Donkey Kong Bananza is coming out this Thursday, and we’ve been getting a lot of interesting information from Nintendo, via the game’s dev team, about how everything came together. We showed you earlier some of the interview statements that help highlight the many things that went into the title itself, but now, we can go even further. For example, would you like to see the tech demo that was made using Super Mario Odyssey models that inspired the destruction-based gameplay? Of course you would!
A technical experiment of putting the hands of Super Mario Odyssey boss Knucklotec on a Goomba led to the destruction mechanic being used in Donkey Kong Bananza.
— Stealth40k (@stealth40k.bsky.social) 2025-07-15T14:02:02.729Z
That was truly the inspiration for things to come, and then, they started to drop a bunch of concept art on the idea. Concept art which you can see…here:
Donkey Kong Bananza Concept Art from Nintendo!
— Stealth40k (@stealth40k.bsky.social) 2025-07-15T13:17:54.722Z
Finally, and arguably, most importantly, we revealed last week that Donkey Kong Bananza wasn’t meant to be on the Switch 2, but the OG Switch. They switched development in 2021 and have been working on the game ever since. In the interviews, they highlighted how the game would’ve looked on the Switch versus the Switch 2, and the results are a bit shocking:
Kenta Motokura confirmed that Donkey Kong Bananza development was moved to Switch 2 in 2021. He shared what Donkey Kong Bananza might have looked like on the original Switch.
— Stealth40k (@stealth40k.bsky.social) 2025-07-15T13:37:44.170Z
As you can see, there’s a lot more detail in the Switch 2 version, and the environment itself feels so much more robust and “alive.” One can only imagine how the full game would’ve looked on the older system. Regardless, the game is almost here, and you can get it on Nintendo Switch 2 on July 17th!
