As in all Game & Watch games, Donkey Kong includes a clock that alarms at a set time if desired. The clock's icon in Donkey Kong is a bell. When the time arrives, a character that the instruction manual calls Mini Donkey Kong comes and starts ringing the bell. If the player isn't playing the game, the game unit will start making an alarm noise, though if he is playing the game, then the Donkey Kong character will just start shaking the bell.
Story
The game follows the same story of the original. Donkey Kong escapes and kidnaps a beautiful girl. Mario, who was still a carpenter in the game, decides to go and save his beloved and heads to the construction site where Donkey Kong took her. He climbs up to the girder which Donkey Kong is standing on and starts to remove the pieces so that he falls down.
Gameplay
The Donkey Kong unit has two screens. It starts on the bottom. There are girders that lead upwards to Donkey Kong, and the playable character Mario must travel on these girders and climb up the ladders to reach his nemesis. Donkey Kong, knowing that his rival is coming, starts to throw barrels down at him. The only way to dodge the barrels is to either jump over them or go in the middle of a ladder. Once Mario reaches to top of the ladder on the bottom screen, he'll emerge on the top screen. Following this he'll continue to climb up the girders. Once he reaches the lever, the player will have to press left on the control pad to make a hook from the crane start to swing. When the hook swings to the left, Mario is required to jump over and grab it. If done successfully, one of the wires holding Donkey Kong is cut. If the player doesn't grab the hook after it swings twice, then it automatically stops swinging.
There are two modes in the game including Game A and Game B. Game A is easier than Game B, which requires more technique and timing than Game B. The highest score of each mode will be shown on the top screen when playing that particular mode.
The main goal the game is to accumulate as many points as possible. The maximum score that a Donkey Kong unit will display is 999 points. Some units, for whatever reason, only display 998 points. Once the player reaches that score, it'll reset to zero. You can receive points by doing multiple things. One point is earned when Mario jumps over a barrel on the lower girder, while two points are earned when Mario jumps over a barrel on the second girder. Depending on how fast the player does it, the player can get from 5 to 20 points when he destroys a wire that is holding Donkey Kong up. After all of the wires that are holding Donkey Kong are cut, the player will receive 20 points.
The player has three lives in the game. When all of Mario's lives are depleted, he will have to start the game over. There are a variety of things that kill Mario. The most common way to die is getting hit by a barrel. If Mario hits his head on a piece of iron, it'll also result in a lost life. In the end of the level when Mario jumps for the crane hook, he'll lose a life if he misses. If the player leaves the game untouched for five minutes, it'll result in a game over and the time will be displayed. If the player receives 300 points, he'll regain one of his lost lives. If he hadn't lost any lives when he reached that score, he'll go into a mode called "CHANCE TIME" where the player receives double the points for everything he does. After Mario looses a life, he'll start from the beginning after the player presses the start button. If the player doesn't press the start button in eight seconds, he'll go there automatically regardless if there's a barrel there or not. If Mario doesn't reach the top in time, the barrels will start to move so quickly that it will be impossible to jump over them.
Rarity
There are plenty of these games around and they are regularly traded on Ebay, so not too rare.
Estimated Value of Working Models (September 2013)
Box and Instructions: £70-£100
Without Box: £25-£40
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