With Banjo-Tooie, Rare really took on the idea that “bigger is better”. The game, however, really shows that it isn’t the case. That said, Banjo-Tooie is still a brilliant game, and one that you should complete at least once, but the sheer size and some of the issues make revisiting it nowhere near as fun as the original.

The problem I have with Banjo-Tooie is that every level needs everything. I love transformation, and the designs of them across every single level in Banjo-Tooie are great, but you need to find a glowbo in each level, then transform, and then sometimes – like the Money Van in Witchyworld – they’re just a glorified key. You can also play as Mumbo this time around, something that is great at first, but having to do it in every single level gets a bit tedious – especially as you have to backtrack back and forth to Mumbo’s skull across levels that really don’t need to be as sparse as they are.

Banjo-Tooie still gets a lot right. At the start of the game, you have all the abilities from the first game, there’s no accident or loose story reason to make the duo forget previous things, you just start with everything and learn an immense amount of new moves, which manage to fit on an N64 controller. There are new kinds of eggs to fire, but the biggest involves Banjo and Kazooie splitting up and gaining their own moves, which is used for some great puzzles, even if a lot of walking back and forth is involved in them.

Another is the ability to use Kazooie as a gun in GoldenEye style areas of the game. There are a ton of different minigames in Banjo-Tooie, which is fun at first, but also something that drags the game down on later playthroughs. These are all available in the game’s multiplayer mode (including the first person shooter deathmatch, with multiple options and modes). It’s probably the most overlooked multiplayer game on the system.

The worlds in Banjo-Tooie look great and have a lot of charm, but also come across as a bit oversized and empty. The notes have been moved into nests of 5 and 20, effectively reducing the amount of them significantly (17 nests of notes instead of 100 individual ones), while spread across a larger world. There are also a lot more jiggies that you can’t connect first time round, due to another feature of Tooie that is both a chore, but also brilliant: the worlds are all interconnected, you can find shortcuts between each, and performing actions in one world can connect another. I do feel like smaller worlds would work so much better with this, as you spend a bit too much time retreading the same paths – even the warp points don’t alleviate the backtracking enough.

Still, Banjo-Tooie is a wonderful game. While replaying it has soured me on it, the first experience is still magical, and your first time discovering all the connections is wonderful, not to mention learning all the new powers, and playing around with Banjo and Kazooie separately. Discovering everything the game has to offer is a sublime experience that, in a way, makes me glad that Rare did go a bit over the top of it.

Fave

But then, when Rare aren’t cynically extending Banjo-Tooie’s lifespan by withholding moves or making you wonder back and forth between Humba’s hut to transform, they’re charming you with some top-notch puzzles. Tensely tip-toeing up to a caveman’s treasure; using spluttering generators in a pitch-black room to illuminate a frighteningly narrow path; firing ice eggs to freeze spinning blades deep underwater. When you reach the mile-high world of Cloud Cuckooland, and realise that pushing objects off ledges will have effects on the earlier levels that lie far below, you can’t help but admire Rare’s sheer creativity.

Mark Green, N64 Magazine #54. Review Score: 81%

Remake or remaster?

The Xbox port is good, but, like with Banjo-Kazooie, we really need a new, updated port with some extra features.

Official ways to get the game.

Banjo-Tooie is available on Xbox 360, One and Series either on its own or part of Rare Replay. It’s also available to rent on Nintendo Switch Online.