Since Nuts 'n Bolts has come out, people have been going back to the earlier Banjo games, and have made their own comparisons. Earlier in the week I was reading stuff on GameFAQ's BK message board, and I felt like talking about the two old classic games as well.

Most people's opinions I've heard have said that they prefer Banjo-Kazooie to Banjo-Tooie. Both are very excellent games, and I thought it'd be great if I lined my thoughts up on both of the games side-by-side as well. Instead of reviewing them both, I'll just simply compare them in basic areas.

Story: Banjo-Tooie
Simply put, altogether, Banjo-Tooie has a better storyline. Gruntilda the witch was trapped under a rock for two years, and her sisters (this, of course, excluding Brentilda) come to her aid. The bony Gruntilda attacks Banjo's house and kills Bottles, thus spurning the avenging of a friend's death. This is further accentuated by the killing of King Jingaling later on, and the fact that other characters, such as Cheato, have also suffered more atrocities at Grunty's hands (although I don't see how, exactly, she found the time to rip his pages out; whatever, it's another unanswered question). Banjo and Kazooie set off on their quest to resurrect Jingaling and Bottles.

BK, however, had a story filled with more cliches. Gruntilda is a nasty, ugly, obese witch, and looking into Dingpot, she sees Banjo's sister Tooty as the fairest maiden of them all. She then kidnaps Tooty and takes the bear to the lair. Banjo then fights through the worlds of Grunty's lair and fights Gruntilda to the end. You can see similarities to this game's story in the storylines of the Mario series such as Mario, Zelda, the Sonic Adventures and Sonic CD, and many more games, I'm sure.

Difficulty: Banjo-Tooie
Let's be honest; BK was way easy. I just blazed through the games beating each level but Click Clock Wood within an hour or less, and that was playing either before school or in the evening, just last week. EVERY level in BT will take you a long time; at LEAST an hour and three to ten minutes unless you're literally a master at the game, and the continual backtracking doesn't make things any easier for you. Practically each level is going to have you backtracking at least once for a jiggy, honeycomb piece, or Cheato page. BK was far more new player friendy; Mumbo's Mountain was INSANELY easy in the beginning; Mayahem Temple was about on par with Clanker's Cavern on difficulty, and even then I'd still probably say that Mayahem Temple was harder than that.

I think BK's levels beat the hell out of BT's, though. I liked all of BK's to some extent; BT's Glitter Gulch Mine was lame, as was Terrydactyland. Grunty Industries was cool, but incredibly complicated and irritating. Not even Click Clock Wood could compare to that.

And, you could also jump straight into Furnace of Fun without doing Click Clock Wood so long as you have more than 765 notes. But, that does make it a lot harder if you're a first-timer. It's not going to affect a Vet in the least.

One thing that would probably make it seem harder, though, is that you need at least 94 jiggies to open up the final required door; 98 if you want double energy. You don't need that much in BT - there aren't even that much in BT - but you need all but 2 to have a good, complete game.

Gameplay: Banjo-Tooie
My goodness, this isn't a contest, either. BT improved several of Banjo's techniques as a whole; the roll doesn't make Banjo stop moving; Rat-a-tat rap can be performed while standing on the ground, there's more control to the aerial Beak Bomb technique, Kazooie and Banjo can be split up, Kazooie can be a dragon, Kazooie can fly and shoot eggs at the same time, there are several types of eggs, there are more transformations and all of them have some sort of offense (save the baby t-rex), Mumbo is playable... I'm not even going to go completely in depth, here, either, because BT is obviously superior in gameplay on all fronts.

Graphics: Tie
BK is brighter. BT isn't. Not really much of a difference; can't be called a lead, either. Other differences: Mumbo and Grunty lose weight. As does the bee transformation, as well.

Replayability: Banjo-Tooie
You couldn't redo many BK minigames/short boss battles unless you did Furnace of Fun, and even then, they weren't all that exciting. You can redo all of the boss battles in BT, or play as a dragon, or look for everything else that you don't have. All you could really go back to do in BK was just storm the levels for the honeycomb pieces, and once you complete the double energy puzzle at the end, getting the honeycomb pieces seems to be nothing but a complete waste.

