Donkey Kong (arcade game)

Donkey Kong is an arcade game created by Nintendo, released in 1981. The game introduced two of Nintendo's most important characters, Mario and Donkey Kong. The unusual name of the game is commonly believed to be due to a mistranslation of the Japanese for "monkey", but Shigeru Miyamoto actually intended for it to have this name. The "Kong" part is obvious (see King Kong), but the "Donkey" part represents "Stubborn".

Trivia

• Sound effects from the Atari 2600 version of Donkey Kong are often heard in television shows where generic video game sounds are needed. In most cases, the audience cannot see what game is being played and these sound effects are consistent regardless of the game console being shown. In an episode of the 1993 series , these sounds were even heard when the character, during a childhood flashback sequence was playing what was obviously a handheld electronic football game.
• In 1984, Ocean Software then an indistinguished small software house released an unlicensed version of Donkey Kong for the ZX Spectrum as simply Kong. In 1986, having established themselves as a major force for arcade conversions they licensed the Donkey Kong name and released a new and entirely separate official version of the game. This makes Ocean the only software house to have released both an official and an unofficial version of an arcade game.