Memory Lane time!

When I was a much younger Goddess, I ended up getting in serious trouble, they took my TV, SNES and N64 away and my Gameboy for doing a bad in school. A couple months later, it was Halloween. I was dressed as a Power Ranger, walking to house to house to get that good ol' candy (back when Halloween was a huge event and get candy by the pound, lol).
I got to a certain house and the couple came out and said that I was the 100th trick or treater, and they gave me a box in my bag. What was it that they gave me? It was the Special Pikachu Edition Gameboy with Pokemon Yellow. That system was awesome, being blue and yellow and having a Pikachu graphic on the corners of the screen. It's one of the more fond memories I have of my childhood.
With that being said, reviewing Yellow ends up with me being a little nostalgic for it. It's basically Pokemon Blue but with some elements of the Anime. Your starter being Pikachu was, for me, awesome. He followed you around and you can even check how he feels, and he talks in this! And Team Rocket's Jessie and James were also in this game, and i loved that as well. Other than that it's that classic Pokemon game that you know and love.
Gameplay is still solid but very basic in the modern times. The difficulty could range here and there but as long as yo fight every trainer you come across it shouldn't be too hard. The music will always be the major highlight here, some of the best video game songs in general stem from the 1st generation. Even the graphics are pretty good for the time, and since it's on Gameboy, the colors of the towns change as you walk through them, it was pretty novel at the time for me.
It's a basic Pokemon game that has Pikachu up front and center for everyone to see, and that's okay. Nostalgia does hold this up for me and you can probably see why. I DID play this somewhat recently on the 3DS, thinking i wasn't gonna enjoy it as much but honestly, it's still a good time.
Definitely a must play for me, do it for the Pika!

Just like Dreamland 2, the first time I fully beat this game was in 2022, directly after Dreamland 2 actually. I first played this years ago when I got an SNES classic, and thought it was cool. But I'll come out and say it, I never really digged the whole multiple bite-sized campaigns in one shtick. I had a greater appreciation for this game, when I played it in 2022, due to some of the series staples it added. But even then, it wasn't one of my favorite Kirby games. How do I feel about the game now though? Basically, the same tbh. Though, when compared to every Kirby game that released prior to this, I'd say it's the clear best.

The biggest improvement, and this would be a Kirby staple once Return to Dreamland released, is the expanded move set. No longer do you only have a single move per copy ability. Now, depending on your directional inputs on the d-pad, you can use several different moves per copy ability. This is a fantastic addition, and probably my favorite aspect about this game, as it makes beating each level more fun. Both of the fire abilities that were in Adventure, are now in one and the one that would turn you into a fireball is your dash attack. Spark, which was a staple in Adventure and Dreamland 2, isn't even in this game and was basically replaced by Plasma (which is all around better because of the electric shield you can get). The copy abilities in general, are really good in this game. You have your series staples like sword, hammer and all that. But then you have new ones like Bomb, Mirror and Yo-Yo which are all really awesome. Compared to prior games, the amount of copy abilities in this game is massive and I think it even rivals some of the modern games. You can also, at anytime, turn whatever copy ability you have into a little NPC helper. This was a fun addition and let's you play the game with two players? I actually never tried it out myself, but I assume you can do that and not have the multiplier be regulated to the minigames.

I am a Dreamland 3 fan, and while I prefer how that game looks visually, Superstar still looks really good for an SNES game. The game is full of that Kirby personality, whether it's with Kirby himself or the enemies he faces. The animations on some of the enemies in this game are just really expressive, and that includes the bosses as well. They're all very charming, especially the computer virus boss, that one is very witty. Some bosses are better than others (I really hate fatty whale) but most of them are pretty fun..especially with the expanded move set.

