Banjo-Kazooie: Nuts & Bolts – LOG’s lost challenges review

by Kowbrainz on Dec 13th, 2008

It was a real pleasant surprise for me to hear that Rare had decided to continue releasing downloadable content for Banjo-Kazooie: Nuts & Bolts this year despite its less-than-average sales last holiday season. I got another pleasant surprise when I learned that their first downloadable content package, entitled LOG’s Lost Challenges, would be valued at a mere 400 Microsoft Points (or US$5.00) and would include 12 brand new challenges, some new multiplayer mode variations and a new Klungo game to test your mettle. However, it was only after downloading the game that I learned that not only were Rare stretching the truth a bit in their advertising of LLC, but the update probably wasn’t something I’d be able to recommend to all owners of Nuts & Bolts.

Upon downloading LOG’s Lost Challenges and booting up the game, you’ll find a new door at the rear of Mumbo’s Motors. Warping through this door will take you through to Mumbo’s Test O’ Track, with several of the characters from the game scattered across it which you can talk to in order to initiate your new challenges. The real problem here is that there aren’t 12 challenges at all – rather, six which you’ll need to complete with a LOG’s choice vehicle first before being able to tackle under Player’s choice standards. And while you may only be paying 400 points in the end, it still feels a bit dodgy.

And then, when you’re paying for six new challenges you’d sort of expect them to be creative and different from the stuff you’d already been through in the game, but this isn’t always the case. Granted, there are a couple of decent ones which force you to think and create some new vehicles. Mr Fit’s challenge requires you to take a large basketball around a course through various checkpoint rings – the difference being that you’ll earn differing amounts of points depending on how difficultly placed the next ring is. Humba’s challenge gets you going through an obstacle course over a number of hurdles, whilst avoiding cardboard cutouts of the showdown town villagers so to not lose valuable seconds from your clock. Jolly Dodger’s challenge sees you staying within a crown, each second within its boundaries giving you a point – much like one of the last challenges you play in the game or the multiplayer game Queen of the Knoll. But then, while these challenges are okay to play and can be fun, the other half simply emphasizes how repetitive Nuts & Bolts’ challenges already were. You have a simple checkpoint race with Mumbo with ridiculously rubbishy vehicles for the LOG’s choice portion. You have another sumo competition with Pikelet, where the changed ring size for each round is made redundant by the fact that you can use the same old simple solutions you used for every Jinjo Push or Sumo challenge in the main game. There’s also a paint can fetch-and-delivery-quest with Bottles which totally doesn’t feel like something you’ve done a million times before…

Completing each of these challenges doesn’t unlock extra jiggies or TT trophies for your game’s totals; instead a large jigsaw puzzle is displayed on the wall of the Test O’ Track which will gradually fill up as you complete the challenges to a Jiggy standard. Completing a LOG’s choice challenge adds a black and white piece to the puzzle, and completing the Player’s choice challenges will colour the pieces in. You’ll earn a couple of neat prizes for completing the challenges to jiggy and TT standard, although the latter is bound to test you, especially for the player’s choice challenges. For these challenges, time is of the essence and even if you’ve beaten the game and collected all vehicle parts it’s going to be stressful putting together a fast enough, efficient enough vehicle for the job, much tougher than the regular challenges in the game. For this reason, the DLC doesn’t really cater too well to the average player looking for something to spark their interest in the game again – rather, for the seasoned veterans who have already collected everything and need something else to really test themselves.

It’s a shame, really, because arguably the best part of it all – and probably worth the full 400 points on its own – comes after you’ve finished all six challenges, LOG’s and Player’s choice, to a jiggy standard or higher. Klungo is back with eight new platforming levels for you to try, most of which are much more difficult than his last batch partially due to the inclusion of some new game mechanics. Despite the utter simplicity of the game, there’s some real ingenuity to some of the levels with some clever design bound to make you smile. You’ll probably pull some hair out on your way to the end after several dozen deaths, but if you do have the patience to finish it all you’ll likely find it’s very much worth your while.

That statement could probably be applied to LOG’s Lost Challenges as a whole, too. If you’re patient enough to deal with some frustrating challenges, patient enough to go through a couple designs to see what works and patient enough to play some of the same challenges you played before in order to get to some goods (and some more frustration courtesy Klungo) then you’ll likely find that 400 points is well worth it. However, it’s still disappointing to see such a small number of challenges on show, made even more apparent by some already-stale challenge types, which isn’t too motivating. If you’ve already beaten the game and are looking for some more to keep you satisfied, then LOG’s Lost Challenges might just be worth checking out, otherwise it probably isn’t worth the frustration.

3/5

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