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It seems like only yesterday that Mr Wiseguy released his Recompiled PC port of Banjo-Kazooie, bringing a bunch of additional features, including high-frame-rate support, widescreen and ultra-wide-screen options, and limited mod support. But it already appears that we're getting another native PC port based on the N64 classic.
This time, however, it is the turn of the Harbour Masters, the team responsible for native PC ports of Mario 64, Mario Kart 64, The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time, and Majora's Mask, to take a swing at things, with the group announcing an exciting new decompilation project called Lighthouse last Saturday (June 15th). This will be released sometime in July and will include some of the same features as the recompiled port, such as enhanced framerates and widescreen support, but will also go beyond what was available, offering additions like a standalone randomiser (letting you shuffle abilities and items) and online co-op.
In case you're unclear about the difference between recompilation and decompilation, recompilation is the process of taking a game's binaries and using a program, such as N64Recomp, to quickly translate a game's code to run on another piece of hardware. Decompilation, meanwhile, is the process of manually reverse-engineering compiled software into human-readable code, which can then be studied or used to create native PC ports.
By comparison, the benefit of PC ports built from decompilations of a game is that they often make a title much easier to mod and alter, as there's typically readable source code to work from, whereas the advantages of recompilation are typically speed and functionality. You can find a more detailed overview of the differences here.
To mark the announcement of Lighthouse, Harbour Masters has released a teaser for the project on YouTube, showing off a bunch of different Banjo Kazooie mods up and running (such as Jiggies of Time, Nostalgia 64, Lair Witch Project, and The Bear Waker from Kurko), stating that "as of right now, theoretically, we have support for any hack made with Banjo's Backpack, as long as it doesn't utilise MIPS code injection." It also offered "a tease" of the online co-op, "in both vanilla and romhack play", and discussed the possibility of support for the cross-game randomiser "Archipelago. However, it stated, "the initial release will not include Archipelago support unless a miracle happens."
"That's right! Harbour Masters is at it again," wrote Harbour Masters in the description of the video. "And this time with Banjo Kazooie! Development is still in progress, but we're close enough and excited enough that we just couldn't wait, but had to share!
"In this video, we showcase the functionality already in the port that just needs fine-tuning. The interpolation already expected of our ports, widescreen functionality, working glitches, etc. In addition, a standalone randomiser that includes full note, Jinjo, Mumbo Token, empty honeycomb and jiggy shuffle, as well as ability shuffle; these can be shuffled across levels, so you can get Jinjos for any level at any time."
"For those curious, the name for this port comes from two places: first, every Harbour needs a Lighthouse, and Banjo Kazooie happens to have one in Treasure Trove Cove. Seemed like a perfect fit! Coming next month!"
As with the Recomp, you'll need to provide an original copy of the game to benefit from these enhancements. We'll try to keep you posted when the port is made available.