Stop N Swop

History

Stop 'N' Swop was a feature in Banjo Kazooie that was never fully implemented. In Banjo Kazooie for the Nintendo 64 there are 2 colored eggs. The credits of the game claimed that these, and an Ice Key (which was actually inaccessible in the game) would be put to use in it's sequel, Banjo Tooie. Two hackers known as Ice Mario and SubDrag hacked into the game and discovered a Stop 'N' Swop menu, which displayed 6 eggs and the Ice Key. When Banjo Tooie was released, there was no way of transferring the eggs or key from the original to the sequel. Rare implemented a way of gaining the 2 eggs & key within the game, by destroying in-game Banjo Kazooie cartridges. The Eggs were given to Heggy the Hen to hatch, and the ice key unlocked a secret ice vault.

The original intention was for the player to switch from Banjo-Kazooie to Banjo-Tooie without turning off the N64. The original versions of the N64's hardware allowed temporary storage for transfer via rambus memory with a window of 10 seconds for players to swap carts. In 1999, Nintendo revised the N64's hardware that reduced that window to 1 second, rendering the swap impossible. Without a safe way to swap games and copy the memory, Rare was forced to scrap the idea.

Xbox 360

With the release of Banjo Kazooie on Xbox Live Arcade and Banjo Kazooie: Nuts & Bolts as a retail Xbox 360 game brought new opportunities for Stop 'N' Swop. In Nuts & Bolts is an outline of the ice key ontop of the gym, and pictures of the two eggs in Showdown Town. Upon collecting them in the XBLA release, crates will appear at those positions. When collected they provide the player with unique parts for their vehicles.

When Banjo Tooie is released on XBLA all six eggs will have a use. They will unlock bonus content both bonus original content and new content specifically for the Xbox 360. The eggs contained in the original Banjo Tooie will still be included, but will Gold, Silver and Bronze.

References to Stop 'N' Swop

There are references to Stop 'N' Swop in other Rare games:

• In Grabbed by the Ghoulies the mathematical equation [Egg] + [Egg] + [Egg] + [Egg] + [Egg] + [Egg] + [Key] = ? appears on a blackboard.
• After completing Banjo Pilot an item becomes available to purchase for 99 Cheato Pages (an extremely large amount of the games currency) called "STOP 'N' SWOP" which results in Cheato saying "So you want to know about Stop N Swop, eh? I hope you're ready. Here goes...Why don't you stop annoying me and swap this game for a nice book or something?"
• In Banjo Kazooie Nuts & Bolts it is possible to buy the "Stop 'N' Swop Truth" for 6000 Notes (an extremely large amount of the games currency). This results in Bottles telling you "I could tell you, but then I'd have to kill you, and we couldn't show that in a game with this rating. Put it out of your mind and think happy thoughts! Thanks for the notes!"