The Future of Banjo, in Smash and with Nintendo

There’s a lot of misinfo floating around about Banjo, and Microsoft in general, so I’d like to address those first.

Many seem to believe that Banjo is the datamined “Brave” character found within the game’s code. We don’t believe this to be true, simply because of the extreme likelihood of Erdrick, as discussed in a separate article.

There’s a very popular poll from Inside Games that gets spread around a lot as evidence of what Japan wants in this game, often used to show that Banjo isn’t really relevant anymore, as he barely places in the top 20. The major issue with using this poll in such a way is that the question asked is not “who would you like to see most in Smash”, as the official ballot was, but rather “who do you believe is most likely to appear in Smash”.

Two Rare titles (Blast Corps and Jet Force Gemini) were datamined from a text file listing all the game series that appear in Smash; this is the file that spirits pull from to display the series title in splash screens. While many have pointed to this as proof that Rare is involved in Smash, both of these games are actually still partially owned by Nintendo, not in content but in name; the Japanese titles are still Nintendo property, as proven by the fact that the Japanese release of Rare Replay does not use them. A dev was likely confused regarding the rights to the names and included them in error.

Many claim that Grant Kirkhope, creator of the soundtracks of Banjo-Kazooie, Banjo-Tooie, and Perfect Dark actually owns the rights to these soundtracks, and this belief has been implied even by some news publications. However, he himself has confirmed this not to be true. Sakurai has confirmed in a Famitsu column, though, that he does reach out to original composers regardless of ownership: “After we had picked the songs out, I left it up to the original composers from there. A lot of the back and forth was between the composers and the sound team, but I’d also perform checks here and there to make sure there was nothing that needed fixing. After all, I wanted the songs to suit Smash Bros. while retaining the energy of the original games they were from; in that way, some songs required a bit more direction.” It is unknown whether Kirkhope would have been informed by now of Banjo’s inclusion in Smash, so any evidence involving him is weaker than one would expect. Regardless, though, info involving him has been included in our document; just be aware.

Many seem to use the rumor of “Xbox Live coming to Switch soon” as evidence of a Microsoft character. In actuality, Xbox Live has been on Switch for a while now, in Minecraft; you can sign in free and get achievement support. Xbox Live being supported in more games simply means more Xbox games coming to Switch, which is a separate point.

With those out of the way, let’s get into the real reasons for the bear and bird.

Banjo x Nintendo

Banjo-Kazooie is among the top 10 best-selling Nintendo 64 titles of all time, #6 of non-bundled releases, surpassing even renowned titles like Pokemon Snap, Majora’s Mask, and Mario Party. Banjo and Kazooie were so deeply connected to Nintendo that official advertising for the console itself often featured them. They were even featured in cross-promotional deals between Nintendo and companies like Keebler and General Mills! Bundles for Banjo-Kazooie, Perfect Dark, and Goldeneye were all pushed aggressively during the N64’s life cycle.

Rare items appeared as trophies in Smash Melee, and Banjo was even seen on boxes together alongside Nintendo’s best: Link, Mario, Donkey Kong, and – sometimes – Ken Griffey Jr. While Griffey’s games were quite popular, we think it’s fair to say we won’t be seeing him playable in Smash any time soon.

Trivially (though still relevant), Banjo made an appearance in a Japanese-exclusive entry to the Mario Paint series alongside Link, Fox, Yoshi, and other new-at-the-time heroes Pikachu and Mew, and included an exclusive render of Gruntilda, making it a Mario game with original Banjo content.

The point I’m getting at here is that Banjo was considered as much of a Nintendo icon at the time as any of their greatest, both in Japan and in the west.

Microsoft x Nintendo

As you likely know, the series began to die off after the purchase of Rare by Microsoft, especially after the infamous release of Nuts & Bolts, a vehicle building game that insulted many dedicated fans. This has begun to turn around sharply, however, in recent years, as these same fans see the fire in Microsoft’s eye lately regarding exclusive titles for their upcoming console, hoping that Banjo will soon return to the spotlight. Yooka-Laylee’s Kickstarter and eventual success proved that there is a demand for this type of game, and that people are willing to put their money behind them; Microsoft should be able to see the long-term benefit of pushing Banjo back into the mainstream, especially among an audience they seem to be struggling with.

Phil Spencer, head of Xbox and executive vice president of Gaming at Microsoft, would like to see Banjo appear within Smash Bros, and has stated as such multiple times. He’s confirmed that he met with Nintendo in a meeting at E3, and that they’ve been a great partner. It’s been heavily rumored that Sakurai was involved in this meeting. Spencer spent some time in Japan in early October, less than a month before the fighters’ pass was finalized, “visiting studios and publishers […] to talk about games in development”. He later visited again in late March for “talking about E3 and getting input on future plans”.

Reports in February indicated that more devices would be getting access to Xbox Game Pass, including cell phones and Nintendo Switch, thanks to their Project xCloud streaming service. Brad Sams of Windows Central, a site renowned for its Microsoft insider info, claims it won’t be coming in the near future, but it’s inevitable.

