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One of the more welcome pieces of news for retro gamers in 2026 was the announcement that Rare and Blaze are bringing Banjo-Kazooie and Banjo-Tooie to the Evercade family of systems on a single cart, which launches in October.
We're already aware that this double pack goes way beyond being your typical emulated offering, but Blaze CEO Andrew Byatt has revealed to FRVR (thanks, VGC) the lengths that both his company and Rare have gone to in order to ensure this release is really special.
“Some of these guys that worked on this project are so enthusiastic and passionate about it," he says. "They’re doing every little touch. Putting our consoles in the game and all that kinda stuff which is kinda cool.”
Byatt explains that many of the companies Blaze works with on Evercade releases are quite hands-off when it comes to the process:
“Sometimes the licensors, in this case, [are] really involved and wanna see the best possible product and they’re really pushing and testing themselves. Sometimes they just wanna literally sign a contract and get some cash and move on because they’ve got other priorities. Sometimes they don’t really get involved. This is one of those where they really put in a lot of energy into it behind the scenes to kind of help and approve and make sure things are perfect.”
Byatt also explains that having access to the original source code for both titles was a massive boon:
"We got source for these. We can do a lot with backwards engineering of the original… it’s quite rare that source is available, really, but we’ve done it without source before and you’re sort of engineering this stuff from assembly, basically, and converting it. That’s another 12 months on top, really, or 9 months on top, but if you’ve got source it makes a massive difference.”
Blaze has taken this approach with other titles – including Glover and Duke Nukem 1 and 2 – and Byatt is keen to stress that more projects are on the way that will take a similar route to market. "We’ve got some other stuff in the pipeline that is more porting kinda related."
The first game is already available as a pre-loaded title on the Rare Super Pocket handheld, which is compatible with Evercade cartridges.
Blaze is also releasing a new Evercade variant this year in the form of the Nexus, which has a larger display, dual analogue sticks and the ability to share games with other Evercade owners.