Time Warp: DKC3

Didn't expect to find myself back into Donkey Kong Country 3, but after re-experiencing the first two games in the series, I was only going to play a few levels of DKC3, now I find myself halfway through the game.

Since DKC3 seems to be the easiest game in the series, as kids we'd race against each other to see who could finish DKC3 in the fastest time. (Of course at the time, we didn't know about the HARDR and TUFST codes to make the game more challenging...)

I'm sure while searching for bonus levels, most of us stumbled upon a few of these mysterious invisible barrels that will teleport you to the end of the level. Not referenced anywhere in the instruction manual, in a time before the Internet, I was fascinated by these warp barrels. Most involve Kiddy Kong tossing his lighter cousin Dixie up in the air to reach an invisible barrel that materializes when touched.

In retrospect, Funky Kong may offer a clue at the start of the game... Sure, "reach the stars" is probably just an expression... But there are clearly stars on the warp barrel. Oh yeah!

Definitely didn't find all the warp barrels back when I first played the game. Turns out there's a warp barrel hidden in every single one of the game's first 10 stages (first 2 worlds) in both DKC2 and DKC3... Allowing you to be defeating DKC3's second boss in 4 minutes of game play.