Originally Bongo Blast was all about bonking the left bongo for left, and bonking the right bongo for right. Now, the Wii remote and nunchuk are used a bit like a tank's controls - you wiggle either to turn in the respective direction or waggle both to boost forwards. Lifting both will make you jump - handy for stretching up to those mid-air bananas or hitting the exploding barrels that litter the tracks and fling you forward like the ones in Mario Kart: Double Dash. There also seems to be rhythm-action style sections where you tilt your little plastic friends to achieve some as yet unknown aim. "GOOD!" and "COOL!" says the game when you get it right. Bless it.
But back when Bongo Blast was Bongo Blast (if you see what we mean), racing was about more than blazing bongos. We were promised we'd get to ride DK's long-suffering animal acquaintances Rambi the rhino and Enguarde the swordfish and, in traditional Donkey Kong style, pelt along a rollercoaster minecart track. There's none of that in these screenshots, but that's not going to stop us praying to the Banana God that they're still in (even though we're guessing that such moments are going to be unlockable treats, or perhaps even some secret shortcuts off the main courses).
There are a whole 16 tracks and they're certainly pretty - if surprisingly lo-res - and, sweetly, the course boundaries are marked out with vines and ropes that allow the actual scenery to stretch out for miles. Jungles drag you past clunky wooden windmills and over the edge of waterfalls. Lava-licked underground mines have moody shadows on the cracked stone walls. Lung-fillingly fresh tropical beaches remind us a bit of Banjo-Kazooie. Underwater realms bring you colossoctupuses (our word) and darting sharks. Nice. But hopefully there'll be more imagination in the un-unveiled tracks - Excite Truck's climactic journey into space will take some beating.
