Banjo-Kazooie (video game)

''Banjo-Kazooie'' is a 1998 platform game developed by Rare and published by Nintendo for the Nintendo 64. Controlling the player characters, the bear Banjo and the bird Kazooie, the player attempts to save Banjo's kidnapped sister Tooty from the witch Gruntilda. The player explores nine nonlinear worlds to gather items and progress. Using Banjo and Kazooie's traversal and combat abilities, they complete challenges such as solving puzzles, jumping over obstacles, and defeating bosses.

Rare conceived ''Banjo-Kazooie'' as a role-playing video game, ''Dream'', for the Super Nintendo Entertainment System following the completion of '' Donkey Kong Country 2: Diddy's Kong Quest'' (1995). The 15-member team, led by Gregg Mayles, transitioned development to the Nintendo 64 and retooled the game as a platformer after the role-playing format proved too complex. ''Banjo-Kazooie'' was inspired by '' Super Mario 64'' (1996) and designed to appeal to a broad audience, similar to Walt Disney Animation Studios films. Grant Kirkhope composed the soundtrack, the first in games to feature vertical remixing, where various sound layers fade in and out depending on the player's location.

''Banjo-Kazooie'' was released in North America in June 1998 and in Europe the following month. It sold over three million copies, making it one of the bestselling Nintendo 64 games, and received acclaim. Critics favourably compared ''Banjo-Kazooie'' quality and design to ''Super Mario 64''. They praised its visuals, soundtrack, and level design, but criticised its virtual camera system. ''Banjo-Kazooie'' received numerous year-end accolades, including two from the Academy of Interactive Arts & Sciences: Console Action Game of the Year and Outstanding Achievement in Art/Graphics.

In retrospect, ''Banjo-Kazooie'' is considered one of Rare's best games and among the best Nintendo 64 games. It spawned a series which includes two sequels, ''Banjo-Tooie'' (2000) and '' Banjo-Kazooie: Nuts & Bolts'' (2008), and two spin-offs, '' Grunty's Revenge'' (2003) and '' Banjo-Pilot'' (2005). Following Microsoft's 2002 acquisition of Rare, 4J Studios developed a port for the Xbox 360 in 2008, later included in the Xbox One compilation '' Rare Replay'' in 2015. It was released on the Nintendo Switch for Nintendo Switch Online + Expansion Pack subscribers in 2022, marking its first rerelease on a Nintendo console.

Gameplay

''Banjo-Kazooie'' is a single-player platform game where the player controls the titular protagonists, an easy-going brown honey bear named Banjo and a troublemaking female red-crested "Breegull" Kazooie, from a third-person perspective. Living in the region of Spiral Mountain, the two attempt to rescue Banjo's younger sister Tooty from the foul-tempered witch Gruntilda, who creates and uses a machine to transfer an entity's beauty to another, which she intends to use with Tooty. The game features nine three-dimensional worlds where the player must gather musical notes and jigsaw puzzle pieces, called Jiggies, to progress. It culminates to a trivia game show a la ''The Adventure Game'' hosted by Gruntilda, where to surpass a title a question about the game has to be correctly answered or a challenge successfully completed, and a final boss fight with her.

The player travels from one world to another through Gruntilda's Lair, a region that acts as the game's central overworld. Jiggies allow the player to complete jigsaw puzzles which open doors to new worlds, while musical notes are required to open doors to new sections of the overworld. There are a total of 100 jiggies to collect (ten in each world), all of which are needed to view the proper ending, and 900 notes (100 in each world). The door with the highest amount of required notes is the one with 880, although 765 notes are needed to enter the final section. Like '' Super Mario 64'' (1996), ''Banjo-Kazooie'' is very open and allows the player to collect Jiggies and musical notes in a nonlinear order. It is also possible to complete certain worlds out of order, assuming the player has enough Jiggies and musical notes to reach a world earlier than intended.

Each world is composed of a number of challenges that involve solving puzzles, jumping over obstacles, racing, playing a bonus game, gathering objects, and defeating opponents. The game features action-adventure elements, and the player must often interact with non-player characters and help them. It is also possible to increase Banjo and Kazooie's health bar by collecting empty honeycomb pieces (of which there are two in each world), and extra lives by obtaining Banjo statues.

