YMMV / Donkey Kong Land

• Awesome Music: While the track is shorter and doesn't feature the "atmospheric" section of the original, DK Island Swing makes a very graceful transition to the Game Boy's 8-bit sound chip, and it is just as fun and swinging as its SNES counterpart, despite being on technically weaker hardware. Some even prefer it to the original track.
• Best Level Ever: As far as worlds go, Big Ape City is the major fan favorite and is regarded to be the most memorable world in the game. This is because in contrast to the previous worlds, which are remixed versions of pre-existing DKC1 worlds, it is a unique location that notably shifts away from the typical locales associated with the series in favor of taking place in a large city, which allows for some fun and unique gimmicks and challenges that are not typically found anywhere else in the series. The implication that Big Ape City is the city in which Mario fought the original DK/Cranky is the cherry on top.^note Though that has since been retconned by Super Mario Odyssey, which confirms that the original Donkey Kong game takes place in an identical but different city located in the Metro Kingdom known as New Donk City (That said, it is possible that Big Ape City was changed to New Donk City at some point in-between the two games).
• First Installment Wins: While the later titles are regarded to be far better gameplay-wise, there are many who prefer the first title for being a more distinctive and original experience than its sequels, which are downscaled ports of Donkey Kong Country 2: Diddy's Kong Quest and Donkey Kong Country 3: Dixie Kong's Double Trouble!.
• Visual Effects of Awesome: Rare managed to translate the then-revolutionary 3D CGI graphics of Donkey Kong Country to the far weaker Game Boy with flying colors, as the game still looks pretty good today. However, as technically impressive as the transition was, some feel this is to the game's detriment, as the Game Boy's smaller and monochrome screen, combined with Land's busy CGI backgrounds and giant sprites, can lead to moments of Fake Difficulty due to it being next to impossible to tell what is in the background and the foreground (which can lead to some unfair deaths). This problem isn't as bad when played on a Super Game Boy, Game Boy Color or Game Boy Advance since they make the backgrounds and sprites easier to tell thanks to the addition of color.

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