Kazoo (1997)

Developer: Rare
Platforms: Nintendo 64
Genres: Platform, Adventure

The 3D catalog: game boxes on wooden shelves, with the cat sitting at the counter next to its greeting.

The catalog in 3D

The same catalog has a room you can walk around in. The cat behind the counter is the AI Catbot, and they pick real games from it when you tell them what you feel like playing. Nothing is for sale, here or in there. Go in from here and this game is already out on the counter, with more like it waiting on the shelf next to it.

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How it feels

An early Banjo-Kazooie prototype with top-down 2.5D play before it became the 3D classic.

retro curiositytop-downprototypeplatformerfantasyhistoric

About

The third phase of development of the game which would later get released as Banjo-Kazooie, Kazoo now stars Banjo instead of Edson, but the gameplay would still be in a top-down view, now as a 2.5D adventure platformer, with a grid-based movement system. Banjo would wear sports clothing as means of power-ups. The game was later reworked into a collect-a-thon 3D platformer, abandoning the sports motif in favor of a fantasy and comedy setting, when it was released as Banjo-Kazooie.

Screenshots

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More by Microsoft

This page is from Underplayed Gems, a catalog of older and overlooked games. Not quite it? You can browse by platform and genre, or take this one into the 3D catalog and ask the Catbot for something closer.