Banjo-Kazooie: Nuts & Bolts

[zeptron]

I'm surprised these haven't been posted already.

 

[zeptron]

 

[zeptron]

 

[amazingfantasy15]

Hope it's not all vechicle based. One of the best things about the first two was using the combined techniques with Banjo and Kazooie.

 

[Dark_Lord]

Trailer

 

[hippie_hunter]

I dunno about this game it's either going to:

a: Based on Rare's more recent track record (Grabbed by the Ghoulies, Perfect Dark Zero, Kameo, Viva Pinata) this game will totally suck.

b: Rare will return to its glory days of quality (Donkey Kong series, Killer Instinct, Conker, Banjo-Kazooie series, Goldeneye, Perfect Dark, Battletoads) and this game will be totally awesome but underperform because Rare is developing for the wrong platform. Most of Rare's fans (except for WHF) stuck to Nintendo's consoles instead of moving with them to the Xbox.

 

[amazingfantasy15]

Trailer

Ugh, why'd they change it from a platformer to a vehicle game? Plus, the final cheapshot at Nintendo in the trailer was totally unnecessary. Not really sure what to make of this, definitely doesn't look like a sequel to the first two.

 

[spidey-dude]

really not sure what to make of this at all...........

I want a new conker...

 

[The Amazing Lee]

It looks ****ing awesome.

 

[StrainedEyes]

How much of this game will be vehicle based? Cause I don't think I like it. The first Banjo-Kazooie was an amazing game.

 

[Capt Throbberson]

Why does Banjo look so blocky?

 

[Untilteld]

I hate Banjo, and I detect fail.

 

[Joker]

1. Viva Pinata was awesome, anyone who thinks other wise is a ******, pure and simple.

2. I don't mind the graphics. Banjo is a bit blocky, but everything else looks great.

3. Not sure how I feel about the vehicle thing. Maybe it'll be like Halo, you know, with vehicle parts, but still mainly non-vehicle. I was really hoping it would be a straight up platformer, but I'll give it a chance.

 

[Wolverini]

RARE said this WILL be a platformer, just not the regular Platforming kind of game

The vehicles can be used to transport yourselves around the level. Although, I must admit, I'm worried that this just turns out to be a racer.

BK1 was AWESOME!
BK:T was GREAT!

Lets hope this one will be cool. Come on RARE, show us that you still have the ability to create awesome games

 

[Timstuff]

Banjo 3 was Rare's last chance to redeem themselves, and they managed to blow it. It should have been a very simple equation: Xbox 360 needs a kid-friendly platform game. Banjo Kazooie is a popular platforming franchise. Rare was making a new Banjo Kazooie game. So where did they go wrong? Did someone at Rare wake up one day and say "Platforming games are dead. We need a car game!" This was a very ******ed blooper on Rare's part, and it may well be the last nail in their coffin.

 

[Joker]

Banjo 3 was Rare's last chance to redeem themselves, and they managed to blow it. It should have been a very simple equation: Xbox 360 needs a kid-friendly platform game. Banjo Kazooie is a popular platforming franchise. Rare was making a new Banjo Kazooie game. So where did they go wrong? Did someone at Rare wake up one day and say "Platforming games are dead. We need a car game!" This was a very ******ed blooper on Rare's part, and it may well be the last nail in their coffin.

Where did you get your advance copy of the game? I love how you're so certain that it's terrible and a flop just because of a few screen shots and one trailer. Ok, so they added a new element. The post right above yours states that the vehicles will be mainly used to get around the levels, and that it's still a platformer. There's probably only certain areas where you NEED to use the vehicles, and even there it would appear to be a weird vehicle based platformer hybrid. So maybe you should wait till the game is actually OUT to say that it's a failure and the final nail in Rares coffin?

 

[hippie_hunter]

Where did you get your advance copy of the game? I love how you're so certain that it's terrible and a flop just because of a few screen shots and one trailer. Ok, so they added a new element. The post right above yours states that the vehicles will be mainly used to get around the levels, and that it's still a platformer. There's probably only certain areas where you NEED to use the vehicles, and even there it would appear to be a weird vehicle based platformer hybrid. So maybe you should wait till the game is actually OUT to say that it's a failure and the final nail in Rares coffin?

Rare just said that 80% of the game will be based in vehicles. That sounds incredibly stupid.