Banjo and Kazooie can perform many abilities, such as jumping, climbing, ground-pounding, swimming, flying, and rolling into enemies. Some moves cannot be performed until conversing with Bottles the mole, who teaches them. The breegull and the bear have unique assets. For example, while swimming, Kazooie moves faster but also has a harder time turning directions than Banjo, who only swims when above ground. Kazooie can perform the Talon Trot, where she runs faster and up slopes too steep for Banjo, the Beak Bomb, a long and fast hit towards something with her beak that she pulls off while flying, and either shoot blue eggs from the front or rear. In the middle of jumps or falls from great heights, Kazooie can use her wings to glide Banjo down at a slower speed for a few seconds. She can also fly and jump way higher than Banjo, but these moves can only be activated by standing on pads signifying them; pads with red feathers on them activate flying, green Shock Spring pads the extra jump height. Some abilities require specific items to be performed. For instance, red feathers allow Banjo and Kazooie to fly, while gold feathers protect them from damage. There are two types of collectible shoes that provide temporary abilities. The Turbo Trainer shoes provide a speed burst used to reach a destination on time, while Wellington boots allows Kazooie to run on otherwise harmful ground, such as the piranha-filled waters in Bubblegloop Swamp and shifting sands in Gobi's Valley.

Additionally, found in each world are five small creatures called Jinjos that Gruntilda imprisoned and, upon collection of the entire world's population, grant the duo a Jiggy. For the camera, there are three choices of views and the ability to spin the camera around the player character. However, some areas fix the camera to one angle, which sometimes hides items out of view, requiring the player to choose a first-person perspective to see them.

Banjo and Kazooie are also aided by Mumbo Jumbo, a shaman who used to be Gruntilda's teacher. Mumbo Jumbo can use magical powers to transform them into several creatures. These include a termite, an alligator, a walrus, a pumpkin, and a honey bee. Creatures have their own abilities and allow the player to access otherwise inaccessible challenges, some of which are required to collect jiggies. Before a transformation process is allowed, the player must find a required number of "Mumbo Tokens" in the worlds. By finding a spell book called Cheato in the game's overworld, the player may also unlock secret codes that increase the capacity of Banjo and Kazooie's item inventory, such as the red feathers from 50 to 100 and the blue eggs from 100 to 200.

Development

Origins

The origins of ''Banjo-Kazooie'' can be traced back to '' Project Dream'', a cancelled video game developed by Rare's '' Donkey Kong Country 2: Diddy's Kong Quest'' (1995) team for the Super Nintendo Entertainment System. Inspired by Japanese role-playing games and LucasArts adventure games, ''Dream'' was developed for 16 months and starred a boy who got into trouble with a group of pirates. The game used Rare's Advanced Computer Modeling (ACM) graphics technology, first used in ''Donkey Kong Country'' (1994), to an advanced level. As development progressed, the boy was considered by the developers to be generic; thus he was replaced by a rabbit for "two or three days," then a bear who wore a backpack, sneakers, and cap.
The bear eventually became Banjo.

Because the introduction of the Nintendo 64 made the ACM technology obsolete, Rare decided to transition the development of the game to that console, and it ran on a "psuedo-3D" engine. When this occurred, the Nintendo 64 was still known as the Ultra 64. The project proved to be too ambitious for the developers, who felt the game was not fun. More than a year into the project, out of desperation "like the end wasn't in sight," the project switched from ''Dream'' to a ''Donkey Kong Country''-esque 2.5D side-scrolling platformer, with more depth and range of movement than a typical 2D platformer. It was given the names ''2.5-D Banjo'' and ''Kazoo''.

In the 2.5D game, Banjo would have collected fruits, the equivalent to musical notes in ''Banjo-Kazooie'', in five "fruit houses" named after the fruit in them: orange, grapes, lemon, bananas, and cherries. Collecting jigsaw pieces would have also been done. Similar to the barrels in ''Donkey Kong Country'', Banjo would have used balls from a variety of sports, such as a football, baseball, soccer ball, bowling ball, basketball, and a water-filled ballon, that could be powered up by a balloon inflator, football boot, football helmet, and baseball glove. The enemy parts and hub map were also taken from the 1994 SNES platformer. Two months into its 2.5D phase, Rare was presented by Nintendo a "really, really early" version of '' Super Mario 64'' (1996), which exposed them to the percceived future direction it would take the video games market. The genre was changed accordingly, a new 3D engine was built, and the aesthetic became focused on cuteness, requiring an alteration in Banjo's proportions (such as an increased head shape) and less tight shorts to match it. However, much of the controls were the same.

