the Switch 2’s gimmicks.
That being said, it lacks a post-game – one that encourages players to think and play creatively using Donkey Kong and Pauline’s Bananza skills throughout the duration of the game. We need more than a time sink that requires players grinding for gold to unlock collectibles. We need tests of skill and new places to explore.
DK Island and Emerald Rush (as a single DLC pack) seems to be built around that idea. It just does so with a questionable asking price, similar to what was recently done with Kirby and the Forgotten Land’s DLC/upgrade on the Switch 2. Before writing this review, I promised myself that I wouldn’t reiterate several of the complaints that other reviewers and players have expressed about this DLC’s price. Instead, I thought to consider price from a different perspective. If you already know about DK Island and Emerald Rush’s contents and only want to read that alternate take of price, feel free to skip to the last few paragraphs of this review. Otherwise, read on.
DK Island is a new layer level that becomes available at the halfway point (give or take) of the game’s story, allowing DK to “daydream” with Squawk and visit the main island of Donkey Kong 64. Since this is a daydream of the past, Pauline and DK’s Bananza Powers aren’t available. It’s just a space for DK to roam about, discover some cute Easter Eggs, and break things apart with his fists.
I truly enjoyed my first few minutes roaming around DK Island. Things looked and felt just like I remembered it, albeit slightly shrunk to accommodate Bananza’s level constraints and this Donkey Kong’s size. Getting that opportunity to head back down memory lane and find these Easter Eggs listening to remastered classic music was delightful. I got goosebumps climbing the mountain, even though it lacked a very important element driving Bananza’s gameplay loop: Bananas (Banandium Gems).
Yes, there are no Bananas to be found here. Just gold – quite a bit of it. There are a few levels that let me farm several thousand gold pieces in the same recycled gold levels I had already completed in the base game, but there wasn’t much else. Instead, it was a nostalgic sandbox that I could destroy as I pleased.
I fear that if you haven’t played DK64, much of DK Island will feel like a waste of time and/or a quick fix for getting some currency for that endgame grind. I was able to recognize so many little tidbits from DK’s 30+ year library sprinkled throughout the island, including a select few from Donkey Kong Country 2. I wouldn’t expect younger players to appreciate this space beyond it being a sandbox for some gold. It’s disappointing, since this space could have been used to get new players up to speed on DK’s past or even an opportunity to accomplish something meaningful tucked away in this island’s nostalgia bomb of a level.
Emerald Rush, however, contains quite a bit to do. It contains a bit of fun gameplay that is perfect for those who have completed the main game. True post-game content. This part of the DLC is unfortunately locked away until you’ve completed the main game, but holy shamwow – it was worth it. If you haven’t yet completed the main story, I’ll do my best to keep things as spoiler-free as possible. Consider returning to this review once you’ve completed the main game.
Emerald Rush kicks off the post-game by having Donkey Kong hired by Void Co. to collect emeralds, a new currency, over multiple rounds of traditional roguelike gameplay. Donkey Kong is stripped of all his powers, only receiving a handful of them during a single run (assuming you get far enough), so it’s up to you to figure out how to use the powers you’ve been granted.
I never thought that I would be playing a roguelite Donkey Kong in 2025, but here we are.
Most of the objectives in this roguelike involve reaching an arbitrary emerald quota, obtained from finding emeralds while smashing, surfing, rolling, and destroying each level. Part of what makes Bananza such a pleasant experience is the ways in which those verbs (smashing, surfing, rolling, etc.) are made satisfying. Emerald Rush amps up the satisfying destruction with the big big numbers that high-score chasing roguelike players love.
With DK in a powerless state and getting randomly assigned skills, I was tested in using abilities I had hardly used during the base game (like the Spin Jump and Spin Spam). Emerald Perks augmented each run, modifying my current playthrough to make it feel fresh.
This mode is an endgame player’s dream. If you spent the base game writing off or outright avoiding some of DK’s skills, Emerald Rush will present a fine challenge in getting you to use those skills and potentially improve in how you navigate playing Bananza. For me, it made me a better player and unlocked new methods of speedrunning that I could consider should I decide to play Bananza all over again.
Emerald Rush rewards players who master its roguelike challenge with additional levels, outfits, and a few other secrets I won’t spoil here. Its difficulty amps up considerably, especially on harder difficulty levels that require far more emeralds collected and enemies defeated in stricter conditions.
I’ll be honest here: Emerald Rush is a fabulous endgame mode that spins Bananza’s core mechanics in ways that players wouldn’t originally consider. It does so while keeping Banaza’s gameplay loop fun, albeit slightly more stressful than usual. Best yet, it gives players a meaningful chunk of time to level up their Bananza skills. It’s a fabulous package…but the fact that it costs a pretty penny and time investment to play is concerning.
I know there have been many players, myself included, who saw the DK Island and Emerald Rush announcement trailer and immediately balked at the current price of owning Bananza in its entirety. With the DLC pack, players would have to cough up $90 in total – a price far higher than any other of the Switch 2’s lineup of games with DLC. It’s incredibly tough to ignore the reality of 2025’s games being increasingly expensive along with everything else that gets us through the day.
I am genuinely torn about recommending DK Island and Emerald Rush. On one hand, the nostalgia of visiting DK Island with its oodles of Easter Eggs and original music along with the massive continuous fun of Emerald Rush make it worthwhile. On the other hand, I don’t want a precedent to be set where truly good post-game content (in a single mode) is omitted from the base game and sold quickly after release as a separate pack for ~30% of the game’s original asking price. At the bare minimum, Emerald Rush could have been included in the base game as a means of easing some of the post-game currency grind, all the while upping the difficulty to test players throughout their playthrough instead of holding the “good stuff” to over 30 hours in.
Here’s the thing, though: I can’t ignore the reality that many players don’t finish games. They play them for a good minute before moving onto the next, assuming that they play the game at all after buying it on deep discount. DK Bananza won’t show up during Steam’s Summer Sale, I know, but Emerald Rush in particular is not designed nor marketed towards the average player. It’s designed for those who have willingly invested hours of their time into Bananza, hopefully enjoying it, and wanting a meaty challenge within the destruction-forward gameplay loop that’s so excellently crafted.
It presents that meaty challenge so…so well.
On that note, let’s wrap things up.
DK Island and Emerald Rush is a dichotomous, albeit controversial, DLC addition to the already fantastic Donkey Kong Bananza. The former is a love letter to DK’s past; it’s a letter that is best appreciated by those who want that trip down memory lane. The latter, though, is a highly replayable and ever-so-engaging roguelite mode that takes things up several notches to truly test your mastery of Bananza’s mechanics. You shouldn’t consider this DLC unless you’ve completed Bananza or intend to do so.
