History YMMV / BanjoTooie

** Grunty Industries. It's by far the most complex level in the entire game, even though it's only the sixth out of eight. Banjo and Kazooie have to do a lot of searching around and messing with puzzle elements to make a dent in the level's defences. In addition, Humba's Washing Machine spell is the worst out of all her transformation spells: it's hard to control, and it's hard to shoot with. On that note, while the first couple of FPS levels in ''Banjo-Tooie'' aren't too bad (though Ordinance Storage can be somewhat overwhelming to newcomers due to its confusing layout), Clinkers Cavern has a very sharp spike in difficulty due to its maze like layout combined with a very tight time limit for you to clear out all of the Clinkers.

* ContestedSequel: While you're hard pressed to find anyone who would outright say it's a bad game, some fans agree that despite its massive suite of improvements over the first game, ''Tooie'' has a lot of its own issues. Among the biggest complaints are the significantly slower pacing (thanks to more emphasis on puzzle solving and exploration over pure platforming), the complexity of obtaining each Jiggy being drastically ramped up, and the frequent backtracking. Just as many fans don't mind these flaws and find ''Banjo-Tooie'' to be a [[EvenBetterSequel significant improvement]] over the original, expanding on the formula by dramatically increasing the world size, adding more bosses, making Jiggies harder to find, removing the limited lives and changing the system for collecting Notes (along with what they do), making the game more challenging while simultaneously removing the more unfair difficulty aspects. All of these unique differences come together to make ''Tooie'' either an incredibly satisfying, detailed and engaging game to complete, or a bit of an overly complicated mess that is not as enjoyable as the first game.

** The Pack Jump is a simple glitch done with solo Banjo that's executed by pressing jump while using the Pack Whack attack in midair, granting him a DoubleJump even without Kazooie. It covers more vertical distance than his version of the Flap Flip, rendering it obsolete immediately after you get the Split Up ability.

* UnintentionallyUnwinnable: As Washing Machine Banjo, it's possible to trap yourself in Grunty Industries (specifically at the bottom of the Air Conditioning Plant).

* UnwinnableByInsanity: As Washing Machine Banjo, it's possible to trap yourself in Grunty Industries (specifically at the bottom of the Air Conditioning Plant).

* TheyWastedAPerfectlyGoodPlot: ''Banjo-Kazooie'' had a rather elaborate Game Over screen, where [[BigBad Gruntilda]] [[TheBadGuyWins succeeds in stealing Tooty's beauty]]. ''Tooie's'' Game Over screen, on the other hand, is nothing but the words "Game Over" in front of a paused screen. We never see Gruntilda's plan to suck out the life force of everything actually work. Especially when Rare is infamous for Game Over Cutscenes that showed the player screwed up big time, like in the other Nintendo 64 platformers developed by them. Though likely this was due to rushed development.

* BestLevelEver: Witchyworld, Jolly Roger's Lagoon being a water level done correctly coupled with the wonderful submarine transformation, and the gloriously difficult Hailfire Peaks.

* ContestedSequel: While you're hard pressed to find anyone who would outright say it's a bad game, some fans agree that despite its massive suite of improvements over the first game, it has a lot of its own differences that can be seen as flaws. The biggest being the significantly slower pacing (thanks to more emphasis on puzzle solving and exploration over pure platforming), the complexity of obtaining each Jiggy is drastically ramped up, and the frequent backtracking. Just as many fans don't mind these flaws and find ''Banjo-Tooie'' to be a [[EvenBetterSequel significant improvement]] over the original, expanding on the formula by dramatically increasing the world size, adding more bosses, and making Jiggies harder to find, removing the limited lives and changing the system for collecting Notes (along with what they do), making the game more challenging while simultaneously removing the more unfair difficulty aspects. All of these unique differences come together to make ''Tooie'' either an incredibly satisfying, detailed and engaging game to complete, or a bit of an overly complicated mess that is not as enjoyable as the first game.

** Terrydactyland due to its large size and having that painfully long sidequest with the Stegosauruses. The muddy quicksand also makes it hard to explore.

** The [[EverythingsDeaderWithZombies zombified throne room]]. Banjo and Kazooie just met a cheerful ally King Jingaling, and Grunty wastes no time in {{Life Drain}}ing his entire palace, leaving him as a zombie who attacks them on sight and reducing his pet to ashes and a pair of eyes. All with [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DokkPsdHjdY horrifically depressing music.]] Comedic villain she might be, but Grunty is not messing around this time. Also, he keeps on saying very weird, random things that just ''sound'' spooky. As you progress through the game, [[FridgeHorror you learn that the things he was saying were warnings about various important enemy characters you encounter in other worlds!]]

** Chili Billi and Chilly Willy are one of the most popular bosses. For one thing, they're two boss fights instead of one. Said boss fights are also quite enjoyable. They have some of the most impressive visual effects on the N64. Also, [[InstantAwesomeJustAddDragons THEY'RE GIANT FREAKING DRAGONS.]]

