We have verified that Amazon Italy has unwittingly revealed the box art for Donkey Kong Country Tropical Freeze for the Wii U in its game listing. This is the source on a rumor about the game’s fourth playable character. Obviously, spoilers follow, so if you don\’t want that, turn back now, and don\’t scroll to the spoiler image below and definitely don\’t click at this link right here.

You may need to look a little close, but just below Dixie and Donkey Kong, you can see Cranky Kong hanging onto Donkey Kong’s leg. Does this mean Cranky Kong could be the fourth playable character?

In the official Nintendo canon, Cranky Kong is actually the original Donkey Kong found in the arcade game from 1981. It was Cranky Kong who kidnapped Pauline, was then trapped by Mario in Donkey Kong Jr, and was thwarted by Stanley the Bugman in Donkey Kong 3. He officially retired from whatever that job description would be in Donkey Kong ’94 on the Game Boy. Donkey Kong Jr. is presumably the current Donkey Kong, although Nintendo has never come forward to confirm this.

If this is true, I expect Nintendo to just go ahead and fess up to it very soon, since Amazon Italy hasn’t been forced to take this down yet. Are you looking forward to playing the irascible old coot?