Anniversary Banjo-Kazooie: Nuts & Bolts Is 15 Today

Once you accept that it's not Banjo-Kazooie nor Banjo-Tooie and you get creative building your own creations to beat every challenge, it's an amazing game. And yes, the concept is much more fun than what Tears of the Kingdom did.

@Rioichi He's right though. It's a completely unique experience and a brilliantly coded game. I went to a talk with the father of Banjo Gregg Mayles and he said it's some of the best code ever written at Rare. I get that it's different and you don't have to like it, but hating on it doesn't make you a bigger fan or make the originals better.

Nuts and Bolts is a really clever and fun game in its own right, but the Banjo-Kazooie brand was mutually harmful to it.

For anyone who hasn't played it, I do recommend giving it a good try, but note that it can take a bit of time for things to come together, as unfortunately, N&B keeps getting in its own way.
It restricts the parts you can build with during the early game, and it forces you to use pre-built vehicles in certain challenges.

For me, the moment that it "clicked" was when I first unlocked the medium engine and bolted it onto the back of a lightweight shopping cart, causing it to fly! The building system is meant for you to experiment with it, and you can "break" some of the challenges with the right vehicle designs.

@nebzila Once you have unlocked a decent number and variety of parts and Banjo has trained a bit, it's amazing how much of your imagination can be translated to the game!

@smoreon My favourite part was to design my own vehicles to beat every challenge and record, finding the right balance for each.

@Banjo- I've been designing a game recently with light vehicle crafting elements and lamenting that this game isn't easily available without game pass. I like to see what other people have done. Microsoft should get it ported. I played bad piggies for about five minutes before my tolerance for mobile games wore down.

@Poodlestargenerica It's included in Rare Replay, a must-have collection 👍.

@Banjo- I probably won't have access to it unelss they port it to pc. Or even better switch 2.

I'm not intending for this to sound snarky, but this is the first time I've ever heard this game be considered a "cult classic".

I've tried to complete it several times since it came out, and I always bounce off hard. Maybe that's the Banjo-Kazooie-connection that sours me subconsciously, or maybe it just lacks something gameplay-wise for me.

It's a bold sequel, though, and that alone is enough for me to still regard it fondly. Obviously it came to mind when TotK was fully revealed, but I think Zelda incorporates the system of player-constructs in a better way. It's very much optional in TotK, whereas in N&B it's the entire bedrock of the game.

I'm sure I'll give it another go in a few years time. Maybe it'll click then.

@whmchrish Banjo-Kazooie (1998) is my favourite 3D platformer. I don't really consider Nuts & Bolts a platform game but more of a focused sandbox game. In the beginning, Banjo is too heavy, that's why I recommend training at Boggy's Gym for making the platforming more fun, because you're going to need him to move frequently and do some platforming for collecting items.

The vehicle construction is the core gameplay feature, but there is a proper builder unlike in Tears of the Kingdom, where I'd say the vehicle construction feels shoe-horned and ultimately boring, giving but also taking from the main concept of the game.

The key is to have a bit of patience because in Nuts & Bolts, it becomes addictive and intuitive to build and to use the vehicles. You feel under control and being able to experiment after a while, but you need to persevere. The variety of challenges make the concept shine.

Nuts and Bolts was awesome.

I understand the hate it got from most people. I'm still mad about Zillion 2. They just wanted the same game again.

Giant Bomb gave it the game of the year in 2008, those brave souls.