Bigger and grander than its predecessor in just about every way. Mumbo's claim at the end of the first game that Tooie would make Banjo-Kazooie "look like joke" Is apparent from the get-go, between its ambitious 20 minute(!) opening cutscene, the jaunt through ruined Spiral Mountain with the first game's moveset nearly intact, and that moment the player steps into the much, much larger Jinjo Village. I can't even begin to imagine the sheer amount of programming tricks required to pull off half of what Tooie's going for with stuff like rendering the ginormous worlds, handling the gameplay shift to its FPS segments, accommodating all the mini-games, the split characters, the cutscenes...
Banjo-Tooie is a very ambitious game. This has both upsides and downsides. The huge worlds lend themselves to a lot of experimentation, but the game sometimes runs into conveyance issues as a result. It's suuuuper easy to get turned around in places like Terrydactyland, and as cool as the inter-level connections are, that a Jiggy in one world can require a puzzle being solved in another (for example, clearing Stomponadon in Terrydactyland to get a Hailfire Peaks Jiggy) means that a player simply searching a given level for solutions can be left high and dry.
Grunty Industries is commonly pointed to as a world with this issue, but I have to side with my friends at Designing For here - Grunty Industries is brilliantly-executed. Having to sneak in, the slow opening of the factory floors, the building sense of scale, pay-off for B-K's WISHYWASHYBANJO, that moment towards the end when you finally unlock flight pads... so much to love there. I know this is the most likely thing to be overhauled in a theoretical remake, but I'd hope they wouldn't change too much.
There's also a sense of incompletion to Tooie that just wasn't present for Kazooie. Part of this was unavoidable - Tooie had to do SOMEthing to fulfill the promise B-K made with Stop 'n' Swop, and with Ninty quashing Rare's initial plan to literally yank out the N64 Game Pak, the team had to make some sort of compromise. But there's no dodging the feeling that a full world's missing, between that suspicious 900 Notes/90 Jiggies count and how nothing Cauldron Keep feels. B-K famously left a lot on the cutting room floor as well, but it had a far more complete illusion; Rare clearly just ran out of time and did their best to put a bow on the game. They did a great job, but there's no arguing with the numbers.
I think, if you only know the first two Banjo-Kazooie games by reputation, it's easy to lump them together as similar ideas. But both end up having very different identities. B-K is a pure expression of 3D platforming and exploration - perhaps less mechanically difficult than something like Super Mario 64, but still derivative of that general formula and its gameplay goals. B-T is less interested in posing mechanical challenges for the player and more interested in encouraging exploration through characters, skillsets, and world integration. Everything in Tooie feels less like "more Kazooie" and more like "commentary on Kazooie" (and other Rare trends, given the FPS segments). They're great complementary titles because they're so dissimilar, really; I'd rather have Tooie be like Sly 2 rather than Super Mario Galaxy 2. I prefer Kazooie all the same, but both are great times.
One last note - Banjo-Tooie would be the last title developed by Gregg Mayles' team during Rare and Nintendo's collaboration. This wouldn't be the team's last effort - Grabbed by the Ghoulies was only a couple years away - but Tooie feels like it carries a ton of weight as the terminus of this team's golden years. This is the same creative effort behind Donkey Kong Country 1 & 2 as well as the first Banjo-Kazooie - all absolutely incredible, ground-breaking releases. I feel like of those four titles, Tooie had the least impact on the industry (modern throwback 3D platformers are more likely to do genre work broadly or Banjo-Kazooie specifically than Banjo-Tooie soecifically). But this shouldn't be confused for Tooie being unimportant. Far from it: Banjo-Tooie is the summation of lessons learned by some of the industry's greatest talents at the tops of their games.
Banjo-Tooie is a very ambitious game. This has both upsides and downsides. The huge worlds lend themselves to a lot of experimentation, but the game sometimes runs into conveyance issues as a result. It's suuuuper easy to get turned around in places like Terrydactyland, and as cool as the inter-level connections are, that a Jiggy in one world can require a puzzle being solved in another (for example, clearing Stomponadon in Terrydactyland to get a Hailfire Peaks Jiggy) means that a player simply searching a given level for solutions can be left high and dry.
Grunty Industries is commonly pointed to as a world with this issue, but I have to side with my friends at Designing For here - Grunty Industries is brilliantly-executed. Having to sneak in, the slow opening of the factory floors, the building sense of scale, pay-off for B-K's WISHYWASHYBANJO, that moment towards the end when you finally unlock flight pads... so much to love there. I know this is the most likely thing to be overhauled in a theoretical remake, but I'd hope they wouldn't change too much.
There's also a sense of incompletion to Tooie that just wasn't present for Kazooie. Part of this was unavoidable - Tooie had to do SOMEthing to fulfill the promise B-K made with Stop 'n' Swop, and with Ninty quashing Rare's initial plan to literally yank out the N64 Game Pak, the team had to make some sort of compromise. But there's no dodging the feeling that a full world's missing, between that suspicious 900 Notes/90 Jiggies count and how nothing Cauldron Keep feels. B-K famously left a lot on the cutting room floor as well, but it had a far more complete illusion; Rare clearly just ran out of time and did their best to put a bow on the game. They did a great job, but there's no arguing with the numbers.
I think, if you only know the first two Banjo-Kazooie games by reputation, it's easy to lump them together as similar ideas. But both end up having very different identities. B-K is a pure expression of 3D platforming and exploration - perhaps less mechanically difficult than something like Super Mario 64, but still derivative of that general formula and its gameplay goals. B-T is less interested in posing mechanical challenges for the player and more interested in encouraging exploration through characters, skillsets, and world integration. Everything in Tooie feels less like "more Kazooie" and more like "commentary on Kazooie" (and other Rare trends, given the FPS segments). They're great complementary titles because they're so dissimilar, really; I'd rather have Tooie be like Sly 2 rather than Super Mario Galaxy 2. I prefer Kazooie all the same, but both are great times.
One last note - Banjo-Tooie would be the last title developed by Gregg Mayles' team during Rare and Nintendo's collaboration. This wouldn't be the team's last effort - Grabbed by the Ghoulies was only a couple years away - but Tooie feels like it carries a ton of weight as the terminus of this team's golden years. This is the same creative effort behind Donkey Kong Country 1 & 2 as well as the first Banjo-Kazooie - all absolutely incredible, ground-breaking releases. I feel like of those four titles, Tooie had the least impact on the industry (modern throwback 3D platformers are more likely to do genre work broadly or Banjo-Kazooie specifically than Banjo-Tooie soecifically). But this shouldn't be confused for Tooie being unimportant. Far from it: Banjo-Tooie is the summation of lessons learned by some of the industry's greatest talents at the tops of their games.
NOWITSREYNTIME17
6 months ago