Defending Yooka Laylee

If you like my videos please consider liking them above! It really helps YouTube push my content out! The more support I get the more videos I make! Thanks :)

I wish this game had more success, it's really fun to play even though it has many missteps you mentioned. I played this and its sequel, its sequel is great too but it's a SNES Donkey Kong Country kind of game, a 2D platformer. Its sequel had an amazing idea though, you would collect pagies to make the final dungeon easier, but you could actually just enter the final dungeon from the beginning but it's extremely tough, you can choose anytime you want to end the game but the catch is that the final dungeon has to be done in one life - my memory may be a little off though. But back to the original game, it felt really fun even though it has flaws. I wish there were more Banjo-Kazooie kind of games, I like the 3D world and being able to choose what you want. These old games felt like going to a buffet as a kid and choosing to do whatever you wanted. Strangely, the voices in Banjo Kazooie were all jumbled but it still sounded pleasing somehow, but for some reason I found most of Yooka-Laylee's voices to be very grating and I don't know why.

Wow, this game is getting a remake! Sweet.

Oh yeah also Trowzer is one of the funniest things ever. We had the level names Necky’s Nuts and Squawk’s Shaft in DKC and its sequel respectively, now we have a whole character to carry on the innuendo legacy. His design I find adorable too

I wasn't exactly a Rare fan back in the day (never had a SNES or N64), but I was a mascot platform fan, and I heard nothing but good things about Banjo 1 and 2. So, when I heard that ex-Rare developers were going to be making a spiritual successor and would be taking it to Kickstarter, I put money in and reserved myself a copy. I actually quite liked the game a bit. Sure, the lack of stages and their oversized nature were a bit of a detriment, but I had a lot of fun climbing the tower and exploring, I went ahead and platinumed the game. Hell, when I heard they were making a sequel, I picked that up without hesitation. It's a proud piece in my PS4 collection, and I'm an unashamed defender of the game. Also, I actually thought the universal stamina bar was a good idea. It gives a proper limit on your skills, such as flight and invisibility (lets face it, they'd be overpowered if something like that weren't in place), without a bunch of redundant peripheral mechanics attached to it.

My biggest problems were - Not enough collectibles and landmarks: The worlds weren't just big, they were empty. Some collectibles should be hidden and encourage exploration and some should be placed to lead players. The worlds also were easy to get lost in because of how samey everything looked. Good luck finding what edge of Tribalstack you are at. - The lack of teleport pads or fast travel: Especially if you make big world's this is a mandatory thing for games. Even Mario Odyssey has fast travel. - Everything being on an energy meter: It's fine for flying, but anything else shouldn't have been. Flying should have been tied to a collectible again. - The sound was really obnoxious at times: The pagey reveal theme is something I'll be happy if I never hear again. - The mini-games are terrible: The casino mini-game does not function because collision desynchs from what you see. - Too many moves that do the same things: Things that break glass being the most notable. - Enemies respawn really fast: At least make fighting them have a point even if it's that they disappear for 5-10 minutes. These are adventure games, not beat em ups.

I pretty much echo most of what you said. It ain’t perfect but it is fun. Though we do need to make sure we point out the flaws so the devs (and other developers) know what not to do for a fun time.

I hope you do decide to do a video on Impossible Lair. Awesome video as always mate

"Could use more time to cook" sums up this entire experience. This is one of the most expensive prototypes and could use more beta testing and about year to get up to Banjo Kazooie standards. Not exactly sure what happened here but it exists. 😅

