An official Nintendo interview went over the Donkey Kong Bananza transformations and how Pauline triggers them.

Super Mario Odyssey originally launched for Nintendo Switch in October 2017, meaning Donkey Kong Bananza has likely had a sizeable development period of close to eight years.

Donkey Kong Bananza's developers revealed that they added Pauline into the game after deciding Kong could turn into a zebra.

Nintendo eventually decided that smashing environments was a perfect fit for Donkey Kong.

Donkey Kong Bananza will be releasing at midnight of your region’s easternmost time zone on Thursday, July 17. This can be a bit confusing for those who live in larger countries, but as soon as it hits midnight anywhere in your region, the game will become available to play — barring any hiccups.

An all-new 3D platforming game, Donkey Kong Bananza, is launching exclusively for Nintendo Switch 2 on July 17th. Donkey Kong punches, grabs, tosses, climbs, smashes and flexes his strength as he explores the depths of this wild action adventure together with his new friend Pauline.

The first thing players will notice upon booting up Donkey Kong Bananza is that its titular ape looks pretty different. Although DK has sported multiple styles before (and the name’s been used for different characters entirely), his core aesthetic has remained mostly the same since the series’ first reboot in 1994’s Donkey Kong Country .

As many previews for the game have pointed out, Donkey Kong Bananza seems to have some performance issues thanks to its modular environment destruction system. However, it appears that the development team at Nintendo is well aware.

Donkey Kong Bananza features a younger version of Pauline from the original DK arcade game, and she makes a fun reference to her older appearances.

A few weeks ago, Nintendo confirmed an unusual piece of lore: Pauline is 13-years-old in Donkey Kong Bananza. This is an odd thing for Nintendo to have done. Historically, it doesn't include exact information about character ages in official communications. Heck, it won’t even say whether or not Waluigi is Wario’s brother, friend, rival, or enemy.

As a longtime fan of games Donkey Kong, Donkey Kong Jr., and 1994 Game Boy game Donkey Kong, I’m going to approach the events of Bananza as the next major milestone in that fran