When dealing with a well-renowned series such as the Banjo Kazooie series, taking that step off in a different direction brings the kind of furrowed brows and dark mumbling familiar to all games forums. Remember when we all realised that our favourite bear and bird combination were going to be in a vehicular-based adventure rather than an on-foot one? Remember the fierce reaction? Yeah. As someone who spent far too many hours wandering around Freezeasy Peak about a decade ago, I’ll admit that at first I was loaded onto the scepticism wagon too.

Time waits for no man, though, as much as a brand-spanking-new Banjo platformer would have been welcomed, the new direction that Rare have taken with Nuts and Bolts makes sense. It might take a few hours of plugging away on the initial Jiggy challenges and exploration, but after a bumpy beginning things begin to slot into place. It’s not, unfortunately, a classic and there are issues which grab the game’s feet and tug it down from what potentially could have been a higher score, but while it lasts it remains mostly enjoyable and is packed full of that quirky Rare charm people of a certain age seem to love.

That charm is evident from the very moment the intro kicks in, with a rather obese Banjo and Kazooie lying in a paddling pool munching pizza. Gruntilda, the series’ rhyming bad guy, tumbles out of where she was last imprisoned at the end of Banjo Tooie (has it been eight years already?) with the slight issue of merely being a head, at which point a strange cloaked monitor appears, proclaims himself the Lord of Games and proceeds to set the two factions against each other in a number of events. Problem is, with one side being a bonce and the other being grossly overweight it’s evident that not much fun is going to go down, so he transports them all off to his own video game world where they will have to play by his rules.

More than just a typically bumbling Banjo intro, this also gives Rare the chance to wipe the slate clean. Gone are Kazooie’s abilities, meaning that Banjo is going to need some mechanical help if he wants to collect enough Jiggys to face off against Gruntilda in an ultimate showdown of doom (possibly) for ownership of Spiral Mountain. Thus, the main axel on which the game continually spins – the vehicle creation – is introduced, and it is pleasingly easy to pick up and play with from the get-go.

The general idea of the whole caboodle is that, throughout your adventure, you pick up certain bits and bobs from crates or through being given them for reaching a certain level of collection, and these parts can then be chucked together in a Lego-esque creation mode hosted by good ol’ Mumbo. The really impressive thing with it is that practically anything goes, and once you get enough parts to create land, air and sea-based vehicles you can tinker around to your heart’s content in an attempt to build the ideal machine for the challenges you are given.

Putting the vehicle customisation to one side a jiffy, it should also be pointed out that the way Nuts and Bolts progresses is actually pretty much similar to Banjo titles previous in that you complete challenges to collect jigsaw pieces, with the number of pieces you have opening up any doors in the main hub world – Showdown Town - that require less than that amount to unlock. You can thus carry on collecting more jigsaw pieces to open more doors, which will then allow you to obtain more jigsaw pieces to open… I’m sure you get the idea. Yes, even you, Jay.

That’s not the limit of familiarity in Nuts and Bolts too, although in the case of the returning notes and jinjos these recurring collectables now have a different objective. The musical notes now act as a currency of sorts and allow you to buy new vehicle parts from Humba Wumba (er, yeah) or bribe the local fat police pig (hurrrr!) to look the other way whilst you are rescuing one of the hub world’s Jinjos from their little prisons. The in-level Jinjos now give you a simple task to complete in order to win a Jinjo Bingo token that can be used in Showdown Town to obtain even more vehicular parts. With a more tangible reason to collect both other than merely to be a completionist, the random collectathon is made all the more bearable (pun possibly intended).

In fact, the vast majority of Nuts and Bolts will be instantly familiar to players who have spent some time with the two platform games. Splashed with all kinds of bright and brash colours and accompanied by a hum-along soundtrack, it’s an enjoyable world to float, drive and fly across and explore. As mentioned above, characters such as Mumbo and Humba Wumba make a return appearance alongside plenty of other favourites and each still have their curious grunty way of talking. Fans of Banjo’s famed guh-huh need not fear; the chunking fatso is still jam-packed full of ‘em.

Yet, amongst all this familiarity is this vehicle creation thing, and this is where the game both charms and frustrates in equal measure. The game makes decent use of the Havok engine and thus is largely physics-based, so stacking loads of engines and parts on the rear of your car will end up with it dragging along in a dragstar wheelie, and whilst loading loads of fun guns on your boat might seem like a brilliant idea at the time, seeing it then sink to the bottom will wipe the smile from your face.

The positive part of all this is that it opens up the jigsaw challenges (well, those that you are allowed to select a custom vehicle for, anyway) to your own interpretation. Take for example one of the earlier tasks, which is to collect an egg, cook it in a nearby volcano’s lava and then return it to the hungry owner. Whilst building a truck with a massive engine to get you there in double-quick time (in order to get the TT trophy which adds to gain you more jigsaw pieces) may seem cool enough, the hilly nature of the path toward the volcano might make a helicopter with an undertray an even more astute plan… if you reckon you can pilot it through the narrow entrance. Choices, choices.

Those choices, and the copious opportunities to exercise them, are a very welcome dollop of variety, making Nuts and Bolts the kind of game that no one person will experience in exactly the same manner. Whilst the main hub of Showdown Town only allows the basic trolley that you can periodically update to allow you to reach new areas, the range of parts and blueprints on offer (should you choose to use them) mean you can pretty much make anything you want. At this level, Rare have excelled

Alas, there are a couple of annoyances that come bumbling along pretty quickly too. The first is that the game often relies on sections of mundane fetch-and-carry missions, such as having to go to a vending machine for each world to collect your obtained jigsaw pieces and then being forced to cart them across town to the bank they are collected in. Yeah, sure, Rare may take jabs at themselves about the whole collection routine at many opportunities, but that doesn’t necessarily mean that they had to feel they could get away with chucking it in there anyway.

The second annoyance is that the game’s difficulty level jumps around drastically, which I suppose could in a way be attributed to the game allowing you to build your way out of potentially tricky situations one moment and then forcing you to use a stock vehicle the next. On top of this, the vehicles themselves are subject to rather odd, floaty handling and seem inclined to get stuck on every single piece of jutting scenery that you drive within a gnat’s wiener of, thus resulting in many a pained scream and thrown controller.

The single player side of things can therefore take some time, both through having a whole load of challenges to complete in a number of different worlds (one of which is a fantastic pastiche on the inner workings of an Xbox 360, loaded with reliability quips to boot) or be it due to the game occasionally throwing somewhat of a brick wall in your face all of a sudden. When you do polish it off, though – and you will want to no matter how annoying it gets at times – there is a multiplayer offering too, allowing you to take your own created wagons online to race and battle against others. Seeing someone try to win a race using a giant spring-loaded pogo stick is one of those moments where you realise that yes, you still love gaming.

That feeling is one that you get often whilst playing Nuts and Bolts, which is pleasing to report after I played and disliked the sample demo a few weeks ago. It isn’t perfect and it most certainly is not a platform game, but you have to admire that Rare have not only made the stand and gone off in a different direction, but that the direction they chose is vast in scope. That they have managed to make it all work reasonably well should give the chaps all the encouragement they need to take the idea a little further and to file away the rough edges, but for now I am more than happy to welcome ol’ yellow shorts and his annoying beaked chum back into my life once more.