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Spoiler warning!
This article contains plot spoilers for Yooka-Laylee and/or Yooka-Laylee and the Impossible Lair.
Yooka-Laylee New Logo
Developer: Playtonic Games
Publisher: Team17
Rating: 10+ ESRB for Comic Mischief and Cartoon Violence
Engine: Unity Engine
Release date: Tuesday, April 11, 2017
(Non-Nintendo Switch ports)

Monday, December 14, 2017
(Nintendo Switch)
August 2018
(Physical Nintendo Switch)
Genre: 3D Platformer
Action-adventure
Collect-a-thon
Modes: Single-player
Local co-op
Local multi-player
Platforms: Microsoft Windows
Mac OS X
Linux
PlayStation 4
Xbox One
Nintendo Switch
Media: Digital download
Physical Release

Yooka-Laylee (formerly codenamed Project Ukulele) is a 3D platformer and action-adventure video game developed by Playtonic Games, comprised mostly of former Rare, Ltd. alumni. The game is the spiritual successor to the Banjo-Kazooie series.[1] The game was released on Tuesday, April 11, 2017 with releases on PC, Xbox One, and PlayStation 4, and was published by Team17.[2] The Nintendo Switch version released on Thursday, December 14, 2017.

Story[]

Hivory Towers is an evil corporation run by the money-and-control-loving Capital B and his scientist assistant, Dr. Quack, who used to run a company known as Quack Corporation before its buy-out by Hivory Towers. After learning of a book known as the One Book that has the power to rewrite the universe, Capital B has Quack build a machine known as the Novelizer 64 (to suck up all the books in the world).

Meanwhile, Yooka and Laylee are enjoying the day in Shipwreck Creek renovating their Shipwreck home when Laylee's book (found inthe shipwreck), apparently the One Book targeted by Capital B, is sucked away into the nearby device. Its golden Pagies escape, and Laylee, deciding to sell it for a large sum of money, gets Yooka to help her after it. They explore Hivory Towers, collecting Pagies to restore to the book. With the help ofTrowzer, a snake salesman who teaches them moves, and Dr. Puzz, an ex-Hivory Towers scientist who transforms the duo, Yooka and Laylee eventually reach the elevator leading to Capital B's office.

Capital B allows them in granted they collect 100 Pagies total. When inside, he reveals it was a trap to refill the Book. Laylee says he will have to take the Pagies from them, and a battle ensues. After Yooka and Laylee win, they begin to question the Capital and Quack. But just then, their friend Blasto the cannon comes for medical aid and accidentally fires at the evil Hivory Towers leaders, knocking them into a nearby book as it locks them inside.

Yooka and Laylee proceed to invite everyone from their grand adventure for a party at Shipwreck Creek, and Laylee says the book "Is going straight in the safe when I get home. It'll only appreciate in value!"

But when the party begins, Dr. Puzz declares Blasto the hero of Shipwreck Creek and holds the party in his honor, much to Laylee's dismay.

It's also revealed after the battle that Capital B is part of a giant corporation of evil business-people known as V.I.L.E..

Gameplay[]

At EGX Rezzed 2015, Playtonic revealed that the game will be a "huge celebration of 3D platforming games leveraging their experience". There will be sequences within the game where the player collects collectibles, with the main ones being pages called "Pagies". There will be several combos and moves to master alongside "beautifully themed" worlds to not only explore but to expand by collecting Pagies as well.[3]

Characters[]

Characters

Laylee (top) and Yooka (bottom)

After the first teaser was released, many fans speculated what the silhouettes of the animals were. At EGX Rezzed 2015, the (possibly) two main characters were hidden in a bush in the first hub world screenshot and could only be seen in the version shown at the event, as Playtonic Games tweeted an identical screenshot, but excluding the characters. It was further evidenced that it was them, as Playtonic tweeted the following: "And for everyone asking why we didn't introduce our new heroes today - we did. Didn't you see them?"[4] According to a Q&A on Playtonic's website, the characters would have a formal reveal sometime in May.[5] On April 30, Playtonic fully revealed the main characters alongside with their names.

Development[]

Mingy Jongo[]

  • In September of 2012, a Twitter account by the name of Mingy Jongo appeared and got the word out that a crew of ex Rareware members (including Grant Kirkhope & Steven Hurst) got together for a Banjo-Tooie Successor. They showed interest in Unity and Kickstarter. Sometime after the announcement of the spiritual successor, the Twitter page went silent.
  • In April of 2014, Grant Kirkhope on a Reddit post would confirm that the Mingy Jongo project was cancelled. He stated: "The other guys actually had a secret meeting in a pub near Rare and we even got as far as having a character drawn up and a demo level type thing but it all fell to bits... everyone's got other jobs etc."[6]
  • On August 12th, 2014, Playtonic Games was incorporated, unknown to the public.
  • Later that year in December, the Mingy Jongo twitter page posted a series of tweets. The three one worded tweets they posted were "Ctrl"[7], "ALT"[8], and "Del",[9] later followed by a tweet in January 2015, "Installing update 0x1D597." Being in hexadecimal form, fans were able to translate 0x1D597 to 120215 which can also be translated to UK date format, reading February 12th, 2015.[10]
  • On February 9th, Mingy Jongo would post its last tweet before the change, reading, "Bzzt. Update Complete. Standby for reboot. Reveal mode engage......."

