When this game was first shown off I was in the majority of people who were really concerned about what Rare was doing with this series. I thought the first one was an amazing game, especially for its time, and seeing them change it to some building block hybrid platformer was concerning.

Well today IGN posted 2 walkthroughs with the developer and I think they show that this game is in fact still a Banjo game. One of the most impressive things I think is the overworld shown in the Showdown Town walkthrough. The overworld looks huge without feeling like it was made as large as it was just to cater to vehicles.




The second part of the walkthrough actually shows some levels of the game and overall I think it looks great. However, while the overworld didn't seem like the size was decided by the inclusion of vehicles in the game, the part of this video with the pirate ship really made me feel like they didn't make that area so huge because thats how it SHOULD be. It feels like they made it big so that the vehicles would have a use. Honestly, if you scaled down that area it would work perfectly as a classic banjo game. But instead they made the area between the land the pirate ship obnoxiously large just to make the player build a submarine type vehicle.



Even with the decision to increase the size of the levels just to give the vehicles a valid excuse, I'm officially excited. I think the fact that they are incorporating all these bits and pieces from past Banjo games is great. Seeing Banjos house years later on a new console is very nostalgic and it should be fun going through the game and seeing all the throwbacks to old levels like the pirate ship. I like the fact that they break the fourth wall by showing the description of the level in Banjo Tooie that was meant to be in the first, hopefully there are lots of opportunities to see things like that in the game.

So, anyone else feeling a bit more excited for this game after these videos?