Errragh! The secret is in the diet.
Koala Kong's first spoken line, Crash Team Racing Nitro-Fueled
Koala Kong is a koala evolved by the Evolvo-Ray. He has a speech impediment and works more often in tasks that require pure strength. Unlike Tiny Tiger, Koala Kong shows no intellectual prowess in any task.
History
Crash Bandicoot
Koala Kong's first appearance was in Crash Bandicoot. He was the third boss and appeared at the end of the second island at a coal mine. He had 4 hit points and attacked Crash by throwing boulders at him. When fighting him, he threw 3 breakable boulders which Crash may destroy by spinning or choose to dodge them, and then another rock that Crash can spin right back at him, damaging Kong. However, mine carts can block the deflected rocks. TNT crates will drop down as the fight continues, and later on in the fight more than one TNT crate will appear at once.
After the events of the game, Kong apparently became a movie star and has been trained by a dialect coach to improve his diction.
Crash Bash
His next appearance was in Bash, when he was playable for the first time. He was summoned by Uka Uka to participate in the tournament after four years of his Arctic treatment. His strengths and weaknesses were equal to Tiny's.
Kong was Tiny's 'Evil Side' counterpart, and with equal abilities. In Crate Crush Arenas, he could toss boxes nearly halfway across the arena, which was nearly double that of Crash and Dingodile. In Tank arenas, his shooting mines had the second longest range, but dealt by far the most damage. In Polar Push, Kong had a single massive push across the ice rather than multiple weak ones like Crash. Also like Tiny, Kong rode on top of Killer Whales in Splash Dash.
Afterwards, the Japanese epilogue details Kong returning to Hollywood and facing a sharp drop in popularity, presumably for representing Uka Uka in the tournament.
Crash Twinsanity
His appearance was a cameo in Twinsanity, at Crash's "birthday party". He has an almost demonic face in this game. Crash does not fight him in this game and he barely moves during the scene; however, he makes a small muscle-flexing motion as soon as his right arm becomes visible, but then Ripper Roo jumps up and gets in the way of the camera for a couple of seconds.
Crash Bandicoot N. Sane Trilogy
Koala Kong reappeared in N. Sane Trilogy, reprising his role from the original game. However upon his defeat, he gets carried away by a runaway minecart instead of just collapsing, and the player is awarded the Koala Konked trophy.
Crash Team Racing Nitro-Fueled
Koala Kong appears as a playable racer as part of the Neon Circus Grand Prix. He is the reward for completing the Bronze Tier. He is later purchasable in the Pit Stop for 1500 Wumpa Coins as of the Gasmoxia Grand Prix update.
Stats
Speed: 7/7
Accel: 3/7
Turn: 2/7
Difficulty: Advanced
Driving Style: Speed
Crash Bandicoot 4: It's About Time
Koala Kong has a small cameo in It's About Time. His face can be seen on the sides of minecarts in the level Toxic Tunnels.
Crash Bandicoot: On the Run!
Koala Kong appears in On the Run! as a boss for Crash or Coco to defeat.
Characteristics
Personality
As a result of Cortex dedicating too many protons to the muscle department and too few to the brains, Koala Kong is the hot-tempered and dim-witted strongman of the original Cortex Commandos. He is extremely self-absorbed and obsessed with his own muscles, constantly flexing and showing them off, which can sometimes distract him from responding to imminent danger. This allowed Crash several chances to hit him with boulders in the original game, and even caused him to collide with a runaway minecart in the N. Sane Trilogy. His interest in becoming a Hollywood movie star also points to him further desiring to put his strength on display and be the center of attention. Though despite his immense physical strength, he is not quite the bravest of Cortex's mutants. While many of Crash's foes will take a direct approach, Kong prefers to keep his distance, attacking with boulders and TNT. This does not stop him from being highly confident in himself, however, as his epilogue in the Japanese version of Crash Bash reveals that he always expected to win the tournament, and even came up with a signature pose for his audience to easily identify him by.
