‘Banjo-Kazooie’ is coming to Nintendo Switch Online in January

Nintendo has announced the next N64 title to come to the Switch Online library is Banjo-Kazooie.

The platformer, created by Rare and originally released in 1998, will be available to play from January 2022 for all Nintendo Switch Online + Expansion Pack members though an exact date has yet to be announced.

Rare studio head Craig Duncan took to Twitter to say: “Always a pleasure to work with our good friends at Nintendo, I’m a big fan of #NintendoSwitchOnline and it’s really important to preserve classic games for future generations to play.”

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Banjo-Kazooie follows on from this month’s addition of Paper Mario to Nintendo Switch Online, which is available from today (December 10). It’s the first game to be added to the library since the initial wave of games was released on October 25 but fans are annoyed by the apparent drip-feeding of titles.

Following the announcement of Paper Mario, one user in the Nintendo Switch subreddit said: “Since you can’t buy month-to-month they’ve already got your money so enjoy that drip feed.”

“With no announced timeline for drops who knows when the next drip will get here!” added another. “This is why I’m not going to bother until maybe next year since they won’t take games off the service…”

And judging by the replies to Nintendo’s Banjo-Kazooie announcement tweet, fans are still annoyed. “So goddamn sick of this dripfeeding. ‘Ooh, if I pay more than double the base online price, I can wait a month to play a 23 year old game!’” tweeted perfectdark101.

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“Another of my favourite games of all time… Still not going to sub to this monstrosity of a paywall” added Bendos_X.

The announcement of Banjo-Kazooie coming to Nintendo Switch Online does seem to suggest Nintendo will be adding one N64 title a month, with Majora’s Mask and Pokémon Snap still to come.






In other news, the long-rumoured Sonic Frontiers is in fact a real game, and it’s what Sega is calling an “open-zone-inspired” take on the series.

Set on the Starfall Islands, there’s going to be powerful enemies, dense forests, waterfalls, and deserts for the player to explore in the open world. It’s due out at the end of 2022.