VideoGamer.com: The game is almost done now, and there's been a lot of coverage of the game in the press. Will there still be a few surprises for us come launch day?
EM: Oh yeah. There are two entire game worlds that nobody has seen yet - we might be revealing those at Tokyo. The thing is, it's such a massive game that what we've shown so far is barely a quarter of the actual experience. It's an immense game, which makes it quite hard to develop, but it also means there's loads to see and do. So yes, we've barely touched on it.
NH: There are lots of components we've not shown off yet. And there are over 100 challenges - we've only ever shown off a handful of them.
VideoGamer.com: So far, this generation, we've seen the return of the Perfect Dark franchise, and now Banjo. Is there any chance we'll be seeing others...
EM: Like Killer Instinct? (laughs)
VideoGamer: Well, anything really!
EM: There's always the possibility for franchises to come back, but as far as we're aware... nothing at the moment. Never say never!
NH: There's always the option. Obviously we've done Banjo, but we've taken it in a new direction. I think as a company it would be very easy for us to just churn out sequels to our old IP.
EM: It's not like we just say, "Let's do another Perfect Dark." There has to be a reason: the right team, the right resources, the right concept.
VideoGamer.com: It's been 10 years since the original Banjo Kazooie, and the industry's whole treatment of mascots and icons has somewhat changed. Do you think Banjo and Kazooie themselves have changed?
NH: Someone who never played the old games might think of them differently, but Nuts & Bolts is still very much a Banjo Kazooie game at its heart. Certainly the humour and the characters themselves are always the same as they always were. It was very important for us to keep it the same.
VideoGamer.com: Where you ever worried about taking the series away from its roots?
EM: You're always going to have concerns when you're trying out something new. As a developer, all you can do is do the best you can and hope that people embrace it. [Creative director] Gregg Mayles, who worked on the first two games, is at the helm. He knows Banjo very well, obviously, so it was his vision to push the game in this direction. We just have to see if people embrace it. Hopefully you've seen for yourself it's a pretty exciting game - we hope people will buy into it. Then it's up to us to see what we'll do with the next one, whether we push it a bit further or perhaps go back to platforming. Who knows?
VideoGamer.com: Thanks for your time.
Banjo-Kazooie: Nuts & Bolts is due out exclusively for Xbox 360 in November. Check the site later for our hands-on preview.
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