--->''Remember Canary Mary? Did you have fun racing her? How I laughed when I was setting up those levels. I'm still laughing!''* TheyWastedAPerfectlyGoodCharacter:

** The [[EverythingsDeaderWithZombies zombified throne room]]. Banjo and Kazooie just met a cheerful ally King Jingaling, and Grunty wastes no time in {{Life Drain}}ing his entire palace, leaving him as a zombie who attacks them on sight and reducing his pet to ashes and a pair of eyes. All with [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DokkPsdHjdY horrifically depressing music.]] Comedic villain she might be, but Grunty is not messing around this time.
*** Also, he keeps on saying very weird, random things that just ''sound'' spooky. As you progress through the game, [[FridgeHorror you learn that the things he was saying were warnings about various important enemy characters you encounter in other worlds!]]

** The game hits you right off the bat by killing off Bottles the mole. It just catches you completely off guard that the sequel to such a bright, fun, cartoony game as ''VideoGame/BanjoKazooie'' could ''start out'' with the death of one of the main characters. And soon afterward you have to face his wife and kids, and Banjo and Kazooie argue for a bit over whether to tell them as everyone goes on about how they expect him home any minute and he's going to be the star of next week's big kickball game.
*** And as he [[TheDyingWalk emerges from Banjo's ruined house]], [[BodyHorror charred black from Gruntilda's spell]], [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JzuwEycde0k&t=840 this]] song plays.

** The destroyed Grey Jinjo house in ''Tooie'', which has a sign beside it that reads: "In Loving Memory of the Grey Jinjo family, who died quite suddenly and tragically when a giant drill ran over their house."
*** Even worse, [[FridgeHorror the Grey Jinjo family most likely had 10 members in it, due to the rising number pattern of each Jinjo family to the next]].

** When you reach the icy side of HailfirePeaks, you see a cinematic of an alien saucer which is attacked which causes the aliens to fall from the sky and die in the snow. The painful part about this is the dialogue that happens beforehand with the alien saying that he's dead, right before his eyes close.
*** This turns into TearsOfJoy when you use [[{{Necromancer}} Mumbo Jumbo]] to revive the aliens and help them fix their ship so they can finally go home.
** Boggy's Igloo. There's just something wrong when the normally happy Freezeezy Peak music gets such a halfhearted rendition, all the while you gaze upon such a neglectful slob of a bear, his abusive wife, and their kids who got brattier since the last game.
*** It got worse in ''VideoGame/BanjoKazooieNutsAndBolts''; Boggy has been kicked out of his own house by his wife, and must now earn some notes by running the local gym. Sometimes when you talk to him, he'll be eating his own scarf, commenting on how he hasn't been fed in days.

*** Thankfully, they both have been [[BackFromTheDead resurrected]] by the time of ''Nuts&Bolts'', possibly by Mumbo or The Lord Of Games.
** After the third fight against Klungo, he comments that every time Banjo and Kazooie beat him in a fight, Grunty beats him and makes his face more disfigured. What really makes it sad is his comment that his wife won't love him anymore if this continues on. It finally makes him [[ScrewThisImOuttaHere quit his job as a minion]].
*** And those bruises are still there eight years later in Nuts & Bolts. Yeesh, Grunty didn't hold back.

*** Once you rescue him, though, he just disappears from the game. Yeah, he shows up eight years later, but not in the rest of the game.

* ContestedSequel: While you're hard pressed to find anyone who would outright say ''Banjo-Tooie'' is a bad game, some fans agree that despite its massive suite of improvements over the first game, it has a lot of its own differences that can be seen as flaws. The biggest being the significantly slower pacing (thanks to more emphasis on puzzle solving and exploration over pure platforming), the complexity of obtaining each Jiggy is drastically ramped up, and the frequent backtracking. Just as many fans don't mind these flaws and find ''Banjo-Tooie'' to be a [[EvenBetterSequel significant improvement]] over the original, expanding on the formula by dramatically increasing the world size, adding more bosses, and making Jiggies harder to find, removing the limited lives and changing the system for collecting Notes (along with what they do), making the game more challenging while simultaneously removing the more unfair difficulty aspects. All of these unique differences come together to make ''Tooie'' either an incredibly satisfying, detailed and engaging game to complete, or a bit of an overly complicated mess that is not as enjoyable as the first game.

* GoodBadBugs: Banjo can double-jump when he's going solo by swinging his backpack in mid-air and then jumping again. This move allows for minor SequenceBreaking by reaching otherwise inaccessible platforms without outside help.
* HilariousInHindsight: One of the ''Styracosaurus'' kids is named [[WesternAnimation/IceAge Scrat]].
* NightmareFuel: Atlantis, hidden under Jolly Roger's Lagoon, is pretty unsettling to discover and explore even as an adult - it's accessed through a narrow underwater tunnel, feels very claustrophobic, and features alien environments that just feel unsettling. Especially frightening are the puffer fish who rapidly inflate when they get near you in a JumpScare!

