Banjo-Kazooie: Nuts & Bolts
by Microsoft
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Our Price: $19.99 Availability: Usually ships in 24 hours Buy Used: from $12.00 (click here) Category: Video Games See more product details |
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Video Game Reviews of Banjo-Kazooie: Nuts & Bolts
Customer Review: I'm simply stunned...
Summary: 5 Stars
I've never played a Banjo & Kazooie game in my entire life. I know nothing of the series. But I saw a demo on an Xbox at a popular Video Game store, and decided to check it out. I downloaded a demo from Xbox Live, and bought the game less than 24 hours later!
Let me tell you something - ANY game that encourages this level of creativity and thought process, and rewards the player for doing so as this game does, is one FANTASTIC video game.
In a world of Grand Theft Auto's and Saints Row's, a game like Banjo & Kazooie Nuts & Bolts is such a welcome breath of fresh air.
If you're reading this now, you're probably not a huge BK fan because if you WERE, you'd have already tried and possibly purchased the game. So I'm writing this to people who are just now getting around to researching this game, since it has been out now for over 6 months.
B&K-N&B is all about building vehicles to accomplish all sorts of missions. All of the missions are timed, which I'll agree can be a little stressful. But failing to accomplish a set time in a mission only encourages one to build a better vehicle, or to find a new method to accomplish the task - to effectively "think outside the box." Vehicle designs - quite simply - are limitless. Cars/Trucks? Piece of cake. Boats? Can do. Planes? Yeup. Helicopters, too! Submarines are possible but a little difficult as your vehicles can either sink or float, but cannot maintain a particular "depth" underwater. Build a sub with a few concealed wheels underneath though and you'll be fine. The most fun (in my opinion) is building multi-purpose vehicles - like amphibious space-jumping race trucks... And of course what vehicle wouldn't be complete without some egg launchers, maybe rockets, or a boot that'll pop out of box and kick unsuspecting foes!
All in all the game aims to be cute - and believe me it delivers. At 30 years of age, even I have to laugh when the instruction says "Engine: makes vehicles move. Even stupid Bear can figure it out..." I'd normally aim this game at kids or maybe women who don't care for the usual gamut of racing/first-person-shooting/roleplaying games. My wife would probably love B&K-N&B.
I LOVE games that let me build stuff. I love games that makes people go, "Hey can I do this?... Wow yes I can!!" Not even 20 hours into the game I was trying to build Mater from the movie Cars. I built a massive cargo plane and watched it fly (complete with retracting landing gear!) and built a submersible helicopter. I don't care who you are - that's AWESOME right there...
I also see a TON of content in this game. After 20 hours I've only unlocked a small fraction of available vehicle parts and levels. Of course, most of that is due to the fact that I'm too busy doing looptie-loops in my jumbo jet or exploring the ocean sea-bed in my truck... But B&K-N&B ALLOWS you to do that stuff, so have at it!!!
Phenomenal game. Phenomenal idea, and just a constant source of entertainment. The text issues have been fixed for the most part. The graphics are beautiful, the stories are funny and entertaining, and even though I know very little of the B&K history, it's obviously not necessary to enjoy this awesome chapter of the story.
Customer Review: So worth the price
Summary: 5 Stars
I remember playing the first banjo Kazooie game on the N64 and trying to find every jinjo possible. Although this game changes the idea alittle with building vehicles from pieces like lego's it works rather well. It ended up being a must buy for twenty bucks on sale. Hope Rare brings out some more awesome games with their original characters.Customer Review: Know about the issues with this game
Summary: 1 Stars
We purchased the Banjo Kazooie game but have not been able to play it. We have a 37" TV but the text in the game is impossible to see. For some reason, the manufacturer seems to think everyone has a giant screen TV to play Xbox.
There is one redeeming fact. IF - and everyone may not have this option - you have Xbox Live, you can get a free downloaded update to fix this problem. But what if you don't have Xbox live - I guess you are stuck with an unplayable game.
Luckily, we have Xbox Live so we will be downloading the fix and trying to play the game. I was not happy with the whole vehicle theme to begin with and this text problem makes it impossible to recommend.
Customer Review: Banjo- Kazooie, Nuts and Bolts
Summary: 5 Stars
Great product, my kids really enjoy this game. We rented it at Blockbuster then the kids wanted to buy. Amazon.com had the best price, and it came in a reasonable amount of time.Customer Review: Vehicular challenges make for a unique gaming experience
Summary: 4 Stars
I'll admit, I wasn't very excited about this game when I heard about it. An N64 platformer, made into a...vehicular platformer? And yet, that's exactly what this game is. And while it sounds crazy, that is the key to its success. This game turns you loose with some parts and encourages you to experiment. This free-form experimentation is what makes this game so fun.
The first thing that one notices about this game is its sense of humor. It doesn't take anything seriously, including itself. The characters tend to be pretty funny, although after a while some can start to get a little annoying. The actual on-foot exploration and platforming feels dated and slow. Fortunately, this game doesn't involve much in the way of traditional platforming. Why walk somewhere when you can fly, drive, or bounce your way there?
The key feature of Nuts and Bolts is the vehicle creation tool. Simple to understand but surprisingly deep, it allows you to create virtually anything you want. The only caveat is that you need to explore the hub town to find many of the good parts that will let you build more exotic things like planes and helicopters. At the beginning of the game it was a little frustrating to find that I couldn't build these more advanced vehicles, but I quickly found "parts crates" and was able to keep building. And at this point, building vehicles is what keeps me coming back to the game.
The story is mildly entertaining, and serves as the catalyst for inspiring you to build, but after I got halfway through the game I found myself caring less and less about the challenges I was supposed to be winning, and more about just building anything I could dream up. While the creation system is surprisingly thorough, it isn't perfect. Physics definitely come into play when driving the various vehicles you create, and I often found myself wishing it was easier to make vehicles symmetrical. That said, the creation tool surpassed my expectations and is the highlight of the game. (As a side note, the most important thing this game has taught me is that jet engines make everything better.)
I had to dock this game down to four stars because, well, when comparing the actual competitions you must complete to advance the story to simply building things at random, I greatly favor the latter. To be quite honest, I haven't finished the game. I got as far as I needed to unlock most of the parts (all the ones I wanted), and haven't done a challenge since. While I'm sure that I'll eventually finish it, to earn five stars the story needed to have kept my attention.
This game does have online multiplayer, but I haven't tried it. From what I've read on fan forums, the online community is fairly small and not very active. Recently Rare released "L.O.G.'s Lost Challenges", which includes some additional missions and multiplayer modes. I haven't bought it, but it might liven the community up a little. I have played some local multiplayer with my brother, but haven't experimented enough with it to create my own customized vehicles for use in the various challenges. There are a lot of different multiplayer modes, with most being variations on sports, obviously played with vehicles. The multiplayer aspect didn't impress me very much and I haven't played it since.
BOTTOM LINE
This is a fun, thinking-person's game. Designing vehicles and testing them out in the included test track is more entertaining that one would think, and building effective vehicles requires some forethought and insight into basic physics. If you're a fan of Banjo and Kazooie, or like sandbox-style vehicle invention, this game is definitely worth a try, though it's not necessarily a must-buy title.