Remember Yooka-Laylee? It’s Time To Yooka-Replaylee!

One of the most popular crowdfunding campaigns of the last decade occurred when veterans of Rare’s golden years united to form a new studio called Playtonic, and asked for cash to fund a spiritual successor to Banjo-Kazooie called Yooka-Laylee. Response was massive and they took in millions. The game was released cross-platform in 2017…but to mixed reviews.

I thought the game was fine. But the people who hated it were a lot louder than I was (that’s usually how it goes). Playtonic seems to have taken that into account with their follow-ups. Yooka-Laylee And The Impossible Lair was released in 2019, and mimicked Donkey Kong Country instead of B-K — to a much more positive reception. I have to admit it IS a better game, though I still don’t think Yooka-Laylee was terrible.

But the naysayers have driven Playtonic’s next move: a “fixed” version of the original, something they’re calling Yooka-Replaylee. It won’t just boast slightly improved graphics and camera controls, but a host of new features and gameplay elements meant to elevate things into respectability:

• MORE BEAUTIFUL THAN EVER – With an art and animations overhaul and enhanced performance and resolution, the favorite buddy duo has never looked or moved better.
• NEW AND IMPROVED CHALLENGES – Improvements to existing in-game challenges and many entirely new challenges to discover and undertake!
• NEW COLLECTIBLE CURRENCY – Capital B’s inept minions have dropped their hard-earned coins all over the place. Collect the official currency of the Hivory Towers to spend on video games’ most beloved sentient vending machine.
• NAVIGATING THE WORLD – Now you can get lost in the game, not in the world! A brand-new world map and challenges tracker helps you know where you are and what needs to be done. Hooray!
• VENDI HAS PLENTY TO OFFER – Tonics are back with all new flavors! With the option to equip multiple game-changing enhancements, you can truly customise your playstyle. And as if that wasn’t enough, Vendi has new lines of merchandise for the modern fashionable adventurer.
• REVISED CONTROLS & CAMERA – A new tweaked move set allows you to combine moves more fluidly while the new camera controls makes framing the action a breeze.
• A DREAMY ORCHESTRAL SOUNDTRACK – The original score from famed video game composers Grant Kirkhope (Banjo-Kazooie) and David Wise (Donkey Kong Country) returns but as a beautifully arranged orchestral score. Now seriously, clean out those ears.

Playtonic hasn’t revealed when we could start playing Yooka-Replaylee, but it’s being developed for an unspecified number of consoles and the PC. The Steam page is up now.