Banjo-Tooie

Banjo-Tooie, formerly Banjo-Kazooie 2, is the second game in the Banjo-Kazooie series and the direct sequel to Banjo-Kazooie. Like the previous game, Banjo-Tooie was developed by Rareware and published by Nintendo. It was released for the Nintendo 64 in late 2000, or 2001 in Europe. It was ported to the Xbox Live Arcade in 2009. "Tooie" is a portmanteau of Kazooie and "two", owing to it being the second Banjo-Kazooie title.

Banjo-Tooie takes place after the events of Banjo-Kazooie: Grunty's Revenge, chronologically placing it as the third title of the series. Banjo-Tooie also takes place two years after the events of Banjo-Kazooie. In it, Mingella and Blobbelda free Gruntilda from the boulder she was trapped under, and they then attempt to help Grunty recover from her skeletal appearance with their Big-O-Blaster invention, which sucks the life from characters and objects in the Isle o' Hags. Banjo and Kazooie go on an adventure to stop Grunty and her sisters. Banjo-Tooie has a more cynical tone than its predecessor and introduced darker elements to the series, such Bottles's death.

Intro
On a dark and stormy night, two years after Gruntilda's defeat, Klungo continues his ongoing two-year effort to free  the witch from beneath the boulder that crushed her following the final battle with Banjo & Kazooie in the previous game. Meanwhile, Banjo, Kazooie, Bottles, and Mumbo Jumbo are playing poker together at Banjo's house, with Kazooie constantly cheating, such as claiming Grunty's return so that she could steal some poker chips.

Suddenly, Spiral Mountain experiences tremors like that of an earthquake, which disrupts Banjo and friends' game. The tremors were caused by a massive digging machine called the Hag 1, piloted by Grunty's sisters, Mingella and Blobbelda, who have come to rescue their sister. After the quake, Banjo says someone should go investigate. Kazooie claims to be too scared, so Mumbo bravely decides to go. Kazooie then reveals she was faking so she can steal some of his chips.

When the witches arrive, Klungo expresses his grief of failing to save his mistress, but her sisters assure they got it covered. They use a spell to destroy the boulder trapping Grunty, but as she climbs out, they realize she has withered away to nothing but an animate skeleton with robes. Grunty is not pleased about being a walking corpse, but Mingella and Blobbelda reassures their sister that they have a plan to restore her body, and she must come with them back to their castle. Having witnessed Grunty's escape from the boulder, Mumbo bolts back to the house, but is seen by the witches.

The skeletal Grunty runs after him, firing spells rapidly. Upon reaching the house, Mumbo rushes inside to warn Banjo, Kazooie and Bottles. Grunty then starts charging a powerful spell to destroy them all. Banjo & Kazooie see Gruntilda, and leave at once with Mumbo, but Bottles, believing it to be another trick, stays put and ends up getting obliterated along with the house. The witch sisters then leave Spiral Mountain in the Hag 1, heading for their castle, leaving behind some minions to destroy the area as well as Klungo.

The next morning, Banjo, Kazooie and Mumbo observe the damaged state of Spiral Mountain and their house. They witness Bottles crawling out of the ruins, dying and becoming a ghost. Mumbo is outraged by this turn of events and swears revenge. He tells Banjo and Kazooie to go after the witch before leaving behind the duo. Kazooie is excited to have another chance to beat Grunty again, but Banjo worries that this new adventure will not be as easy as the last one.

Adventure
The duo follow the Hag 1's tracks into a cave, encountering Klungo, who attempts to impede them. After defeating the dim servant, who leaves to be violently punished by Grunty, they continute following the Hag 1's trails, leading them through various areas of the Isle O' Hags, the island on which Spiral Mountain & Grunty's lair is located, and the game's hub world. They arrive in Jinjo Village, where the Hag 1 has also caused trouble, flattening the house of the grey Jinjo family (one of the ten families residing in the village), and killing them. Banjo and Kazooie continue on, to the Royal Jinjo Palace, where King Jingaling, resides. The ravaging of Hag 1 scared the jinjos off, and King Jingaling requests the duo's help in gathering them back in the village. He informs them of Master Jiggywiggy and the ancient order of the Crystal Jiggy, which is crucial to their quest. He then gives them a Jiggy to help them get started, and opens a secret passage to the Isle O' Hags.