Staff and workflow

The team comprised both experienced and inexperienced people; some had been working at Rare for 10 years while others had never previously worked on a video game. Gregg Mayles served as the head designer, Bayles' brother Steve "chief scribbler" and character designer, and Chris Sutherland head programmer. Ed Bryan was also a character artist, as well as animator and box cover artist. Bryan has not revealed much about the making of the cover art, other than Rare wanted him to "tell a story" with it. Kieran Connell was junior software engineer when the team said "the game had no chance of being completed on time," and Gavin Price joined as tester only a few months after receiving a demo of the game from ''Official Nintendo Magazine''.

Actual work on ''Banjo-Kazooie'' started in March 1997 with a development team of 10 people. As development progressed, the team grew to a total of 15 members, which included seven engineers, five artists, two designers and one musician. The development of the game took overall 17 months to complete after Rare discarded ''Project Dream'', the first two of these being spent experimenting with ''Dream''s graphic technology. Each staff member had a work week of at least 80 hours, a day lasting until three-to-five in the morning. Mayles and Bryan, in one week, attempted forty hours of normal time and 60 overtime hours for a total of 100 hours, Mayles admitting in 2022 to have worked 102 hours. Sutherland reported one morning where the Stamper brothers threw stones at his house window, as well as provided a McDonald's meal, to get him to work.

Design

Despite being praised by critics and gamers as an improved version of ''Super Mario 64'', ''Banjo-Kazooie'' was not intended by the team to simply be that. However, ''Super Mario 64''s 3D aspect was referenced heavily, as Rare intended to combine it with the look of ''Donkey Kong Country''. The developers appreciated the freedom of movement the 3D game provided, but analyzed it did not take enough advantage of it. Instead, it centered on quick timing and reflexes required for most 2D platformers, which Mayles considered unsuitable for 3D games due to lesser accuracy of viewing distances. Thus, ''Banjo-Kazooie''s gameplay was mostly exploration and discovery. Rare also disliked ''Super Mario 64''s forcing of the player back into the hub world once they collect a star in the level, thinking that it hindered immersion. This is why the player stays in a world after collecting a jiggy.

For the collectibles, Mayles wanted ''Banjo-Kazooie'' to differ from other games involving collecting, in that "rather than being just a shiny object, he jiggywas a shiny object that could actually be used for something." The jinjos, which Mayles found the game's dumbest collectable, were green-lit out of an idea Rare had since developing ''Donkey Kong Country'' (1994), a "hard-to-collect collectable" that chased away or camouflaged when the player was about to obtain it. However, they stood and whistle'd to the player character in the final product. Other collectables, such as the eggs, feathers, notes and honey combs, were incorporated to contribute to the theme of the titular protagonists. Difficulty balance was a major focus; for example, the musical notes were ultimately the only collectibles the player would lose if they died or exited a level.

Rare decided to make an action-based game that focused totally on Banjo and his abilities, Kazooie later born out of the planning of them. Mayles wanted Banjo to run really fast and have a double jump, but thought the bear looked strange doing it. According to Mayles, "We came up with the ..idea that a pair of wings could appear from his backpack to help him perform a second jump. We also wanted Banjo to be able to run very fast when required owe added a pair of 'fast-running' legs that appeared from the bottom of the backpack. nd soon afterwe came up with the logical conclusion that these could belong to another character, one that actually lived in Banjo's backpack." Furthermore, the backpack containing an animal also rationalized why Banjo walks slow. Kazooie was named after a kazoo, which was considered an annoying instrument, "much like the personality of the bird" to Mayles, while the witch Gruntilda was inspired by Grotbags from the '' Grotbags'' British television series.

Writing and humour

''Banjo-Kazooie'' was designed to appeal players of all ages in a similar vein to Walt Disney Animation Studios films. According to Rare, "We wanted the characters to primarily appeal to a younger audience but, at the same time, give them enough humour and attitude not to discourage older players." One major goal was for everything to have personality, down to the collectables, which includes items with eyes and eggs that bounce up and down. Another was its style of humour that distinguished it from other platform games, which Mayles described as "very dry, very typically British, slightly sarcastic, happy to poke fun at ourselves." All the characters, in particular, "basically had something wrong with them", Mayles explained. ''Banjo-Kazooie'' continues the trend of Rare games with characters titled "amethe nimal/object, the name of the animal or object occasionally rhyming with the name, for example Mumbo Jumbo.

