Donkey Kong Bananza was originally developed for the Switch 1 before shifting to Switch 2

Donkey Kong Bananza is one of the most sought-after Switch 2 titles (image source: Nintendo) will launch next week, and the game’s development has been pretty dynamic, to say the least. Originally intended for the Switch 1, the developers decided to leap to the Nintendo Switch 2, as the team wanted to implement voxel-based environmental destruction.

The Super Mario Odyssey team is behind Donkey Kong Bananza is one of the most sought-after Switch 2 titles (image source: Nintendo), with Kenta Motokura as the producer and Kazuya Takahashi as the director. Kenta Motokura has worked on titles such as Super Mario Sunshine, Donkey Kong Jungle Beat, and Pikmin. In an interview with IGN, Motokura explained: 

“The very original impetus for the development of Donkey Kong Bananza was when my boss, Mr. Kozum, approached our team and asked us to consider working on a 3D Donkey Kong game. Around the same time, we had a programmer who was experimenting with voxel technology.” 

Super Mario Odyssey had a few levels featuring limited voxel-based destruction, such as Luncheon Kingdom and Snow Kingdom. When news broke about the Switch 2’s development and its new features, including mouse controls, the team decided to shift development to the Switch 2. Producer Takahashi detailed the move to the new handheld:

“When we learned about the Switch 2 development, we realized that the best implementation of these ideas and technology would be on Nintendo Switch 2. This allows us to engage in creating an extremely rich variety of materials and very large-scale changes in the environment on that new hardware.”

The new features Takahashi refers to include mouse controls for co-op mode and the new DK Artist mode. Motokura explained that the entire game world is built using voxels, making Donkey Kong a perfect fit in a destructible environment.

Donkey Kong Bananza is set to release on the Nintendo Switch 2 on July 17 and is currently available for pre-order.