Now for the meat and potatoes of this game, the game modes. This is the part of the game I'm not much of a fan of. The game consists of 9 modes in all. 4 of them are normal Kirby campaigns, 3 of them are short minigames, 1 is a weird campaign that is more akin to a Metroid game and the last is a boss rush basically. They're all mostly fun in their own right, I just much prefer a more focused, full sized campaign since even with the longer modes here, they just don't stick in my mind as much. I'll delve into each mode though and explain my feelings on every one of them.

Megaton Punch is a short, button timing mini-game where you must see who creates the biggest crack on Popstar. It's very short and humorous to watch, but there's not much to it. Samurai Kirby is basically a remake of the one western minigame from Kirby's Adventure, and it's even more simple to play. You just press the A button faster than your opponent but I swear I just can't do it, even on the easiest difficulty. I always lose to Meta-Knight at the end. It's alright but I prefer Megaton Punch. The last mini-game is Gourmet Race. I won't get into the staple song just yet, but know it's my favorite of the three minigames because of its music and because its fun to race Dedede (and to see his reactions to you winning).

As for the normal campaigns, the first one is Spring Breeze. Not much to say here, it's the shortest of the four and is basically just a remake of Dreamland 1. It's actually even shorter than that game since it lacks the reused portions of levels before Dedede. Dedede is also super easy in this version compared to Dreamland 1. Dynablade is a little longer than Spring Breeze, but not by much. Also don't really have much to say here either, it's a pretty uneventful set of Kirby levels. Revenge of the Meta Knight is a lot longer than the previous two campaigns, or at least it felt like it was. It has Kirby trying to stop Meta Knight and his crew. The level takes place, mostly, in his ship as you destroy it. It also has the most dialogue in the game, because of his crew members, and it's very charming because of them. This felt like the most unique of the normal campaigns and it was definitely my favorite next to the final one. The final one, Milky Way Wishes, has Kirby trying to stop the sun and moon from fighting, which Kirby must make a wish using Nova (this cat face clock thing) because this fella Marx told him to. In the end of the adventure though, Marx dupes you and takes the wish for himself and you have to fight him. This one probably has the most stakes out of any campaign and Marx has a really cool design. I also really liked the space theme and I really really liked the copy ability mechanic. Basically, you can only get copy abilities from these pedestals hidden throughout the world, but once you do you keep the ability forever and can freely switch between any you've gathered at anytime. Thinking about it then, this is probably my favorite mode in the game..it would've been really cool to see this one fleshed out even more though since it still isn't very long.

As for the other two modes, The Great Cave Offensive is different from the other modes. It acts as sort of a metroidvania, where the goal is to explore each section of the game for treasure. You can backtrack freely which is unusual for a Kirby game and is why this one feels different from the other 4 campaigns. It's fun but getting every treasure can be a pain, and pretty much all of the bosses (which you would first see here) get reused in the later campaigns. The last mode, which you unlock from beating every other one, is the arena. This is the boss rush I mentioned earlier, and it's a staple in like all of the modern Kirby mainline games. I actually didn't beat it this time, I gave it like 10 go's, but I did beat it back in 2022. The copy ability you want to use is definitely hammer as it does the most damage. The arena is usually the hardest part of the modern Kirby games and that's no different here, as you have to defeat every boss in the game with only 5 Maxim tomatoes for all of them. It's not totally my thing but it's a decent inclusion nonetheless.

The OST is good, as most Kirby games are, and the standout of course is Gourmet Race. It's one of the most well known Kirby songs for a reason (besides becoming big because of Smash) and yeah it's pretty awesome. The rest of the OST is good too, but this was my favorite new song, as this game continues the trend of remixing a lot of older Kirby songs.

I'm not crazy about this game like some other Kirby fans are, due to the multiple campaigns, but I can't deny it added some great series staples like the expanded move sets and the arena. While not in my personal top 5, at this point in the series this is definitely the best Kirby game thus far. Fun time overall!

Before playing this game, the only 3D Sonic I ever played was Sonic Colors. And even then, a good chunk of that game was in 2D. So Adventure was my first fully 3D Sonic game ever. For years, I'd hear people say this game was broken beyond belief or just simply a "guilty pleasure" game that they enjoy despite being shit. While I did not love it like some people do, I can personally say I did not think the games were either of those things.

