| Banjo-Kazooie: Nuts & Bolts | 
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| From: Microsoft
Category: Video Games
List Price: $39.99
Buy New: $29.99
You Save: $10.00 (25%)
Buy New/Used from $29.99
Avg. Customer Rating:   (5 reviews)
Sales Rank: 142
Platform: Xbox 360
ESRB: Everyone 10+
Media: Video Game
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.2
Dimensions (in): 7.5 x 5.3 x 0.6
MPN: S73001
Model: 882224729765
UPC: 400009416411
EAN: 0882224729765
ASIN: B0019MLWL4
Release Date: November 11, 2008 (New: Last 30 Days)
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
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| Features:
| • | Banjo and Kazooie return for this third installment in the franchise, exclusively for Xbox 360 | | • | The famous bear and bird return in high definition, with plenty of user-generated content and fun gameplay options | | • | Lord of Games (LOG) has built a multitude of worlds with lots of challenges and villains, including the evil witch Grunty | | • | Vehicle creations are nearly endless with hundreds of parts, gadgets, and customization options | | • | Offers complete single-player and multiplayer experiences |
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| Editorial Reviews:
Amazon.com Product Description
Rare Ltd. revives the Banjo-Kazooie franchise with this third installment, created exclusively for the Xbox 360. Banjo-Kazooie: Nuts & Bolts brings the famous bear and bird duo back in high definition, with plenty of user-generated content and fun gameplay options.  |  | Players:
Offline: 1
Online: 2-8
Gameplay Modes:
Single player offline, multiplayer online cooperative.
Save File Size:
1 MB
Format:
16:9 Widescreen on HDTV 720p/1080i/1080p
Audio:
In-Game Dolby Digital |  | | 
Banjo and Kazooie return in this third installment to battle it out with the evil witch Gruntilda. View larger. | 
Build a vehicle to pilot over land, water and air at Mumbo's Motors. View larger. | 
The Lord of Games (LOG) has built many worlds to determine the rightful owner of Spiral Mountain. View larger. | In Nuts & Bolts, a showdown has been set. The Lord of the Games (LOG) has arranged a duel between Banjo and the evil witch Gruntilda, aka Grunty, to decide the rightful owner of Spiral Mountain. LOG, being the creator of all video games, has built a multitude of worlds to host the challenges. Banjo must complete all the worlds to win, while Grunty tirelessly tries to stop his efforts using every method she can muster. Build it at Mumbo's Motors
The game is loaded with vehicle options to help Banjo pilot over land, water, and air. Parts for vehicles are widely diverse, ranging from your standard engines and wheels to egg guns, floaters, and other gadgets. The Mumbo's Motors workshop makes it easy to create new vehicles. You'll collect different parts by solving puzzles and exploring worlds. Vehicle parts include a wide variety of body panels, engines, wheels, wings, propellers, fuel, and weapons, plus lots of bizarre items like Mumbo Bombos, floaters, and the versatile sticky ball that allows you to create almost anything from a simple object. Once you've finished your ride, customize your creation with a paint job and a suitable name before Banjo takes the wheel and pilots it into action. Customize, Customize, Customize--or Just Get Down to Business
LOG's worlds are littered with hidden secrets, reward puzzles, and over 100 contraption parts that deliver an almost limitless combination of vehicle possibilities. As you work through the worlds, you'll discover more and more ways to customize and improve your contraptions, creating a surprising level of user-generated content. But even if you don't fancy yourself the greatest inventor or a highly creative craftsman, you can still have countless hours of fun with Banjo-Kazooie's pre-built vehicles. With these at your fingertips you're ready to jump in and get started, and there are plenty more contraptions available for purchase throughout the adventure using in-game currency and musical notes. Characters, Old and New
Banjo and his best friend, Kazooie, are ready to battle for their homeland and prevent Grunty from developing it into tower blocks and malls. Other familiar faces return as well, such as Bottles, Captain Blubber, and the Jinjos, along with a vibrant cast and crew of new friends and foes. Keep your eyes peeled for Grunty's minions--look out for Trophy Thomas, Piddles, and Grunty's menacing Gruntbots: they'll do anything to prevent Banjo's success. Nuts & Bolts offers an engaging storyline, entertaining characters, and fun gameplay options. This game offers complete single-player and multiplayer experiences--tackle LOG's worlds on your own, or play with your friends in competitive and cooperative challenges. Banjo-Kazooie: Nuts & Bolts for Xbox 360 is a enjoyable, challenging game that appeals to people of all ages and types.