The developers wanted the game to be character-driven, and characters were conceived on the spot, sometimes in relation to design decisions. For example, Mumbo Jumbo originated simply as a way to include animal transformations and for character dynamics to exist between Banjo, Kazooie, and another; Banjo gets along with Mumbo, but Kazooie can not stand him. Some jiggies also require solving certain characters' "real world problems" in order to collect. Most of the dialogue was ad-libbed, and a challenge was remember the personalities and mindsets of the characters while doing so. The environment of the development farm was dominated by the workers pulling off various pranks and gags on each other, such as playing a monkey sound Robin Beanland sampled very loudly, pulling each others' shorts down while being smacked in the face, and being called names such as "Winky Boy," "the Shine," and "the Judge." This bled into the style of humor of the final product. They tried to push the E rating of the Entertainment Software Rating Board with Kazooie's snark remarks, a few of them rejected.

Rejected concepts and features

Rare originally planned to include a multiplayer mode and more worlds, such as a mine level, but these were not implemented due to time constraints; some were included in the sequel ''Banjo-Tooie'' (2000). Connell recalled encountering the team working on a four-player mode only three weeks before Nintendo's approval. Developers were also conflicted between each other whether to create sections where Banjo and Kazooie would be separate from one another, but they ultimately decided it would be "too much." This was another mechanic transferred to ''Banjo-Tooie''.

One scrapped feature, " Stop 'N' Swop", would have allowed ''Banjo-Kazooie'' to interact with ''Donkey Kong 64'' (1999), '' Jet Force Gemini'' (1999), ''Banjo-Tooie'', ''Perfect Dark'' (2000), and '' Conker's Bad Fur Day'' (2001). During development, Rare discovered the Nintendo 64 retained flash memory for several seconds after a cartridge's removal. They implemented a feature whereby removing a cartridge and quickly inserting the ''Banjo-Kazooie'' cartridge, while the other game's memory was still in the console, would unlock bonus content. Nintendo requested Stop 'N' Swop's removal when Rare submitted ''Donkey Kong 64'' for approval. Nintendo was concerned the Nintendo 64 would not retain RDRAM long enough for the feature to work and that it could potentially damage consoles. Specifically, Nintendo 64 models produced after ''Banjo-Kazooie'' release reduced the amount of time the console retained flash memory, making Stop 'N' Swop nearly impossible to activate as intended.

Preview coverage from July and August 1997 revealed that Tooty was originally Banjo's girlfriend Piccolo, and that there were 16 levels accessed via jiggies instead of nine. An animation that did not make the released game was named "cack bad egg", and depicts Kazooie pooping out a gassy rotten egg Banjo reacts to. Another rejected concept was another stage of the final boss, where Gruntilda turned Banjo into a frog.

Visuals and levels

''Banjo-Kazooie'' was developed on a Silicon Graphics workstation. employs an advanced technique to render its graphics. The in-game characters were created with minimal amounts of texturing so they could have a sharp and clean look, while the backgrounds use very large textures split into 64×64 pieces, which was the largest texture size the Nintendo 64 could render. A ''Nintendo Power'' preview also emphasized its exploitation of the console's LOD management and anti-aliasing. The fact that the player could be transformed into small creatures was implemented to give some of the worlds a different sense of scale. A 2018 ''Nintendo Life'' feature discussed how the size and scope of the worlds took advantage of the limited memory and were significant in 3D video games at the time, citing the different seasons in Click Clock Wood, the organ section in Mad Monster Mansion, and Freezeezy Peak's size.

Because the advanced graphics technique caused significant memory fragmentation issues, the developers created a proprietary system that could "reshuffle" memory as players played through the game. More specifically, the programmers centered on culling parts of the world that were not viewable from the perspective. Sutherland and Mayles have admitted in interviews that they do not perceive the practice as being commonplace in the Nintendo 64 library. The designers began implementing this when designing Treasure Trove Cove, which is built around a massive rock structure. Mayles looks back fondly on the method, elaborating that an unintentional consequence was that they focused on hiding objects, which created mystery and intrigue, incentivizing the player to explore the environment to find them. The combination of the big shark Clanker and the player's interaction with him was noted by ''Nintendo Life'' as pushing the console, causing issues of frame rate.