The game is broken up into 6 (technically 7 if you complete all other routes) character routes. You can play as Sonic, Tails, Knuckles, Amy, Big the cat and Gamma respectively. Each of these characters play differently from each other, whether it's for better or worse, and even tho each playthrough varies in quality, I can at least commend how ambitious this is. Because in each character's playthrough, you get different cutscenes and also context for certain scenes that may not be explained in earlier playthroughs. As my friend Lemonstrade said, it's sort of similar to what Drakennier does which again is super cool conceptually, especially for a 1998 game.

But back to the actual characters, Sonic is the clear best one here. He has his spin dash, is of course the fastest in the game and also has a super fun aerial dash. I've heard people say the controls are bad in this game and I simply don't get that at all. Sonic, at least, feels simply perfect to control. The levels on the other hand, I can see people having issues with. I disagreed with the fact this game is broken beyond belief, but it definitely can be a bit broken if you're unlucky. I only glitched through the stage like 2 or 3 times, but the first time it happened was on the very first stage. That made me think the entire game would be broken, but it wasn't. Unless I got lucky, those claims, while still credible sometimes...are massively overblown. Besides that though, Sonic's stages while still fun, can feel incredibly janky just because of how fast he goes. It's hard to explain but if you've played the game you'd know, a lot of times the animations and your movement through levels can feel very unwieldly. It can be really hard to control sonic sometimes, and it often looks super awkward when looking back at it. Like I said it's hard to explain, and while I still had a ton of fun with his levels (just because he feels so good to controls) I can't help but think thee levels feel off. Again, this is mostly when you're at full speed going through loop de loops and shit. When it's slower sections you're going through, it's not an issue.

As for the other characters, they all have significantly less stages than Sonic. Tails has you racing against sonic, and with him being able to glide, you can take some seriously crazy shortcuts. The game itself even encourages this which I thought was pretty neat. Knuckles has you searching for three master emerald shards. It's basically a treasure hunt, with the emerald icons turning different colors depending on how close you are to them. These were alright, but story-wise I wasn't really a fan. Honestly thought his story would be more different from Sonic's than it was, not to mention the final Chaos fight was barely different from Sonic's (and Tails had a unique fight for his ending). Amy was probably my least favorite character to use. Her levels consisted of getting to the end like Sonic, while running away from one of Robotnik's robots. Problem is, while her hammer bounce is kinda cool, her moveset isn't nearly as fun as Sonic's yet her levels are still long like Sonic's (which isn't much of an issue with Tails and Knuckles). That plus, besides the one Gamma scene, her cutscenes were lame. Big the cat is the most contentious character by far, and honestly I didn't hate him. Yeah his cutscenes are super dumb and don't add much to the story. However his campaign is by far the shortest, and the fishing is actually really easy (and kinda fun) once you get the hang of it. Gamma is by far the best character next to Sonic. Not only are his stages fast paced, with you having to kill enemies quickly to get more time to your total. His story is actually significantly different compared to the others, and quite touching at that. If I had to rank each character's campaigns, I'd say Sonic>Gamma>Tails>Big>Knuckles>Amy.

To go to each actual level, you have to navigate the hubworld. For a 1998 game, it's not bad but it can feel somewhat empty I felt. Though, there are things to get that aren't just apart of the main story. There are some optional collectables and even some minigames you can play. There's also the chao garden which, I tried to get to work but since I was emulating the game, I suspected there was an add on I needed or something idk. But from the little I've heard, it does sound fun.

The story in general, does have its high points, like the aforementioned Gamma campaign and the ending is really nice. It's simple but effective. However, the actual voice acting is horribly stilted a lot of the time. It's not even a so bad it's good situation, it was just mediocre a lot of the time. That is, except for Robotnik who is super over the top but hilarious. Even despite the fact they reuse fight dialogue in actual scenes (which is jarring for sure) his dialogue is super duper memorable and easily the highlight. Something else that was memorable were some of the face animations, goddamn are they awful sometimes.

