According to Michael John, producer of Spyro the Dragon and currently a professor of games and playable media at University of California, Santa Cruz, “level design is management of affective state.” In this context, “affective state” refers to the underlying feelings impacting the player’s mood. By organizing a level’s architecture, obstacles, and characters in just the correct way, a game’s level designer can modulate the player’s mood so they feel specific moods as they progress. In this section, I will attempt to break down the affective states I experienced while playing through the level. These states will be indicated in bold.

The level begins with Donkey Kong hurling himself through the door of his treehouse and out into the level. Beginning with a short energetic animation rather than fading in on a static scene of DK standing around gives the character, and the player, a sense of adventurousness, especially compared to other 2D platformers of the era like Super Mario World, or even Sonic the Hedgehog. It makes the player motivated to keep DK moving quickly through the level, but they need to make a choice.

The start of Jungle Hinjinxs is actually a four way intersection. The player can go (as indicated in the above image):

A: Back into the treehouse by climbing up the cliff

B: into the cave below the treehouse

C: along the ground, following a short trail of bananas, or

D: up the cliff, but then along the treetops rather than into the treehouse.

While playing through the level, my eyes were first drawn to the steps on the cliff. I wanted to go back into DK’s treehouse because I wanted to see where Donkey came from before the level started. Doing so felt rewarding, as I got to see DK’s very ’90s pad and also found a balloon. Curious as to what the balloon would do, I had to touch it. It was an extra life.

Leaving the treehouse, I next wanted to visit the cave. I actually wanted to get on with playing the level and suspected that the cave was not the place to do that, but as I received a balloon for my curiosity in the treehouse, I didn’t want to miss out on what might happen in the cave. Upon entering the cave, I found DK’s banana hoard to be empty. DK seemed visibly upset about this. I understand that in the story of the game, this is likely meant to be an inciting moment of anger. The bananas are gone and it’s time to get them back. I was not angry myself because I don’t have any emotional history with these bananas, but I was endeared to Donkey and felt a desire to retrieve them. He seemed so sad.

If you read the original instruction manual for the game, you’ll find a four-page story entitled “It Was a Dark and Stormy Nite…” about how the evil Kremlings had stolen both Donkey Kong’s bananas and kidnapped Diddy Kong while Diddy was standing guard. It’s cute and it contextualizes the cave full of not-bananas in Jungle Hijinxs, but it is very likely for players to completely miss this detail. Very few people read manuals. I happen to be one of the few players who do, but as this is a level design-focused paper, let’s pretend I didn’t and, therefore, wouldn’t know that this empty cave had anything to do with Diddy Kong (or that there even was a Diddy Kong).

After seeing Donkey’s lack-of-banana-induced pouting, there were two paths remaining. In truth, I’ve played through this level a number of times and, depending on how experienced I was when I was playing, chose different paths. First, I’ll talk about my inexperienced path through the level.

The Beginner’s Level

It’s been many years since the first time I played Donkey Kong Country, but it’s not difficult to imagine how a beginning player might experience the level. In an attempt to be complete in my analysis, here’s a detailing of a playthrough I did where I attempted to mimic the first time I played through the level.

I traveled along path C, toward the grounded trail of bananas.

Immediately, I was faced with the first enemy of the game, I character I know to be called a “Gnawty.” It’s a short beaver that slowly walks forward toward the left, the direction Donkey Kong is coming from. I felt hurried into making a decision. I could jump over the enemy, but I wanted to see what else Donkey could do, so I tried all the face buttons. Eventually, I found that the Y button causes Donkey to do a roll. I felt confident that this roll would defeat the Gnawty, so I went for it. My hypothesis was proven correct and I felt accomplished seeing DK roll through the Gnawty like a knife through hot butter.

During the roll, I had Y held down. This was fortunate because I rolled straight into a DK barrel. I did not register the DK barrel as a threat considering it’s just a container and it has my character’s initials on it. Because I was holding Y as I touched the barrel, DK picked it up. It’s sometimes difficult to tell exactly what sorts of possible interactions items in this artstyle have, so to have figured out exactly how to use the barrel was exciting.

Letting go of the Y button caused DK to throw the barrel, which made an explosion effect and spawned Diddy Kong. At once, I was both excited to have Diddy Kong with me and enlightened about the barrel holding/throwing mechanic. Because it reacted to me letting go of the Y button, I realized that grabbing the barrel was probably also related to the Y button as well, so that was a learning moment.

After that, I reached a small mound with a Gnawty walking below it and a Kritter walking back and forth on top. Even though I did not jump over the earlier Gnawty I saw, I was still fairly certain that I could. With this one, however, I was not as sure. Because of the spatial relationship between the Gnawty and the Kritter, I could not jump over the Gnawty without colliding into the Kritter, which I was afraid might mean death. Jumping onto the platform was also a no-go considering that the Kritter starts in the area DK would jump to. In this way, the Gnawty and the Kritter create a barrier that Donkey Kong must break through in order to proceed. Desiring to tackle this problem carefully, I waited until the Kritter had walked toward the right a bit then jumped up onto the mound and then again onto the Kritter’s head. The flatness of a Kritter’s head and shoulders affords being jumped on. Hobbyist game developer Michael Julius Peterson called this specific attribute certain platforming enemies have “boppable heads” while discussing the design of the Tiki Tak Tribe enemies in Donkey Kong Country Returns. The Kritter’s boppable head created a shortcut from me seeing it to me bouncing on it that didn’t require any thought on my end.

At that point, I was looking at the K KONG letter floating above, within jump height. Another nearly automatic motion: it was shiny so I grabbed it. It was a quick flash of curiosity, and then contentment.

After killing the Kritter and collecting the letter, I had a choice between either taking the road on the bottom or jumping up to the treetop marked on the above image as E. I followed the bottom path as I could not reach the treetop playing as Donkey. I could have switched to Diddy, who has a higher jump, but I did not this run.