Krunch

Krunch is a Kremling playable character in Diddy Kong Racing and Diddy Kong Racing DS. He wears a purple leather vest, similar to the Kritters' jacket in Donkey Kong 64 and both versions of the cancelled Diddy Kong Pilot. The back of his vest has a skull-and-crossbones design in Diddy Kong Racing, but it is omitted in Diddy Kong Racing DS, possibly due to graphical limitations.

In the 2002 acquisition of Rare Ltd., the rights of many franchises and characters were passed on from Nintendo to Microsoft. Nintendo sought to keep all characters directly linked to the Donkey Kong series, with the exception of the cast of Donkey Kong Racing. Due to the nature of Krunch being a Kremling, which is a Nintendo-owned fictional species, Krunch was the only Diddy Kong Racing cast member, besides Diddy Kong, whose rights were kept with Nintendo.

Diddy Kong Racing
In the backstory for Diddy Kong Racing, provided in the instruction manual, Krunch was sent by King K. Rool with another Kremling, to investigate why Diddy Kong and his friends are at Timber's Island, and to see if they were plotting against the Kremlings. Krunch and the Kremling watch Diddy Kong and his friends, before Krunch suggests following them further; the other Kremling declines, but Krunch proceeds to follow Diddy Kong. Instead of antagonizing them, Krunch ends up helping the racers on their journey to expel Wizpig from Timber's Island. The instruction manual states that, despite offering to help Diddy Kong and his friends, they all do not trust him.

As a playable character, Krunch is a heavyweight with the lowest acceleration and handling of the racers, but has a very high top speed. He is the third-fastest racer in the game. Krunch's top speed without bananas is 60 mph.

Diddy Kong Racing DS
In the remake, Diddy Kong Racing DS, Krunch reprises the role of the original game with very minor changes. He appears in the new intro cutscene, spying on Diddy Kong, Tiny Kong and Dixie Kong behind a boulder, with another Kremling. This Kremling reuses the exact same model as Krunch. As they watch the three characters run by, Krunch tells the other Kremling, "Where are thosssssssse Kongssssssss going? I will follow!". The other Kremling then leaves, as Krunch begins to follow them.

As a playable character, Krunch's turning and acceleration were slightly increased, and his top speed was slightly decreased.

Diddy Kong Racing

 * Diddy Kong Racing instruction manual: "(Low acceleration, heavy weight, difficult handling, high top speed) Seeing Diddy Kong rush off so suddenly makes the Kremlings very suspicious, so Krunch goes bounding after him to make sure that there aren't any anti-Kremling plots in the works. Diddy Kong, Timber and company don't exactly trust him, but Krunch insists he's only there to lend a hand..."
 * Character stats
 * Weight group: Heavy
 * Acceleration: 1/5
 * Turning: 1/5
 * Top Speed: 4/5
 * Vehicle Color: Orange

Diddy Kong Racing DS

 * Character stats
 * Speed: 4/5
 * Acceleration: 2/5
 * Handling: 2/5
 * Vehicle Color: Orange

Trivia

 * Footage of the early pre-release build 1.964 of Diddy Kong Racing shown in the German Nintendo 64 promotional VHS tape "Wieviel 3-D hältst du aus?" reveals that Krunch was named "Krash" at some point in development, though this name was already taken by another Kremling in Donkey Kong Country.
 * The Kritter character in both versions of the cancelled Diddy Kong Pilot bear an almost identical appearance to Krunch. In addition, in the 2001 version of Diddy Kong Pilot, the internal name for the Kritter is "Krash". Whether the Kritter was at some point intended to be Krunch is unknown, but all of the remaining information and screenshots for the cancelled two games simply refer to this character as "Kritter".
 * Krunch has four fingers in Diddy Kong Racing–for the remake, Diddy Kong Racing DS, his new appearance now has five fingers.
 * Krunch would have been included as part of the cast to Diddy Kong Racing Adventure, a rejected video game idea pitch that never came into fruition. It was planned that he would use his jaw to chase down other racers as a special move.