Tin Foil Hat: Timeline of Rumors for a new Banjo-Kazooie Game

 

WILL THERE BE A NEW BANJO-KAZOOIE GAME THIS DECADE? OR IS THIS A MASSIVE BANJO-COPIE?

 

2013 "leak" featuring the game Banjo-Kazooie: Gruntyland, first reported in 2012 by Banjo-Comet.

2017

In October 2017, the Xbox Live API leaked revealing several titles in the works such as MechWarrior, Perfect Dark, and Battletoads. Klobrille, the one who had initially reported on it found a file called Banjo/20A potentially alluding to something Banjo-Kazooie related but he isn't confident.

2018

We saw the anniversary of Banjo-Kazooie, where nothing actually occurred except cosmetics for Sea of Thieves and merchandise.

2019

Vergeben reports that Banjo and Kazooie are going to be in Super Smash Bros Ultimate. A listing on Amazon Germany featured a Banjo-Kazooie game coming to the Nintendo Switch and removed four days later. Days after Vergeben's leak Banjo and Kazooie are announced for Super Smash Bros Ultimate. Playtonic Games tells gamers they are not working on a Banjo-Kazooie game as rumored.

2020

Craig Duncan tells Games Industry.biz that they have not abandoned their legacy IP and are willing to work with other companies that can do the games justice, which they have for Battletoads and Perfect Dark. This leads people to falsely assume that DoubleFine is working on a new Banjo-Kazooie, which they have denied multiple times. Phil Spencer tells Kotaku, that Banjo-Kazooie development is up to Rare. Banjo-Kazooie is accidentally added to the Wii U virtual console release schedule and promptly removed by Nintendo.

2021

Nintendo releases a trailer for Banjo-Kazooie coming to the Nintendo Switch Online service in October. Overall it was a very quiet year.

2022

Dimitris Giannakis, a developer for Nightdrive Studios tells the Nate the Hate podcast that there are rumors of a Banjo-Kazooie game in development, hearing it from multiple people and it will soon be announced.

2023

Nate the Hate tells ResetEra that a Banjo-Kazooie game was greenlit in early 2022, and is in active development. Another prominent Xbox influencer, TimDog, said that this was false. Phil Spencer confirms that he knows Banjo-Kazooie fans want a new game, "Banjo fans, I hear you."

In June, the Banjo-Kazooie trademark was assigned from Rare to Microsoft, giving them 100% control of the franchise.

In August, the website, BanjoKazooie.com updated but is still inactive.

2024

 Nate the Hate tells ResetEra that the new Banjo-Kazooie game is being reworked from its original vision and scope for the better.

 

Image from a cancelled Banjo-Kazooie project found in David Rose's old portfolio.