Dixie Kong and Tiny Kong replaced Conker and Banjo in the DS remake. This is thought to be due to a legal issue, as both IPs belonged to Microsoft after Rare was acquired by them in 2002. The plot was slightly altered because of this change, with the original game's manual stating that Diddy Kong had sent messages to Banjo and Conker via Squawks, even noting in their respective character bios that Banjo and Conker are both friends of his.

Diddy Kong Racing DS is somewhat infamous for introducing the newly redesigned Tiny Kong, who despite being originally conceived by Rare as Dixie Kong's younger sister in Donkey Kong 64, was now depicted as a taller teenager. This design would carry over into future titles such as Donkey Kong Barrel Blast and Mario Super Sluggers.

Contrary to popular belief, as revealed on a December 20, 2007 edition of Rare's Scribes, the decision to redesign Tiny into a teenager was not Rare's call, but Nintendo's, which is appropriate considering Nintendo retained full ownership of Rare's Donkey Kong characters since the latter company's acquisition by Microsoft in 2002, and thus have had full creative control over how those characters have been portrayed ever since.

One detail that is worth pointing out, and may provide an explanation to why Nintendo had no qualms with redesigning a character who was meant to be Dixie's younger sibling into a teenager, is that the Japanese localization of Donkey Kong 64 reportedly makes zero mention of Tiny being related to Dixie, instead just being described by the manuals as just a "Charming girl Kong". It's also worth pointing out that every game that has featured Tiny Kong since 2002, such as Mario Super Sluggers, Super Smash Bros. Brawl, and Super Smash Bros. for Wii U has also made zero mention of Tiny's relationship with Dixie Kong, which adds credence to the theory that Nintendo opted to ignore and essentially retcon Rare's initial lore of the two being siblings.

Krunch is actually one of King K. Rool's spies, sent to investigate why Diddy Kong and his friends are on Timber's Island, and to see if they're hatching some kind of anti-Kremling plot. This information is not shown in-game, but is described in the backstory in the original game's manual. The opening cutscene for the Nintendo DS remake of the game opts to show this.