* SeinfeldIsUnfunny: Fans often cite ''Tooie's'' ambitious, interconnected levels and complex Jiggies, which were seen as amazing and revolutionary at the time of the game's release, as more negatives than positives, comparing them unfavourably to the original game's smaller, but denser levels and simplistic Jiggies ([[ComplexityAddiction whereas Tooie's would often require switching around Mumbo's spells, Wumba's transformations and moves learned in later levels in order to obtain certain Jiggies]]).

* SpiritualAdaptation: It could be argued that ''Banjo-Tooie'' is the closest thing the Nintendo 64 ever got to a ''Franchise/{{Metroid}}'' game, since its open-ended structure with a {{backtrack|ing}} focus, [[RailRoading gate-heavy structure]], and [[AbilityRequiredToProceed emphasis on collecting new moves and items to advance]] is very much in vogue with the {{Metroidvania}} style of gameplay.

** Terrydactyland due to its large size and having that painfully long sidequest with the Stegosauruses. The muddy quicksand also makes it hard to explore.

--->''Remember Canary Mary? Did you have fun racing her? How I laughed when I was setting up those levels. I'm still laughing!''
** The Pot O'Gold challenge, also from Cloud Cuckooland. What makes that challenge so hard is that if you want to win the Jiggy you have to hit 90 targets in only 45 seconds. You have to be INCREDIBLY lucky to be able to hit that many targets in such a short amount of time.
* TheyWastedAPerfectlyGoodCharacter: Some think playable Mumbo is underutilized. He is mostly used to open paths for Banjo and Kazooie to get through, and he has no Jiggies to collect besides a single one from the first world.

** Mr Patch is probably the most popular boss in the game due to being a textbook example of the [[GettingCrapPastTheRadar game's humor]], having one of the most enjoyable fights in the series, and his catchy battle theme.

* EvenBetterSequel: The levels are bigger and more involved than the ones in ''Banjo-Kazooie'', but not as gigantic as the ones from ''VideoGame/DonkeyKong64''. Every level has a transformation, and all of them (minus the baby T. Rex) are able to attack. Every level also has at least one boss (bosses being surprisingly rare in the previous game). BagOfSpilling is famously averted, you no longer lose all your notes if you die, and the Jinjos' colors are randomized, making each playthrough unique. ''Banjo-Kazooie'' may be more popular, but ''Tooie'' has plenty of passionate fans.

* DevelopersForesight: It's possible to use [[spoiler: Dragon Kazooie's fire breath]] to damage Weldar without having to shoot a single egg.

* EvenBetterSequel: The levels are bigger and more involved than the ones in ''Banjo-Kazooie'', but not as gigangic as the ones from ''VideoGame/DonkeyKong64''. Every level has a transformation, and all of them (minus the baby T. Rex) are able to attack. Every level also has at least one boss (bosses being surprisingly rare in the previous game). BagOfSpilling is famously averted, you no longer lose all your notes if you die, and the Jinjos' colors are randomized, making each playthrough unique. ''Banjo-Kazooie'' may be more popular, but ''Tooie'' has plenty of passionate fans.

* EvenBetterSequel: The levels are bigger and more involved than the ones in ''Banjo-Kazooie'', but not as gigangic as the ones from ''VideoGame/DonkeyKong64''. Every level has a transformation, and all of them (minus the baby T. Rex) are able to attack. Every level also has at least one boss (bosses being surprisingly rare in the previous game). BagOfSpilling is famously averted, and the Jinjos' colors are randomized, making each playthrough unique. ''Banjo-Kazooie'' may be more popular, but ''Tooie'' has plenty of passionate fans.

* SequelDifficultySpike: ''Banjo-Tooie'' is a ''lot'' more challenging than its predecessor. The levels are larger and more complex (to the point that warp pads are introduced), and the Jiggies are harder to find, as there is almost none out in plain sight like in the previous game's earlier stages. The bosses are more plentiful and more difficult overall, including the infamous Weldar of Grunty Industries. It is worth noting, however, that Rare did show some mercy by removing some of Kazooie's more irritating components, such as giving the player infinite lives this time around and completely retooling how the collection of Musical Notes works.

* TheyWastedAPerfectlyGoodPlot: ''Banjo-Kazooie'' had a rather elaborate Game Over screen, where [[BigBad Gruntilda]] [[TheBadGuyWins succeeds in stealing Tooty's beauty]]. ''Tooie's'' Game Over screen, on the other hand, is nothing but the words "Game Over" in front of a paused screen. We never see Gruntilda's plan to suck out the life force of everything actually work. Especially when Rare is infamous for Game Over Cutscenes that showed the player screwed up big time, like in the other Nintendo 64 platformers developed by them.