

Part of that is because the plug-and-drive vehicles respond logically. First stabs may wobble and flounder, but basics like weight distribution are quickly absorbed and implemented. As long as there's an engine, fuel and a seat, and wheels, wings or floaters, you can take to land, air and sea without much thought. Not that you encounter serious ones, because you really can stick things together and go. Your mistakes - like fitting propellers to thin air, or forgetting to put on a seat - are highlighted and easily remembered in future, and there's an instant-access test-track to iron out the kinks. It can seem overwhelming at first, and you can't always find a great camera angle with the right stick, but the system of rotating and positioning car, boat, plane and helicopter parts in three dimensions is easy to grasp - certainly compared to LittleBigPlanet's Create mode, or Guitar Hero World Tour's Recording Studio, to use a couple of recent examples of content suites. If Banjo-Kazooie has a star though (with the possible exception of Chester Cheatah rip-off Trophy Thomas), it's the Duplo simplicity of Mumbo's workshop, which you visit to build vehicles.