Playtonic Games Reveal[]

Game teaser image1

Teaser of Playtonic's future mascots: Yooka and Laylee.

  • On February 10th, 2015, Mingy Jongo turned into the newly formed company Playtonic Games, which announced a "spiritual successor" to Banjo-Kazooie under the name Project Ukulele. Along with the announcement, they released a teaser image picturing the two unknown protagonists hiding in a bush.[11]
FacebookTeaser

Teaser posted on Facebook on March 11, 2015.

  • On March 11th, Playtonic Games posted a teaser picture of a palm tree on their Facebook with the caption "Soon... #Rezzed" referring to the reveal of their game at the upcoming EGX Rezzed event.[13]
  • On March 14th, a few details about the game were revealed at EGX Rezzed, showcasing screenshots of possible hub worlds and announced a Kickstarter to come in May for fans to support the game.[14]
  • On April 10th, Playtonic Games announced on their Twitter that the Kickstarter would go live on May 1st, 2015.[15]
  • On April 16, 2015, Playtonic tweeted the following: "Who could be hiding in there? Only 14 days left until you meet the buddy-duo heroes of #ProjectUkulele" with the first teaser image, referring to the launch of the Kickstarter on May 1st, 2015 which will reveal the characters.[16]
  • On April 30, 2015, Playtonic Games announced the game will be titled Yooka-Laylee, along with revealing the main characters.[17]

Kickstarter[]

  • On May 1st, 2015, the game's official Kickstarter was launched. It passed and surpassed it's goal in less than 30 minutes.
  • On May 11th, 2015, the first major supporting character, Trowzer, was revealed.[18]
  • On May 29th, 2015, the Ghost Writers were revealed.[19]
  • On June 16th, 2015, the Kickstarter was ended and the project successfully raised £2,090,104 with 73,206 backers.[20]

Post-Kickstarter/Pre-E3 Update[]

Raising the Curtain[]

Yooka-Laylee 'Goes Gold'![]

  • On January 30th, 2017, Playtonic Games announced that Yooka-Laylee has 'Gone Gold', and Kickstarter Backers could change their platforms.[43]
  • On Saturday, April 1st, 2017, at 3:00 PM 0:00 GMT, Playtonic Games presented the final version of Yooka-Laylee at EGX Rezzed 2017 at the Tobacco Dock in Wapping, London where Playtonic Games showcased worlds, characters, transformations, collectibles, abilities, sounds, music, minigames, etc.[44]

Post-Release[]

  • Yooka-Laylee was released on Tuesday, April 11, 2017 for $39.99 USD. A day one patch was released, fixing some of the major bugs that reviewers criticized the game for and removing JonTron's voice due to controversy prior to the game's release.
    Spit N' Polish

    Yes we cam

  • On June 27th, 2017, Playtonic Games released the Spit 'N' Polish Update for Steam users that gives the following features: ability to skip dialogue faster, bypass cutscenes, reduce gibberish voices, camera updates, pause menu music, and additional design polish.[45]
  • On September 25th, 2017, Playtonic Games released an update claiming that they switched to a new version of Unity 3D 5.6 to fix a bug, but doing this created additional problems. On the same day, composer Grant Kirkhope on Twitter stated that there were currently no plans for the orchestral version for Yooka-Laylee.[46] Two days later on September 27th, 2017, communications director of Playtonic, Andy Robinson, stated that it was on their to-do list, and no progress has started due to the Switch issues.
  • On November 2nd, 2017, the TIGA Games Industry Awards 2017 awarded Playtonic Games with the "Game by a Small Studio" award for Yooka-Laylee, while also being nominated in the "Action and Adventure Game" category![47]
  • On November 28th, 2017, Playtonic Games announced that Yooka-Laylee would be released on the Nintendo Switch on December 14th, 2017 and released a new trailer.[48][49]
  • On December 14th, 2017, Yooka-Laylee was released for the Nintendo Switch.[50]
  • At E3 2018, Playtonic Games announced that they had partnered up with Limited Run Games to produce a limited edition physical release of Yooka-Laylee for the Nintendo Switch for an August release.
  • On September 7th, 2018, a Yooka-Laylee Collector's Edition was made available for pre-order at limitedrungames.com, including a physical copy of Yooka-Laylee for the Nintendo Switch, a retro-style box, the official soundtrack on CD, a poster and a non-functioning Nintendo 64-inspired cartridge was also included.
    • Backers of the Kickstarter who donated the 64-Bit Edition (£340) tier received a special coupon code that changed the non-functioning Nintendo 64-inspired cartridge into a special colored version of the product.[51]
  • On April 1st, 2019, Playtonic Games released their first DLC for Yooka-Laylee, the 64-bit Tonic, for the Nintendo Switch and Steam editions of the game.

