Inside Story: How a Tense Watermelon-Eating Session Shaped Nintendo Switch 2’s Donkey Kong Bananza!

Launched in July on the Switch 2, Donkey Kong Bananza invites players to unleash mayhem as the iconic Nintendo character Donkey Kong. This game allows players to punch, smash, and burrow through its vibrant, open-world stages, discovering various items along the way. The game’s eccentricity and focus on fruit are highlighted by its unique sound effects, which were created by the game staff themselves, involving a lot of chewing and munching sounds.

In a detailed interview with Famitsu, Kenta Motokura, the producer of Donkey Kong Bananza, shared insights about the game’s sound effects: “The digging sounds you hear are actually recordings of someone chewing watermelon. Our sound team purchased watermelons specifically to record these effects.”

However, recording these sounds was not as laid-back as one might think: “The sessions were quite intense because they had limited opportunities to get the perfect take,” revealed Wataru Tanaka, one of the game’s directors.

In conversation with Nintendo Dream Web, Naoto Kubo, the sound director, elaborated on the extensive effort that went into producing and refining the foley sounds for the game. He mentioned that the team “recorded a vast array of real-life sounds,” which they repeatedly tweaked before integrating them into the game. “We dedicated years to perfect sounds like the shattering of rocks, with countless hours spent on fine-tuning,” Kubo added, noting that all in-game sound effects were produced in-house.

Donkey Kong Bananza uses distinct sound effects based on the interactions with different objects within the game. For instance, the sound effect for punching watermelons in the game was produced by actually smashing watermelons. Kubo recalled the challenge in recording this particular sound: “By the time we planned to record, the watermelon season had ended. We struggled to find quality watermelons,” he said, mentioning that he finally captured the desired sound the following year.

For creating the sound when Donkey Kong interacts with apples, the team experimented with biting into various items like apples, cookies, celery, and even hard candies. Kubo shared that ultimately, the sound of biting into a real apple was deemed the best. Meanwhile, the sound effects for the game’s gold were crafted by experimenting with different metals from a hardware store.

Additionally, some sounds were produced by combining different recordings. For example, elements of the watermelon-smashing sounds were mixed into the effect heard when breaking a hamburger patty in the game, because biting into a real hamburger patty didn’t produce a satisfying sound. The “boing” sound made by rocks when smashed was similarly crafted by incorporating a cicada chirp.

To learn more about the behind-the-scenes details of Donkey Kong Bananza’s creation, refer to our interview with Motokura and Takahashi, and discover why the game received a perfect score in our review.

Verity Townsend is a Japan-based freelance writer who has previously worked as an editor, contributor, and translator for the gaming news site Automaton West. She has also contributed to various publications on Japanese culture and cinema.