4.5/5 ★ – delaydan17's review of Donkey Kong Country 3: Dixie Kong's Double Trouble!.

91/100 Donkey Kong Country 3 in many ways feels like a spin-off of the DKC series rather than the third in a trilogy. This is not to speak to Donkey Kong Country 3’s weaknesses—the game is still one of the finest 2D platformers available—but rather to the game’s failure to live up to ridiculous standards set by the first two masterpieces in the series. In Donkey Kong Country 3, the player controls Dixie Kong and Kiddy Kong for a platformer adventure. Unlike in the first two DKCs, this is not a remotely balanced duo and Kiddy Kong ends up feeling like dead weight for the first 90% of the game. I also disliked the notable addition of the playable elephant; the only animal in the series who feels like a power-down rather than up. Still, the platforming mechanics themselves is inarguably Donkey Kong Country and unimpeachably amazing. There are a wide variety of excellent levels in Donkey Kong Country 3 with fantastic level design. This being said, DKC3 relies a lot more on a specific linear gimmick for each level and the quality of the levels is more dependent on the quality of the gimmick—as opposed to the first two DKCs more fully developed levels. While all the world areas in Donkey Kong Country 3 are attractive and well developed, only Kaos Kore feels like a genuinely new, fresh, and well developed area (and it also has a couple lesser quality levels). I also don’t think the boss fights really compared to the second game overall. Like many other aspects of Donkey Kong Country 3 the art and music in the game are both aesthetically excellent, yet do not live up to DKC 1 and 2’s masterpiece standard. Many of the basic enemies have been reskinned into less attractively designed variants (like those weird green bees). The graphics are still fantastic for the system, however, and maybe have the best level background art in the series. David Wise composes yet another awesome synthy 90s soundtrack, but it just doesn’t feel as amazingly fresh or new as the first two games. With all these negative comparison to DKC 1 and 2, one might be tempted to imagine that I was disappointed with Donkey Kong Country 3. This is not at all the case (just look at my score!) the game just simply does not live up to the first two games as being two of the finest 2D platformers ever to have been made. Examined on its own, Donkey Kong Country still stands out as a phenomenal 2D platformer with both excellent level design and mechanics, as well as some of the finest graphics and music available on the SNES.