Although borrowing similar themes to ''Super Mario 64'', such as desert, ice, and haunted house, the worlds were intended to be "a lot more grounded in reality". The worlds were intended to be diverse in theme to give the player new experiences and emotions. Explained Mayles, what a player feels swimming in the water of an island is different from being at a haunted mansion. To conceive them, a theme was chosen first then all the traits and design choices, including the animal Mumbo would transform Banjo and Kazooie into, associated with it. His favorite stage was Rusty Bucket Bay for its design being mostly around a single ship and the extreme pace and difficulty of the ship's interior. The incorporation of a trivia game at the end was a method of making ''Banjo-Kazooie'' unique; the section was initially planned to only have a few questions for the player to ask, but became a massive board game in the end.

Audio

Music and sound effects were entirely done by Grant Kirkhope. Although ''Banjo-Kazooie'' was not his first project for Rare, as he previously converted David Wise's score for ''Diddy's Kong Quest'' to a Game Boy port and helped on '' Goldeneye 007'' (1997), it was the first time he worked on all music and sound effects for a game. He conceived ''Banjo-Kazooie''s musical style after listening to Danny Elfman's score for ''Beetlejuice'' (1988). As he explained the philosophy, "I realized you can use really dark chords with dark harmonies, and as long as the rhythm's quite comical it’s not going to scare the kids".

''Banjo-Kazooie'' is significant for its introduction of vertical remixing to video games; various sound layers of the same composition fade in and out depending on which area the player has moved to, such as going from above ground to under water. This came from Mayles commanding Kirkhope to got a step beyond the early 1990s LucasArts' iMUSE, which faded between themes instead of sound layers. Animal sound effects are also occasionally instruments.

After ''Dream'' was disbanded, Rare was focused on getting ''Banjo-Kazooie'' finished as much as possible. One way to do this was to reject ''Dream''s pre-recorded speech and have the dialogue be presented in text; however, they still wanted the feeling of speech. As a comprise, all the characters have their voices executed via "mumbling", with text presenting dialogue. This choice was made to convey their personalities without them actually speaking, as Rare felt the actual speech "could ruin the player's perception of the characters." Some of the voices were performed by Sutherland, who voiced Edison in ''Dream''. Some of Edison's voice clips, such as "Guh-huh!", were re-used for Banjo.

Release and promotion

In June 1997, a working version of the game was shown at the Electronic Entertainment Expo, where it was officially announced that ''Dream'' had become ''Banjo-Kazooie''. The panel, for what was considered by '' 64'' to be Nintendo's flagship game at the event, featured several big machines and sculptures, such as those for Banjo and Mumbo Jumbo. The Nintendo 64 games presented at E3 were lauded by ''Nintendo Power'' as "pushing the boundaries of interactive entertainment, innovation, and intensity". ''Banjo-Kazooie'' was a major example, highlighting how its advanced technology created a Disney-esque "rich, animated world full of fun animals and great music", visuals containing "rich textures, creative lighting," and dynamic music. The reaction from gamers and critics towards the game was generally positive, '' 64'' magazine predicting it to be "the biggest hit of the year." However, it was also met with skepticism as a rip-off of ''Super Mario 64'' and overly cute, and despised its new name. The gaming community was also mystified by some of its concepts, such as the usage of a bird-bear duo for a ''Super Mario 64''-esque genre, fart sound effects for speech, and Kazooie pooping out eggs as an attack.

The game was then presented at the 1997 annual Nintendo Space World event, where the first five worlds were playable. Its panel had women that were dressed up as Banjo with shirts on. ''N64 Magazine'' gave a glowing review of the panel, admitting it to be the event's most absorbing experience, even moreso than the ''Zelda'' game that got the most attention from other gamers and journalists. They considered the worlds immersive due to its "graphical opulence," such as the "incredibly realistic ripples" on the water, and choice of environments "realistic" even considering the cartoony characters. They also positively commented on its implementation of the dual-character mechanic (particularly how certain sections require a specific character unlike other games).