In the Spring 2019 Nindies Showcase, Cuphead appearing on Switch was specifically mentioned as a direct result of working with “our friends at Microsoft”. This may sound minor, but it’s a reflection of the strong relationship between Microsoft and Nintendo developing over the past year or so.

As for modern releases, merchandise is still produced by manufacturers including First4, Stubbins, and Totaku. The most prominent of these deals, a promo box with Lootcrate, was mysteriously pulled after a now-deleted tweet from the company was put out asking fans how they felt about Banjo’s potential inclusion in Smash. The company has yet to comment on the issue, but has been offering refunds due to the change.

Banjo x Smash

Banjo was considered an obvious inclusion back in the days of Melee, and was seemingly excluded mainly due to rights issues: “Incidentally, including a character from Rare in Smash would be difficult for various reasons. I know there are some people who think that Banjo & Kazooie are an obvious inclusion, but that’s unlikely for a variety of legal and financial reasons.”

A very specific glitch existed in Version 2.0.0 of Smash Ultimate involving Mii Swordfighter and the Duck Hunt Duo, in which the Mii Swordfighter uses a Gale Stab against the Duck Hunt Duo’s gunman, crashing the game (thanks to FlamingOranges’ post on Reddit for a detailed report on this). There were also many reports of these two characters, along with Piranha Plant, destroying save data when used in single player modes. These reports all add up to these characters being very bugged upon release of 2.0.0, potentially due to DLC. Piranha Plant, of course, is DLC in itself, but the other two could be bases for future DLC; some characters have used existing ones as bases to save development time (Ike was used for Cloud, Zero Suit Samus was used for Bayonetta, etc). Our belief is that Erdrick – Chrono/Sora if you’d prefer – is the cause of Mii Swordfighter’s problems, and Banjo of the Duck Hunt Duo’s.

A journalist known commonly only as “someone who Phil Spencer follows on Twitter” (and whose identity we’ve chosen to keep unlisted for his sake), leaked that Steve would not be appearing in Smash, and that he’s heard Banjo’s name mentioned. He later clarified that this isn’t concrete, but the fact remains that he seems decently confident in his sources.

Grant Kirkhope is the composer of the soundtracks of Banjo-Kazooie, Banjo-Tooie, and Perfect Dark, and has been more than happy to make them as easily available as possible, even making them free to download online.

As of recent Kirkhope has been less than vocal on their inclusion compared to last year, a time at which he was quite outspoken about the character’s potential. His comments are now far more vague, and his only major Banjo-related production has been a metal cover of the Final Battle.

Other Microsoft Characters

Cuphead, Master Chief and Steve have all been deconfirmed to varying degrees by high-up employees.

Cuphead’s co-creator, Jared Moldenhauer, spoke in detail of his desire to see his creation in Smash, generally considered a sign that this is not already the case. Unrelated to our argument, though interestingly, he claimed he would most want to see a 2v2 battle between Cuphead, Mugman, and the Ice Climbers.

Frank O’Connor, director of the Halo franchise at 343 Industries, has been known to tease fans asking him about Master Chief’s potential inclusion. One would think he would ease back a bit if it was going to happen. The official Halo Twitter account has tweeted April 2 in favor of Master Chief in Smash, again implying that this is not the case, as it means there are no NDAs.

Aubrey Norris, senior manager and head of community for Minecraft, seems to be… shall we say, far from the biggest fan of the potential for Steve in Smash. She’s apparently also been keeping up with the community, uh, “civil debate” between Banjo and Steve fans. She later clarified that these are purely her opinions, and declined to comment about any potential Smash inclusion, but her thoughts on the topic are fairly clear.

Summary

Banjo was, for a time, considered as much an icon of Nintendo as anyone in the original Smash 64 roster, to the point where Sakurai saw him as “an obvious inclusion” for Melee despite not having the rights to him, and Xbox has more reason than ever to bring him back with the recent success of indie collectathon releases like Yooka-Laylee and A Hat in Time. Xbox seems very interested in working with Nintendo as of recent, and Nintendo has been quite open with fans about this budding relationship. Phil Spencer has specifically and openly stated his desire to see Banjo in Smash, and he’s been visiting Japan more than usual lately, confirmed to have met with Nintendo at E3 and presumably also meeting with them in October and March to talk about in-development games and plan for E3 2019. A relatively major marketing scandal occured recently when Lootcrate pulled Banjo from their crates after a tweet they made about Banjo in Smash went viral and was swiftly deleted. Bugs and datamines within Smash have shown evidence of a quadruped-bird tag team likely existing as DLC, as well as Rare Replay titles already existing in code. Multiple prominent journalists with known connections have openly confirmed that Banjo is likely, though they’ve had to do so anonymously. The composer for Banjo-Kazooie has gone nearly silent on the topic recently, though he’s still tried his best to implicitly show some love for his character through cover songs and vague tweets of joy. Any other prominent Microsoft characters have been soft-deconfirmed by Microsoft executives and character rights owners. With all this stacked up, it seems rather obvious to us who the E3 reveal is most likely to be.

Credits

Creator of list used as base: Pistolium
Creator: Grapevine (@Grapevin_e)
Co-creator: iSpiN (@iSpiNbro)
Editor: MintPepsi (@MintPepsi1)
Editor: Supiror (@supirorguy)