Donkey Kong (1981 video game)

"Donkey Kong (arcade game)" redirects here. For other Donkey Kong arcade games, see List of Donkey Kong video games.

Donkey Kong
Donkey Kong's 1981 North American arcade flyer by Leslie Cabarga
North American arcade flyer
Developer(s)
Publisher(s)Nintendo
Director(s)Shigeru Miyamoto
Producer(s)Gunpei Yokoi
Designer(s)
  • Shigeru Miyamoto
  • Gunpei Yokoi
Artist(s)Shigeru Miyamoto
Composer(s)Yukio Kaneoka
Series
Platform(s)
Release
  • Ports
    • Game & Watch:
    • Atari 2600:
      • NA: July 1982
    • Intellivision:
      • NA: August 1982
    • ColecoVision:
      • NA: August 1982
    • Coleco Mini-arcade:
      • NA: August 1982
    • Atari 8-bit:
      • NA: June 1983
    • Famicom/NES:
      • JP: July 15, 1983
      • NA: June 1986
      • EU: October 15, 1986
    • TI-99/4A:
    • IBM PC:
    • VIC-20:
    • Commodore 64:
    • MSX:
    • ZX Spectrum:
    • Amstrad CPC:
    • Famicom Disk System:
      • JP: April 8, 1988
    • Atari 7800:
    • Nintendo e-Reader:
      • NA: November 11, 2002
    • Game Boy Advance:
      • JP: February 14, 2004
      • NA: June 7, 2004
      • EU: July 10, 2004
Genre(s)Platform
Mode(s)Single-player
Arcade systemRadar Scope

Donkey Kong[c] is a 1981 arcade video game developed and published by Nintendo. As Mario, the player runs and jumps on platforms and climbs ladders to ascend a construction site and rescue Pauline from a giant gorilla, Donkey Kong. It is the first game in the Donkey Kong series and Mario's first appearance in a video game.

Donkey Kong was created to salvage unsold arcade cabinets following the failure of Nintendo's Radar Scope (1980), and was designed for Nintendo of America's audience. Hiroshi Yamauchi, Nintendo's president at the time, assigned the project to first-time video game designer Shigeru Miyamoto. Drawing inspiration from "Beauty and the Beast" and 1930s American media such as Popeye and King Kong, Miyamoto developed the characters and scenario and designed the game alongside chief engineer Gunpei Yokoi. It was the most complex arcade game at that point, using graphics for characterization, including it and cutscenes to illustrate a plot, and integrating multiple unique stages into the gameplay. Donkey Kong pioneered the platform game genre before the term existed, is the first to feature jumping, and is the first video game with a damsel in distress narrative. It had a limited release in Japan on July 9, 1981, before receiving a wide release some weeks later.

Although Nintendo of America's staff was initially apprehensive, Donkey Kong succeeded commercially and critically, becoming the highest-grossing game of 1981 and 1982. It was ported to the Game & Watch, selling eight million units, while Nintendo licensed the game to Coleco, a developer of arcade conversions for home consoles, selling six million cartridges. It was later ported to the Nintendo Entertainment System (NES), designed to replicate its technological capabilities; both the game and NES were integral in spreading Japanese video games to Western audiences. Donkey Kong's various ports sold more than 15 million units worldwide. Other companies cloned the game and avoided royalties altogether. Universal City Studios unsuccessfully sued Nintendo, alleging that Donkey Kong violated its trademark of the King Kong franchise.

Donkey Kong's success positioned Nintendo for market dominance for the 1980s and 1990s. The game debuts Mario, who became Nintendo's mascot and one of the world's most recognizable characters. It was mass marketed in multitudes of products, including breakfast cereal, toys, and television cartoons. Donkey Kong is considered one of the most important games from the golden age of arcade video games and one of the greatest and most popular arcade games of all time. It has been frequently referenced in pop culture and subsequent video games and has an active high score competition.

  1. ^ "Retro Diary". Retro Gamer. No. 104. Bournemouth: Imagine Publishing. July 2012. p. 13. ISSN 1742-3155. OCLC 489477015.
  2. ^ "「ドンキーコング」[AC]1981年7月9日発表/7月中旬稼働（任天堂）". Twitter (in Japanese). 究極VGL@アーケードゲーム愛好会. Archived from the original on April 6, 2023. Retrieved July 16, 2021.
  3. ^ "Donkey Kong Advert(Japanese, bottom-left)". Game Machine Magazine 15th July '81. Amusement Press Inc., Osaka, Japan. July 15, 1981. Retrieved October 12, 2022.
  4. ^ Cite error: The named reference CVG-ARC was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  5. ^ "Donkey Kong (Registration Number PA0000146899)". United States Copyright Office. Archived from the original on May 31, 2021. Retrieved May 29, 2021.
  6. ^ McFerran, Damien (February 26, 2018). "Feature: Shining a Light on Ikegami Tsushinki, the Company That Developed Donkey Kong". Nintendo Life. Archived from the original on October 8, 2020. Retrieved September 10, 2020.


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