Kong also suffers from speech impediment. He is never heard speaking in any of the games (with the exception of the intro for the Neon Circus Grand Prix in Crash Team Racing: Nitro-Fueled, where his only line is "The secret is in the diet!"), and met with a speech therapist according to the epilogue of the first game, to deal with this problem. Crash Bandicoot development literature titles Kong as the Rocky Balboa of the animal world, and describes his speech as "corner-of-the-mouth mumbling," hinting that Kong's speech is slurred, much like the actor Sylvester Stallone, who portrays Balboa in the Rocky series of movies. This is supported by the shape of Kong's mouth in the first game, which is always seen smirking and sneering with a drooping bottom lip, caricaturing Stallone's own trademark facial expression. However, this trait was not carried over to any of his appearances after Crash Bash.
Physical Appearance
Koala Kong is a very large musclebound koala, so muscular that he seemingly lacks a neck, his head nearly level with his shoulders. His legs are very skinny however, leaving him extremely top-heavy. He has plush light grey fur, a large black nose, small black eyes with black eyebags and black eyebrows, round ears with pink insides, and a mouth which is almost always pulled back in a grimace, revealing his teeth.
He wears a low-cut red tank top and mustard pants. He originally had his pants held up with a rope, but as of the N. Sane Trilogy this was replaced with a thick, black belt with a silver skull-shaped buckle on it. He wears thick black bracelets, which were originally very simple, but gained spikes as of Crash Twinsanity.
His design is mostly very consistent, but has a few differences in Twinsanity; his bracelets are brown, his fur is a darker shade of grey with a blueish tinge, his nose is red, he has yellowish rings around his eyes, his ears are more pointed, and his tank top is higher cut. His belt is also entirely missing in Crash Bash.
Profiles
Crash Bandicoot
- Manual
“So much for a steady diet of peaceful eucalyptus leaves. When Dr. Cortex made this bruiser, he dedicated way too many protons to the muscle department and too few to the brains. He likes to throw rocks. Fine. Do your best to return the favor and you may get to the third (and most dangerous) island- the fortress of Dr. Cortex.”
Crash Bash
- Manual (NTSC-U)
“Koala Kong’s primary diet consists of Eucalyptus tree trunks. After taking a break on the south seas, Koala Kong has returned to join his creator, Dr. Neo Cortex on Team Uka Uka. His powerful kick is brutal and he can throw just as far as Tiny.”
- Manual (PAL)
“KOALA KONG – mad, bad and dangerous to know”
Appearances
- Crash Bandicoot
- Crash Bash
- Crash Twinsanity (cameo)
- Crash Bandicoot N. Sane Trilogy
- Crash Team Racing Nitro-Fueled
- Crash Bandicoot 4: It's About Time (cameo)
- Crash Bandicoot: On the Run!
Gallery
See: Koala Kong/Gallery
Trivia
- Real-life koalas' diets consist mainly of leaves from the Eucalyptus trees, of which almost no other animal can feed upon. The Crash Bash manual insinuates that Koala Kong is capable of eating entire Eucalyptus tree trunks.
- Koala Kong, along with Doctor Nitrus Brio, Tawna, Komodo Moe and Baby T are the only known characters of the Crash universe before Crash Bash that were not playable characters in CTR. However, all of these characters, including Kong, make cameos in CTR's Scrapbook, unlocked by beating the game, or via cheat code.
- Koala Kong had spikes on his wrists in early Crash Bandicoot concept art, but they weren't implemented in his final design. Crash Twinsanity was the first game to actually implement the spikes on his wrists in-game.
- Crash Bash was the only game prior to N. Sane Trilogy in which Koala Kong had a voice.
- In a Twinsanity concept art piece (the go-fish image), he leans over to look at Pinstripe's cards, while they and the other players were looking at Cortex standing in the door, who had just thawed from the iceberg.
- In the prototype version of Crash Bandicoot, Koala Kong had five hit points instead of four. Also, it was not possible for Crash to simply spin the boulder back at him as it didn't self-aim itself.
- Like Pinstripe, Tiny, Ripper Roo, and Crash, he is based off a marsupial found only in Australia.
- In Crash Bash, Kong's voice is made mainly from the growls and roars of a bear. This is most likely a humorous nod to the fact that koalas are sometimes referred to as "koala bears" for their teddy-like appearance.
- Crash Team Racing: Nitro Fueled marks Koala Kong's second playable appearance since Crash Bash.
- Grunts and interjections aside, Koala Kong only has one spoken line in the series.
- Koala Kong's outfit somewhat resembles Teddy from MOTHER/Earthbound Beginnings.
- Koala Kong's last name is a reference to an iconic movie monster of cinema history called "King Kong" since 1933.
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