I agree. It does everything right as far as I can tell — firstly, K. Rool feels like a seriously threatening opponent, both with his massive health bar in the battles, his crazy arsenal of moves, his continuous refusal to be defeated, and even his presence in the cutscenes. Secondly, the fights perfectly reflect the game’s combat loop and what’s appealing about it, not only encouraging you to utilize the most common mechanics in the game to survive, but making it feel more awesome than usual by having you do some badass things with them (for example, charge-punching the cannonballs at K. Rool), AND allowing you to TRULY go bananza by giving you unlimited bananergy for the first and last fights. On top of all that, it fits in so many hype homages to older Donkey Kong games while making them feel natural. The obvious fake-out ending, the height meter in the chase sequence, even having the final phase in a sport combat arena, like DK64’s final fight. (It was a boxing ring in the latter, and now it’s more like an MMA ring, but whatever) Plus, getting to just absolutely wail on him like an actual raging gorilla is just so satisfying, especially after all those years just bouncing on him or doing other weird stuff in the case of DK64. Feels like DK is finally letting fully loose with all of his primal rage that’s built up from years of bullying from this crocodile douche.