Banjo-Kazooie Successor Yooka-Laylee Gets New Screenshots and Details

With its successful Kickstarter campaign wrapping up last June, things have been quiet on the Yooka-Laylee front for almost a year. Developer Playtonic Games is now finally ready to show off more of its Banjo-Kazooie spiritual successor, beginning today with some new images and details.

In a post on its website, Playtonic offered new information regarding the Toybox and collectibles. The Toybox is a self-contained demo of sorts that it says won't spoil the full game. Instead, it's meant to give Kickstarter backers "a taste of the platforming to come in the final game." It features "plenty [of] moves to try, custom-built props to play with, secrets to discover and yes, shiny collectibles to hunt out."

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The scope of the Toybox was originally much smaller; it was previously going to be a "web-based, single-room play thing." Playtonic says it's become "a much more significant chunk of playable content." This is the reason it hasn't yet been released, although a date is now in sight--backers who pledged enough money (the $32 tier and up) will get their hands on it in July.

Playtonic has still not announced a specific release date for the full game, but it says it's "getting close." It also says it's hoping to hit the release window promised previously--October 2016--but notes that "as fans of some of our past work will attest, we're a group committed to releasing games only when they're polished, complete, and at the quality level you expect. As soon as we're confident we've ticked all of those boxes, we'll inform our backers directly of when to mark their calendars."

Playtonic also explained how Quills (one of the game's many collectible items) can be cashed in to unlock a variety of new moves in any order.

"[T]he buddy-duo will purchase and unlock moves from the serpent salesman Trowzer, which they can choose to do in virtually any order that the player decides," the developer said. "This is just one way which Yooka-Laylee empowers player choice, in addition to the ability to expand and make larger the worlds you've already explored, and the unique Tonic gameplay modifiers which can be used to customise your play style."

Playtonic went on to say that we'll learn much more about the game in the coming weeks. Yooka-Laylee will also be on display at E3.

Yooka-Laylee is more than a little inspired by Rare's Banjo-Kazooie series. A number of former Rare staffers work at Playtonic, helping to make a pitch for the game on Kickstarter last year that attracted over $3.2 million. Versions of the game are headed to PS4, Xbox One, Wii U, and PC.