I didn't like LOVE the soundtrack like some people do, but it is quite nice overall. Very experimental which I appreciate a ton. My favorite songs were probably Red Skull Mountain, Welcome to Station Square and Egg Carrier: A Song That Keeps Us on the Move.

Once you complete all 6 character routes, you unlock the 7th and final one..Super Sonic. This is essentially just the final boss and some closure on the story, but it's definitely satisfying. You become Super Sonic, defeat Chaos's final form at supersonic speed, and in turn this cleanses Chaos of his evil as we find out he wasn't ever bad from the start. The closure on the whole Chao's and the past cutscenes was really nice. That along with Gamma's scenes ofc, easily the highlights of the story.

This game is definitely flawed in some ways, and Adventure 2 might improve on everything in this game idk. But I can officially say, this game is overall good and that Sonic had a good transition to 3D. Not everything works in this game, but I can acknowledge this game is full of heart.

May drop it down to a 6 cuz I was feeling like that for a good while but for now it's a 7.

Back in September of 2023, I decided to replay both Banjo games to see how much I still liked them. It had been around 10 years since I had played Kazooie since then, and 4 years since I'd last played Tooie, so I was excited to dive into both games. Well, as it turns out, I loved replaying both so much I decided to replay them directly after. I very rarely do that, so I just knew I had to bump both games to a 10. Well, after my whole review purge, I decided to replay these once again and rereview them all over again. Only 7 months later after playing them both twice before, I'm a madman I know (haha you won't get this reference because those reviews are now deleted). Anyways, just like before...I had a blast replaying Kazooie and consider it one of the best N64 games ever.

The first thing I'll get into are the controls and Banjo-Kazooie's moveset in general. I honestly think this game controls masterfully, Banjo and Kazooie have such a varied move set that flows well with each of the levels. The talon trot is a must in every level as it let's you go through each area that much faster. With the c buttons, it's also really easy to remember how to perform it too. In fact, I haven't played the game on anything but the N64 itself, but idk how I'd feel about playing it on another controller just cuz I find the N64 controller fits it perfectly lol. Besides the talon trot, you also have a roll attack, rat-a-tat rap which is an aerial move, golden feathers which you can use to turn invincible as long as you have them, red feathers which you can use to fly (and the flight in this game is more satisfying than Mario 64), the beak bomb which is an attack you can use while flying and more. All of this you unlock gradually while playing and is all used plenty through-out the game. You also have two power-ups that let you either traverse unsafe ground (wading boots) and the speedy shoes which, as the name implies, let's you go fast. Even the swimming in this game is pretty nice once you know how to use it. I've seen some people say it's awful because it's so clunky. Which, if you're not holding the R button then yeah totally, but if you are it's very nice and smooth as you have a breast-stroke and a paddle you can perform depending on what you need.

The game itself is incredibly charming, both aesthetically and comically. The world's all look lovely and is just full of that N64 Rare ware charm. When playing through a world, you would be hard pressed to not see a pair of googily eyes on an enemy or even the items (when the item explanation first pops up) and for how lighthearted this game is, it very much fits. That's not to say the dialogue is all light-hearted. It's not as dark as Tooie obviously but they still put in a couple of dirty jokes hear and there. The dialogue itself, while not nearly as funny as Tooie imo, its witty enough especially Gruntilda's dialogue.

Going into Gruntilda and her lair in general, both are fantastic. The lair is a tightly designed hub world that is super memorable, not just because of it being compact in size and easy to traverse, but because the whole way through Grunty insults you and eggs you on. Kazooie has way less dialogue than Tooie, and Grunty herself I find more menacing in that game, but when it comes to her insulting rhymes...they're easily the most memorable pieces of dialogue in the game. Even on this most recent playthrough, I was still hearing rhymes I've never heard before. Really makes me wonder just how many there are in total lol.

