This game evokes many memories for me, as it is the first game I really managed to master in my local arcade. I played Crazy Kong which had a timer bug on level 11 causing the bonus counter to start at 500 instead of >8000, making it impossible to get past the 100m level. I still managed to score in excess of 300,000 points though :) Regular Donkey Kong is playable until level 22, when the same problem occurs.

This is the original appearance of Mario, the famous Italian plumber featured in many of Nintendo's later games. Your mission is to resuce the princess, taken captive by the evil Kong. The name of the game comes from a mis-translation or spelling error, as it was originally to be called Monkey Kong. Can you find the Donkey? The game is played on 4 levels: 25m, 50m, 75m and 100m high. On the first 3 levels your aim is simply to reach to top of the screen, and on the final level you must remove the rivets from the girders, causing Kong to fall to his doom, and then it starts all over again. On every level there is a bonus counter, and you must complete the level before the counter reaches zero, or you die. You are awared the score of the bonus counter on completion of the level.

On level one you must make your way across the girders and up the ladders to the top of the screen, avoiding the barrels thrown down by Kong. The first barrel ignites the oil, and turns into a fireball which follows you up the ladders. You can jump over the barrels, and collect the hammer to smash the barrels for bonus points.

On level two your aim is to make it to the level where Kong moves back and forth. There are no barrels on this level, just fireballs to avoid and moving conveyor belts filled with pies(!). Again collect the hammer to smash the fireballs and pies for extra points. You can also collect the bonus items, the hat, the umbrella and the handbag for extra points.

On level three you must use the ladders and elevators to make your way to where the princess is standing. Avoid the fireballs and the bouncing springs. Timing is more important on this level, especially to get to the princess and not be hit by a bouncing spring. You can also collect the bonus items, the hat, the umbrella and the handbag for extra points. There are no hammers on this level.

The fourth and final level is where you get to do some damage to Kong. Remove the eight rivets which connect the four upper levels by walking across them or jumping over them. Avoid the five fireballs which appear periodically on the opposite side of the level to where you are standing. Use the hammers to smash the fireballs, and collect the usual bonus items for extra points. Once you knock out the final rivet, Kong falls to the ground and you are briefly reunited with the princess, before Kong whisks her away once more and it starts all over again!

On level 4, Donkey KongUS will go to 125 meters, with the progression being :
barrels -> pies -> barrels -> elevators -> rivets.

On level 5+, Donkey Kong US will go to 150 meters, with the progression being:
barrels -> pies -> barrels -> elevators -> barrels -> rivets.

Japanese nintendo version . In this version barrels do not come down a ladder when you are standing at the top of it, and the levels play in the order barrels-pies-elevators-girders instead of barrels-girders-barrels-elevators-girders...

Crazy Kong - Donkey Kong clone which runs on the same hardware as Crazy Climber. The most notable differences are a larger character set and the display rotated 90 degrees.

On the 50m level collect the handbag and go up the ladder to the right. Then get to the next level using whichever ladder keeps you away from the fireballs. Jump to the far edge platform and up to the next level as soon as possible. Then get onto the extending ladder as soon as you can, and hold up to get level with Kong as soon as the ladder extends. Kong does not move above your ladder so he can't kill you. Any fireballs on Kong's level do not come back down, but you will have to wait if one is waiting for you at the top of the extending ladder.

On the 75m level take the up elevator to the top and jump right, avoiding the fireball. Then jump onto the down elevator and as soon as possible jump to the platform on the right, landing on either the upper or lower of the two platforms (lower is much easier). Once you make this jump, you have made a good shortcut, not having to worry about making your way all round the bottom of the screen. Climb to the platform where the springs move across, and they will not hit you at the right hand side of this platform. Then make your way left to the middle of this platform, and after the 2nd spring passes you run right and up the ladder without stopping. The next spring will seemingly pass through your feet as you climb the final ladder, but will not kill you, and you will complete the level. It will take some practise to master this, but once successful it should not be a problem again.

On the 100m level remove the left side rivets first snaking from bottom to top, and then collect the hammer in the middle of the screen. Smash as many fireballs as you can and stay right of the centre of the screen. New fireballs will then appear on the left, cut off from you by the removed rivets. Then you can remove the right side rivets with much less to worry about.

It IS posible to jump a fireball. Just a matter of timing, and hoping the fireball does not change direction when you are in mid-air!

On Crazy Kong on the 25m level you can jump from the first girder on the right hand side off to the right and fall through the floor, thus completing the level very quickly.

On Crazy Kong on the 50m level you can drop the first hammer on the right hand edge of the conveyor belt (press jump while holding the hammer). When the hammer disappears you still get points for any pies which hit the spot where you left it.

Just wanted to fill you in on something; in your section about Donkey Kong, something is mentioned about where the name of the game came from. It actually wasn’t a mistranslation, rather Miyamoto, the game’s developer, wanted to come up with some descriptive word that made the villain sound, well, villainous. He opened up the dictionary looking for some synonym for stubborn. The context exapmles that were included were things such as “stubborn as a mule”, “stubborn as a donkey”. And for some reason he latched onto the title Donkey Kong. (Kevin C)