 

[amazingfantasy15]

Banjo 3 was Rare's last chance to redeem themselves, and they managed to blow it. It should have been a very simple equation: Xbox 360 needs a kid-friendly platform game. Banjo Kazooie is a popular platforming franchise. Rare was making a new Banjo Kazooie game. So where did they go wrong? Did someone at Rare wake up one day and say "Platforming games are dead. We need a car game!" This was a very ******ed blooper on Rare's part, and it may well be the last nail in their coffin.

While I'm not crazy about the new vehicles aspect, I think it's still way too early to call it a complete failure.

 

[Capt Throbberson]

http://www.rarewitchproject.com/?id=1655

80% of the Game is Vehicular.

 

[hippie_hunter]

Having the game 80% vehicular wouldn't be that bad if it weren't for the fact that it's been a while that an actual console version of Banjo-Kazooie has come out. They shouldh have done it a bit more traditionally first then go onto something different.

 

[imdaly]

Banjo-Kazooie Nuts and Bolts Unveiled

It's not the most common of things for a videogame franchise to be simultaneously reinvented and revived, so you can imagine the wondrous looks of the other visitors as we entered Rare's secluded studio in rural England. The Banjo franchise is beloved and the platformer genre is on Mario life support. Rare would need to do something special to win over a skeptic public. At the end of the day, it was easy to read the smiling faces of the other visitors: This is the game that we've been waiting for Rare to deliver since being bought by Microsoft.

As you may have already heard, this Banjo is not a traditional platformer like its predecessors. It's an evolution that injects user generated content into the classic platforming structure. Rather than completing a level and unlocking a power or skill to use in the next, this Banjo only gives you the parts and leaves the tool making up to you. But I'm getting ahead of myself.

To say that Banjo has completely abandoned its traditional platformer roots wouldn't quite be accurate. Our hero may have lost most of his moves in favor of his new toys, but he still has a trick or two up his sleeve. He can lift things up with Mumbo, climb poles, shimmy across tight ropes, grab onto ledges and hop around like a madman, to name a few of his talents. These will come into play more in the larger hub worlds. I got a look at the first of five hubs, called Showdown Town (this region, by the way, is the largest single gameplay region for a Rare game yet). These areas restrict the game slightly, paring it down to something more traditional. The point of these hubs? These are where players look for game globes, and other collectibles like Jiggies, to bring back and activate. Each game globe found gives access to new levels. That's where the real fun begins.

Each level quite literally takes place within one of the game globes. Inside you can see the plastic edges and each object inside has a distinctly artificial look as if it is all sewn together or made from blocks. It's within these globes that you'll find various challenges and assorted parts to toy around with at Mumbo's Motors -- a workshop that you'll be spending quite a bit of time in.

Each challenge in Banjo requires you to use a vehicle of some sort. A stock one will be given to you, but to truly excel and completely finish the game you'll have to construct your own. Building a new ride is a lot like playing with Legos. Slap a few blocks together, add some wheels, a seat, some fuel and an engine and you have a car. Take off the wheels and add a propeller and you've got a boat. Put the propeller on the top and you just made yourself a helicopter. You get the idea. With hundreds of blocks in categories for body, seats, propulsion, propellors, fuel, wings, gadgets, weapons, ammos, and misc. and you can begin to see how limitless the possibilities are.

In this way, the game progression is quite similar to platformers of the past. Instead of learning a double jump technique, Banjo will provide you with a new part. Perhaps it's a spring that will allow you to hop into the air. It's up to you to figure out how to put together a new ride that takes advantage of it, but once you do you'll find access to new hidden goodies or challenges and higher ratings in the challenges.

The two challenges we saw demoed showcase this new structure quite well. First up was a simple task of collecting some coconuts as fast as possible. The ride provided was a simple basket and vacuum cleaner affair. Ride over the coconuts while avoiding small rocks that get in the way to grab the goods. We tried our hand at this one and found it not quite as easy as Rare made it look. Those enemies trying to block your progress are good at their job. Once we were shown the simple way of doing it, the team loaded up a craft made later in the game. It could fly and had the vacuum attached to the end of a chain dangling from the bottom. Without having to worry about any obstacles, the task was done in a snap.

The next challenge was a long jump that reminded me of Crazy Taxi. Zip down a ramp and take a jump to see how far you can make it. First we saw it with some rockets in place of an engine and a spring on the bottom to vault off the end of the ramp. Not bad, but it only scored a D. Then we saw the same attempt with a car that had a detachable ball cage. At the apex of the jump the ball was let loose to bounce its way along the ground. Sounds like a pretty creative way to solve the task, but even that wasn't enough to get an A.