Thanks for the videos. I know I'm late to the party, but just to give my opinion on some of the things about the game. 1- The ghosts were a really cool addition, having each ghost present a different kind of challenge (which could have increased difficulty as the game progresses), from being invisible, to being in a more hidden location, to fighting him (the red one could even morph into a boss in some late world just for fun). They add a cool change that was missing from the jinjos in Kazooie; 2- I honestly liked the idea of expanding a world, being that the gimmick around the worlds are books whose pages you collect, it makes sense that you could "complete" them if you have enough pagies. My main problem was the execution of the expansion that suffers from the problems you mention in the video; 3- The moves themselves were really solid with few exceptions. For me at least, havind Yooka's ammo (ice ball, fire breath etc) being timed with the last fruit (cannonball, honey or whatever) you ate felt off for me. I'd much rather have an ammo storage system similar to Tooie. That would ad some difficulty to challenges, since you know that you're gonna have to use a tree that the game simply put there for you...; 3.1- The energy/stanima barr is such a horrible ideia in these games, like you said, it 100% percent cuts the flow of gameplay and having the same butteflies that grant you health being used to restore energy (without giving you health) makes no sense; 4- most of the NPCs in each level felt like copy + paste, from the snowmen to shopping carts to slot machines...They had a lot of possibilities for them and I think they really could do better than recicling NPCs and reusing NPCs from different levels. I think this takes away from the worlds in a big way. In kazzoie there were very few NPCs but their quests and interactions felt more unique. In Tooie each NPC felt unique and belonging to the world in some sense (exept the bunnies in Grunty Industries) and by and large, the worlds felt alive in some way that the ones in Yooka don't; 5- Rextro and Kartos were fun for exacly one mini game. Having to do they quest in each world really felt like a chore, expeccially because they didn't seem to belong anywhere. Kartos would've been really cool as a character in a mine level or something (more on that below). Rextro to me was the worst for 2 main reasons: 5.1- even if you've beaten his high score on your first try, for some messed up reason the developer thought that forcing you to play again was a great ideia and it sucked...In Tooie's minigames if you got enough point you could win all the rewards at once in every mini-game; 5.2- Most, not all, but most, of kazooie's and tooie's mini games you played them exacly as you would play the game, same controls, movements and moves. So you are the developers could use a polished gameplay from a platform game to include minigames, in rextro's games you play like a poorly controled arcade that plays entirely different from the main game (and have to do this twice in each world!!!) with poor physics and limited controls; 6- Most bosses were bad as well, with capital B being the only exception. 3 of the 5 bosses of the worlds were basicaly attatched to walls for some reason...; 7- They had a really cool opportunity (that I really wish they use in a next game) of having levels base on literary genres, from detective stories to space adventures to monster and terror stories to knights and romances to fables to fairy tales to wild west to pirate stories...endless possibilities...For some reason I think they tried to do that but didn't really which is a shame since the concept was great... Also more worlds is a better option than bigger ones; 8- Dr Puzz transformations were hit and miss. The school of fish and the boat were my favorites, the other ones not so much; 9- The enemies in each level lacked personality as well, they were basically reskins of the same enemies again... I actually enjoyed the game...I think my main frustration was with the fact that I can see that they could do a LOT better

I personally loved the game, it was just a spark that ignited a love for it, probably one of the only games I'd replay it a few times

⁠ The Pros for me Aside from Tribalstack, which I think is the only stage where the emptiness problem is that bad, most of the levels are really well designed for both navigation and exploration. Glitterglaze Glacier having its expansion be a series of interior mazes that have no bearing on navigating the rest of the stage was brilliant in keeping the overall size manageable. Moodymaze Marsh’s areas are all very well set apart so that it’s easy to tell where you’ve been and where you should be going just from taking a look around. Capital Cashino has some great theming and the layout is very straightforward, Tribalstack done right in that sense. Nothing feels like it’s just there to waste your rolling stamina, the puzzles make good use of the space. Galleon Galaxy feels big in a way that’s exciting instead of barren, thanks to the overall variety in challenges. Kirhope’s soundtrack with contributions by Wise is on point as usual. Especially like Glitterglaze Glacier and Capital Cashino’s themes. Also Hivory Towers The writing starts kinda meh for me but really picks up as the game goes on. Except for the business jokes. I actually like the quizzes, but I always have. Still, they’re far less punishing than the end of game quizzes in Banjo, so I never thought the complaint was justified. Also Capital Cashino again is just really good. The slots having different patterns to figure out was a simple but clever way of keeping that aspect from growing stale, the platforming has a lot of creativity, Capital B in disguise forced to give you Pagies is hilarious, just a wonderful stage.

The funny thing is, I'm pretty sure the stamina bar was added due to feedback from the toybox demo because people didn't like feeling compelled to roll everywhere, or something. I don't quite remember. I might be wrong about that, but at the very least I remember the discussion back in the day about people being annoyed by constantly talon trotting in Banjo-Kazooie and that was something they wanted to fix. I don't know if a stamina bar was the right method, though.

I recently plays a 2nd run of the game, not finished yet, but i feel the game a very good one... Yooka-Laylee 1 is basically that type of game where it is only worth to 100% complete only the 1st time, and that's nice too, because sometimes you just need just to play until the final boss and call it a day... nvn

Man, I love this game. the music alone makes me feel like a little kid sitting and playing Banjo or Spyro.

I remember seeing the preview screenshot and think "Oh my God, they are finally make Banjo-Threeie !" Guess they kind of did !

Being different doesn't necessarily mean that it's bad; it's all in how you execute it.

I just wish They would make a sequal so we can see them truly shine

Wow! I remember seeing this game I never played it and I had no clue it was made by the team that made banjo kazooie 😅 I learned something new✨ today

Enjoyed the video good sir very professional, I loved this game 👍🏼 I think all games have a few frustrating moments but if someone sticks through till the end I think they'd see its a good game. Great review, really hope we get Twooka Laylee before we're 100. Like DK64 I think the first Yooka Laylee has a somewhat bad reputation due to big Youtubers who I think didn't give it a fair shot trashing it but after its on sale like 24/7 hopefully more people played it by now and more people actually beat the game