Fun factor: Banjo-Tooie
All BK really had were Grunty's lame rhymes and cheesy taunts from faces such as Boggy and Mr. Vile. BK was definitely fun, but BT had humor that was just classic. BT also has multiplayer - I enjoy the shoot-out games a lot - a replay cinema, boss battle replayability, everything. Most of the BT cast brought the humor; only Kazooie really said funny stuff in BK.

Music: Tie
BK had more themes I personally enjoyed, but BT had some themes good enough to give BK's a run for its money. I like BK's soundtrack a little more still, however. Rusty Bucket Bay's theme remains a favorite to this day.

Overall: BT
It's all still a matter of preference, but according to the comparisons I drew in the topic, BT comes out on top.

This isn't to say that both games aren't without fault, though. Both games are like collectathons, in which you've got to collect:

Jiggies
Notes
Jinjos
Eggs
Feathers
Other (Mumbo tokens, Glowbos, Cheato pages, etc.)

That's a lot to be on the lookout for in just that compact list right there, which isn't even including the BT eggs and even the special situation ones (Proximity, gold, etc.) or the feather types. Jinjo collecting is just intensified in BT, adding to the difficulty rating yet increasing the tedium factor of the game as well. In BK, all you had to worry about really were Jiggies, notes, five jinjos a level (with just five colors, and a guaranteed jiggy for getting them all), and maybe Mumbo tokens. Since Humba and Mumbo appear in every world, collecting Glowbos for the two of them is worse than just collecting tokens for Mumbo to transform you in only a couple of levels. There are also Cheato pages (optional, though), and since there are so many more moves in BT, you've also got to scope around for Jamjars constantly, whereas Bottles was often in plain sight in BK, save learning the Invulnerability technique.

There are lots of comparisons you could make, though. I liked a lot more BK characters, for an example. BT had boss battles in every level; BK just had "beat 'em up" events - the Mutant Snippets, the Gold Flibbits, the Zubbas, Boss Boom Box, Nipper, yadayada - although, BK had a lot cooler enemies - I liked all three of the snippet types.

What do the BK/BT players here think? And, has anyone here played Nuts 'n Bolts?

Back in the day I played BK once or twice, then bought BT and loved it.

Then recently (like a week ago) I bought BK on the Xbox 360 arcade.

I agree with almost if not everything you've pointed out.

BT will remain my all time favorite N64 game, but It's nice to go back and play the game that started the series.

I originally got BT first back when it came out, then went and bought BK and played it. Both were fun, but like you said BT does win. The multiplayer and the storyline of BT pretty much do it for me; my bros and I spent hours playing the shoot-out multiplayer on BT...and we even still play it. Definitely close to the top on my fave games list.

I liked BK a lot, but only got a little ways through BT, so I can't say a whole lot about it. BK was definitely fun, though. I don't have a very high opinion of Nuts n Bolts thus far. Anything that spams out on vehicles kind of gets annoying.

I heard that that's what really killed it for Nuts 'n Bolts, really - creating the vehicles allows you to test your ingenuity I suppose, but I hear it got really annoying when the vehicles didn't suit the level you were exploring. Do Banjo and Kazooie even use techniques as seen in the first two games?

Eh. It just sounded awful; not a sequel I waited 8-9 years to see.

I personally enjoyed both of them a lot, but Banjo-Kazooie has more of a nostagic feel for me. It was one of my first N64 games, and I remember playing it when I was 7 years old. There were some parts that I couldn't seem to get past (i.e raising Clanker in Clanker's Cavern and reaching Rusty Bucket Bay). That made it seem to me as though BK was more difficult, even though it probably wasn't. I really enjoyed that game, so I had a lot of anticipation for Banjo-Tooie, and it didn't disappoint. It did seem easier, but again, I was a few years older at that point, so it was likely more a matter of experience than anything else.

I was really irritated when I found out the third BK console game was to be an exclusive XBox 360 release, because I only own Nintendo consoles, but the more I've heard about it, the more apathetic I've become. The "innovation" behind the completely different gameplay just makes it seem less like Banjo-Kazooie, even though it is technically a sequel. I'd still try it if I had the chance, but I'm not crazy about it.