When it comes to the worlds themselves, they are excellent tightly designed levels just like Grunty's lair was. Mumbo's Mountain is the worst one imo, and that's just because of how small it is...which makes a ton of sense because it's the first world. All the rest are very enjoyable, with some of my favorites being Freezezey Peak, Clanker's Cavern and Click Clock Wood. Now you might be saying to yourselves, Clankers Cavern? Yeah, idk why but it might've been my favorite world this time around. I honestly don't have an issue with the swimming portions, I love the track that plays in it and the dank grimey atmosphere I find wonderful (which makes sense because I love Tooie and it has a lot of that). It feels like one of the more unique world settings next to Rusty Bucket Bay. Speaking of Rusty Bucket Bay, it has the infamous engine room area and yeah that's still my least favorite part pf the game. It's not TOO bad if you do that part right away, but I still died like 5 times this playthrough. I also died to Click Clock Wood very stupidly, those two levels even now can still get me as they're easily the two hardest in the game. Going back to the engine room tho, the reason it's so hated is because it's the only world with an instant death pit. In the N64 version, instant death means you lose all your notes as the game tracks a total note score in this version rather than keeping your notes when you die like in the Xbox version. This is also a small gripe I have, but only in these last two levels because I pretty much never die in any of the earlier ones.

The music in this game was done by Grant Kirkhope and he's absolutely legendary. He has a very distinct bouncy style to his music and it absolutely fits here with how goofy this game is. My favorite tracks in the game would have to be Rusty Bucket Bay, Spiral Mountain, Clanker's Cavern, and The Final Battle. The entire soundtrack is wonderfully though, and I especially love Grant's use of dynamic music. His work on Banjo Kazooie and Tooie, and DK64 show he's a big fan of it and it's perfect in these types of games.

Once you beat every single world, and have obtained enough notes and jiggies to progress, you enter Grunty's Furnace Fun. This is basically a giant quiz show that puts your knowledge to the test. It's very goofy and fitting for the type of game Banjo Kazooie is. The questions consist of listening to the voice of a character or song of a level and guessing who/what it is, random trivia, playing a mini-game from the main levels or a Grunty question. The grunty questions consist of trivia about Grunty herself that you must know to answer. To find these out in-game, you must hunt down her sister Brentilda, who is hidden in specific areas of the lair. You might think, meh I'll just look the answers to these online. But they're randomized per playthrough so you simply cannot do that. Luckily, with the joker card which let's you skip 2 spaces on the board, you can bypass these if you weren't able to find Brentilda. Same with the instant death skull spaces which are usually just a basic trivia question, but still are very nerve-wracking. After you get to the end of the board, you get a hilarious joke where Grunty makes her escape by forcing credits on you. After that though, it's actually time to fight her.

Before you fight Grunty, depending on how many collectables you have gotten, you can unlock consumable refills and even double health. Once you've gotten what you need, it's time fight Gruntilda herself. The final battle may honestly be in my top 20 fights ever, it's super good. It tests you on many of your moves you've learned through out the game and it has a killer boss theme to boot (as you know with my favorite songs portion). The end of it is super satisfying too, with the Jinjonator being summoned to defeat her. If there's any one thing I love more than Tooie, it's this final boss and cutscene. The Hag-1 is a fine enough final boss for that game, but it pales in comparison to Kazooie's final fight.

All in all, I'm glad I replayed this once again as it's still amazing and still one of my favorite games ever. Back in September, I stated I might love Tooie even more for the things it improved on and its expanded worlds, and yeah I probably do in the end. However, Kazooie has its own strengths , some even over Tooie's and it's still a must play as an N64 fan. Next up though is Tooie, and I simply cannot wait to replay it so look forward to that review coming soon!!