But then, it's the creativity and ingenuity of the gamer that is going to spell success. A rocket works pretty nicely as a means of blasting a car along the ground. But what if you put a few on the bottom of the car? Now you have a hover vehicle. A spring works well for hopping along (you can create a vehicle that has no engines and just bounces if you want), but what if you put a spring on the side of a vehicle? Now you've got an offensive weapon in a race. It's up to you to solve each challenge. Rare is just providing the tools.

Banjo-Kazooie Nuts and Bolts looks fantastic. The vibrant and beautifully crafted style is instantly appealing, but the full weight of Banjo's look isn't felt until you see it in motion. Physics commands everything and the engine has the chops to back it up. The interactions with the environment are great (just watch Banjo's idle animation on a soft surface to watch him slowly tamp a shallow footprint into the surface). It's the vehicle physics that make this game so special.

Everything you do in your design process affects how the vehicle will control.

Too many blocks and you'll be left with a gas guzzling tank. Too few and you'll find enemies don't have much trouble bouncing you around. Put that rocket on backwards and you might find yourself spiraling out of control when you fire the engines. In the hands of the masses, we're going to see some truly special designs. Rare gave us a glimpse at that future with a car made to look like a profile of Mario…which the demoer then sent a volley of missiles at to destroy.

Now I've never considered myself to have much artistic talent and I fully expected whatever I made in Banjo's workshop to fall apart as soon as it hit the ground. This turned out to not be true which gives me great hope for even the most novice of engineers out there. Putting pieces together to make a vehicle is a snap. Simply place one adjacent to another in the design lab and they'll stick. You'll know you have a good fit if the piece you're moving around turns green. Once you start piecing things together -- and remember to add the necessities like a seat and some fuel -- it won't be long before you've got some truly awesome looking rides.

Oh, and it's not just a single player game. You'll be able to show off your creations and put them to test over Xbox Live. Rare wasn't talking much about the possibilities for online such as sharing blueprints or the like, but it did let us hop in and try a multiplayer online competition. The goal was to stay within a moving ring to rack up points as it moved around the globe. First we tried it with stock cars, but then each player designed his or her own vehicle to bring into the mix. My massive tank had firepower and couldn't be moved, but had trouble keeping up with the pack. Next I made a little hovering cage that could drop grenades down on the chumps below. This one had a little more success, but was a beast to control. A word of advice -- the freeze gun is a monster even if it isn't as cool looking as the egg gun.

Banjo-Kazooie Nuts and Bolts is looking like Microsoft's first real success in expanding its first party offerings beyond the action and shooter genres. This is a game that all gamers can get behind. It looks wonderful, handles great, and has a hook that everyone from the most casual to most hardcore can lose themselves in. It's been kept a secret for a long time, but the wait was worth it and it's almost over. Banjo returns this November as the perfect way to keep your blood pressure down in between bouts with Gears of War 2.

Source: Ign

 

[spidey-dude]

I read that the pther day, makes it sound quite fun....I dunno.....

 

[Sugarculted]

It's going to be awful. BK and BT were my favourites on the N64. I purchased an N64 just for those games, a few months back. We're first treated to the redesign of Banjo sometime at the end of last year, and thinks already didn't look promising. Then we're treated to this pile of ****?
The basis for BK, was the nifty move set Banjo and Kazooie had. Using Kazooie to perform certain stunts was class, and the ability to fly around Treasure Trove Cove was amazing. But, to hear that they've completely eradicated ALL of Kazooie's moves? That's just the first signs of this game being a failure. Banjo at its core, is a platformer using the abilities of both animals. This team working on Nuts and Bolts for Rare have really screwed it up, by attempting to appeal to a wider audience, in fears of the BK name not being that well known for other gamers.
They can't say they're drifting away from the usual platformer and 'evolving' it, because hell, Super Mario Sunshine did just that.
Yeah, you've lost a fan Rare. This is only worth a rental. Mumbo Jumbo as a damn mechanic? He's a shaman, for ****'s sake. I'll just hold onto my Banjo cuddly toys, and hope that my placement for my video game course is at Rare Studios in Twycross, it's only a few miles away. I'll sort them out.

 

[Mutagen]

This doesn't sound good at all. Bk and BT were great on their own. No need to change what already works just fine.

 

[Joker]

Yeah, change is all bad, all the time. I mean...taking Mario into 3D? WHAT were they THINKING?