Guest Voice Actors[]

There are a number of guest voice roles in Yooka-Laylee. During the Kickstarter campaign, backers could select a reward tier which involved performing a role for the game. Below is a list of the voices provided in the final game by non-Playtonic Games employees.

Gallery[]

Artwork[]

Screenshots[]

References[]

  1. http://www.wired.co.uk/news/archive/2015-04/13/playtonic-announces-project-ukelele-kickstarter
  2. http://www.mcvuk.com/news/read/team17-will-publish-yooka-laylee-and-eyes-retail-release/0153431
  3. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8ulJeGQ0Krk
  4. https://twitter.com/PlaytonicGames/status/576783922647965696
  5. http://playtonicgames.com/news.html
  6. https://www.reddit.com/r/IAmA/comments/23h2s1/i_am_grant_kirkhope_composer_of_banjo_and_dk_64/cgwxvwl/
  7. https://twitter.com/PlaytonicGames/status/546667528966385665
  8. https://twitter.com/PlaytonicGames/status/547739248854831105
  9. https://twitter.com/PlaytonicGames/status/550360447975952384
  10. https://twitter.com/PlaytonicGames/status/559079487883968513
  11. http://www.ibtimes.co.uk/rare-veterans-playtonic-games-reveal-banjo-kazooie-spiritual-successor-1487513
  12. http://www.hardcoregamer.com/2015/02/16/playtonic-games-announce-musical-composers-for-project-ukelele/135124/
  13. https://www.facebook.com/playtonicgames/photos/a.1537659646501576.1073741830.1498721160395425/1550444471889760/?type=1&theater
  14. http://www.gameinformer.com/b/news/archive/2015/03/14/former-rare-developers-39-playtonic-games-show-more-of-project-ukelele-kickstarter-coming-soon.aspx
  15. https://twitter.com/PlaytonicGames/status/586531374938648577
  16. https://twitter.com/PlaytonicGames/status/588618002389553152
  17. https://twitter.com/PlaytonicGames/status/593815612801024001
  18. http://www.playtonicgames.com/learn-from-the-bessst/
  19. https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/playtonic/yooka-laylee-a-3d-platformer-rare-vival/posts/1244297
  20. https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/playtonic/yooka-laylee-a-3d-platformer-rare-vival/posts/1266484
  21. https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/playtonic/yooka-laylee-a-3d-platformer-rare-vival/posts/1309158
  22. https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/playtonic/yooka-laylee-a-3d-platformer-rare-vival/posts/1326179
  23. https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/playtonic/yooka-laylee-a-3d-platformer-rare-vival/posts/1373021
  24. https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/playtonic/yooka-laylee-a-3d-platformer-rare-vival/posts/1412178
  25. https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/playtonic/yooka-laylee-a-3d-platformer-rare-vival/posts/1463534
  26. http://www.playtonicgames.com/mein-kart-ist-ihre-kart/
  27. http://www.playtonicgames.com/more-veterans-join-playtonic/
  28. https://twitter.com/PlaytonicGames/status/720187361829777408
  29. https://twitter.com/PlaytonicGames/status/731192071973945344
  30. https://twitter.com/PlaytonicGames/status/732250238686265344
  31. https://twitter.com/PlaytonicGames/status/732614934962540544
  32. https://twitter.com/QuackCorp/status/732614642518917120
  33. https://twitter.com/PlaytonicGames/status/732983409698557952
  34. https://twitter.com/QuackCorp/status/732983643120009216
  35. https://twitter.com/PlaytonicGames/status/733345481506578432
  36. https://twitter.com/QuackCorp/status/733345919400353792
  37. https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/playtonic/yooka-laylee-a-3d-platformer-rare-vival/posts/1581743
  38. http://www.playtonicgames.com/yooka-laylee-edge-magazine/
  39. http://www.playtonicgames.com/yooka-laylee-trailer-release-update/
  40. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7piOjxp13-U
  41. http://www.playtonicgames.com/yooka-laylee-reptile-rolls-towards-release/
  42. http://www.playtonicgames.com/new-year-new-us/
  43. http://www.playtonicgames.com/going-gold/
  44. https://www.egx.net/rezzed/news/playtonic-to-present-final-version-of-yooka-laylee-at-egx-rezzed
  45. https://www.playtonicgames.com/major-update-live-steam-sale/
  46. https://twitter.com/grantkirkhope/status/912396878423175173
  47. https://twitter.com/PlaytonicGames/status/926212736014536704
  48. https://www.playtonicgames.com/yooka-laylee-leaps-onto-nintendo-switch-dec-14/
  49. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q37UB09gf6U
  50. https://youtu.be/astCPHs7d_c
  51. https://twitter.com/LimitedRunGames/status/1037373675295498240
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