Donkey Kong was designed by Shigeru Miyamoto for a 1981 arcade game. Miyamoto first planned to use Popeye characters, but Nintendo could not get the license, so he created a new antagonist to replace Bluto. He named the gorilla 'donkey' to suggest stubbornness and 'kong' to suggest gorilla, drawing on Beauty and the Beast and King Kong. Originally Donkey Kong was Mario's rebellious pet; later games cast him as a hero protecting his bananas. He became Nintendo's first major international success.

Hampi is a UNESCO World Heritage Site in Karnataka, India, with more than 1,600 surviving remains spread over 4,100 hectares. It was the capital of the Vijayanagara Empire from 1336 to 1565. Travellers from Persia and Portugal described it as a prosperous, wealthy and grand city with temples, markets and farms along the Tungabhadra River. By 1500 it was estimated to be the world's second-largest city after Beijing, and probably India's richest at the time. In 1565 a coalition of Muslim sultanates defeated the Vijayanagara Empire, its capital was conquered and destroyed, and the city was left in ruins. Hampi remains a religious centre, with the active Virupaksha Temple at its heart.