As I stated in my Kazooie review, I replayed the game two times back in September of 2023. With Kazooie, that doesn't seem too crazy because it's about half the length of Tooie. However, I also replayed this game twice as well. And with it being twice as long, or maybe even longer for some people, as Kazooie? Seems a bit nuts right? Well, I really went Banjo crazy that month because after beating both games once, I couldn't stop thinking about them which led to me replaying them again right away. The thing is, that whole time I couldn't stop thinking about playing them again...I was thinking about Tooie pretty much. I don't know what happened to me because I went from thinking this game was just decent and definitely worse than Kazooie, to thinking it was amazing and super addicting and better than Kazooie overall. After replaying both games yet again, do I still think this? Probably, tho it's a bit complicated.

If you played Kazooie prior, the first thing you'll notice with Tooie is just how much Banjo and Kazooie's moveset has improved. The roll attack lasts longer, is more mobile and has a nice visual of Kazooie shielding Banjo. The normal attack you perform by standing still, which before was a simple claw move by Banjo, is now replaced by a more effective stationary rat-a-tat rap. The swimming is now WAY better naturally and doesn't require you to hold the R button for it to be good. In fact I don't think the R button does anything when swimming lol. You can now flip-flap directly out of a talon trot. When you do a beak buster, you can now move forward while you're doing rather than staying in place. This change can actually lead to some exploits you can perform too which is rad. These along with some non move-set changes like how whenever you speed up the text it makes the characters talk faster and doesn't pitch up their voices (which was an issue I had forgot to mention in Kazooie), the camera is slower but smoother to use and is overall an improvement, Banjo's backpack animates now when he walks and something about it is incredibly satisfying to me idk why, and the biggest thing is now notes don't get reset when you die (for a reason I'll get into later). All of these improvements drastically enhance the basic gameplay and I honestly miss a ton of these whenever I go back to Kazooie.

That's all fine and dandy, but how about new moves? Well, Tooie's got you covered because it's got like double the amount of moves in Kazooie. The biggest addition is the split-up mechanic. Now you can play as Banjo and Kazooie separately which makes for some clever puzzles. Each singular character gets their own specific moves and while Kazooie's are generally really fun, Banjo's are mostly situational. Kazooie's consist of moves that aren't as context-specific like the ability to glide on her own, her own backflip that's better than the normal one, and the ability to hatch eggs which gets used quite a bit. Banjo's however, besides the first one that lets him pick up and move objects which can lead to some fun puzzles, aren't used that much. He has an ability that let's him recover HP which is nice but only gets used a couple times overall and isn't as helpful as you think because lives aren't an issue anymore. I actually forgot to say they don't exist anymore and it's actually better to die sometimes because it respawns you at the last split-ip bad/beginning of the world which can work in your favor. But anyways, his other two abilities which let him go in dangerous liquids and the other let's him go in his backpack like a burlap sack to cross dangerous obstacles, just aren't used much and are incredibly situational. They all feel pretty samey too unlike Kazooie's, so overall I'd say Kazooie had the better new moves overall. This isn't even getting into all the new moves they both got together. There's 4 new egg types: Fire, Grenade, Ice and Clockwork. All have various uses and are fun additions. There are two new shoes, the claw clamber boots and the springy step shoes. The springy step shoes feel a little derivative because of the jump pads but they're still cool. The claw clamber boots however let you walk on designated parts of walls and it's awesome. There's the bill drill which is also kind of situational but is super satisfying to use. You can now fire eggs in first-person, which can be a little tricky at first with the N64 joystick but is also fun. Because of this, the game also added egg shooting in the air and water when going in first-person mode. The first-person shooting also leads into this FPS mode where you use Kazooie as a gun, certainly riding on the success of Goldeneye, and they can be super fun as well. All of these additions, plus the split-up stuff just really add to their whole move set and makes traversing through worlds a ton of fun.