While Banjo & Kazooie stop to discuss the encounter, Gruntilda and her sisters have arrived at Cauldron Keep, their lair. Mingella and Blobbelda introduces the B.O.B., Big O' Blaster, which can suck the life force out of any living thing. They intend to store large amounts of life force in a tank, and have Grunty shower in it, restoring her old body. Grunty decides to steal King Jingaling's life-force, as he just helped Banjo and Kazooie, and decides to deal with the rest of the Isle later. A beam is fired, making Jingaling's golden palace dead as a rock, and turning Jingaling into a zombie. Grunty reassures her sisters that with Bottles dead and Jingaling zombified, Banjo has no hope of reaching Cauldron Keep in time. Banjo and Kazooie, still outside the palace, narrowly miss the beam, and realize that the situation is much more desperate then previously anticipated.

They continue to Bottle's house, where his family are waiting for him. Kazooie has no problem telling the family about Bottle's death, but Banjo convinces her not to. Using the passageway King Jingaling opened, they make their way to the Isle O' Hags.

The two soon find the (closed) entrance to the first level, Mayahem Temple, and Master Jiggywiggy's sacred temple. They learn that Jiggywiggy is a powerful sorcerer (with a Jiggy-shaped head), who will help them on their adventure by opening worlds, but they need to gather jiggies to prove themselves worthy. With the first Jiggy at hand, they can start, and Mayahem Temple is opened.

On their journey they collect a total of 90 Jiggies, and receive help from old and new friends. They often stumble upon Mumbo's hut, where he agrees to go out and use his magic to solve puzzles and open passages for them. They also encounter Drill Sergeant Jamjars, Bottles' military brother, who agrees to teach the duo new attacks (if, of course, they can present the proper number of musical notes). They also meet Humba Wumba, a female shaman and Mumbo's arch-rival, who requests magical Glowbos in exchange for transforming Banjo and Kazooie into something else (thus taking on the role Mumbo had in Banjo-Kazooie).

Final Showdown
Finally, the pair reaches Cauldron Keep. After facing her henchman Klungo for the last time, Grunty traps the duo in her "Tower of Tragedy" quiz, where where she asks a series of questions based on the Banjo's current adventure (much like in Grunty's Furnace Fun), but only ends up mercilessly killing off her sisters for losing. After surviving the lethal game show, they hurry upstairs to reverse the effects of B.O.B., thus reviving Bottles and Jingaling.

They then rush to the top of the tower and face off against Grunty with both her magic and Hag 1 machine, as well as answer a few more questions. After the duo eventually disable the Hag 1, Grunty resorts to using her most powerful spell (likely the same one she used to destroy Banjo's house and kill Bottles (and maybe even the same one she tried to use as she fell from her lair in the first game)), but they shoot one last egg at her, causing the witch to drop her spell in the Hag-1. The explosion destroys the machine along with most of her weak, skeletal body, leaving her nothing more than a talking head.

Banjo and Kazooie return to the Isle o' Hags to celebrate with their friends, including the now reformed Klungo, but they arrive too late as the party was already over. Kazooie then suggests a new fun idea: kicking around Grunty's head atop Cauldron Keep, much to their joy and her disgust. She vows to have her revenge in the game's sequel, "Banjo-Threeie"

Gameplay
The gameplay of Banjo-Tooie is fundamentally similar to its predecessor, Banjo-Kazooie: Banjo and Kazooie must travel across open worlds and collect items and complete tasks to unlock access for later areas; the areas are about twice as large as in Banjo-Kazooie. Banjo and Kazooie can use every move they have learned in Banjo-Kazooie (except for Claw Swipe, which was replaced with Peck), and learn some additional moves from Jamjars in every level. The new moves include Egg Aiming, the ability to use more Eggs, and using Split-Up Pads to play as Banjo and Kazooie individually; both characters can learn their own moves while separated.

Jiggys retain their role as the main collectibles. Instead of being used on Jigsaw Pictures, Jiggies are used to unlock worlds from Jiggywiggy's Temple; Banjo and Kazooie do not have to relinquish their Jiggies to enter a new world. Musical Notes appear in every level but only appear in nests. Every standard nest contains five Musical Notes, which have a 20-count variant named Treble Clef. Similarly, Eggs and Feathers are also grouped in nests.