  
Banjo-Kazooie: Nuts & Bolts delivers loads of customization options, interesting characters (old and new), and plenty of fun, challenging gameplay.
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| Customer Reviews:
 Great Game---Not a Game For Younger Non-Readers November 19, 2008
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
***I know this game says 10+, however, I just wanted to post a warning to parents or anyone thinking of buying this game for younger gamers that are non-readers. There is NO speech the game is a reading based game and you must read throughout the entire game to find clues to your next adventure and gameplay tips etc.***
I have found this game to be very challenging and have put in around 10 hours of gameplay. The game does start out slow while trying to figure out how to play the game and build vehicles. However, once the mechanics of the game are mastered and other worlds unlocked the game really shines. The challenges are very exciting with flying, racing, searching etc. all under a time constraint. Spend some extra time with this game as its not a sit down and play, you will really need to read and learn the in/out of the game to get the full potential.
Great game. November 12, 2008
6 out of 6 found this review helpful
It is really nice to be able to play a Banjo game again, and while this one is definately a departure from the other two games, it is still quite fun.
Although the text is a little small, I do not have problems reading it on my HDTV, so it is a non-issue for me.
Banjo is back with minor changes November 12, 2008
11 out of 12 found this review helpful
Banjo Kazooie is an interesting game, I love the mix of platforming and vehicle creation that this game allows; when put against a task there are multiple methods of completing this task by creating a default vehicle using the included blueprints of designing your own vehicle.
If you enjoy platformers, this is the game for you!
A fun, family friendly game for the holidays! November 12, 2008
12 out of 13 found this review helpful
Well first off, I'd like to say that there has been a concern with the text in this game. I think the points made by others are valid and the issue of small, fast-scrolling text IS being addressed by RARE and will soon be fixed with a patch. The text issue ONLY affects those with an SDTV, HOWEVER if you have an HDTV the text is legible. It only scrolls fast for cutscenes, but in-game, when talking to characters, you have the option to choose when the next screen comes up. The only reason I dedicated this large section just to the text, was because the other people base their reviews on it when the rest of the game is practically flawless. The game doesn't deserve 1 star because of this and it should be higher cause I don't want a review the negate the average score when other parts are superior. Now onto the actual review!
The game plays by you building your own vehicles with the different parts you collect. At first the vehicle-building system seems complex and difficult to master, but after learning the basics, any kid could create anything! With all of the parts, you could make vehicles ideal for riding on land, flying through the air, gliding through snow and water, and even swimming underwater! Although the majority of the games were based around on-foot platforming, there are still parts you can run through and explore. Due to the use of vehicles now being available, the worlds are MASSIVE and detailed. It would take minutes to cross on foot, which is why riding a vehicle is a must. In total there are 6 worlds to explore, each comprised of several acts. Each act of the level is huge with characters and lots of enemies and physics objects to carry and push around. The gameplay is centered around using your vehicles to complete challenges, races, and games. Completing them can earn you notes or a jiggy which can be collected from a bank rather then "stored" in Kazooie like previous ventures. If they're completed fast enough, you can earn a T.T. trophy which are used to get even more jiggies. The whole point of the game is collecting enough to fight the final boss.
The characters are funny and well designed with well written dialogue. Some charcters talk with weird grammar on purpose to sound like they have accents or can't speak english very well.
The graphics are beautiful, all of the levels are HUGE with extreme detail, color, and characters. The game runs super smooth with no slowdown or lag whatsoever with everything appearing clearly from far away. The soundtrack is also incredible. The majority of it is borrowed, remixed, and remade orchestrally from older Banjo-Kazooie games. The sound effects are all brand new and sound great. With surround sound you feel like your in the world. The game is very long and has tons of replay value due to so many secrets and challenges to complete.
On top of this there is online multiplayer. You can play using default vehicles or custom made vehicles. There are lots of modes to choose from. You can simply race in land, sea, or air or complete in fast paced matches trying to destroy each other with your crazy vehicles. If parents are worried about other peoples online behaviors you can choose to mute or ban any disruptive or trash-talking players You can also set limits for how long they can play online.
