Diddy Kong Racing

Diddy Kong Racing is a 1997 racing video game developed and published by Rare for the Nintendo 64. The game is set on Timber's Island and revolves around Diddy Kong and his friends' attempt to defeat the intergalactic antagonist, a wizarding pig named Wizpig, through winning a series of races. The player can take control of any of the featured characters throughout the game. Diddy Kong Racing features five worlds with four racetracks each, and the ability to drive a car, hovercraft, or pilot an aeroplane.

In Diddy Kong Racing, players can choose one of ten characters, who have access to three different vehicles: car, hovercraft and aeroplane. The car is an all-round vehicle; however, it is the slowest on surfaces such as sand and water. The hovercraft is designed for both sand and water areas, but lacks in acceleration and manoeuvrability. The aeroplane is designed to access aerial areas; it is good at acceleration and manoeuvring; however, it has the slowest speed. Each racetrack has a set of boosters known as 'zippers' that temporarily boost the player's speed, as well as featuring regenerating balloons of various colours that provide power-ups. There are five different types of balloons: red, blue, green, yellow, and rainbow. Red balloons grant missiles to attack racers ahead, blue balloons grant a speed boost, yellow balloons grant shields to protect the player from attacks, green balloons grant deployable traps to delay other racers, and rainbow balloons grant a magnet ability that brings the player closer to the nearest racer. If multiple balloons of the same colour are picked up, the power-up will be upgraded to a more powerful version. A total of two upgrades are available for each balloon. Additionally, racetracks contain non-regenerating bananas that add to speed when they are picked up. A maximum of ten bananas will improve the speed, but can also be obtained to prevent other players from gaining speed. If a racer gets hit, two bananas will be deducted.

In 'Adventure Mode', players control the racer of their choice to progress through the story. Players begin on Timber's Island, which consists of five interconnected worlds; Dino Domain, Snowflake Mountain, Sherbet Island, Dragon Forest, and Future Fun Land. The worlds are opened up by collecting balloons, except for Future Fun Land, which is a hidden world reached by accomplishing several secret objectives. Each world contains four race tracks, an unlockable battle stage and a race against a boss character. If the player defeats Wizpig in Future Fun Land, obtains all amulet pieces and collect all of the gold medals, the player will be able to play in a mode called 'Adventure 2'. In this mode, all of the balloons change colour to platinum and the tracks are inverted from left to right. The game also features four battle modes which consist of two deathmatch maps, a capture-the-flag-style battle and a mode which involves opponents capturing eggs. The battle modes are not initially selectable, and must be unlocked by collecting keys hidden in each of the worlds.