Grant Kirkhope did a lot of the voice work for the original games. For example, he voices Mumbo, the Jinjos, the Gruntlings, the Pots in Mad Monster Mansion, King Jingaling, Jamjars, and Mingy Jongo.
Chris Sutherland provides the "voices" for both Banjo and Kazooie. Since the bear and bird frequently talk to one another throughout their adventure, you're hearing Sutherland talking to Sutherland.
Colbert Bump: A very late one was caused by Masahiro Sakurai in September of 2019. When he said in "Mr. Sakurai Presents Banjo & Kazooie" (the presentation showcasing the bear and bird a few hours before their release in Super Smash Bros. Ultimate) that the original games can be played on Xbox ONE, he subsequently caused "Xbox" to trend in the Japanese parts of Twitter.
Chris Seavor (more known as the voice of Conker) provides the voice for Gruntilda the Witch in all of her appearances, and does a disturbingly convincing job at it.
Since Kazooie is a girl, Chris Sutherland voicing her also counts as an example.
Creator Steven Mayles has stated on his Twitter that Tooty is his least favorite character in the series, presumably due to her utter lack of personality, hence why she didn't return in the sequels save for joke cameos, though she does make two appearances in Super Smash Bros. Ultimate, running around in the background of Spiral Mountain and getting a spirit (complete with brand new artwork!).
"She's officially the least favourite BK character. Didn't even make the sequel. Go on, name me a more unpopular BK character."
Lead designer Gregg Mayles has said that Brentilda is his least favorite character as well, though this is due to him regretting how poorly the execution of the idea behind her (her randomly giving you answers to questions that would help you in the Grunty's Furnace Fun quiz) turned out, hence why she was dropped from the sequels as well.
"Brentilda is my least favourite Banjo-Kazooie character and her role around providing 'facts' on her sister to enable you to win Furnace Fun is certainly one of the worst pieces of design I have ever created. The idea was OK, but I think I could have done a much better job of implementing it."
In the Rusty Bucket Bay level, there is a picture of the original pink-furred brunette version of Berri from the aborted Twelve Tales: Conker 64 (who did appear as a Damsel in Distress in Conker's Pocket Tales). This Easter Egg only appears in the original N64 version; it's a picture of Conker in the XBLA version.
Captain Blackeye was the villain of the original "Project Dream," a game about a boy trying to rescue his girlfriend from pirates. The game was eventually completely overhauled into the game that became Banjo-Kazooie (also called "Dream" early in development). This has not stopped Blackeye from showing up in the series anyway. Portraits of Blackeye appeared in Banjo-Kazooie in several parts of the game (most notably Mad Monster Mansion), though he was otherwise absent. He appeared in person in Banjo-Tooie as a sea-sick captain in the bar at Jolly Roger's Lagoon, raving about how he had a dream in which he had his own game, but a bear that looks like Banjo stole his glory.
Grant Kirkhope salvaged some of his work from "Project Dream" when making the music for Banjo-Kazooie, as seen here.
In Banjo's house, the picture of Banjo in a forest is commonly assumed to show Fungus Forest, but it's actually a screenshot of Kazoo, an elusive prototype that bridges the gap between the Project Dream development period when Banjo was the protagonist, and the final game.
In the Mad Monster Mansion section of Banjoland in Nuts & Bolts there are gravestones that the player can interact with, as well as some wooden gravestones. These wooden gravestones have pictures of scrapped Gruntbot enemies on them, referencing how they were cut from the final game.
Dueling Games: The first 2 games with the original Spyro the Dragon trilogy. Both series started out as collectathon-style 3D Platform Games in the mold of Super Mario 64 starring cartoon animals traversing fairytale-inspired worlds. Though both series were critically acclaimed, Spyro the Dragon sold better in large part due to it releasing on the more popular Playstation hardware.
Changes to the N64 cartridge hardware caused the full functionality of the legendary Stop 'N' Swop feature to be scrapped. While the secret items are still in the game and, as was discovered by fans many years later, the mechanism itself was even implemented into the game's code, it's not possible to actually do anything with them since the aforementioned hardware changes made unlocking the items and using them in other games via quick cartridge swapping all but impossible.