''Banjo-Kazooie'' was initially scheduled for a release in November 1997, in the US 24 November, but was delayed to give developers more time for polish. When Rare met Nintendo of America's Howard Lincoln at E3 1997, he was against a delay, complaining: "We've committed $20 million to this campaign". To fill that year's Christmas schedule, Lincoln told Rare to include ''Donkey Kong'' characters in an '' R.C. Pro-Am'' game they were developing at the time, turning it into ''Diddy Kong Racing'' (1997). ''Eurogamer'' called ''Diddy Kong Racing'' "something of a testing ground for Rare's intendo 64era heroes", as it included Banjo and Conker as playable characters prior to featuring in their own games. In the following months, Rare screenshots at such a rate that by May 1998, ''N64 Magazine'' suspected the game was completed besides testing.

''Banjo-Kazooie'' was released on 29 June 1998 in North America, 17 July 1998 in Europe, and 6 December 1998 in Japan. The Japan date was shifted multiple times, set to be released before other territories in January 1998 as of November 1997, and moved to April months later. The UK date was also set to 16 March 1998 as of Christmas 1997, before being moved to July two months later. In Europe, the game was released in the summer, an active season for Nintendo 64 releases that followed a scarce period and included games of various genres, such as ''Quest 64'' (1998), ''Mortal Kombat 4'' (1998), '' Off Road Challenge'' (1998), '' Dezaemon 3D'' (1998) and '' Virtual Chess 64'' (1998). It had a marketing budget of $10 million.

''Banjo-Kazooie'' performed well in both the UK and US. Virgin Megastore reported that the game was topping the UK charts as of 21 September 1998. In Japan, ''Banjo-Kazooie'' entered ''Famitsu''s Top 10 sales charts for the week ending 13 December 1998, selling 74,000 copies for a total of 117,399. At the 1999 Milia festival in Cannes, the game took home a "Gold" prize for revenues above €26 million in the European Union during 1998. As of March 2003, the game had sold more than 405,000 units in Japan. As of December 2007, it had sold more than 1.8 million copies in the US. As of 2021, ''Banjo-Kazooie'' worldwide sales were 3 million, making it the tenth highest-grossing Nintendo 64 game.

Reception

''Banjo-Kazooie'' received critical acclaim from video game journalists, who often compared it to ''Super Mario 64'' due to its similar gameplay. Writing for '' IGN'', editor Peer Schneider felt that ''Banjo-Kazooie'' was "the best 3D platformer e hasever played, and a more than worthy successor to ''Super Mario 64''". Similarly, ''Electronic Gaming Monthly'' reviewer Shawn Smith called it the best 3D action-adventure game at the time, praising its graphics, sound effects, and the amount of gameplay each level offers. '' GamePro'' described ''Banjo-Kazooie'' as a "more complex, more fluid, and more attractive game" than ''Super Mario 64'', while ''N64 Magazine'' highlighted the game's length, noting that the game can take 40 or 50 hours to fully complete.

The graphics were seen as one of the strongest aspects of the game. Jeff Gerstmann of ''GameSpot'' explained that ''Banjo-Kazooie'' "maintains the look and feel of ''Mario 64'', but instead of flat, shaded polygons, he gameuses a lot of textures". The game's long draw distance, solid frame rate, special lighting, transparency effects, and animations were highlighted very positively. Critics also praised the game's dynamic soundtrack. ''IGN'' remarked that it "lets players know where they are going. This happens all the time and in every level. It's all very Disney-esque." The sound effects received similar praise, with some critics crediting the characters' unique and diverse speech patterns.

''GameSpot'' remarked that, although the gameplay is relatively formulaic, it "makes the logical progressions you would expect Nintendo to make." ''Game Informer'' observed that, while ''Banjo-Kazooie'' is very similar to ''Super Mario 64'', it has less emphasis on the platforming and more on exploration. '' Next Generation'' highlighted the game's depth and detail, stating that ''Super Mario 64'' "looks naked and aged in comparison." Colin Williamson of ''AllGame'' stated similar pros, crediting the level design as "simply delightful, loaded with creativity, secrets, and memorable characters." ''Nintendo Power'' remarked that the game's puzzles were fresh and that the characters "have more of a loud-mouthed attitude than Mario and crew."

