and packaging before it could be released. Musgrave recalled that the ultimate goal of the game was to make it "run as fast" as Mario Kart 64, which proved difficult during development as the latter game utilised 2D character sprites whereas Diddy Kong Racing used fully 3D models. Musgrave later attributed the success of the overall project due to the "small team" of 14 people who worked on it. In an October 2012 interview, Musgrave said that Timber the Tiger would have been the main character of Pro Am 64 had the intellectual property for Diddy Kong Racing not been conceived. Two of the characters who featured in Diddy Kong Racing, Banjo the Bear and Conker the Squirrel, starred in games (Banjo-Kazooie and Conker's Bad Fur Day, respectively) which were unveiled to the public before Diddy Kong Racing, at the June 1997 Electronic Entertainment Expo (E3), but ultimately not released until after Diddy Kong Racing. Rare stated that they chose not to exhibit Diddy Kong Racing at E3 because of the proprietary animation technology used in the game. Soundtrack The music for the game was composed by David Wise. The soundtrack was first released in Japan on 1 April 1998, with 42 tracks, while a version of the album was released in Europe with the same number of tracks. For its United States release only 16 tracks were featured. The disc itself was specially shaped in the form of Diddy Kong's head, which was unplayable in certain CD players. Release Due to most of the Nintendo 64's planned 1997 Christmas season line-up being delayed until 1998, Diddy Kong Racing became the main Nintendo 64 release for the holiday shopping season, and a majority of Nintendo's $200 million advertising budget for the entire year was allocated to promoting the game. The game had a $20 million marketing budget in North America. Diddy Kong Racing also held the distinction of being the only game in the North American Christmas season line-up for which development was contracted by Nintendo; the other two first-party Nintendo 64 games in the line-up, Bomberman 64 and Mischief Makers, were both licensed from Japanese third-party publishers. Reception The game received critical acclaim upon release. The Nintendo 64 version holds an aggregate score of 89% at GameRankings based on 20 reviews and 88 at Metacritic based on 15 reviews, whereas the Nintendo DS remake received a score of 67%