Speaking of the worlds in this game, they're overall a lot bigger than Kazooie's. The first couple are kinda comparable in size to the first game's but by the time you get to Terrydactyland, they become just massive in size. You'd think this would be super annoying compared to Kazooie, but the game added warp pads that can warp you all over the level. These are the reason I never found the game tedious, if the game didn't have them or if they were awful like DK 64's warps, then the game would be way worse than it is. Anyways, the world's are much bigger in size and there's a lot more things you can do in each world. Though, overall there are less collectables because notes are now in bundles of 5 and 20. So overall the game has less of a focus on tons of collectables like the notes and more of a focus on the jiggys themselves. Jiggy's require way more steps than they did in Kazooie and this turns a lot of people off of the game. A bit understandable but the game is clearly trying to be more of a slower paced adventure platformer rather than Kazooie's brisk pace. I like both approaches but when it comes to Tooie's unique world themes like a run-down amusement park, a dinosaur world and a combined fire and ice world, I definitely prefer just how creative Tooie gets.

I mentioned how Jiggy's take longer to get because more steps are involved, and that's partly because of Mumbo Jumbo and Humba Wumba. In this game, Humba is the one that transforms you and Mumbo is actually a playable character. It greatly depends on the world but overall, I think this is a fun change. Mumbo has a very basic moveset compared to BK but his whole deal is using his magic on specific Mumbo pads. This is incredibly situational ofc and depending on the world it can be a bit tedious, but it can also lead to some interesting puzzles where you have to switch back and forth between BK and Mumbo. Same thing with Humba, sometimes you actually have to switch between Mumbo and then the Humba transformation. Mostly in the later levels do they make these portions kinda puzzling. In terms of everything new they added, this is probably the weakest addition just because it can lead to some tedium, I'll admit that, however I personally never had much of an issue with it tho I also have the whole game memorized at this point so take that as you will.

Besides all that, one of my absolute favorite additions was the fact a lot of the world's are interconnected. Early on, you'll help this mayan cat character out in recovering this idol. Well, you obtain it from this caveman in a weird looking cave and bring it back to him. That's strange though, you're in a world called Mayahem Temple and you just saw a caveman. What gives? Well it turns out, you just entered Terrydactyland when you did that, the aformentioned dinosaur world. This happens a lot in this game where you'll briefly cross over from one world into another or even unlock paths to directly travel between each one. The most memorable one is where you have to feed a different tribe of (good) cavemen this time, and to do so, you unlock a shortcut between Terrydactyland and WitchyWorld. You pick up some burgers from this one character, use the claw clamber boots you get from Grunty Industries and walk along the wall to feed them. All these working parts and interconnectivity just make the world feel alive and I love it.

I mentioned how you had to get the claw clamber boots from Grunty Industries, which is world 6, and use them for a jiggy in Terrydactyland which is world 5. Banjo Kazooie did this exact same thing only once, where you had to backtrack with an ability from another world. Tooie does this way more often and because of that and the interconnectivity of the world, it kind of feels like a 3D metroidvania at points which is awesome. Anyways, people seem to have an issue with backtracking in this game and I don't get it. The more complex jiggy's I understand, but the backtracking is not required as there's enough jiggy's in the game for you to beat the final boss. And even then, there really aren't that many backtracking jiggy's in general. Maybe like 12 or 13 of the 90 jiggy's require backtracking I think? Either way I think that complaint is majorly overblown and is not an issue at all to me, again the Mumbo and Humba stuff I can understand but backtracking to old levels with future abilities? Never even crossed my mind as an issue.

Something else this game added was a boss for every world and they're all really fun. Some are better than others, Lord Woo Fak Fak for example is probably the worst, but I really like how almost every single one of them are large in scope. They really feel menacing even if some of them are pathetically easy.