One habitually-criticized aspect of the game was its camera system, particularly the placement of viewpoints. ''N64 Magazine'' called it one of the game's best features, reporting it as "excellent" for a majority of the gameplay, the automatic movements "pretty good" and the manual control buttons easy to adapt to. However, the magazine scored it a point lower from ''Super Mario 64''s camera, criticizing some moments of unfavourable fixed viewpoints. ''GameRevolution'' remarked that it can occasionally be in a bad angle to gauge a jump properly, ''Edge'' and ''N64 Magazine'' was particularly critical of the fixed angles of the water sections, which were considered frustrating while retrieving collectables. ''AllGame'' also reported the camera getting stuck behind walls when Banjo falls from a very high platform.

In 1999, ''Banjo-Kazooie'' received two awards during the 2nd Annual AIAS Interactive Achievement Awards: Console Action Game of the Year and Outstanding Achievement in Art/Graphics. It was also nominated for Game of the Year and Console Adventure Game of the Year. ''IGN'' awarded the game Overall Best Graphics of 1998, Best Texture Design of 1998, and Best Music of 1998.

Legacy

Sequels and re-releases

A sequel, ''Banjo-Tooie'', was released for the Nintendo 64 in 2000 and largely adopts the gameplay mechanics of its predecessor. The '' Banjo-Kazooie'' series continued to be developed with the release of '' Banjo-Kazooie: Grunty's Revenge'' and '' Banjo-Pilot'' for the Game Boy Advance in 2003 and 2005, respectively. The characters Banjo and Kazooie proved to be popular and were once seen as a potential mascot for the Xbox 360 console. A third main game, '' Banjo-Kazooie: Nuts & Bolts'', was released for the Xbox 360 in 2008. ''Nuts & Bolts'' is a departure from its predecessors and involves the player building vehicles of all shapes and sizes to complete challenges.

An Xbox Live Arcade version of ''Banjo-Kazooie'', developed by 4J Studios, was released for the Xbox 360 on 26 November 2008. This version runs in a full widescreen mode with an updated 1080p resolution, cleaner audio and consistent frame rate, includes achievements, and supports the "Stop 'N' Swop" connectivity that was incomplete in the Nintendo 64 game, used now to unlock features in both ''Banjo-Kazooie: Nuts & Bolts'' and the then-upcoming Xbox Live Arcade version of ''Banjo-Tooie''. The Xbox Live Arcade version was generally well received by critics, featuring an aggregate score of 77 out of 100 at Metacritic and generally considered a solid revival of a classic. ''TeamXbox'' praised its controls as very responsive in comparison to most other XBLA re-releases. However, the port also reminded them of the game's original issues, especially with the camera, such as the inability to look up high enough, resulting in several items that are not seen on screen, and the camera flipping at inopportune moments. '' PALGN'' reported brief pauses in one of Gruntilda's cutscenes and returns to the hub world, and disappearances of collectables like musical notes and jiggies. ''PALGN'' was also disappointed in the small amount of rewards provided by the Stop 'n Swap feature for ''Nuts & Bolts'', only a few vehicle accessories. In 2009, IGN ranked it seventh on its list of Top 10 Xbox Live Arcade Games. In 2015, the Xbox Live Arcade version became one of the first backwards compatible titles for Xbox One, and was re-released as part of the '' Rare Replay'' video game compilation. In 2019, this version was enhanced to run at native 4K resolution on Xbox One.

A spiritual successor to ''Banjo-Kazooie'', ''Yooka-Laylee'', was released in 2017. Elements, largely coming from ''Banjo-Kazooie'', were released as downloadable content for the crossover fighting game ''Super Smash Bros. Ultimate'' on 4 September 2019, including Banjo and Kazooie as a tag team of playable fighters and a stage based on Spiral Mountain, a location in the game. ''Banjo-Kazooie'' was added to the Nintendo Switch Online library of Nintendo 64 games on 20 January 2022, marking its first re-release on a Nintendo console.

