Over the years, there have been quite a few fanmade conversions of Nintendo’s classic arcade game Donkey Kong for the ZX Spectrum, as well as an official version from Ocean Software released in 1986.
But earlier this week, a new port was dropped from the homebrew developer Artonapilos and the producer Bubu Marcianito that could potentially be the best version yet (thanks IndieRetroNews for the spot!).
The new version of the game features characters that are significantly closer to the designs seen in the arcade original (especially when compared to Ocean’s effort) and is much more colourful than many of the previous versions we’ve seen. It also doesn’t seem to be much of a slouch when it comes to its performance either, with the game running pretty impressively from all of the footage we’ve seen of it so far.
The port was developed as part of an ongoing series of Arcade clones for the ZX Spectrum, which also features versions of Atari’s Tetris, Valadon Automation’s Botanic, and Tago Electronics’ Anteater. And this is where we start to have some concerns. That’s because all of these games seem to be unlicensed yet judging from the itch.io page, the developer is charging money directly for the downloads, potentially putting a great big target on their back with the respective rights holders.
As a result, we don’t exactly expect this Donkey Kong port will be around for long before Nintendo’s lawyers take notice and issue a takedown to the project.
Here is a link to the store page. You can watch a video of it in action below:
Go on.... treat yourself to a new game.
