Diddy Kong (or Diddy for short) is the secondary Kong protagonist of the Donkey Kong series along with Donkey. He is the fastest and most agile member of the Kong Family, a rather quick thinker on the fly, and Donkey Kong's eager best friend.
He has been described by his designer as a "chimpney", a portmanteau merging the terms "chimpanzee" and "monkey". The type of monkey he was based on is a Spider Monkey.
The nimble Diddy with his childlike naivety has gone on countless adventures with Donkey and is a jovial peace seeker wanting to help all of his friends. Diddy has made good friends with Banjo the Honey Bear, Conker the Red Squirrel, his childhood friend Timber the Tiger, and even Krunch the Kremling.
In the instruction booklet of Donkey Kong Country, he was introduced as a young boisterous monkey, who always looked up to DK and dreamed of one day becoming a video game hero just like him, although he also inherited Donkey's recklessness, irresponsibility, and mischievousness.
Diddy's look and role originally started as an updated/re-imagined Donkey Kong Junior, however Nintendo not being a fan of the new look encouraged Rareware to make the redesign a separate character that fit in with their DKC universe, hence Rare's mascot Diddy Kong was born. He is a creation of the British company, Rare; however, he has the Nintendo logo on his red hat. This is to signify the actual publisher of the DK series. Diddy has also gone on countless adventures by himself and has even starred in his own racing game for the Nintendo 64 and its remake/sequel for the Nintendo DS, games where he was the one that defeated Wizpig multiple times. He is also a recurring racer in the Mario Kart Series.
The name "Diddy" is a slang word used in some parts of northern England meaning "small", as Diddy Kong is one of the smallest Kong Family members (along with his girlfriend, Dixie Kong (who is the same size as Diddy) and her sister Tiny Kong (before Diddy Kong Racing DS)), Diddy could also be used to describe a type of tune/song.
He is designed by Rare, specifically Kevin Bayliss who also designed Donkey Kong the Third, and is currently voiced by Katsumi Suzuki but was voiced by Chris Sutherland in Diddy Kong Racing and Donkey Kong 64. In the Super Smash Bros. series, Diddy Kong was given realistic spider monkey screeches, instead of the respective voice actors from the Donkey Kong main series, where Diddy Kong was given a cartoonish voice. He was voiced by Andrew Sabiston in the TV Series.
Daemon Rising with a...SMASH![]
He briefly appeared as one of the many supporters in the large audience of allies to the Smashers below Peach's tower encouraging the heroes to fight back Daemon and her infection possibly corrupting their loved ones. He was with the Kong Clan and the Animal Buddies.
Trivia[]
- Diddy Kong was chosen as one of Ikran's favorite Petites in video games.
- When she was around 10, she fantasized on having 3 squads assist the ThunderCats; those being the Prehistoric Squad, the Fast Bro Squad and the Diddy Kong Racing Squad as Diddy ran it and worked alongside Panthro before Bumper, then his partner were the Thunderkittens.
Gallery[]
