February 15, 2008
In the closing days of the SNES game system’s lifespan, Project Dream was conceived. This little cancelled gem followed a boy who had to fight pirates. The game was later moved to the N64 and completely changed. The boy was replaced with a bear and the pirates with a Witch and her minions. The bear, Banjo, had a backpack that did nothing in early production. However, wings and legs were put in to pop out of it. These body parts eventually became a full-fledged bird named Kazoo. Though due to copyright issues, her name became Kazooie. This was the birth of Banjo Kazooie.
The game was a 3D platformer in the style of Super Mario 64. Still, this game’s charm, graphics, music, and overall expansive worlds kept it original. The game still holds up exceptionally well for a ten year old product. With the success of the first, it was time to make a sequel.
Banjo Tooie was actually announced in the first game’s secret ending. If you collected all 100 jigsaw pieces (jggies,) the character Mumbo would show you pictures of Banjo Tooie. These photos were of areas in Banjo Kazooie that were unreachable without entering codes that hackers found. Cheat devices weren’t needed. The rooms were in fact not accessible in Banjo Tooie, but the menu that held the items in the locals was called Stop’n’Swop. This led people to believe that you were supposed to swap them into Banjo Tooie somehow. This was in fact confirmed by the company involved, Rareware, but the process was replaced with breakable Banjo Kazooie cartridges in the sequel. These held the objects in question.
As for the game itself, Banjo Tooie made the game bigger, darker, funnier, and somewhat better looking. The only problems were that the worlds were maybe too big, and the framerate didn’t hold up to them. Otherwise, this was an improvement.
Two GBA games followed the release of Tooie. These were Banjo Kazooie: Grunty’s Revenge (a bridge between the N64 titles) and Banjo Pilot (a Mario Kart-like airplane racer.) But, the most exciting announcement was the third game in the series. Originally slated for a Gamecube release, the Banjo game without a name will be coming to the Xbox 360. This is because Rareware was bought out by Microsoft in the Gamecube’s early days. The third installment is slated for a holiday 2008 release.