Unlike Bottles, Banjo and Kazooie must collect a specified number of Musical Notes before Jamjars can teach the ability to them. Unlike the last game, the Musical Note count is preserved if Banjo and Kazooie were to enter then exit from a world. Like the previous game, five Jinjos appear in each level, including the Isle o' Hags hub world. There are nine Jinjo colors, and they are each grouped into families. Like Witch Switches from the first game, collecting every Jinjo in a world causes a Jiggy to appear outside the world's entrance.

Banjo-Tooie adopted some features from Donkey Kong 64, most notably the removal of the lives system: if Banjo and Kazooie lose all of their health, they restart from the last entrance. The Another similarity is how enemies respawn in the levels over time. Similarly, there is also a multiplayer mode where up to four players can compete in minigames.

Mumbo Jumbo is a newly playable character, whose main role is using magic spells to solve puzzles and Mumbo Pads to open newer areas. The player can switch control to Mumbo from Mumbo's Pad, if Banjo and Kazooie give a Glowbo to him in each world. Mumbo's new rival, Humba Wumba, handles the world transformations instead, and must also be provided with a Glowbo (the successor to Mumbo Tokens).

The worlds are physically connected to each other at multiple points, and are effectively extensions of the Isle o' Hags hub world. Chuffy can be used to transport minor characters between two worlds that each have a Train Station.

One of the minor differences is the HUD having a static headshot of Banjo and Kazooie, which would change emotion in the previous game (from happy to sad) based on the amount of health they had. Some slight visual improvements were also added, which includes animated water, better usage of lighting and shadowing, and some objects (such as Honeycombs) receiving new animations on the world map.

Main characters

 * Banjo - The game's hero, a honey bear wearing yellow shorts and a blue backpack he is always ready for adventure and happy to help people out.
 * Kazooie - A rude and sarcastic female red-crested breegull who resides in Banjo's backpack and helps out Banjo and others at times.
 * Gruntilda Winkybunion - The game's villain, an evil witch who wrecked Banjo and Kazooie's home and plans to suck the life out of many innocent characters.
 * Mumbo Jumbo - A shaman with magical powers, friend of Banjo and Kazooie, Mumbo helps out the duo with magic.
 * Humba Wumba - A new character introduced in the game and the rival of Mumbo, Humba helps the two by transforming them into many different forms.
 * Bottles - Friend of Banjo and Kazooie, he was killed in the start of the game by Grunty and it is the duo's job to revive him.
 * Jamjars - Military Drill Seargeant and Bottles' brother, Jamjars can teach Banjo and Kazooie new moves for the game if paid enough musical notes.
 * Klungo - Gruntilda's henchman, he assists Grunty in various things and fights the two heroes three times throughout the game.
 * Mingella - One of Gruntilda's sisters, she and Blobbelda built the Big-O-Blaster (B.O.B.). Joining magical forces with her sister, Blobbelda, she removed the rock under which Grunty was trapped, with the help of a spellbook.
 * Blobbelda - Grunty's short, "shapely" sister. Helped Mingella build the B.O.B.
 * Master Jiggywiggy - Head of an ancient order dedicated to the powers of The Crystal Jiggy. An ally of the duo, who opens new game worlds if given enough Jiggies.
 * King Jingaling - King of the Jinjos, is turned into a zombie by Gruntilda early in the game.

Worlds
Like in Banjo-Kazooie, there are nine worlds, one hub world, and a starter world, equaling 11 in total.

Reception
Banjo-Tooie was critically and commercially successful upon the time of its release. The scores were consistently very high and rivaled its predecessor, Banjo-Kazooie. IGN praised the multiplayer system and its characters but criticized the frame rate issues at points of the game.


 * GamePro - 4.5 of 5
 * GameSpot - 9.6 of 10
 * IGN - 9.4 of 10
 * Official Nintendo Magazine - 9.7 of 10
 * GameStats - 9.2 of 10
 * 1Up.com - 9.6 of 10

Banjo-Tooie was nominated for many awards - including a nomination for the "Moving Images Award" at the 2000 BAFTA award ceremony, and was also nominated for "Console Action/Adventure Game of the Year", "Console Game of the Year", and "Game of the Year" at the 2001 Academy of Interactive Arts and Sciences awards.