Playtonic Games’ ode to the 3D platformers of the ‘90s is coming to modern consoles. Yooka-Laylee is getting a remastered version called Yooka-Re-playee for Xbox Series X/S, PlayStation 5 and “Nintendo platforms,” according to the press release. It’s possible the plural use of platform refers to the current-gen Nintendo Switch and Nintendo’s next console.
Yooka-Laylee is a spiritual successor of sorts to 3D platformers like Banjo-Kazooie and Spyro the Dragon. In fact, some of the people who worked on the original Banjo-Kazooie and Donkey Kong Country helped bring Yooka-Laylee to life.
Playtonic funded the development of its launch title’s with a successful Kickstarter campaign in 2015 that raised more than £2 million. The game came out two years later for consoles, PC and Mac. Then in 2017, Playtonic Games released a sequel called Yooka-Laylee and the Impossible Lair.
The remastered version comes with updated graphics, new enemies to pounce on and revised controls and camera views. The original score penned by Banjo-Kazooie’s Grant Kirkhope and Donkey Kong Country’s David Wise is also getting an update from a full orchestra.
Yooka-Laylee plays like an updated Banjo-Kazooie in a new, colorful, open world to explore. The titular duo are a chameleon and a bat fighting a ruthless CEO named Capital B who attempts to steal all the books in the world with a giant vacuum. Yooka and Laylee head to a world called Hivory Towers to stop Capital B from finding the “Pagies” of the One Book that can rewrite the universe.
