Playtonic Studios has finally broken silence and revealed more information regarding their much anticipated 3d platformer, Yooka-Laylee. As many of us may remember, Yooka-Laylee was revealed to us last year by way of a kickstarter campaign and is being hailed as spiritual successor of sorts to the Banjo Kazooie franchise.

The campaign created waves in the gaming community from those that would have liked to rid themselves of the bad taste that Banjo Kazooie Nuts & Bolts left in their mouths, and rightfully so. The gameplay footage that was released contained all the promise of the elements we grew to know and love from the N64 days with a modern facelift to today’s graphics and functionalities.  To add to the hype, the developers—Playtonic Studios—are comprised of a small team of some ex Rare employees along with a few new talents. Suffice it to say, the campaign had no problem in reaching their goal.

It’s been about a year since then and for the most part, Playtonic Studios has remained relatively silent on the game’s development with only a few details being released periodically, until now. In a blog post released on the Yooka-Laylee game page, Playtonic studios gave us insight into the storyline, new characters,  gameplay features and how collectibles will be incorporated into their up and coming 3d platformer.

Along with releasing some seriously stunning photos showcasing the game’s aesthetics, we learned that the main baddie in this tale is corporate creep, Capital B—a honey bee hell bent on absorbing all of the world’s literature and converting it into pure profit for his baneful business. The chameleon-bat buddy duo will work together to explore Hivory Towers and save the day from corporate greed. New supporting characters have also been revealed including the likes of the multi-limbed scientist, Dr. Puzz and her traitorous former colleague Dr. Quack.

One of Playtonic’s main objectives in creating Yooka-Laylee was the reintroduction of collectibles to achieve a purpose, rather than collectibles simply for collecting’s sake. Yooka-Laylee will introduce a roster of shiny collectibles with gameplay progression at their core along with the inclusion of more valuable materials. The main collectible in Yooka-Laylee revolves around collecting magical Pagies which unlock and expand the Grand Tomes that are being held captive in Hivory Towers and which our heroes will need to seek out in order to save the day. Butterfly energy will refill health and a brand new power meter is being designed to encourage fun and challenging gameplay.

Playtonic also released details concerning the most heavily anticipated event since the announcement of Yooka-Laylee’s development– Toybox experience. The experience will be available in July exclusively for Kickstarter supporters and will be a spoiler-free sandbox experience that will allow players to get a taste for the platforming in the final game. The Toybox experience promises several moves to try, shiny collectibles to seek out, and custom built props to play with.

As far as a release date is concerned, Playtonic Studios is aiming to stick to their original projected date – October 2016 – but has also made it well known that they will only release when they feel the game has been polished and complete. Yooka-Laylee will be coming to PS4, XBoxOne, WiiU and PC.

A lot is riding on the shoulders of development team behind Yooka-Laylee and admittedly, all of the material we’ve seen to date appears to be pretty promising. Playtonic has gone on to say that we will hear much more regarding the game’s development in the coming weeks and the game will also be on display at this year’s E3.