Donkey Kong Bananza DK Island and Emerald Rush DLC review

Out of all the things I’d anticipated from the September 2025 Nintendo Direct, Donkey Kong Bananza DLC was not on my list. Despite DLC additions for recent Splatoon and Pokémon games, I still never anticipate more content from a Nintendo game, often to avoid getting my hopes up. So, when I saw DK’s face light up, mine did the same, eager to spend more time platforming and pulverizing on my Nintendo Switch 2.

To get you up to speed, I gave the base game a 10/10 score in our original Donkey Kong Bananza review, referring to it as “the first Nintendo Switch 2 masterpiece,” before immediately adding it to our guide to the best Switch games. A couple of months later, and I stand by that score, but admittedly, I haven’t revisited the game all that much, having collected all the fossils, outfits, and Banandium Gems.

So, what does this DLC consist of? Well, there’s a new area to explore in DK Island and a fresh game mode in Emerald Rush. While there’s a link between the two, I’m going to approach each part of the DLC individually, as, at least as far as I’m concerned, there’s a bit of a gulf in quality between the individual parts.

Let’s start with Emerald Rush. I love it. Now, I am a bit biased, as I love roguelike games, and Nintendo has co-opted a few ideas from that genre in Emerald Rush. The story behind the new mode is that Void Kong is back, but he’s not looking for trouble. Instead, he wants to hire Donkey Kong as an emerald miner, and he’s happy to reward the loveable ape for his work.

Emerald Rush is split into 99-second rounds, and you have a quota of emeralds to find every round. The shiny green gems appear everywhere gold would in the base game, so there’s plenty to find in barrels, enemies, and veins. Fossils, which reset every run, unlock perks, which boost the amount of emeralds you receive depending on the source, the Bananza form you’re using at the time, or other factors. Banandium Gems, which also reset each time, can bag you Bananza forms and skill upgrades, as well as extra emeralds and Banandium Chips.

On the subject of Bananza forms, Emerald Rush wipes your skills clean, so you start each round with just three health and no souped-up sonar or turf surfing power-ups. You can upgrade on the fly by using Banandium Chips in the skill menu, but sometimes that isn’t the best option, as certain perks reward you for hoarding chips or not unlocking any Bananza forms. Emerald Rush constantly throws decisions at you, and while they might feel immaterial in the first few rounds, every perk makes a difference by the time your quota swells.

For a while, I wasn’t sure how much I was enjoying the Emerald Rush mode. Then, before I knew it, I’d spent four hours trying to beat my high scores, creating some truly broken builds on my way. At one point, I’d heavily invested in perks that boosted the amount of emeralds I earned while in Ostrich Bananza form and from taking down Crockoids, to the point where I could earn my quota to continue to the next round just by beating down a couple of the Crockoid monstrosities on DK Island’s beachfront with a swing of my wings. It’s Donkey Kong Bananza at its most chaotic, and I can’t get enough.

Despite my love for Emerald Rush, I’m willing to admit it’s not perfect. It feels like Nintendo has designed DK Island specifically for the new game mode, but it’s not quite as fluid in other layers, such as the Lagoon Layer or Feast Layer, which can make the early game tricky when you dial up the difficulty. I also had a couple of runs where I selected Kong Bananza-adjacent power-ups, only to realize that the Kong Bananza upgrade wasn’t available anywhere on the map. It feels like the game should be smart enough to turn off power-ups related to a specific Bananza form if I can’t use it during that particular run, so I don’t waste the precious and limited upgrades from finding fossils and Banandium Gems.

While I’m a big fan of Emerald Rush for the most part and can already see myself doubling my current playtime in that game mode alone, DK Island itself is a little underwhelming. It’s a nice enough little nostalgia trip to check out DK’s treehouse and the rest of the island, but it just feels a bit empty, with an absence of new fossils or Banandium Gems to hunt down outside of Emerald Rush. There’s something new to collect, though, as you can exchange 100 Banandium Chips with Squawks the parrot for statues, which range from different fractones you encountered in the main quest to icons from the Donkey Kong series.

These statues are pretty cool, and they do make DK Island feel a little more engaging, almost like a post-game museum, but there’s a downside there, too. If you’re not a fan of the Emerald Rush mode, which rewards you with Banandium Chips, it’s going to take a lot longer to grind for Chips to unlock new statues. For me, this isn’t a problem, as I’ve already spent over ten hours playing Emerald Rush, but if you’re not a fan, it almost makes DK Island a bit of a bust by default.

If I’m wearing my cynical hat – and it is one of my favorite hats – I do wonder why Emerald Rush mode wasn’t part of the original game. While Donkey Kong Bananza did offer a fair bit of post-game content, it’s nothing incredibly replayable, which is how I’d describe Emerald Rush. It feels very much like the cherry on top, and while I’m personally willing to part with more money for that, I feel like some might feel a little shortchanged, with the complete Donkey Kong Bananza experience now setting you back the best part of $100.

All in all, the Donkey Kong Bananza DK Island and Emerald Rush DLC is fantastic for a certain kind of gamer, which I so happen to be, but might be a little lacking for others. Given its $20 price point, which, yes, I know, is the same as Hollow Knight: Silksong, I wish there were a little more to DK Island to make it pop. That said, I still can’t get enough of Emerald Rush, which adds a replayability factor to a game that was slightly lacking one once you’d collected all there is to collect.

That was our Donkey Kong Bananza DK Island and Emerald Rush DLC review. For more of our thoughts on the latest and greatest Switch games, be sure to check out our Star Wars Outlaws review and Daemon X Machina: Titanic Scion review. Or, if you’re looking for more Donkey Kong fans, join in the fun by heading over to the official Pocket Tactics Discord.