Nintendo says it believes in the idea that “it is more fun to destroy that which is beautiful,” which is why it stuffed hundreds of millions of voxels into at least one of the layers in Donkey Kong Bananza.
Nintendo producer Kenta Motokura and programmer Tatsuya Kurihara peeled back the layers of last year’s Nintendo Switch 2 Donkey Kong game during a GDC panel attended by IGN earlier today. The hour-long session offered a deep dive into the crust of what made the game special, including information about its ties to Super Mario Odyssey and, of course, its destruction mechanics.
Members of the Donkey Kong Bananza team. Photo by Rebekah Valentine/IGN.
Outside of his love for bananas, Motokura says one of the first things that comes to mind when many others think about DK is that “his arms are big and strong” and allow him to do things most humans are incapable of. The Nintendo team kept this in mind when challenging themselves to deliver a unique experience with Donkey Kong Bananza, which eventually led to its core feature: destructable environments.
Voxels, which Kurihara describes as 3D versions of pixels, were used in Super Mario Odyssey for elements like snow and cheese. Following that game’s launch in 2017, Nintendo experimented with the technology (one famous example saw the team strap arms onto a Goomba) before completely destructible terrain became the core feature in Donkey Kong Bananza.
Kurihara describes the game’s Canyon layer, just one of its 17 nearly destructible levels, as “rather big,” saying that it contains roughly 347,070,464 voxels. Each voxel on any one level can contain properties that include things like density, wetness, destructibility, and more. Voxels materialize as terrain and NPCs, and are always moving, with individual voxels also carrying varying resolutions, too.
Donkey Kong Bananza Voxel Material Properties. Photo by Rebekah Valentine/IGN.
Motokura, Kurihara, and the rest of the team felt each detail packed into the voxels helped make exploring layers more satisfying. It’s a complex, dynamic system that Nintendo strived to bring to life. DK’s destructible sandbox takes elements from Super Mario Odyssey and brings them to a new level, but achieving these goals was easier said than done.
Building a foundation on voxels while maintaining 60fps proved difficult, especially when the project was originally in development for the original Switch. It wasn’t until the technological advancements offered by the Switch 2 that the team was able to build DK and Pauline’s journey to the planet’s core with more freedom.
“There were times confusion permeated the team. There were even times when I wanted to say, ‘Oh, banana,'” Motokura said via translator, quoting DK’s Bananza catchphrase. “Even in those times, we understood each other’s ideas and continued forth, like when Donkey Kong gives a thumbs up.”
Donkey Kong Bananza Different Resolutions for Some Voxels. Photo by Rebekah Valentine/IGN.
Donkey Kong Bananza launched exclusively for the Switch 2 July 17, 2025. Its DK Island and Emerald Rush DLC added new locations to dig through and mechanics to uncover when it launched for $19.99 in September. We gave the base game a 10/10 review upon its release, calling it “a truly groundbreaking 3D platformer, with satisfying movement, powerful abilities, impressive destructible environments, and clever challenges.”
Photos by Rebekah Valentine/IGN.
Michael Cripe is a freelance writer with IGN. He’s best known for his work at sites like The Pitch, The Escapist, and OnlySP. Be sure to give him a follow on Bluesky (@mikecripe.bsky.social) and Twitter (@MikeCripe).