Overall, the game is great for BOTH children and adults, will be enjoyed for months, and it's a great value for what you're getting. I highly recommend getting this game for the holiday season for any kids. It's a bargain and an unforgettable experience.
 What Were They Thinking? (FUN Parent Test Below!) November 12, 2008
13 out of 58 found this review helpful
Just played this with my son, and I was very disappointed at the speed of the text on the screen - so much so that my boy couldn't even understand what was going on. And I logged into Amazon tonight specifically with the intention of telling you all about my experience.
--> To the game developers: Your core audience is young kids. I'm an adult and could not even read the text showing the story, instructions or character comments no matter how fast I tried to read them (silently or aloud). What a joke.
--> To you the customer: This game is driven by text. Over & over & over again. That's all you get (no speaking) in every instance for anything relating to the game itself.
This game had so much potential. Excellent graphics. Fun little contruction cars (my kid loved them and compared them to building his Legos). And most of all, the sound effects and overall 'cool factor' for young kids would've been great! The driving mechanics were bearable - especially for a kid - and the clever jokes that occur when you drive around town and talk to people showed that they put much effort into a potentially great experience.
Everything seemed to be easy to follow with 'hint' graphics all over the place for young kids to follow, and there was a thin story line ruined by the speed of the text scroller as I will unfortunately have to complain about more below.
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Here, do this right now (I swear this will have you convinced and LOL)...
I want you to read this sentence as FAST as you possibly can silently right now, ok? Here we go:
"I'm saying this sentence to myself because a reviewer on Amazon.com is trying to make a point that this GAME is ruined by the speed of the graphics..."
OK, did it? Now I want you to imagine that the graphic cuts off screen at the capital word "GAME" above in the sentence you just read. (I swear, it's pathetic, isn't it) Now imagine, that as you're trying to read that, THE NEXT GRAPHIC COMES UP! And you can't get to the end of that one either! There's no pause button, no nothing. I would've liked to spend some time reading these things to my kid (in that slooow parent voice we all use) but no. You could'nt even follow where or what the heck they were trying to tell us; about the story, the characters, the instructions, and the explanation of the actual imaginary world we were supposed to be in!
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All it would've taken to make this game a 4/5 stars, was a "Continue" button at the end of each text line, so that we, the players (the parents! and kids!), could've understood what was going on. I can't imagine for a minute that this game went through any 'beta' or truly public testing with normal people. No way.
Moreover, it would've been a great game to help kids to learn to read while sitting with a parent having them read to them. What a shame. Sitting with a parent (me) and trying to enjoy what could be great family time ended up with me actually laughing at the game and the developers for a ridiculously fast text (no one talks, it's one of those games with mumbling instead of true overdubs/voice overs, and THAT ruins it even more, especially in regards to the potential educational experience that "could of" been with a cheaply hired actor to speak the words to the children).
Man, what a HUGE disappointment. For someone who plays the XBox 360 in competitive gaming environments and understands the gaming industry extremely well, I could not believe that they screwed this up 'that' bad to the point where even an adult could not read the screen in time.
OVERALL: A truly awesome graphically stimulating experience and a potentially GREAT family hour experience with your kids ruined by ill-thinking, no true 'beta' testers (this has to be a fact), and a lack of understanding that their core audience will NOT be able to read that fast, nor will they know many 'big' words used in the writing. When are you guys going to figure out what kids are capable of reading? Heck, most adults don't have this games vocabluary, and the grammer is the worst and most harmful thing you did to this game.
Instead of "Bear see mountain of lost money. Bear sad game got bad review on Amazon" - you could've just done it right! "The bear sees the mountain of lost money, and the bear is sad because the game was given a bad review on Amazon." Jeez guys, c'mon. Speed reading AND terrible writing? Kids WON'T be able to figure this game out without bothering their parents every 2 seconds asking what to do! And when we try to help, there's no contoller graphic in the menu for us to tell them what to do! (like soooo many adult titles have, go figure). We can read. They can't. We can't read that fast. They can't either.
Don't waste your money on this, nor even bother to rent it, or buy it used. Just tell your kid when he/she sees it, or asks you about it, exactly what I've told my kid many, many times throughout his childhood; "It only got 1 star on Amazon.com. The kids hated it. Let's get a game with 4 or 5 stars, OK? Trust me."
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