Retrospective reception

''Banjo-Kazooie'' is occasionally included in "best games" lists by video game publications. In terms of best all-time Nintendo 64 entries, it was ranked number seven on IGN's 2000 list, six on ''NME''s 2017 list and ''Video Games Chronicle''s 2021 list (where it tied with ''Banjo-Tooie''), four on a 2022 ''Nintendo Life'' list, five by '' Digital Spy'' in 2017, eight on rankings by Shacknews in 2021 and GamesRadar in 2022, 13 by SVG.com in 2022, and two on a 2022 ''Destructoid'' top-five article. It also appeared on unranked N64 game lists, such in 2021 by '' PC Magazine'' and 2022 by news.com.au and ''GameSpot''. ''Shacknews'' called it the fifth best Rare game in 2018, while '' New York'' magazine's ''Vulture'' website, in 2022, listed it as one of "The 25 Best Games on Nintendo Switch Online." In 2009, ''Game Informer'' ranked the game 71st in their list of the Top 100 Games Of All Time. The same year, ''Official Nintendo Magazine'' ranked the game 36th in a list of greatest Nintendo games.
''Nintendo Life'' gave the game a 10/10 rating in 2022, stating that ''Banjo-Kazooie'' "is one of the intendo 64s very best releases, and one of Rare's undisputed crown jewels."

Some critics noted the importance of ''Banjo-Kazooie''s indication that Nintendo's EAD was not the only developer to pull off a first-rate 3D platformer. ''Banjo-Kazooie'' was also one of the most notable products of a platform-adventure trend of games that emphasized exploration, increasing abilities of the player character, and inventory management. It reached its zenith in the Nintendo 64 and PlayStation era, but declined to a point where they were near non-existent in the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 generation of gaming, out of Nintendo's ''Mario'' series. Kirkhope recalled Rare getting tired of making ''Banjo'' games after ''Tooie'', contributed by Rare's general philosophy being against sequels.

Opinions on how well ''Banjo-Kazooie'' has aged differ. Reviews of the XBLA port from Eurogamer and IGN considered it outdated in its gameplay style and issues related to the controls and camera. Others, however, argue the game still holds up and is one of very few retro 3D platformers to do so, which was expressed as early as 2000 by Matt Casamassina and as late as 2022 by long-time video game journalist Chris Scullion's book ''Jumping for Joy: The History of Platform Video Games''. Claimed '' The Ringer'', ''Banjo-Kazooie'' was part of a seven-year period of Rare entries that started in 1994 with ''Donkey Kong Country'', and ended in 2001 with ''Conker's Bad Fur Day'', that showed a strong devotion to quality in the platform and shooter genres. Victor Lucas, reviewing the game for ''The Electric Playground'' upon its release, noticed it was a part of Rare's "bombardment of triple A games", which also included ''Goldeneye 007'', ''Diddy Kong Racing'' and (at the time) the upcoming ''Conker'' game.

As one of the earliest platformers, ''Banjo-Kazooie'' was noted by ''The Ringer'' and Jonas Kaerlev, developer of '' A Hat in Time'' (2017) which was marketed as taking elements from ''Banjo-Kazooie'', for a major difference from the ''Mario'' series it took influence from: the rejection of a start-to-end structure in favor of exploration. Many of the 3D ''Mario'' games continued to follow a linear formula until ''Super Mario Odyssey'' (2017), where the player can explore the world without a time limit and remains in it after collecting a power moon. Additionally, ''Odyssey''s capture mechanic, where Mario turns into whatever object or animal it latched onto, is similar to Mumbo's animal transformations in both ''Banjo-Kazooie'' and ''Banjo-Tooie''. Nintendo never publicized if they took inspiration from the ''Banjo'' games. As Mayles responded, "We took enough influences from Nintendo's games, so if they were influenced by Banjo, then that’s kind of a nice thing."

A frequently-cited reason for the decline, which ''Kotaku'' and ''The Ringer'' have suggested, was the overwhelming amount of collectables, which Rare's 3D platformers were particularly notorious in that regard. Although ''Kotaku'' and Kirkhope considered the most excessive on ''Donkey Kong 64'' and ''Banjo-Tooie'', ''Banjo-Kazooie''s "charming-if-pushing-it collecting of items" was cited as an example, its success laying a collect-a-thon ground for subsequent games of its type to distort. Reviews of the 2008 XBLA port provided more reasons. Meghan Watt of ''Official Xbox Magazine'' argued players had less tolerance for limited lives and "endless hint-free puzzles", IGN suggested, "Most gamers have had their fill of simple fetch and hop games and like a bit more action and drama on their consoles.”

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