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Grunty's Furnace Fun from Banjo-Kazooie

One of many of my favorite things about Banjo-Kazooie and Banjo-Tooie is how many different sorts of styles they went for when thinking about the progression of the games. Different levels need different powers to progress, or certain levels involve more creative thinking when the duo split in Banjo-Tooie. The two games combined, there are so many different ways to tackle the adventure ahead of you to the point that the games never feel boring. One of my all time minigames is in the original Banjo-Kazooie though there are a lot in Banjo-Tooie that I love as well. I'm talking of course of Grunty's Furnace Fun.

To me, this is the way to do it. Have the adventurer get through every level and collect everything you can along the way and learn whatever you can as you go. Then at the end of it all, before the final showdown with Gruntilda herself, they quiz you on what you just did. You go through Grunty's Furnace Fun either replaying minigames that appeared in levels that you played prior, or they ask you questions pertaining to certain events that happened on your adventure. At first, it seems like it'd take a while to get through everything, but with such a variety of different tiles on the board, it's actually really fun to try and do everything so that you can collect everything that is available on the board. Of course, you could also just beat the challenge then run across the whole board afterwards. What fun is that though. You've already experienced 100% of what the game has to offer up to this point, you may as well experience the rest in its entirety.

My next point should really be no surprise if you'd been reading my thoughts on Banjo-Kazooie thus far, but one again, the music that plays along with this part of the game just adds more enjoyment on top of what it is already accomplishing. It fits the sort of chaotic yet fun theme that it has going for it, and really truly adds to the experience of going through it. The first time I ever played through the game this part was a little tough but once you do it over and over, you pretty much know what to expect which sort of lets you enjoy it a little more and sort of put yourself to the test of what you know about the game.

I would also like to add that I think it's neat that they have this where it's at because it's simultaneously right after you progressed through each level and right before you take on the final fight and finish the game. It just adds a nice addition to the already excellent pacing of the game as a whole, never making it feel like one thing is a chore. It all blends together nicely.