Former Rare Designer Reveals What Shigeru Miyamoto Thought Of Banjo-Kazooie's N64 Sequel

Gregg Mayles recently announced his departure from Rare after 36 years, which means the brains behind such classics as Battletoads, Donkey Kong Country and Banjo-Kazooie is no longer with the legendary British studio.

While he's very much focused on his future, Mayles is equally keen to promote his past, and has been digging into his personal archives to unearth material related to Banjo-Tooie, which recently celebrated its 25th birthday.

Among the paperwork you'll find scripts, unfilmed TV commercials, lost special moves, maps and unused abilities, but the item that made me smile the most was a fax from Nintendo's Japanese HQ which cleared the game for release in that region.

The author of the fax was none other than Shigeru Miyamoto himself, who has written in English, 'Splendid game' – along with a smiley face giving the all-important thumbs up.

I now have a vision in my head of Miyamoto adding personalised messages to all of the approval faxes which emanated from NCL's offices. We certainly lost something in the move to email, if you ask me.

I'm sure Mayles will be showing off more material related to the game, so be sure to follow him on social media.

View full article