Files for Tooie's random honeycomb item exist in Kazooie's coding.
An underwater theme for the Engine Room on the Rusty Bucket exists in the game's files but is impossible to hear in-game otherwise, implying the bottom may have originally been intended to be filled with water. Similarly, the files also include an underwater theme for Freezeezy Peak, where the only water is cold enough to damage you on contact and is programmed to be impossible to dive in.
The first game was also going to feature more levels, but they didn't make it due to time constraints. One of those, Mount Fire Eyes, was reused as the fire side of Hailfire Peaks in Tooie, and Fungus Forest, another of those unused levels, made it into Donkey Kong 64 as Fungi Forest.
A number of musical tracks were cut from the game; some hailing from the game's Dream phase, while others were composed for Banjo-Kazooie itself. Several of them would be repurposed for Tooie and Donkey Kong 64.
Follow the Leader: The first game was basically a riff on the Super Mario 64 formula — albeit a pretty frickin' good one. Nuts & Bolts took a sly dig at this.
Mid-Development Genre Shift: The first game went through several of them: it was originally conceived as Dream, a 2D Super Nintendo RPG with human characters rather than a 3D Funny Animal platformer. Dream was later revised as a 3D top-down game on the Nintendo 64, redesigned again into a 2.5D platformer, then finally into a collectathon a la Super Mario 64, by which time it had changed names several times.
Steve Burke replaces Lee Ray as Bottles and Grant Kirkhope as Mumbo Jumbo, King Jingaling and Jamjars in Nuts & Bolts. He also voices Fat Banjo at the start of the game but Chris Sutherland reprises Banjo when he's restored to his usual weight.
Serendipity Writes the Plot: The original game and Tooie were supposed to have actual voice acting, but the developers didn't want to risk it due to the N64's limited cartridge space. The now-iconic Banjospeak was implemented as a way to still give the characters some level of personality.
Teasing Creator: Rareware used to be notorious for skirting around fan questions about the original plans for Stop 'N' Swop and Project Dream.
Un-Canceled: "Stop 'N' Swop" was added between Nuts & Bolts and the XBLA release of the original game. Unsurprisingly, this was massively nerfed to unlocking minor cosmetic parts in N&B. It was also implemented into the XBLA release of Tooie, in which the feature is used as it was previously intended: having both games on your hard drive unlocks the ability to collect those items in Kazooie, which you can then use in Tooie for rewards. Numerous jokes are made about how long this took (such as Banjo mentioning he's been carrying the eggs for the last ten years, or Banjo hoping it isn't a cruel joke this time around).
Stop 'N' Swop. While the rumour had a basis in a real plan of the developers, the lack of implementation lead to wildly varying rumours as to what you could do to access the stubs left behind, amplified by all the teases left around through the years after. It didn't help that the credits shamelessly teased you with the eggs and key. Or that they left in unnecessarily long codes for the sandcastle to actually be able to get them (and about three others they didn't show).
To a lesser extent, the locked door at the top of Grunty's Lair (The one in the room seen in the Game Over screen), and the two remaining Jiggies after every puzzle in the game is filled in. Many a rumor linking the two together and to Stop 'N' Swop has popped up, a popular one being that there used to be a puzzle meant to be filled in with the last two Jiggies, which would open the aforementioned door and lead to a room where you could perform the Stop 'N' Swop.
Gobi's mention of "the lava world" is a reference to Mount Fire Eyes, a world that never got developed beyond the early planning stages for the game. This didn't stop players from speculating that there was a secret lava world that could somehow be accessed through the room with the lava pit (an assumption based on the Portal Endpoint Resemblance for all the other worlds).
Working Title: In addition to Project Dream, the game went through the titles of Kazoo and Banjo Kazoo (with no hyphen) before the final name was decided on.
The ship Rusty Bucket also lists "Twycross, England" as its home port.
Unlike other sub-areas in other levels, Ticker's Tower in Mumbo's Mountain uses a completely different melody, rather than a rearrangement of the main level's theme. This is because the music for Mumbo's Mountain was drastically changed in development, while Ticker's Tower retained the same theme.
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