The game is also way funnier and a lot more cynical in general which I dig. Kazooie was both of these things as well but Tooie cranks it up to the max. The game literally starts off with Bottles dying and Kazooie going "well, he wasnt the most popular character anyways". The game is just full of this tongue-in cheese cynicism. The cast of side characters is not only WAY larger, they're more distinct and memorable just because the dialogue is so much better. There's literally an immigration joke when BK have to help some actual aliens, it's amazing. I think this, plus the interconnected worlds and more unique world themes, are THE main things I like over Kazooie. That plus the improved move set ofc.
The OST is again wondeful just like the first game, but instead of being upbeat, catchy tunes..Grant went for a more atmospheric darker ost this time around. Because worlds are much larger and take more time to beat, I think this change is for the better since the music track won't get old at all. Some of my favorite songs were Grunty Industries, Weldar's Theme and Mr Patch's Theme.

Yes I know two of those are from Grunty Industries. I honestly don't get the hate at all for that world. Something like Terrydactyland I can get, even if I still like it, because it's a massive world with empty space in a lot of it. However, Grunty Industries is a complex, zelda dungeon-like world and it's amazingly designed. I guess if you went into Tooie expecting it to just be like Kazooie, you'd hate it however it's very fun to explore and again super well-designed. It's not even that easy to get lost imo, it's a multi-layered world with distinct set-pieces rather than a super large open world. Sorry for the rant, I just don't get Grunty Industries hate lol. Something I did end up feeling a tiny bit sour on this time around was Hailfire Peaks. I still really like that world, and think the theming is awesome. However the fire side is a little too big for its bridges I will admit and the lag gets really bad sometimes there. The game can get laggy throughout portions of the game, which is only a thing on the N64 version, but there especially it's pretty bad.

One more thing before I mention the endgame and close out the review, is Canary Mary. Canary Mary has methods that make her very doable but she's still easily the worst part of the game and the only part I straight up dislike and dread doing. Her first button mashing races in Glittergulch Mine are perfectly fine. Her races in Cloud CuckooLand tho are insane. If you aren't doing the pause trick, idk how it's humenaly possible to win without using a turbo controller or something. The 2nd race isn't as bad because you can stay near her until the very end and then button mash to hell to pass her right before she can catch up. These races are easily doable with the right methods but the fact you have to do them this way, it just stinks man. But luckily this is only for 100% and only a tiny portion of the actual game so it's not the worst thing in the world.

I talked about a lot of improvements this game has over Kazooie. If there's one thing Kazooie destroys Tooie on however, it's the quiz section and final boss. Gone is the charming board game aesthetic of Kazooie, now you have a typical game show-esque quiz game where you have to answer enough questions to beat Grunty's sisters. It's not bad but it pales in comparison to Kazooie's version as it's less charming and even has less question types. Yeah, I won't miss the Gruntilda specific questions but no sound/music quizzes? That's kinda lame. Again, it's not bad and is only disappointing when compared to Kazooie. The final boss is also not nearly as good as Kazooie's. Is the Hag 1 harder? Most definitely but it's not as memorable as the Gruntilda fight from Kazooie and isn't as fun. It's a solid fight overall but compared to Kazooie's, just a bit lackluster.

So do I like Tooie more than Kazooie? In many ways, hell yes. It improves on many things like the duo's moveset, the writing is way funnier and the interconnectivity between worlds felt like a logical step to take after Kazooie. It may have the weaker end boss and quiz show, it's definitely and easier game to replay/100% and the Canary Mary rematch race is the worst thing between both games, however I'm still feeling like I may like this just slightly more than Kazooie just because of how ambitious and fun it is. It's kinda like Mario Galaxy 1 and 2 where each game has is own strengths over the other and it's just hard to choose what's better. Either way, it's still a 10/10 like the first game and one of my favorite games ever now. Easily in my top 3 N64 games, alongside the first game and Majora's Mask of course. Either way, if you see people saying you shouldn't play this game after you've beaten Kazooie. Don't listen to them, give this a try and you might fall become infatuated with it like I have.

This Banjo double feature was fun but I reckon it's time to play some Kirby again. Stay tuned for a Dreamland 2 review coming soon!