Banjo-Kazooie is the platonic ideal of a video game to me; all throughout its assortment of colorful levels are opportunities to see and learn new control modes and special moves for its title characters to interact with the game world, either asking you to use them skillfully or cleverly to earn the next jigsaw piece. It can sometimes be unclear what to do next, and a game with this level of variety is obviously not going to be 100% perfect (ah, a refreshing game of Concentration awaits around the corner), but despite those shortcomings, Banjo-Kazooie is nevertheless so well-paced and courteously laid out that it maintains its appeal where many other 3D platformers fall short. Loads of secrets, too!

+the story is honestly a fascinating unreliable narrator tale with solid pacing throughout
+introduces many great Org XIII characters, many of which return later through story fuckery
+roughly speaking, the room card system gives the game a bit of a fresh roguelike feel.... I'm stretching here....
+riku's story cuts much of the fluff out of each disney world

-the card combat is terrible. there was no reason for them to try to juggle real-time combat with flipping through a card deck, it's just too frustrating
-to clarify: individual keyblade slashes are tied to cards. it directly contradicts the main component of kh combat, which is mashing X
-the worlds are all straight out of the first game, assets and all. even bosses are reproduced, though with different strategies (mostly)
-the disney stories have been pared down and their cutscenes are barely worth watching
-each world has a generic layout due to the room card mechanic, so virtually every world feels the same to move through
-there is no even gradation in strategy efficacy. you will either be destroyed by bosses or you will accept strategies that bust the game wide open
-heartless battles are tedious and lack any real danger. they are purely a way to grind room cards to synthesize upcoming rooms
-as implied earlier, each room in the game needs to be synthesized with a card or set of cards. some requirements require many cards and thus an uncomfortable amount of grinding
-some room card requirements require very specific cards as well, and without other room cards that can help ease looking for said cards, the grinding can become excrutiating
-riku's story strips any strategy out of the game and renders the card system pointless by using premade decks and making virtually every card an attack card
-some of the boss fights are repeated (I'm looking at you RR, six times in a single game is too much)

a frustrating and boring experience, but honestly necessary to understand kh2 at all. the main campaign had no right being 20 hours long, especially with another 6 hour campaign tacked on afterwards that is essential for plot reasons. thankfully, the good Org XIII members return as optional boss battles in kh2fm, so they haven't been completely wasted here. this may have been impressive or fun on a gba, but really does not hold up well as a 3d action game

Used to be an all time favourite but a recent play of it has knocked it down for me. The final act is just too much of a mess, even with the restored content mod. The reason so many people argue and disagree on Kreia is more because her writing is blatantly unfinished and borderline nonsensical more than anything. Half the companions start off strong and then become mutes because, again, it's blatantly unfinished. This is a good game DESPITE its flaws but I don't think I can call it a favourite like I used to.

A great rail shooter with mastercraft art direction that plays perfectly to the Saturn's strengths and weaknesses. Unfortunately, it's held back by how unforgiving its health bar and limited continue system is. Have a level select code or save states on hand for this one.

I know some people dislike this game for being too basic and archaic but I think that's kind of the point? It's this experimental first attempt at 3D about dragon soldiers in desolate wastelands, I don't know why people go into this expecting a more modernist, contemporary approach to game design