Another day and another big demo is up on Xbox Live Marketplace which is for Banjo-Kazooie: Nuts & Bolts by Rare. I think its pretty smart that Microsoft decided to put up a demo for this game before its release to get players who never played the original BK and its sequel on the Nintendo 64 to get familiar with the bear and bird along with the vehicle-driven gameplay that this entry focuses on. For me, this demo felt like a reunion with them as I loved the original BK that much back in its day that I 100% the game], but I never played Banjo-Tooie yet. Since it is a reunion, Rare has brought back the franchise's signature humor and personality of the characters to Nuts & Bolts. In addition to all that humor, there are lots of references to the previous games already in this demo just by the quotes, Banjo Land (which feels like memory lane of previous worlds in Banjo games), and other random business like more teasing for Killer Instinct 3 and a plug for the XBLA port of the original.
In this pic above (thanks to NeoGAF for pics), Kazooie is pissed that he doesn't have his signature moves like flying and his peck. All he does in Nuts & Bolts is to use a wand that can move objects around (compare it to the gravity gun). Banjo himself can't really attack either missing his roll and other abilities. It is clear that Rare is taking the vehicle-driven gameplay more seriously than making just another Mario-like platformer, which fans want to see the platforming return in huge ways, but you're not going to do much jumping around unless you're at Showdown Town, the hub world, trying to get on the top of buildings getting music notes and various parts to bring to Mumbo's garage where you customize vehicles. Since the beginning of the game has some weak parts to add to vehicles, the handling of them seems sluggish and it can lead to some frustration tackling some of the missions especially in this demo. Hopefully, with better parts allows for better controls in the later worlds of the game. Collecting music notes in Nuts & Bolts is basically the currency to buy blueprints and more parts for vehicles. For jiggys, aka the puzzle pieces, collecting more of them unlocks more worlds to transverse as long they are deposited to the jiggy bank at Showdown Town. In this demo, there are four jiggys to collect once you enter the second act of Banjo Land, the demo ends.
The levels themselves feel different to the original games in terms of structure of progression and exploration as they are huge with lots of scope and no wonder vehicles are needed because running around will just take a long time. Various missions and challenges are scattered throughout the levels by talking to certain characters to start them. In the demo, there is a race event, time attack, a different twist of soccer, and defending Clanker fromn Grunbots. There are not really a lot of enemies in these levels, but completing these challenges at a faster time earns you more notes and jiggys. I can see the replay value of playing them again and again to go after T.T Trophies (a nod to Diddy Kong Racing) which require a perfect run of these challenges to earn them. Usually, the right vehicle of choice is the way to go to beat them, but there could be other solutions to beat them as well. Sure, the missions provided in this demo may seem a little boring and frustrating at first, but I can see them being fleshed out more in later levels. I haven't really messed around with the vehicle customization (Did today and the potential is there to be amazing as you can spend hours just trying different parts and assembling vehicles like Legos) and the multiplayer yet as this first run-through of the demo is just trying to finish it.
The graphics for Nuts & Bolts look amazing and Rare has done a good job delivering big worlds while maintaining the personality and style they have known in their previous games on 360 (mainly the Viva Pinata games and Kameo, Perfect Dark Zero doesn't count). I did notice rare instances of slowdown in this demo, but the game looks at a smooth framerate. As for the sound, there is some great music in this game already that sounds standard for the genre. Rare also kept the voice acting to only grunts like the original games, which works for games like these, but I can see why fans are complaining about this especially with the small text of the subtitles. Plus, for this generation, all-out voice acting feels like a requirement these days - the Ratchet & Clank games are good with that.
For 1 GB of hard drive space, I highly recommend downloading the demo for Banjo Kazooie: Nuts & Bolts if you're on the fence considering how much of a departure the core game is from the previous platform-heavy games. I believe this will be Rare's best game with Microsoft so far trying to put a different spin on the platforming genre, but with competition from Sony and Media Molecule's LittleBigPlanet, which is pretty much amazing, who knows if people will still buy this. Fans of the franchise that appreciate the change like me and little kids would enjoy this, but it won't be that much of a success sales-wise. At least Microsoft dropped the price for N&B at 40 bucks and if you pre-order it, you get the XBLA port of the original BK for free, which is a good deal. Speaking of pre-ordering, I need to do that on Friday to get that free code.
Pre-Order UPDATE - I placed my reserve after trading in Wii Fit and the Balance Board, so I'm set on that being paid off along with Gears 2.
Yes, I will buy this over other big fall games as it will be my calm and refreshing game compared to the juggernaut that is Gears of War 2. Expect a review on this soon (likely December-ish).
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